Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 87181 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 436(@200wpm)___ 349(@250wpm)___ 291(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87181 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 436(@200wpm)___ 349(@250wpm)___ 291(@300wpm)
“You can’t be serious right now,” I asked, stunned but completely aware that Kai was right. Matthew was not who I’d thought he’d been.
He groaned and pulled out his cell phone. He started scrolling on his phone, then looked at me with a cocked eyebrow. “You’re still here?” he asked.
I stood from the couch, grabbed my coat and purse, and paid for my taxi home.
Sitting on the edge of my emotions, all I could think about at that moment was how desperately I needed a hug from my best friend. Yet sadly enough, I no longer had one of those. Instead, I wrapped my arms around myself and worked hard not to fall apart in the back of a random taxi.
KAI
“Congratulations. Do you want a prize?” Holly asked as she stood in my apartment doorway after I opened it for her. She was in sweatpants, and her hair was tangled up in the messiest bun ever. She looked completely disheveled as she wore her white slippers.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, alert. It had been three days since she’d paused our friendship. There hadn’t been a moment when I hadn’t thought about her over the past few days.
She tossed her hands up in the air. “Don’t act concerned now. You get to boast, okay? You get to rub it in my face that Matthew was just like the rest. He played the long game as you told me to get what he wanted, and then when I wouldn’t give it to him….” She inhaled sharply as her eyes glassed over, and her voice cracked. “When I wouldn’t give it to him, he told me how pathetic I was and kicked me out. It’s been three days, and I just…I was just…I was nothing to him.” Her body trembled. “I’m nothing, okay, Kai? You were right. He didn’t want me, he just wanted sex, and when he realized he couldn’t get that, he kicked me to the curb, and now I’m alone again, so say it. Say I told you so.”
Watching her heart break made my own begin to shatter. “Holly…”
“Just say it,” she ordered, lightly shoving me in the chest. “Tell me what an idiot I am for thinking for a minute that a man would like me for me and stay.”
“You’re not an idiot, Holly.”
“Yes, I am,” she choked out as tears began streaming down her cheeks. “Yes, I am. Because you told me.” She shoved me once more. “You told me he didn’t care. Say it. Say you were right.”
“No.”
“Say it!” she screamed as she was swallowed whole by her emotions. “Say it! Say it!” she shouted, shoving into me. I let her hit me. I let her fall apart. I let her rage against me because another man broke her heart. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair that a heart like hers was breaking.
As she began to swing one more time, I grabbed her forearms and pulled her into my chest. I held her tight against me as she gripped my T-shirt and cried into me. “Why aren’t I worth staying for?” she whispered as her sobs grew more as I held her close.
And my cold, closed-off heart?
It shattered right there with her own.
After holding Holly for a while in the doorway, I pulled her into my apartment and held her on my couch. We didn’t talk any. I just allowed her to fall into me. To break. To shatter. To feel. I held onto her until she fell asleep in my arms. Exhaustion must’ve hit her as her head rested against my shoulder blade. My arm went numb from holding her, but I didn’t care. I’d stay on that couch as long as she needed me to hold her.
After a while, the front door swung open, and Mano walked in. I shot him a stare and silenced him before he began making a lot of noise. He took one look at Holly and then turned his stare to me.
“Is she okay?” he mouthed.
I shook my head.
He frowned and nodded. He then walked into his bedroom and reappeared with a blanket that he covered us with.
“I’m going to go do homework. Let me know if you need anything else,” Mano said before disappearing to his room.
Holly moved a little in my lap before falling back into her slumber.
When she woke, I hoped she’d feel a bit better. Then I’d repeatedly tell her there was nothing wrong with her until she believed me.
“How long have I been asleep?” Holly asked as she awakened on my chest. She rubbed the palms of her hands against her eyes and hurried out of my lap. I missed holding her the second she moved away from me.
“Not too long.”
She glanced toward the window. “It’s dark outside. It wasn’t dark when I came over.”
“It’s a little past nine.”