Total pages in book: 136
Estimated words: 131789 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 659(@200wpm)___ 527(@250wpm)___ 439(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 131789 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 659(@200wpm)___ 527(@250wpm)___ 439(@300wpm)
“But?”
“I mean…you’ve sort of played with guys, too. In different ways.”
I stare at her, lips tight and jaw clenched. Then, on a long exhale, I flop back to the floor.
“Fine. You’ve got me there.” I frown at her. “But definitely not the same thing.”
“Definitely.” Casey continues to study me. “Only, maybe that’s not the point?”
My phone vibrates again. It’s been doing that every few seconds since I got home, a minute or two between attempts at most. The incessant buzz of RJ’s hapless pleas for me to hear him out.
“I don’t even know what that means. The point is he let me believe he was this genuine, authentic person, no bullshit. Except it turns out the entire basis of our…whatever it was, was formed on a lie.”
“I get what he did was terrible.” Casey’s still trying to find an angle of approach where her balloons of optimism won’t get shot out of the sky by rooftop snipers and anti-bullshit missiles. “I do. Still doesn’t mean everything about him wasn’t true. The person you talked to and hung out with is still the same.”
RJ: Sloane. Let’s just talk. Please.
This time I take a second to text back, if only to stop him from blowing up my phone all evening.
ME: I don’t even know you. There’s nothing else to say.
“That person isn’t real,” I tell my sister, my tone flat. “And so he doesn’t exist.”
I’m still staring at the ceiling hours later in bed, after all the lights are out and Casey’s abandoned her mission of character rehab on RJ’s behalf. I turn the last week over in my head a dozen different ways to find the clues I missed, all the moments where a different choice would have saved me the embarrassment of getting had by the scam artist. Flashes of our kisses, his hands, burst through my thoughts. Intruding. Because thanks to RJ, I can’t even find peace in my own head. He’s invaded that too, refusing to let me sleep and just forget this day. And his face.
On the nightstand my phone lights up. It’s around one in the morning and there’s another text. My eyes are bloodshot and blurry when I try to read it.
RJ: I’m outside.
Exhaustion stutters my brain’s engine and I have to read the text three times before I understand what it says.
ME: That was stupid.
RJ: Probably. But I’m going to start throwing pebbles at your window if you don’t come out here.
Nothing about this approach is endearing. In fact, it feels like more of the same manipulation that got us here. Practically, however, if he wakes up the whole house and my dad has to go storming out on the lawn in his house robe, we’re all in a shit ton of trouble. So I throw on a hoodie and shoes, then climb out my window. I find RJ standing against a tree at the far corner of the house. He peers out of the shadows when he hears my footsteps.
“Thank you,” he says with hesitance in his voice. “I know you don’t want to talk to me.”
“Great. Good chat.”
He rakes a hand through his dark hair, clearly nervous. “But if you’ll just give me a few minutes to explain what was going through my head…”
“I don’t really care.”
Emotionally fatigued as I am, I hate the fact that my first thought is how hot he looks in a black T-shirt and loose jeans with years of memories worn in. His pants are more honest than anything that’s come out of his mouth.
“Please.” Something in his eyes won’t let me turn my back on him. I don’t know if I’d recognize his sincerity, but it’s close. Desperation, maybe.
“Fine,” I mutter. “Make it quick.”
We walk under a full moon down a trail that leads from the back of the house toward the lake. For some time, he doesn’t speak. At a distance we follow the light of our phones to navigate the fallen tree limbs, rocks, and divots. I’m not sure whether he’s gathering his thoughts, or just rehearsing the meticulously crafted load of bullshit he’s spent the last several hours drafting in his dorm with the expert assistance of Fenn and Lawson.
The silence is nice, though. I miss the way the forest whispers late at night. When the insect songs have quieted and there’s only the warm summer breeze that nudges the leaves. The wings of an owl lifting off from a limb. The faint skittering of tiny rodent feet through the grass. It puts me in a trance, and I don’t realize until the silver reflection of the moon on the water catches my eye that we’ve walked all the way to the lake without uttering a word.
There’s an old, rusted paddle boat overturned at the water’s edge, where we sit to stare at the ripples traveling the surface of the water. Another minute or so passes before he senses my restlessness and sucks in a breath to plead for his life.