I roll to my side and create enough room for her to sit. When she does, I reach for a cookie, but she pulls the plate back. “Spill first.”
“Fine.” I grumble and tell her about how wonderful the night of the work party had been. The pig, the belly dancer, the kiss. Ending with the grand finale. The bet.
“I’m so sorry, Jules,” she says and finally slides the plate over to me.
I’m so hungry I devour two in five seconds.
“Me too.” Not even warm chocolate chip cookies seem to be able to take the edge off my pain.
“But…” she starts, and I turn an angry glare on her. “Hear me out.” She flings her hands up in front of her. “Maybe there was more to it. It sounds like you didn’t give him a chance to tell you his side.”
“Well no, I didn’t feel like letting him drive a semi over my heart repeatedly.”
“But what if he apologizes—”
“No.” I stop her right there. “It was all a scam. At least now I won’t be stupid enough to fall for it again.”
“Wow.” She leansagainst the wall, her dark brown eyes fixated on me like I’m an exhibit in a museum.
“Wow, what?”
“I thought you werescared to fall in love because of your parents’ divorce. I didn’t realize you were turning into your parents.”
Karli’s comment sends a sucker punch right into my stomach. I’m not my parents. I’m not bitter and selfish.Iwas the victim here. Like I always am.
That’s why I put an end to this before things got more complicated, so I didn’t make the same mistakes they did.
“I’m not condoning what Michael did, but you need to hear his side,” Karli says, more gently this time.
“I think it was pretty obvious what he did. He used me.”
“Are you sure about that? You have always hated the way your parents communicated. You said if they would havestopped fighting for a minute and listened, half their problems could have been solved.”
I rub the sore spot in the middle of my forehead. I did say that. Again and again, I’d wished they’d stop arguing their point and listen to the other person for a change.
I didn’t give Michael two minutes to explain.
“I have to come clean,” Karli says, playing with the frayed edges of her ripped jeans.
“Huh?” I shake my head, clearing my thoughts.
“I lied about my psych project.”
I eye her while I reach for another cookie. I stick the entire thing in my mouth; I have a feeling I’m going to need it. “Elaborate.” I demand, feeling nothing when cookie crumbs spill out of my mouth.
She scoots a few inches away. “Ididhave a huge assignment, and Iwasbehind on it, but…”
“But…?”
She looks down. “You weren’t the project.”
I shake my head, my brain slowly processing what she’s telling me. “There was no project?”
She bites her fingernail. Her guilty look if there ever was one. “Well, I wouldn’t say that necessarily. Your happiness was more of a…personal project.”
I don’t know what to say. Should I be a normal amount of mad or livid?
I drop the plate on my pillow and stand. “My happiness belongs to me, Karli!”
