“Don’t worry,” I assure her, groaning internally. “This is so juicy you’ll be able to drink it.”
Izzy’s, Conwick’s own independent coffee shop, is one of those artisanal rustic kiosks, with warm wood walls, chalkboard menus, and amber-tinted vintage filament bulbs hanging along the front edge of the awning. It’s centrally located, positioned at the northeast side of the main quad right next to the student center as if it’s an extension of the building itself, but it has plenty of outdoor seating so customers can enjoy their drinks outside, come rain or shine—or even snow, for those willing to brave the New England winters, and who are too stubborn to get their order to go when space within the center is limited. Whichis almost always. Izzy’s makes the best coffee around and is popular with not only the students but with faculty, too. I swear I’ve even seen the odd local sneaking onto campus to partake of its greatness.
Not wanting to contend with the near constant crowds, Ronnie, Andie, and I usually skip Izzy’s when the cold weather hits, and just opt for one of the inferior chains in town so we can sit inside and keep warm while we discuss that week’s latest gossip—or rather, while Ronnie and Andie discuss said gossip and I listen to their prattle intently, pretending to be interested in people I don’t know. The coffee is never as good as Izzy’s, but nothing on earth is good enough to warrant freezing to death or losing a finger to frostbite. At this time of year, though, we’re all too happy to soak up the fresh air, which means I get to enjoy Izzy’s caramel macchiato for a while longer before succumbing to the local Newport variation.
Ronnie is already waiting for me at one of the tables when I arrive—even as a blur, I’d recognize her anywhere, her mane of vibrant copper hair like a beacon that guides me to her through the crowd. She bolts up from her chair at my approach and gasps like someone auditioning for a telenovela.
Rushing over to me, she presses my glasses into my hand, and I quickly push them onto my nose, sighing when the world around me slides into sharp focus. I blink a few times, then glance at Ronnie, who gapes at me with shocked doe eyes.
“Did you trip on your skank heels on the way over here? You are a hot mess minus the hot,” she says, her upper lip curling. “Here, take my sunglasses before somebody sees you.”
She pries a pair of designer shades off the top of her head—the tortoiseshell frames are so obnoxiously huge Audrey Hepburn would be impressed by their size—and shoves them onto my face before I can protest, pushing them right in front of my glasses. I’m sure I look absolutely ridiculous wearing both,but I’m so grateful for the relief from the scorching sunlight that I decide to leave them in place.
“You know,” she says offhandedly, giving my shoulder a light, sympathetic pat, “it’s a good thing we aren’t around any elementary schools. I’d be sincerely worried you might frighten the children.”
I scowl at her, but she just brushes me off with a flick of her hand, gesturing for me to go sit down before prancing over to the counter to order.
My thoughts are a tidal wave of nausea, pain, and regret as I collapse at the first table that crosses my path. My vision is glassy as I wait, and I stare blankly ahead, seeing but not truly processing my surroundings. I’m so out of it I could be sleeping with my eyes open. Either that or fucking Damian Navarro again has shaken me far more than I thought.
The tinkling sound of Ronnie laughing is like a defibrillator to my heart, and I glance at where she stands at the outdoor counter, looking as glamorous as always despite her comment on the phone about being bare-faced in public. If anything, she looks like she just walked off a movie set for a romcom, confidently donning a flowy knee-length skirt, heeled sandals, and a pink bralette as she talks up the cute barista. He grins at her over the register, dimples for days in each cheek, and when she giggles at something he says—tossing her perfect curtain of hair over her shoulder—little cartoon hearts seem to explode from his eyeballs.
“I’ll have a vanilla latte with a sprinkle of cinnamon,” I hear her say with a flirty wink at Dimple Boy. She then glances over at me, a worried frown tugging down the corners of her mouth. “For that one, a caramel macchiato withseveralextra shots of espresso. The largest size humanly possible. Do you do buckets? Make it a bucket if you have one.”
Ronnie plops down in the metal chair opposite me a few minutes later, our drinks secured in a recyclable tray in one hand, and the barista’s number scribbled across a brown napkin clutched like a trophy in the other.
“Sorry.” She offers me a gentle smile, slipping my coffee free of the cardboard holder. “They don’t sell it by the bucket. The largest I could get was a venti.”
I make grabby hands at her. “I don’t care. Gimme.”
She slides the cup over with an appraising tilt of her head, and I lift it to my lips, moaning like a porn star faking the world’s biggest orgasm as the warm, soothing liquid coats my tongue. As I swallow, an unsettling thought crosses my mind.
Did I moan like that last night for Damian?
Nope. We’re going to nip that in the bud right now, thank you very much.
Desperate to put off the topic of my terrible life choices for as long as humanly possible—or as long as Ronnie will allow me to—I jerk my chin toward the napkin still clamped in her hand. “I see the barista gave you his number. Does this mean you’re officially over Jay?”
An air of hostility overtakes Ronnie’s serene summer glow, and she shoots daggers out of her eyes at me, their russet depths borderline homicidal. “I thought we agreed toneverspeak of that lying sack of shit again.” When I lift a brow, she leans back in her chair and crosses her arms. “AsifI would still have feelings for Jay…assuming that’s even his real name.” She scoffs. “No. Nope. I am setting my sights on greener pastures. Moreavailablepastures.”
“Like Dimple Boy over there?” I quip.
Ronnie bobs her head. “Exactly.”
Yeah, I believe that about as much as I believe Damian will ever stop being an entitled prick. The only way Ronnie is datingagain anytime soon is if Timothée Chalamet and his chiseled jawline ask her out.
“I see.” I nod slowly, then shoot my free hand out across the table with far more speed than I would expect myself capable of in my hungover state, successfully grabbing her phone before she can intercept me. “Then you won’t mind if I check to see if you really deleted his number?”
“Hey!” She scrambles to retrieve the device, but fails, reluctantly falling back into her seat. She gives me an affronted look when I turn the screen toward her face to unlock it.
As I scroll through her contacts, I think back to freshman year when Ronnie all but dragged me and Andie to her home in Santa Cruz, California, where we then met Jay, who was also staying in the area for spring break. At the time, Andie and I had both felt so certain he wasthe onefor Ronnie. And it wasn’t because he was almost disturbingly handsome or English, a lethal combination—not that the latter would have affected her too much seeing as one of her dads is Scottish—but it was thewayhe had looked at my best friend, like he was Icarus and she was the sun, and he would happily let himself get burned just for the chance, however brief, to be near her.
It’s not unusual for people to be attracted to Ronnie, like Barista Boy with his little heart eyes or the model-pretty retail assistant who helped us pick out some clothes when we went shopping earlier this week just before the new semester started. She’s gorgeous, after all, inside and out, with a personality as charming and bold as her looks. But prior to meeting Jay, it seemed like any connection she made only ever scratched the surface, and was always limited to the physical. And it’s for that reason her relationships never last. Ronnie dates for theperson, for the sincerity of their soul, not their gender, and yet, despite always seeing who they are deep down, those same people neverseem to see the real her. They never bother to dig deeper, to try to look past the aesthetically-pleasing exterior.
But with Jay, it was different. From the moment their paths crossed one sunny afternoon on a beach near the Santa Cruz Boardwalk, he looked at her as if he could see past her pretty face to who Ronnie was on the inside. You had to be blind not to notice it, not to perceive how he hung onto each word she said, like he needed every last one to survive. Frankly, itlookedlike love, even though they had only just met.
They spent almost the entire spring break together, and then, at the end of that week, he ghosted her. No goodbye. No nothing. Not even a break-up message over text or voicemail. Although she denied it, I knew my horoscope-loving best friend—who believes in fate, and true love, and was so excited by their astrological compatibility—was completely heartbroken and isstilltorn up about it six months later. She doesn’t hide it well, and her persistent anger at the mere mention of his name only makes her actual feelings more obvious. I think it’s the lack of closure that bothers her most. A feeling I understand too well.
Just as I knew I would, I find Jay’s number in her phone—not because I know it, but because I can’t think of anyone else Ronnie would have listed in her contacts asPRINCE DICKFACEfollowed by seven puking emojis, a Union Jack flag, and a tiny crown.
