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“Oh my god,” Olivia said as Adam snorted into his wineglass.
“Which is to say that when he went to kiss poor Jenny,” Brooke went on, “he threw his mouth open and basically unhinged his jaw like a python as he came at her.”
“Oh god,” Dylan moaned, tipping his face into his hand.
“Poor Jenny took one look at him coming for her like that, screamed, and ran right out of the room.”
“I’m not sure she’s ever kissed anyone to this day, she was so scarred,” Dylan said, hanging his head.
“I think you need to demonstrate,” Olivia declared. “I’m really having a hard time picturing it.”
“It was basically something like this…” Dylan opened his mouth and started to come at Brooke, who ducked and shoved him away.
“I called my teacher ‘Mom’ once,” Adam offered genially.
Olivia kissed him on the cheek. “Oh, sweetie, everyone’s done that.”
“Yes, but I did itin front ofmy mom,” Adam said. “She was so upset, she gave me the silent treatment for a week. And my poor teacher got the stink-eye from her for the rest of the school year.”
“What’s your most embarrassing childhood moment?” Dylan asked Olivia.
“I know this one,” Adam volunteered, slipping an arm around Olivia. “She laughed so hard once she peed her pants at school.”
“That’s right.” Olivia gazed up at him adoringly. “I did that.”
“Okay, that’s enough embarrassing stories,” Brooke said before Dylan decided to play another round and start airing out thereallydirty laundry. “I want to hear Adam Bomb wow us with one of his amazing facts.”
Brooke had given Olivia’s boyfriend the nickname Adam Bomb because he was always dropping unbelievable, strange-but-true facts that totally messed with your worldview. Like that there were more fake flamingos in the world than real flamingos—which was totally true, Brooke had looked it up—or that Oxford University was older than the Aztec Empire—which, again, true.
Everyone turned to Adam expectantly, and his brow wrinkled as he thought about it.
“Well, I did see an interesting article recently. Apparently some people have an internal narrative running through their head all the time and others don’t. My thoughts always take the form of sentences in my head, like a one-sided conversation, but I guess a lot of people don’t think in words so much as abstract images and ideas—more like a concept map.”
Olivia nodded. “We were talking about this the other night. My internal monologue won’t ever shut the fuck up, so I can’t even imagine what it’s like not to have one.”
“I’ve always heard voices in my head,” Brooke said with a shrug.
“I don’t,” Dylan offered, and they all turned their heads to stare at him.
“Really?” Brooke said.
“How does that even work?” Olivia asked.
“I don’t know. I never gave it much thought.” Dylan looked around at them in bemusement. “Y’all really have voices talking in your head all the time?” His questioning gaze landed on Brooke.
“Yes,” she said, staring back at him in surprise. “You don’t?” She couldn’t believe she didn’t know that about him. All these years, as close as they’d been, and she never knew his brain worked in a way that was completely different from hers.
He shook his head and brushed his fingers against her temple. “Doesn’t that get exhausting? All that chatter?”
“So exhausting,” Olivia muttered, downing a mouthful of wine.
“What’s it like?” Adam asked Dylan. “What about reading? Do you say the words in your head as you’re reading them?”
“Not really,” Dylan answered, frowning thoughtfully. “I can if I focus on a particular word, but in general I don’t really.”
Adam continued to pepper Dylan with questions, clearly delighted to have found someone who supported the article’s hypothesis. Dylan answered all his questions gamely, and fired back with some of his own as he tried to understand how the other side lived their interior lives.
While the two men were absorbed in their conversation, Olivia took Brooke by the arm and pulled her away. “I need another drink. Come on.”
