Page 65 of Faking With You

Grayson places a couple glasses of water on the table and kisses the top of Hannah’s head as he tells her he’s going to head out. When my tears stop, I stay with my head in her lap, just staring into the distance. I don’t know how long I stay like that when I hear the front door open and the rest of the girls filter in. The second I see them, I burst into tears again.

A heavily pregnant Olivia takes a seat at the end of the couch by my feet while Zoey and Bailey kneel in front of me. Being surrounded by my friends makes me feel better and worse all at the same time. I feel all of their love, but I also know how each of them have found their person and I had, too, the difference is I don’t get to keep mine.

When my tears die down again and I sit up, Hannah says, “So, ice cream for breakfast?”

I wipe at my eyes. “I’ve already been up for almost twelve hours,” I say.

“And I’m assuming you haven’t eaten anything.”

I nod and hug a pillow to my chest. Hannah returns with two large containers of ice cream and five spoons. We each take a spoon and pass the ice cream tubs around.

“Okay, babe, we’ve given you some time, but we need to know why you turned up at my front door in tears when you’re supposed to be in London with your boyfriend.”

I shake my head. “He’s not my boyfriend.”

“What happened?” Zoey asks.

I chuckle in a self-deprecating way. “He never was. It was fake from the beginning.”

Hannah’s spoon hovers in front of her open mouth, and she stares at me. She doesn’t do anything until a drop of ice cream drips off her spoon and hits the top of her boobs. “Did you just admit to entering into a fake dating situation, like one of our books?”

I nod and shovel a huge bite of ice cream into my mouth.

“Huh, never thought I’d hear that,” Bailey says.

“Wait, those are usually tit-for-tat, so what did you get from it?” Liv asks.

My face immediately heats, and I quickly shove another bite of ice cream into my mouth.

“Oh, this must be good,” Hannah says, leaning forward in the chair she moved to.

“So, um...” I play with my spoon and Zoey, the brat, takes the tub of ice cream from me. I know it’s so I don’t use it as a buffer, but damn it, I need the buffer right now. Plus, I didn’t realize how hungry I was because I quite frankly didn’t want to eat earlier.

“So? What?” Liv pushes.

“So, I may have been a virgin before and now I’m not.” I shrug, and all of them look at me with open mouths.

“How did we not know this?” Hannah asks.

“Because I’ve never been big on discussing my sex life or anything about sex.”

“But you told Mac?” Zoey asks.

“No. No, no, no, no. I didn’t tell him. Really, this is all your fault if you think about it.”

“Mine? What did I do?”

“You made us write stupid manifestations down for New Year's and I did and Mac saw it and then made me this offer, pretend to be his serious girlfriend so his father will give him the promotion to CEO when he retires and he’ll help me achieve my manifestation. Once he got the position, it would all be over.”

They all look at me stunned, but nod in acknowledgement.

“He got the position last night, and I thought we’d end things peacefully when we got back, but then his dad showed up this morning, banging on the door and said he wanted to start everything for the transition and asked when Mac is moving back to London. I don’t know, I spiralled. Him moving back to London made it all real that we were really ending.” I wipe at my tears and look up at the ceiling. “God, why am I such an idiot?”

“You fell in love with him, didn’t you?” Bailey asks.

I nod. “Like an idiot. I knew it was temporary, and I let him burrow himself into my heart anyway. I was at least smartenough to make sure we spent most of our time at his apartment so I don’t have too many memories of him at mine, but there are still some. How am I supposed to go back? Plus, I have so much stuff at his apartment.” I duck my head into the pillow I’m squeezing as hard as possible against my chest.

“When’s he moving?” Liv asks.