AllFreeNovel
Share Us
God, he’d forgotten his first impression of Mina—that she was cute but too young for him. Somehow, in looking at her artwork online and thinking of the chronic illness she lived with, youth didn’t matter any longer. Had she been born with HIV? And, if she had, had she ever been able to be young? Did he care?
“I should have stayed around to talk with her,” Levi muttered. He should have done everything about that night differently. Or everything after Mina had told him.
“Like, you were standing on her front lawn and she said, ‘Hey, let’s talk’ and you said no?” Dennis lowered his beer to the table, his mouth open in disbelief. That he didn’t say anything else was proof Brook hadn’t shared Mina’s secret. Not that he’d expected his sister to do something so terrible, but he’d done it, and he wouldn’t have expected it of himself, either.
“You just told me she was too young for me.” Levi waved away another beer. Maybe Mina was too young for him, but he was too old to keep drinking until the world blurred. And these days the world blurred at fewer and fewer drinks.
His oldest friend shrugged. “She looks too young for you. But age would be the least of my concerns if she were inviting me into her house.”
“Yeah?” Levi asked, knowing he’d regret this. “What would top that list?”
“The plumbing just don’t work like you think it should.”
Levi raised his eyebrows at his friend, who looked all-knowing.
“She’s young and maybe has expectations. Remember when you were young and...”
Levi interrupted with the only thing he could think of to stop this conversation dead. “Don’t forget that you’ve been married to my sister for twenty years, and I don’t want to hear about it.”
Dennis took a swig from his beer. “Stuff changes. That’s all.”
“I don’t want to talk about my neighbor or my dick with you. Separately or together.”
“Fine.” Dennis called for another beer. Levi asked for a glass of water. He didn’t need to drink more, but he also didn’t want to leave his friend stranded. Especially not when Dennis was in a good mood.
“When ya’ gonna pay up on the fantasy league?” Levi asked. If Dennis was going to make him uncomfortable with questions about Mina, Levi would return the favor and bug him for money.
CHAPTER NINE
MINA HAD MADE it out of bed enough to get down to the kitchen and take her morning meds before collapsing on the couch in a sprawl. She’d hoped to stay that way, eyes closed and clinging to the cushions all morning, but her head was knocking too much to embrace her hangover and all the pain that went with it. When the knocking was followed by the doorbell, she realized it wasn’t her head.
It was her front door.
She rolled off the couch into a heap, then dragged herself up and opened the door. The bright morning sun had her blinking back a reinvigorated headache and swallowing her nausea. Stupid, she now realized, to have spent all week with an upset stomach and then to have drunk enough wine to invite vomiting just as the side effects of her meds seemed to have settled.
But the damage of both the drinking and the tell was done; there was no escaping the consequences. Mina raised her hands to her brow to block some of the light and stared uncomfortably at Levi, who was standing on her front porch. She swallowed and searched his face for judgment, but all she found was concern.
“Are you—” he hesitated and sniffed “—okay?”
“Yes. I would just really like to be back on my couch right now.” If she were lucky, a big hole would open up under her couch and suck her down to a place where no one was playing drums in her head, and Levi wasn’t standing on her porch while she looked and smelled like something the cat dragged in last week, then buried under the trash can for the dog to dig up.
“Can I come in?”
If she were still drunk, this would be easier. “Why are you here?”
“I wanted to apologize and talk to you.”
“Can you come back?” After she’d showered...and brushed her teeth for a half an hour.
“Are you sure you’re okay?”
“I’m hungover, Levi.” God, he had to be able to smell the stale alcohol on her. She hadn’t brushed her teeth in twenty-four hours. But at least she hadn’t barfed on herself. Small mercies and all that. “I had dinner with Echo. We drank too much. I need a minute before I hear any apology.”
