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“Come in,” I said, stepping aside and looking up and down the hallway to make sure that no one was watching her come into my room.
I shut the door and she stumbled over to the bed and fell facedown on it.
“You gonna be okay over there?” I asked, not sure what to do. Echo flipped onto her back and sniffed.
“I'm fine.”
I’d never seen her cry before, and I wasn’t sure what to do about it. This was new territory.
As I tried to figure out what to say to her, there was another knock. Room service.
I let the guy in and gave him a tip. He seemed tired and did not give a fuck that Echo was in my room. I mean, really, he had no idea what the situation was.
“Do you want something to eat?” I asked, pushing the tray over to the bed.
Echo sat up and wiped her eyes with her hands.
“What did you get?”
“Fries and a grilled cheese sandwich and cake and chips and guac.” She raised her eyebrows as I listed everything off.
“I was hungry,” I said, and handed her a cloth napkin.
“Do you have any ketchup?” she said, reaching for a few fries. I handed her the bottle and she banged on the bottom to get it out on one side of the plate.
The grilled cheese sandwich was cut in two diagonally and I picked up one half.
“Do you want half my grilled cheese?” I held it out to her and for the first time since she came in, she smiled a little.
“Yeah, thanks.” She took it from me and dunked that in the ketchup, much to my horror.
“What are you doing?”
“Eating my grilled cheese. You should try it.” She chomped down on the sandwich and I grimaced. No way. Ketchup did not belong with grilled cheese.
Echo and I ate, and she grabbed the remote and put the TV on. She flipped through until she found an old show that I had seen a million times before. It was one of my comfort shows that I watched when I needed something that made me feel good. Guess it was one of Echo’s comfort shows too.
We ate and watched and I kept stealing glances at her to see how she was doing. She’d stopped crying, but she didn't seem to want to talk, so I let her be silent. It didn’t matter as much if she got caught here now. I guess I’d stopped caring so much. Besides, we weren’t doing anything bad right now. Just sitting and eating and doing nothing.
“What was your score?” she asked. Dom and I had gotten our sheets back, along with comments from the judges. I was going to use them to build next year’s routines.
I told her. She shook her head and smiled.
“You bitch, you beat us.”
“We did?” I hadn’t even been thinking about it. Somehow, in the midst of everything, I’d forgotten about my own vendetta. Guess I wasn’t very good at vendettas.
“Yeah, you did.”
Laughing, I jumped up on the bed.
“Fuck yeah, in your face, Echo! Now who’s gloating?” I jumped up and down and laughed while she watched me, her eyes narrowed, but she started laughing when I did a ridiculous dance that involved a lot of hip action.
“What are you even doing right now?” she asked.
“My victory dance. I knew it, we won, you lost, we won.” I posed dramatically.
“You’re fucking ridiculous.”
