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CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
SometimeswhenIdrinka lot, I can’t sleep more than a few hours, no matter how tired I am. That’s what’s happening now. It’s only 9 a.m. and even though my body is exhausted from drinking and walking all night and getting back to our room around four in the morning, my mind is wide awake.
It could also have something to do with the fact Troy will be here later today. Last night before we left 3rd Base, Lexy made me write my number on our receipt. It hasn’t changed in the past year, but she figured it was better safe than sorry. I deleted his number at some point, but when his text came through around midnight, I knew it was him. “Hey, Maci from math class.” I nearly spit out my drink laughing, remembering that’s how I entered my name into his phone last year.
I nudge Lexy and she rolls over, trying to ignore me. “Lexyyy,” I whisper. “I can’t sleep! Let’s get up!” When she stays silent, I add in an extra cheery voice, “You have to say yes you know!”
She turns over to face me and rolls her eyes, but it's followed by a laugh as she sits. “Okay, okay, let’s see what we can get into today!”
I tie my hair into a low messy bun and check myself out in the mirror while I wait for Lexy. I’m slipping my sheer black coverup over my head when I hear my name. She’s standing at the door holding two bottles of water that have been replaced with what I’m assuming is mimosa. I love Vegas. You can do whatever you want and be whoever you want when you’re here.
When we swipe our room key and open a door that leads to the roof of the hotel, a rectangle pool surrounded by cabanas lies in front of us. The blue mattresses of the day beds are slightly faded from the sun, with perfectly rolled white towels set on the edges. Off to one side of the pool is a stage where a DJ sets up his equipment. It’s already 80° and perfect in the sunshine, and past the wall, we have a partial view of the Strip. It’s like we are in a movie all over again.
We choose two sun chairs from the row sitting behind the cabanas on the opposite side of the stage so we can hear each other talking once the music starts. I’m laying my towel on my chair when I look and see Lexy already laid back on hers, stripped down to her red bikini. She’s wearing her matching red heart sunglasses over her eyes and scrolling on her phone. I’m not sure why it hits me all of a sudden–maybe it’s the mimosa–but I’m overwhelmed with gratitude for Lexy. When Mack and I broke up, I was a little worried I would lose her too since she was Mack’s friend first, but she’s been here for me ever since I met her.
“Lex,” I get her attention.
“What’s up?” she replies in a distracted tone, not looking over from her phone.
I sit on the edge of my chair, the palms of my hands pressed into the plastic on either side of me. She puts her phone down and looks over when she feels me staring. “Everything okay?”
“Oh yeah, I just…I know mushy isn’t your thing and all, but thank you. I seriously don’t know what I would have done without you these past couple months. You’ve been such a good friend to me since the day we met and an even better one since everything happened with Mack even though you didn’t have to be.”
“How could I not be your friend, Maci? Before you came along, I really only had Mack. As much as I consider him my best friend, he’s still a guy, and it’s not the same as having you around. I’m not sure what happened with his sister, I know you used to be close, and I’m not trying to take away from that. But you’re my best friend, Maci, and I’m really glad that idiot dragged you here.”
I laugh at how she twisted a joke into her words so she didn’t have to get too serious. One of my favorite qualities of Lexy’s is how she keeps the mood from getting too dark, and it keeps me going. She reminds me of Mack in that way. “I want to tell you what happened with Avery. At first it didn’t feel like it was my place to say anything, or my story to tell, but you deserve to know, especially after being such a big help that night. If you want to know, I mean.”
She sits up and faces me, really focused now. Even though Avery and I have gotten past everything that happened, we’ve drifted apart lately. It’s not in a bad way. We both have a lot going on, and it’s harder now that we don’t share a lease, let alone live in the same state. I’m not trying to replace her, but I trust Lexy. She is someone I know I can count on to be there for me no matter what and point me in the right direction when I have no idea what path to go down.
I spend the next few minutes filling her in on what happened both with Avery and then my breakup with Mack. The more I tell her, the more I see her piecing parts of stories together, understanding washing over her. I feel relief from sharing. I haven’t talked about it with anyone other than Mack. It's like a weight has been lifted off my chest, like I’ve let go of both events a little more. Just in time to deal with something else from my past.
“Wow, Maci, I had no idea that’s what was happening. Full disclosure, I knew about the drug problem, but I just assumed you did too. I’m so sorry. He wouldn’t tell me what happened, or I would have said something. He said he wanted to leave it up to you to tell me when you were ready. Which was sweet, but also…Ugh, that makes me so mad at him. Especially since he relapsed. We worked so hard to get him clean.” Frustration laces her voice, and her hand clenches around the edge of her sun chair.
“Please don’t be mad at him. He’s your best friend, and the last thing I want is to come between you two. There’s no sense in ruining your friendship over it, and I’m sure he hasn’t used since. It’s just been hard for me to let it go. I wanted to work through our struggles before it got to that point.”
“I get it, you know I love Mack, but that’s seriously messed up, Maci. Ugh, maybe he was terrified of losing you and freaked out? Not that it justifies it at all, it just seems so out of character, at least for the Mack he’s been the last year.”
“Yeah, I know. I’ve been running it through my head on repeat ever since. But I keep thinking about how it feels out of character for the Mack we know, but he wasn’t always this way, and I don’t know how to trust the person he used to be won’t come back.”
She hesitates for a moment, like she's debating sharing a thought. “Do you still talk to Avery? Did she know about all this?”
“Yeah, we’ve been friends way too long to let anything come between us. It’s been a few weeks since I’ve checked in though. I’m not sure she knows Mack and I broke up, and I doubt she knows about the drugs. She would have told me if she did. Either way, I don’t want to bring her down with it when she just moved into a new house and is in such an exciting phase of her life.”
“I’m sure she’ll understand and want to be there for you. It sounds like she will. You know you're stuck with me now, regardless, but it still sucks. I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay. Time seems to be helping. None of it matters right now anyway. Can we talk about how wild last night was?”
“Can we talk about how wild tonight will be instead?” She wiggles her eyebrows, full of assumptions.
CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT
Iwasn’tabletoconvince Lexy to get our own hotel room for tonight. She’s still sure Troy will show up with a smoking hot friend she’ll want to hook up with, and we will either stay out all night, or the boys will let us share their room. Either way, she is set on the night going according to her plan. I rolled my eyes at her because as much fun as that could be, I haven’t seen Troy in forever.
Even having insight into his head from his letter, I’m still very hesitant about the whole situation. I mean, I don’t know very much about him. I’m all for Lexy’s positive thinking, but we don’t know the friend Troy is bringing with him. What if he’s intolerable? I doubt that's the case because Troy doesn't seem like someone who would hang out with people who aren’t fun. But then again, what do I really know about the boy who sat beside me for two weeks in class? Not a whole lot. All of that on top of the fact I still think about Mack every day and wonder at least once a week if I made the right choice.
Still in our swimsuits and cover-ups, we head to the car, where we dropped off our things at checkout. We dig through our bags, which are in the trunk, for the dresses we have picked out for tonight. I choose a royal blue one I pulled out of Lexy’s closet because after growing up her whole life in LA, she has a lot more choices than I do. It cuts right above the knee with a slit that follows my thigh up a bit. The spaghetti straps lead into a much lower cut than I’d usually wear. Last night was more of a confidence boost than I expected, and I plan for tonight to be the same. So much has happened since I met Troy and he disappeared on me. I’m not interested in dating him, but I’m still human, and of course I want him to think I look amazing.
We walk back to the hotel and find the nearest bathroom. They are all so fancy here. There are couches in a sitting area when you walk in and TVs on the mirror in front of the sinks. It’s weird. I plug in the curling iron so it can heat while we do our makeup and slip into our dresses. Troy texted earlier to say they were getting in around 7 and to invite us to meet them at Ghost Donkey, which is apparently a speakeasy inside the Cosmopolitan hotel. We finish getting ready at ten til, stopping back by the car, tossing everything we didn’t need back in the trunk. We start walking away, but I swipe the keys back from Lexy and grab my toothbrush.
