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She doesn’t answer.
Hoping she ran to her room, I detour to the front desk for a new key to mine. And lose fifteen minutes to selfies with a group of sequined women waiting for a cab to take them to a publisher party. When I get to my room, I stop outside the adjoining door. Behind the thin barrier, I hear Jess’s lame attempt to covert cry. The sound’s muffled, like she’s covering her mouth or sobbing into a pillow.
“Jess?” I knock on her door.
Her TV turns on, blasting obnoxious laughter and exaggerated one-liners. The kind of canned acting that grates under my skin.
I lift my hand to knock again when a text pops on my screen.
Elevator Girl:I’m fine.
If a girl shuts you out and there’s tears involved, she’s a lot of things, and none of them are fine. Even I know that. I sit on the floor, rest my back against the adjoining door, and try again. “Jess.”
The TV volume skyrockets.
My costar’s hip-hop text tone pings my phone.
Kim:We need to talk about us
There is no us. She knows this. I rub my forehead.
Kim:Gabe
Kim:????
Kim:What happened before you left isn’t going away
Be easier if it did. I toe off my shoes.
Kim:You can’t keep ignoring me
Kim:Stop being a dick
That gets me.
Me:Because I didn’t USE you I’m a dick?
The kicker to all this drama is if the last guy she’d dated hadn’t literally screwed her over, we’d probably be laughing about that freaking kiss she started and I stopped.
She doesn’t reply, and I delete the thread, then see a message I missed from my sister.
Short Blonde One:Forgot to tell you happy bday yesterday. Please change your mind. Ur all I have.
Her text brings the burn I get when I bench my highest weight. I let my finger hover over my screen. This time last year, Coley flew out to North Carolina. I spent my birthday week helping her fill out college applications, giving her crap about her crush on Carlos—my condo mate and my beta wolf on the show—and bingingPretty Little Liars, threatening to spill all to Carlos if she told anyone I sat through every season of her favorite show.
Me:Don’t want to fight
Short Blonde One:Did you see Mom?
Me:No
Short Blonde One:Are you going to?
I could lie. I want to. But I don’t.I don’t know.
And wait...
... and wait...
