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“Oh,” Raegan interjects, shaking her head, “I’m going to bed. I love you Lucas, but I barely make it past nine-thirty right now. It is ten-fifteen and I have to be up in seven hours to start puking.” She groans. “We’ll be in New York for work in like two weeks.” She points back and forth between her and Wes. “We’ll go to dinner?”
Lucas gets up and I notice he’s moving a little lethargically making me wonder if he stopped off at the bar when he went to the bathroom and consumed even more alcohol than the two stiff whiskeys he had at dinner.
“I love you, Rae.” He hugs her.
“Oh, you’re drunk. How did I miss that?” She chuckles before kissing his cheek. “I love you too.”
“Shut up.” He nudges her shoulder. “Big brother, I guess?” He shakes Wes’ hand and when they share a look of respect, Raegan beams at them.
“Look at this! Two of my favorite guys. Just missing one.” She looks at Theo who stands up and says goodbye to them as well.
We make it outside and while Rebecca is saying goodbye to Raegan and Wes, Lucas wraps an arm around me. “I’m going to go with Ave,” he says to Theo.
“Lucas, maybe we should just go back to your house.”
“It’s my last night in Philly!”
“Okay, we talked about this earlier,” I joke as I rub his arm. “It’s literally an hour train ride. People commute from Philly to New York every day.”
“You know what I mean. I’m going to be working all the time. You’re going to be working. It’s going to be hard for us to see each other, you know?”
“We’ll make time,” I tell him. “I’ll always make time for you.”
“Awww,” he pinches my cheek. “Fine, yeah let’s just go to the house. That way you can actually indulge with me.”
Lucas slams his trunk closed, tapping his hand on top of it a few times before turning to me and Avery who are standing next to his car. “Well, that’s it.” It’s barely nine in the morning and Lucas is already packed up and ready to head back to New York. “I know it’s close, but it’s still weird.” He looks at the house behind me and then over at Avery’s house. “Keep my dad out of trouble, will you?” He says, wrapping his arms around Avery and it takes everything in me not to react to that.
“Sure thing.” She smiles.
He turns to me and gives me a look that I can’t quite read. “Give us a second?” I nod, before heading back to the house. I’ve never known Lucas to like any kind of dramatic goodbye so I wonder what he’s going to say to her and I try not to watch from the window but I can’t seem to move away. He pulls her in for a hug before kissing the top of her head and when they pull back, I see him rub her face making me wonder if she’s more upset than she let on about him moving. I hate the pang of jealousy that flares in my veins in response.
I finally pull away from the window not wanting to encroach on their moment or annoy myself further. A buzzing in my pocket breaks my thoughts and when I reach for it, I see it’s from an unknown number.
It’s Saturday at nine in the morning, who the hell is this?
“Theo Graham.”
“Theo. Hey, it’s Wes.”
Well, I know what this is about.“Wes, what can I do for you?”
“I hope I’m not bothering you too early, but Raegan said you were probably up.”
“It’s not too early, I just finished saying goodbye to her brother. You caught me at the right time.”
“Great, I just wanted to talk to you if you have a minute? I know we didn’t really get to talk much last night.”
“Yeah, I thought I would let Rebecca run the show.”
“And as much as I thoroughly enjoyed that,” he laughs sarcastically, “Raegan does value your opinion about everything, so I wanted to at least make sure you and I are good.”
I take a sip of the half-drunk coffee that I’d made this morning. “We’re good.”
“Great, would you mind if I stopped by? I would just prefer to talk to you in person.”
You knew this was coming.“Sure, when were you thinking?”
“Maybe an hour?”
