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Hannah shrugged. “I don’t know, honestly, a lot of music schools send stuff to Emmy, so it’s possible that it’s one of them. You know, trying to butter her up to enter their music program.”
I nodded my head. “Yeah, she’s like the star quarterback of the harp world, right?”
Hannah chuckled. “Yeah, something like that.”
“Hey, Ava, I’m glad you made it,” said a voice from behind me.
I turned and saw Mike Crenshaw walking in my direction. I have to admit, he was the last person I wanted to see. Although, lying about needing tutoring wasn’t exactly a capital offense, he’d still lied, which I didn’t love.
“Hey, Mike,” I responded, lukewarm at best.
“I’m glad you made it. You should have let me pick you up.”
“Yeah, well, I already had a ride, so…”
He shot me a flirtatious grin. “So, I want hang out with you. You want to go somewhere and talk?”
I gaped at him in surprise. The last subject we’d discussed was calculus, so to say this was a shift in gears was an understatement. I guess he was ready to drop the whole tutoring façade, unless he had a math book stashed somewhere at this party.
Before I could respond, an arm dropped across my shoulders and a bottle of beer appeared in front me, the cap already removed. “Here you go, Ava.” He turned to Mike, making a sound of supposed surprise. “Oh, hey, Crenshaw.”
I almost laughed at Jack’s comically casual greeting. Mike gave me a look of disbelief and dismay. “Hey, Becker,” he grunted. “I’ll talk to you later, Ava,” he said and stalked off toward the house.
“So…you two are together?” asked Hannah, as she gestured between us with the beer in her hand.
“We are tonight,” Jack responded and took a deep swallow of beer. The cavalier way he spoke of our relationship, such as it was, caused me a brief lash of pain and irritation. I knew I had agreed to being casual, but I had already decided I wasn’t cut out for it. The sooner I told Jack, the better.
Hannah frowned and grunted, shooting me a concerned glance. Obviously, she wasn’t much of a fan of Jack’s approach either. Although, she didn’t know the whole story between us, which I felt bad about, I’m certain she knew I liked him.
“You know, Jac–” Hannah started.
“Hey, Hannah, how about coming to the bathroom with me?” I needed to fill her in before she really started laying into Jack. I didn’t need him telling her about the dynamics of our “relationship.”
She shot Jack one more scathing look and followed me as we walked into the house.
“I can’t believe what a fucking asshole Jack is being toward you,” Hannah ranted. “Like, he only wants to date you one day at a time? What the hell?”
“Okay, Hannah, I have to update you on a couple things.” I pulled her into what looked like a study.
She looked at me in concerned confusion. “Oh, god, what’s that look on your face? What did you do?”
“Um, well, I kind of slept with Jack,” I blurted out.
She gasped. “What?! Kind of? Why didn’t you tell me? When?” She volleyed questions at me like ping pong balls. I tried to sort the questions in my mind.
“Well, not kind of. I did sleep with him. It happened last weekend and I, partly, didn’t tell you because you were kind of handling all that shit with Nikolai’s dad, and you seemed like you had your hands full.”
“Oh, Ava, that’s really thoughtful, but holy shit, I’m your friend. You can always come talk to me, especially about stuff like this. I knew something would happen between you guys, I knew it!” she cried. Like Jack and I sleeping together was a victory for her.
“I’m not going to lie, I think part of the reason I didn’t say anything was because I didn’t want to have to dissect it. Jack isn’t exactly the poster boy for monogamy, so I didn’t want to have to examine my feelings too closely. I didn’t want to have to answer questions about why I would choose someone like him to get hung up on.”
Hannah nodded sympathetically. “So, what exactly is going on with you two?”
“I don’t exactly know. When we decided to have a casual relationship, it had felt like an empowering decision. You know what my past was like with my ex-boyfriend.”
Hannah grimaced in understanding.
“I wanted to do something for myself, so Jack’s limitations seemed tolerable, maybe even preferable, after the relationship I just got out of, but now…I don’t know.” I shook my head, frowning with displeasure as I recollected Jack’s distant attitude after we had sex. “I think I actually like him, and he has barely given me the time of day since we hooked up.”
