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So, I pulled out my phone and texted the group chat between Maddie, Piper, and me.
Me: Please, can someone pick up Plan B from CVS? I’ll pay you back.
Maddie: OMG, tell me you didn’t whore it out with Blaise again!!!
Maddie: I fckn love you. <3
After slapping my hand across my forehead, I grunted and walked through the main hallway and to the library’s counter. Sue, an elderly woman who had worked here for almost fifty years, waved at me with a wrinkled hand.
My phone buzzed again.
Piper: I can pick some up. I’ll swing by the library in a couple hours. When do you get off?
Maddie: She gets off at five, and I’m coming with. I need the deets.
Halfway through my shift, the rude CVS employee from yesterday sauntered up to the counter with a pile of books in his arms. “Look what we have here,” he said, voice teasing as he placed down the books about machinery. “I remember you.”
Giving him my best customer-service smile, I didn’t say anything to him and started scanning his collection of nonfiction books that looked boring as hell. Of course this guy would read some dry material and nothing spicy.
“You work at the pharmacy, don’t you?” Sue said, smiling at Jim or James or whatever his name was. She tapped my arm and leaned toward me. “I go get my medication there all the time, and this boy is the sweetest.”
“The sweetest, huh?” I asked, glancing at the CVS employee and hoping Sue didn’t hear the distasteful sarcasm laced heavily in every one of my words. Because this asshole had been anything but sweet to me yesterday.
He leaned against the counter and grinned. “How are you doing, Sue?”
“Oh good, my dear,” she said, nudging me. “Just trying to find a nice boy for my Vera.”
God, between Maddie, Piper, and Sue, it seemed like everyone in this town was trying to find me a man.
“Vera,” Jim repeated, turning his gaze on me and smirking. “We’ve met before.”
After quickly scanning his final book, I pushed them across the counter toward him and gave him another fake smile to make my manager happy. I needed this job and the money way more than I cared about faking it with him. “Your books are due back in two weeks.”
Once he stuffed them into his backpack, he swung it over his shoulder. “I’m sure I’ll be seeing you before then. See you soon, Vera.”
I gritted my teeth the entire time he walked down the main hallway and out the double doors that led to downtown Redwood. Sue began chatting about how lovely Jim was to her and how she thought we’d make a cute couple as I aimlessly scanned books in and out.
Even if Jim had been nice to me, I wouldn’t even consider going on a date with him. He wasn’t my type, and I kinda, sorta had gotten caught up with another bad boy who had a thing for fucking me in public. And, like the girls in some of my stories, I had self-diagnosed myself with body-betraying syndrome—or BBS, as I liked to call it.
Body-betraying bullshit.
Because I had stupidly gone along with it both times!
Five minutes before my shift ended, Maddie and Piper strolled into the library and immediately made a beeline for me. Piper shoved a brown paper bag across the counter as Maddie wiggled her brows.
“So, deets.”
I grabbed the bag. “Thanks,Piper,” I said, emphasizing her name because I really didn’t want to give any sort of details out about fucking Blaise in the middle of Redwood Academy in front of Sue.
She thought I was an angel, and I planned to keep it that way.
After swallowing the pill in the restroom, I grabbed my coat from the back room and left for the day. Because Blaise still had my notebook, I hadn’t been able to write any sort of stories today during work, and I was getting antsy to get back home.
Once I slipped into the backseat of Maddie’s car, she drove us through Redwood. But instead of taking the turn to head into the slums, where I lived, she continued driving until we reached the hospital.
“Okay, okay,” Maddie said, turning the car off and stepping out. “You don’t have to spill the details—though Iknowthat you want to. But I pulled a couple of strings this afternoon and got you into my gynecologist’s office. We’re getting you on birth control tonight.”
“Maddie,” I said, chewing on the inside of my lip. “You know I can’t afford—”
