Choosing Henley(14)

“You’re going to love me, Beatle. Fight it all you want, but when this clock counts down a year from now, you’ll be mine for good. Just you wait and see.” His chocolate eyes are locked on mine, and I can’t look away even if I tried. “You’re mine already. You just don’t know it yet.”

I don’t get a chance to answer before the world around us starts moving again. I vaguely hear the famous tune of “Auld Lang Syne” playing in the background as our friends swarm around us, wishing the best for the new year.

And what a hell of a new year it is shaping up to be.





‘I’M BOSSY. I’M the first girl to scream on the track. I switched up the beat of the drum. That’s right, I brought all the boys to the yard, and that’s right, I’m the one that’s tattooed on his arm.” Somewhere way too close to my ear, “Bossy” by Kelis is blaring.


“What the fuck,” I groan, my eyes still closed.

It’s the morning—or if I have to guess now, probably the afternoon—of New Year’s Day. Bill’s closed down around four last night, and by the time we all caught cabs home, it was nearly six in the morning before we managed to go to sleep. I use the term ‘sleep’ loosely because, now that Hannah has moved out, Beth likes to crash in my room when she is drunk. And Beth is a snuggler. Hardcore snuggler, I might add.

Said snuggler mimics my groan and starts blindly whacking her hand around on my side table. She knocks something over and I hear a thwack as it slams onto the floor.

“Motherfucker,” Beth curses as that stupid song keeps playing the same lines over and over again.

I bury my head into the pillow to wait out the torture that is Beth’s ringtone.

“There you are, you evasive little shit,” she says, scolding her phone. She clicks the phone to silent before she moves around in the bed.

Now that she’s done with that, I can feel her staring at me without even opening my eyes. “What?” I ask.

“Oh don’t you what me, you hungover grumpus. You know what,” she says—a little too loudly.

“Your sister’s right. You’re a nosy little shit,” I quip back, shoving my face farther into the pillow.

She doesn’t say anything, but I feel the mattress dipping as she moves around again. When I hear her pick something up, I relax back into the bed. She’s getting up. Then I hear a quiet ringing and open one eye to look for her. Aw hell. She’s sitting cross-legged on the bed with her phone on speaker mode in her hands. It rings three times before a sleepy voice fills the air.

“Morning, butthead!” Beth shouts into the phone, and I wince.

“Do you have to fucking yell, Beth?” Hannah’s voice comes over the phone. “It feels like there are tiny men bashing hammers around in my brain. Let’s use our inside voices.”

Beth looks at me and smirks. “John over here was just saying how you’re always right and how I’m a nosy shit. So I thought we might as well do this like old times. A shakedown if you will.” She cocks a perfect, blond eyebrow at me.

I flip her the bird in return before slowly sitting up. “You’re completely insane,” I mutter, sweeping my hair up into a ponytail.

“Did you seriously think we weren’t going to notice?” Hannah laughs from inside the little demon box of technology that’s trying to crack open my skull.

“I wasn’t really thinking about you two buttheads at that specific moment,” I reply snarkily. Nothing like waking up hungover to a cross examination in your own bed.

“How drunk were you?” Beth asks.

I sigh and give in. “Not that drunk,” I answer honestly. I remember everything. The time-stopping kiss, and the declaration of… Well, I’m not really sure what that was, actually.

“This isn’t going to work over the phone,” Hannah states. “It’s nearly impossible to get her to tell us anything in person, let alone through the phone, where I can’t see her face. Let’s meet for breakfast… Err… Make that late lunch.”

“Fine,” I say, flopping back down on the bed.

“Sounds good to me! I need waffles!” Beth replies, sounding like Donkey from Shrek.

Twenty minutes later, Peyton, Beth and I are climbing into my SUV to meet Hannah for a late lunch. She meets us at Ricky’s All Day Grill and we are seated quickly due to the odd time of day.

To say we looked haggard would probably be putting it kindly. We are all dressed in some variation of yoga pants, UGG boots, and sweaters. I am almost certain that Beth’s makeup is what’s left over from last night, and Hannah’s hair looks like she just rolled out of bed—which, knowing Mr. Hunnam, isn’t unlikely. Whether he was hungover or not. Sticking to our ‘don’t go out without nice hair’ rule, Peyton and I tamed our rat’s nests to make them look somewhat presentable.