She touches my nose with her wet fingertips, bringing my eyes back up to hers. I know I’m blushing after being caught staring at her, but after the way we’ve just loved each other silly, I don’t care.
“Your phone’s vibrating.”
“So is my body.”
“Ash!”
She laughs. “It’s so fun to make you blush. Who’s texting?”
“I didn’t look.” I’d never look at her texts without her knowing.
She closes her eyes and goes back to rinsing the shampoo from her hair. “Can you look in case it’s work?”
“Sure.” I scroll to the text and my stomach tightens. I hold up the phone, hating the shaky sound of my voice. “It’s Sandy.”
Her expression doesn’t change. “What does it say?”
“You want me to read it?”
“No. I want it to read itself.” She turns and faces the spray, washes her face.
“I don’t want to read her text.”
She looks at me like I’m being ridiculous. “Whatever.”
I don’t want to read it…but I also do. Really, really badly. “Fine, I’ll read it.” I open the text and read it quickly, wishing I hadn’t. My heart feels like it’s going to explode at the sight of the thread of texts from Sandy.
“Well?”
“She…She texts you all the time.” I scroll up and read some of the messages from the last few weeks.
“Uh-huh. I don’t answer.”
No, she doesn’t usually answer her, but she has a few times.
She turns off the water and reaches for a towel. “What is it this time?”
“She’s…” I can’t look at Ashley, and I’m not sure I can force myself to tell her what the message says.
She takes the phone from my hand and reads it, then sets the phone on the counter and dries off.
“Well? Aren’t you going to respond?”
“No.” She walks into the bedroom and opens the dresser drawers, then begins dressing.
“She’s out. She broke up with that guy and—”
Ashley spins around and faces me. Her eyes are narrow and angry, and her face is pinched. “I know, okay? You don’t have to reiterate. I read the message.”
“Well, does it make you want to go back to her?” I can’t help it. I hate that I ask, but it’s not like I have the power to stop my heart from pouring out my mouth.
“No, it doesn’t make me want to go back to her. It pisses me off. Why would she send me this now? Months after we broke up? If I didn’t mean enough to her then, I don’t now.”
Her phone vibrates again and we both turn in the direction of the bathroom, where she left it on the counter.
“Aren’t you going to check it?” Every word is bathed in sarcasm as I settle my hand on my hip, more to stop it from shaking and offer myself a modicum of stability than for any other reason.
She rolls her eyes and storms out of the bedroom. “No.”
I grab my backpack and shove my feet into my boots. I don’t know why I’m so upset. She’s not doing anything wrong, but all those texts from Sandy are niggling at me like a thorn in my shoe.
“Why didn’t you tell me that she texts you all the time?”
“I did.”
“No, I’m fairly certain you didn’t.” I cross my arms and stare at her.
“I told you she sends me random texts.”
“Random isn’t exactly…I don’t know how many, but random implies less than how many she’s sent. I saw them, Ash. She texts you every few days! And you’ve texted her back a few times.”
“So what? I probably told her to stop texting or something.”
“No.” I clench my jaw shut, feeling like a nosy bitch for reading her responses.
“No, what?” Ashley leans against the back of the couch.
I can’t lie to her. “You didn’t tell her not to text you. When she asked how you were, you said you were good, that you were happy.”
She shrugs. “So?”
“And when she said she wanted to see you, you said it wasn’t a good time.”
She turns away, but not before I see something like sadness flash in her eyes.
“You said yourself you were falling for her, and now she’s out. It’s what you wanted.” Tears sting my eyes, but I don’t give in to them.
“It’s not what I want, Delilah.”
“Then why would you tell her it wasn’t a good time instead of telling her you didn’t want to see her? Why didn’t you tell her about us?”
“I don’t even know the timing of that text.”
“It was the day after our first kiss.”