Pieces of You(47)

“Nope. I’m staying here and we’re going to wallow in self-pity over our ex-boyfriends until our tears, and the tequila, run dry. I’m off to the market to stock up. Do you want anything besides hard liquor?”

“Red Vines,” I say before I can change my mind.

I know it’s a stupid choice because it reminds me of Adam and all the times he brought me Red Vines after work when we were neighbors in Wrightsville. If there’s one thing I’m great at it’s torturing myself.

As soon as Senia leaves, I curl up on my bed and press the blanket into my eyelids to absorb the tears that seem to never stop. I try not to think that this breakup has anything to do with the fact that I’m not good enough for Adam. He has a degree and a successful job that keeps him busy and traveling. I’m a year behind in college and I’ve got enough baggage to weigh down a 747.

Not to mention the fact that I have no family.

As if on cue, my phone makes a tinkling noise; my text message tone. I turn over and snatch the phone off the nightstand. I close my eyes so I can’t see the screen. I make a stupid wish that it’s Adam telling me he changed his mind or even that he was just kidding. I could forgive a joke like this. It might take a few days, but a few days is better than eight weeks—or forever.

I open my eyes and it’s Chris. The notification has a picture icon, which means there’s no text, just a photo attached to the message. I hit the notification and it takes me to my messages app where Chris’s text message opens up. It’s a picture of Abigail.



Senia arrives as I’m just beginning to doze off. I don’t turn around in my bed, but I can hear the door slam shut and the sound of glass bottles clanking together as she drops some bags onto her bed.

“Get up, get up! It’s time to get shitfaced and plot our revenge. I say we get our revenge by moving on with some really hot guys—ahem, Chris—then we can plaster kissing photos all over our Facebook walls.”

“That is so immature and totally pathetic,” I say, as I turn over in my bed, still clutching tightly to my blanket because it still smells a little like Adam. Not at all pathetic.

I sit up in bed as she pulls a bottle of silver tequila out of a paper bag along with some limes, a bag of ice, margarita mix, and some plastic cups. She tosses a pack of Red Vines at me and it lands on the foot of my bed.

“I forgot the salt,” she says apologetically. “But I thought of a great game on the way over here. We take turns saying one thing we hate about Adam or Eddie and every time we stumble or stutter we have to take a shot.”

“I can’t do that. I don’t hate anything about Adam.”

Senia stands between our beds, five-feet-ten inches of Amazon woman glaring down at me.

“What? It’s true. I love everything about him and miss him like crazy so that game just sounds stupid to me.”

Senia heaves a deep sigh and I can tell she’s not happy with this response. “Okay. I think I heard what went on with Adam during that conversation, but why don’t you break it down for me. Did he really dump you because he thinks that’s what’s best for you?”

I draw in a long, stuttered breath as she reaches into a small paper bag and pulls out something that looks like a burrito wrapped in foil. She hands it to me then sits down on her bed. The bottles in the bags clang against each other as she makes herself comfortable. I unwrap my burrito and the smell makes me sick. I immediately wrap it up and set it down on the nightstand.

“Yes, he dumped me because he thinks he’s just another distraction that I don’t need and I kind of got the feeling that he was trying to tell me I’m a distraction for him. He thinks we’re going to end up hating each other if we try to stay together while he’s in Hawaii.”

“You have to eat something if we’re going to drink.”

“I’m not drinking. You know that.”

“He’s right,” Senia says, and by the look on her face she’s totally serious. “It’s too painful to hear about everything that’s going on with you and Chris and Abigail while he’s five thousand miles away. If you two try to stay together through this, you’ll probably end up breaking up before he gets back. At least this way, there’s a chance you may still want to be with him when he comes back.”

“Stop applying your logic to my relationship.”

She smiles, but it’s a weary smile. She’s right. I’m just torturing him with all this stuff. He has a job to do and I have schoolwork and legal business to attend to.

“Being mature sucks,” I pout. “I want to go to sleep and wake up in eight weeks.”