Dirty little secret: Did she hit you? Not gonna lie. That kid kinda scares me.
Me: WTF? No. Why would she hit me?
Dirty little secret: I don’t know, she liked Hanna. I’m sure just like everyone else, she would see this as a betrayal of sorts.
Me: I don’t think that’s the case at all. She wanted me to drive back to Charleston tonight. She’s on a “follow your heart” kick.
Dirty little secret: Am I thinking of the same kid? Seventeen, five feet, a little heavy on the black eyeliner?
I inwardly laugh, she does look like the teenager that rips hearts out and sows them back up during fourth period.
Me: Yep that sounds like her. Anyway, I talked her out of coming tonight, but if it’s okay, we’d like to come get you tomorrow.
Dirty little secret: We?
Me: Yeah, we.
Dirty little secret: Are you sure this is a good idea? What if she tells Hanna?
Her text aggravates me a little because now I’ve moved out of the stage where I’m sad, and I’m in the angry stage. Angry that Hanna chose Jameson, and yet her feelings are still above mine. She has no right to tell me who I can like, whether it’s her friend or not. It’s not fair.
Me: Let’s try for five seconds not to think about Hanna.
Dirty little secret: She’s my friend Eric.
Me: She’s my ex.
Dirty little secret: She was your friend too.
Me: Was. Now, what are we?
Dirty little secret: I don’t know. I guess that’s a conversation that you two need to have.
I highly doubt that Hanna and I could still be friends, have two people ever actually broken up and remained friends? I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say probably not. At least nowhere near like before, plus the issues with Hanna go beyond our friendship. She lied to me. She lied to herself.
Me: I’m gonna call her this week and set something up.
Dirty little secret: Not about us, though, right? I need to tell her myself, or she’ll never forgive me. She probably won’t as it is.
Me: Whatever you think is best.
Dirty little secret: So you and Lainey want to come here to Charleston?
Me: Yeah, we can go to the fair. I’ll win you the big prize this time.
Dirty little secret: Shut up. The fair isn’t even in town plus limp duck would be so jealous.
Me: Okay, well, we can go downtown. I’ll find you a Carmel apple.
Dirty little secret: They are my favorite.
I know.
Me: It’s settled then.
Dirty little secret: I guess so.
CHAPTER 15