"I don't know."
"The teachers had no idea?" I heard amusement in her voice. Yes, this was going well.
"By that time, my parents had started dressing us in certain colors to help our teachers keep us apart. I wore blue and Max wore red. His English test was after lunch, so at lunch time, we went to the bathroom and switched shirts, and when the bell rang, I went to his class and he went to mine. I had art after lunch, so it wasn't like it was going to be a letter filled afternoon for him. After the test, I told his teacher I had to go to the bathroom, and I met him there. We switched shirts and went back to our own classes."
"It was really sweet of you."
I couldn't explain why, but those words filled me with so much hope. Would she now begin to see me as a person who could be kind and loyal?
"What about you? Did you and Ethan ever pull any crazy stunts?"
"No."
And just like that, her voice turned distant and aloof.
Fuck.
“Ethan fake married Lucy, though. That’s a stunt, right?”
“Wow. Really?”
“He was still trying to win our grandfather’s favor. My asshole grandfather told him he was losing out on a deal because he wasn’t married, so he asked Lucy, whom I’d sent to work for him, to marry him. He promised her a shitload of money.”
Huh. “So their marriage—”
“Oh, it’s real now.”
I remembered hearing something about Kate not being happy about it and nearly losing faith in Ethan and her friend. “Was it your brother’s proposition that bothered you?”
“No, although it bugged me. What bothered me was they didn’t tell me they were sleeping together. They purposefully hid it. The only two people in the world I trusted, and they were lying to me.”
I hated that she only had two people in her life. “But you forgave them?”
“Yes. He’s my brother and she’s my best friend, after all.”
God, how I wished she’d forgive me.
"I always got the feeling that you had a very loving and supportive family,” she said.
"I do." I kicked myself for not having her meet my parents. Another of many regrets.
"Mine wasn't like that."
I waited for her to say more, but she didn't. Not wanting to lose the positive connection we’d had up until now, I decided to change the subject.
"So, did your day go better after I left?"
"Yes."
I smiled because I swore that I could hear the satisfaction, and possibly, a hint of a blush in her tone.
"I still can't believe you left like you did," she said.
"Had to sit in my car for fifteen minutes before I could put my seatbelt on.”
She laughed, and I realized it was the first time I'd heard her laugh like that, so free and full of humor, since we'd been together five years ago. "You poor thing."
My dick started to swell from the memory. "It wasn't easy. It was quite painful, to be honest." I was joking. Well, itwasfrustrating, but I wanted to elicit her sympathy.