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She’s looking at me with an intensity I’ve rarely seen from her before, and I can tell she means business.
Slowly, I peel myself off the couch.
“That’s more like it.” Laurie grins. “Now go get ready. We have reservations for eight.”
We arrive at a quaint little restaurant downtown. It’s a Saturday night, and I know Laurie expects us to go clubbing afterward. I’m already thinking of excuses to bail out early.
“I think it’s a good decision for you to take a break from social media.” She nods. “It’s clearly a toxic place for you right now, and staying on there isn’t doing you any favors.”
“If only that was the only thing.” I sigh.
The waiter pours us both a glass of wine, but even looking at it is making me feel queasy.
It reminds me too much of Enzo.
“You’re still thinking about him, aren’t you?” Her voice softens.
“Constantly,” I admit, “It’s gotten to a degree where I’m asking myself if it's worth the trip down there to ask him to give me closure, once and for all.”
“Yeah, don’t do that. It’s just fresh right now. You’ll feel better in a few weeks.”
“It’s been almost a month since I left.” I bite down on my lip. “I don’t even remember being this upset about Liam. The divorce wrecked me emotionally, yes, but I didn’t miss him when it was over.”
“You know, sometimes a short-lived situationship messes us up way more than a long-term relationship ever could,” Laurie muses.
It stings when she refers to what we had as asituationship,but I don’t have the grounds to argue.
That was all it was to Enzo, after all.
The waiter arrives with our food.
“Oh, yum.” Laurie rubs her hands together. “Fuel up, Quinn. We’re going to need it later at the club.”
The smell of the food wafts up to me, and I immediately hunch over my seat as a wave of nausea hits me.
She frowns. “Wait, are you okay?”
A retching sound tears my throat.
“God, you’re going to throw up.” She turns to the waiter. “Where is the ladies’ room.”
I run to where he points and arrive just in time.
Laurie’s hand smoothes down my back, as I throw up the ice cream that’s the only thing I had on my stomach.
Laurie helps me clean up. I’m in the middle of washing my mouth out when the nausea hits me again, and I run over to the nearby stall again.
“Quinn, should we go to the hospital?” Laurie asks me when I re-emerge. “You might have food poisoning.”
“How? I’ve barely eaten these last few days.”
“Then what’s going on with you?”
We look at each other, and I know when her mind clicks because it’s when mine did too.
I scramble for my phone, opening my period tracking app.
“Do you think…” Laurie peers her head from behind my shoulder.