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“No, Skye, weweretogether.”

“Okay, maybe you were!” I burst out. “But look at it from my perspective. I don’t know you. I do know Jordy. He never gave me any reason not to trust him.” His “fable” today crosses my mind again, and I shove the thought aside. “I wasn’t there when Jordy moved away from you. You’re asking me to believe, based on your word, that Jordy lied to me, and hid you from me, and vice versa, for two months. I can admit I don’t know for sure. I can acknowledge that, maybe, the breakup wasn’t as clear as Jordy meant it to be. But if you want me to say I completely trust that Jordy was lying to me for the first part of our relationship, I can’t.”

“But you don’t know for sure,” Maya says.

“Of course not. At the moment, it’s your word versus Jordy’s.”

“But if there’s even a chance my boyfriend cheated on me with you,” she goes on, “are you okay with that?”

“No. I’m not okay with it. I just…” I sigh in frustration.“What if we confronted Jordy together? Maybe it can all be sorted out?”

“He’ll just keep lying, Skye. It’s what he does.”

“And he said it’s whatyoudo.”

We fall into silence. Better than going around in circles, I suppose. It’s a riddle with no answer. If Maya’s wrong, she owes me an apology. If Maya’s right, I owe her one. For Maya to be right, Jordy has to be wrong. And that simply can’t be right. Not Jordy. Someone else, maybe, but not Jordy. Not sweet Jordy, who approachedme.Who started flirting withme.

But then I think of the Jordy with oil all over his chest, simpering at the camera. How he smoothly invented a whole new backstory for us without hesitation. The canned lines that were a little too robotic to be romantic.

The way he spoke to me on the phone, usingjustthe right words to get me to come. Convincing me I was special, something that hasn’t exactly been backed up by his actions today. I kick off from the bed and take slow steps around the carpet, hugging my arms around my chest.

Maya goes on in a steady voice. “Hewanted to do long distance. We did video chats and phone calls every day. He bought me a ring for Christmas.” I shake my head as she continues. “He flew back to visit me in early December. He stayed in the spare room for days. Does that sound like ‘broken up’ to you?”

I stop pacing and cross to the desk, to lean my hands on it and face the wall. “No.”

Maybe I was wrong to think she believes in this version of events. She could be fabricating the whole story to mess with my head, or to drive a wedge between Jordy and me.

But what if she’s not?

What if he’s actually a very, very talented liar?

“My cousin saw you two at a New Year’s Eve party makingout, and she told me. At first, he said it was just a drunken mistake, and begged me not to leave him. I wasthisclose to forgiving him. Then he came back a day later and said he couldn’t be with someone as possessive as me, and he broke up with me.Hecheated on me, andhebroke up with me for not handling it well enough. Next thing I knew, you were all over his profile.”

I flinch.

Could it be true? That Jordy said kissing me… hisgirlfriend…was a drunken mistake? We’d been together for over a month by New Year’s. We were still at that giddy, early stage where we spent the day “watching movies,” but didn’t retain a word because we spent the whole time kissing and gazing at each other, whispering affectionate, sappy nonsense that seemed like earth-shattering truths at the time.

A mistake?

Suddenly, Maya gasps, and springs to her feet. “I can prove it,” she says, half to herself. She makes a beeline for the chest of drawers, digs through her clothing, and emerges holding an iPad. Brandishing it in triumph, she dives back onto her bed, while I watch her. After a moment, she glances up at me. “Please don’t tell anyone I’ve got this.”

I shrug. “None of my business.”

She gives me an impish grin, then busies herself navigating to her message history with Jordy. I realize what she means by proof, and a knot of tension starts to grow in my stomach.

“Here,” she says finally, passing it over to me. “Read from here down. You can see the dates.”

I can see the dates. Even with Maya’s permission, reading this feels like an invasion of privacy. I suppose it’s Jordy’s privacy I’m invading. But after reading the first few messages, any guilt I have around this evaporates.

There’s Jordy saying he loves her on Halloween.

Jordy and Maya exchanging selfies.

Maya and Jordy talking about their days, and how desperately they miss each other.

Jordy and Maya swapping Thanksgiving meal photos. Maya and Jordy making plans to see each other in December. Maya messaging Jordy that she was at the airport.

Early December. When Jordy had ostensibly visited the US for his aunt’s birthday. But it doesn’t look to me like he stayed with his aunt. It doesn’t look as though he went for his aunt at all.