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Lily

*Hakuna Matata, Baby!*

I think I’ve grown up a little since last night. Or maybe this is just what it feels like after another person gives you orgasms. Whatever it is, I want more of it. I want more of Wes. That’s nothing new, and neither is the flutter of apprehension that goes with it, but there’s something else I’m feeling too. Something unfamiliar. Or maybe it’s a lack of something—denial and resentment.

It’s Vicky’s day off, and my father hasn’t responded to the text I sent him ten minutes ago, informing him that I was on my way home from Alecia’s house. I suck in my breath as I step out of the Uber, because his Benz is parked in the circular driveway. I’m not mentally prepared to see him so soon after having Wes Carver’s face up in my lady bits, but I also don’t want to find out that he’s already left for Seattle without saying good-bye to me.

I remove my shoes before opening the front door—not because I’m going to stealthily run upstairs like a teenager who doesn’t want to get caught; simply because my very grown-up feet hurt.

I make it to the second-floor hallway without encountering my father—which is not too surprising, in a mansion. Now I can take a shower and wash the delicious sex smells off me. And have flashbacks of Wes’s hands and mouth on me, and my hands and mouth on him, while not touching myself because my dad’s somewhere in the house. Easy!

When I’m out of the shower, I see that my father still hasn’t responded to my text, but I do have a text from my bestie.

ALECIA:You home yet?

The truth is, I feel less at home now than I did when I was at Wes’s house.

ME: Indeed, I am.

One second later, my phone is playing “Milkshake” by Kelis, and a photo of seventeen-year-old drunk Alecia squeezing her own boobs pops up on the screen. It has been so long since she’s called me instead of texting, I had forgotten that that’s the ringtone I’d programmed for her. As always, when I receive an unplanned phone call from someone under the age of forty, I panic and wonder who’s in the hospital.

“Hi. Everything okay?”

“Don’t change the subject! You’ve made me wait long enough. Now dish!”

I laugh. “Do you have me on speakerphone?”

“No. I’m in the laundry room. With the door closed. Holding my phone to my ear. Quit stalling. What happened?”

I sigh and take a seat at the foot of my bed. “Can’t you give a girl like a day to pretend to be discreet and ladylike?”

I hear a muffled squeal. “So thereissomething to dish about!”

“Kind of.” I collapse back onto the mattress. “We didn’t sleep together. But orgasms were had by one and all.”

“Holy tits!” she whispers. “This is huge! We have to go on a double date! Or we’ll have you guys over for dinner! Bitch, you better make me your matron of honor!”

“Calm yourself, friend. It may have just been a one-time thing. It was…complicated.”

“Complicated, like BDSM? Or butt stuff?”

“Um. Neither. I can’t even…”

“Tell me immediately.”

“You can’t tell Neal.”

“I don’t tell him anything!”

“Don’t lie to a motherless child.”

“Awww. Dark. Okay, I promise not to tell my husband this one juicy amazing thing. Go on…”

I kick my legs up in the air and don’t speak until my toes are touching the ground again. “It feels like I’m falling apart,” I whisper.

“Nah. You’re just falling in love.”

“Ugh. It’s awful. Why do people do this?”