Page 114 of Hate Me Like You Mean It

Candy

Girly stuff like nail polish and earrings

Blanket forts (Stacy C. did a big one for her birthday last month and Alice kept going on and on about how much she loved it)

I think I know what I need to do.

Alice

I slept through the night. Through the morning. And into the afternoon.

No dreams, no restless tossing, turning, or frustrated flipping of pillows. Just darkness—blissful, and quiet, and so endlessly deep that I was disoriented by the time it finally loosened its grip and allowed me to resurface.

It took me a minute to connect the dots on where—and who—I was.

“Dom?” I eventually called out, squinting around the blurry room. Was it just in my head, or were my eyes taking a lot longer to adjust to the light than they usually did? “Dominic? Are you still here?”

A dull pang of disappointment tugged at my chest when no one answered. The last time he’d left me after spending the night, it hadn’t exactly ended well. There was no note this time either, so I reached for my phone, thinking he’d at least sent me a text or something.

There were fifty-three unread texts from the family group chat. A missed call and three messages from Rachel. A brunch invitation from Jamie and Jackson. But nothing from Dom.

I got out of bed, stripped out of my clothes, and stepped into the rain shower. It took substantial effort. My bones felt stiff and heavy, like rusty metal weighed down by bags of wet sand.

The hot water helped. The unexpected knock on the bathroom door did not.

My shoulders bunched, and the shampoo bottle slipped out of my grip and tumbled onto the stone tiles.

Out of all the sounds that a woman who lives alone wants to hear within the walls of her apartment, someone knocking on her bathroom door while she’s butt-naked in the shower scrapes the bare bottom of the list.

“Alice?”

Relief collided with adrenaline, making my legs tingle. I slid the glass door aside and poked my head out. “Dom? I thought you left.”

“Where would I have gone?”

“Home?”

“To do what?”

I frowned at the door. “I don’t know. What do you normally do with your free time?”

“Well, I used to do a lot of stomping around and plotting sweet, sweet revenge on my lifelong nemesis, but I don’t have that to default to anymore, so I’m feeling a little lost.”

I would have smiled if I weren’t in such a crumpled and soggy mood.I wonder if we can go visit Rosie again today. “I’ll be out in a bit, and we can do some brainstorming. Find you a new hobby.”

“Can we do it now? I have some ideas.”

“I’m in the shower.”

“I don’t mind.”

My lips twitched. “Oh, then, by all means.”

The door swung open.

And my jaw hit the floor.

I blinked, half-convinced I was hallucinating.