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Rafael dropped me off at my house, and the moment he left, my gut started to knot up, but when I hear a mixture of laughter and screams coming from inside, that tension in my gut settles.

I’ve never had such a desire to be with someone all the time, and it feels strange to want him nearby so often, but I’ve also missed my girls.

I push the door open, and the sight is definitely something to see.

Chelsea’s sitting on the kitchen counter, eating one of those vile creations she always makes with a fruit winder wrapped around a dill pickle, and her camera is pointed at Letty and Adhira.

Letty’s got Adhira doubled over in a chair as she screams her head off, clutching her robe around her waist.

“What did I just come home to?” I ask, already having an idea thanks to the pot of hot wax sitting on the counter beside them.

“Your friend is torturing me.” Adhira groans from beneath a cascade of dark hair. And for the first time, I notice she’s a lot thinner than she had been at the start of the year. Probably just stress.

“My friend?” I ask, smirking as I drop my duffle by the door and take a seat at the kitchen island.

“I no longer claim her,” she says, her posh British accent blending with the sing-song lilt of the remnants of her Gujarati accent from summers spent in India as she grits out the words.

Letty dips a thick popsicle stick into the pot of wax, winding it around several times to cool the molten liquid. “You asked for this,” she says, showing no remorse as she pushes the fallen strands out of her way, applying a thick layer of wax along Adhira’s neck.

“You’re right. I should really be blaming my mother for plaguing me with her hairy neck.”

“It’s okay, babe. I’ll get Chelsea’s unibrow next,” Letty jokes, ripping the wax off and clamping a hand down on the red spot blooming beneath it to calm the sting as Adhira yelps in pain.

“One of these days, I’ll have my unibrow permanently lasered off because waxing this shit every month is ridiculous. ”

Our eyes fill with tears from a mixture of pain and laughter over the next thirty minutes as Letty finishes waxing Adhira’s neck.

Adhira pays her back in kind, even requiring Chelsea and I let her wax our lady ‘staches as payback for laughing at her.

By the time we’re done, my cheeks hurt from laughing so much, and that little pang of guilt is encroaching again. I wish I could tell them about Rafael. I wish I could tell them about my weekend, but I can’t.

Not yet.