Page 51 of Same Thing

“I think you should stay here and wait for him,” Delta told her.

“So, we can do the whole break up talk? No thank you. We just met the other day. No harm, no foul. Everything is great. This is what boys do.”

“I don’t understand.”

“All the TV shows I’ve ever watched warned me this would happen!” she exclaimed.

Delta flinched, as if the pitch of Nory’s voice hurt her ears. “I don’t watch much TV.”

“You sleep with a man and then they ditch you,” Nory said, throwing her clothes into her duffle bag. “I need pants.”

“You’re wearing pants. Wait, you slept together?” Delta asked.

“Please don’t judge,” Nory said through a sob.

“I wouldn’t ever. I wouldn’t ever! That’s great, I think!”

“Delta, look around. He bolted.”

“Um, that’s not what is happening.”

“Then what else could it be? What could possibly drag him from here if he isn’t having regrets?”

“Jackson,” she whispered.

That name on Delta’s lips froze Nory into place. “W-what?”

“That guy who is messing with you. That’s all I can say.”

Nory’s mind raced. “Wait, what is he doing with Jackson? I had a plan. I am going to get away from him.”

Delta shook her head. “That’s not how we work,” she whispered on a breath.

Nory shook her head. “No, he wouldn’t. We had a plan.”

“You had a plan.”

“But…he said he was fine with it.”

Delta pursed her lips into a thin line.

“Why would he lie?”

“They were supposed to be back by now,” Delta said.

Chills rippled up the back of Nory’s neck. “When? When were they supposed to be here?”

“Before dawn. Nate said they would be back before you woke up.”

“And you stayed here to what?”

“Cover for them.” Delta wrung her hands in front of her. “Only if you woke up though.”

“Delta, it’s almost ten o’clock.”

She nodded and admitted low, “I’m worried.”

A flash of panic took her. What if they were in jail? Or what if Jackson killed them? He was crazy. Her throat was tightening up as she bolted from the bedroom and out to the living room. Delta was asking questions behind her, but she couldn’t understand her words over the roaring in her ears.