Page 116 of The Hardest Fall

“Talk to me about something else then. I’m gonna lose my mind if I can’t smash his face into a pulp.”

“Hulk. Smash!” Becky popped in. “What’s pulp?”

“Is my hair done, Miss Bluebird? Can I look?”

“I get mirror, you see it. You sit here. Okay, Zoe? You sit and you wait, kay?”

As I helped her off the couch, I nodded. “Sit and wait—got it.”

Before she could run away, Jared stopped her with a hand on her arm. “KayKay is sleeping in my room and the door is open, so be quiet when you’re looking for that mirror, okay?”

“Is KayKay sick?”

“No, sweetheart. She just has a little headache so she needs her sleep. She’ll be fine. After you finish showing Zoe her new hair, you’re going straight to bed yourself. It’s way past your bedtime.”

“Okay Jar. First hair, then bed.” Satisfied with her answers, she ran away to her room.

“I should get going, too. It’s past nine and I need to get back.” As soon as Becky was out of earshot, I blurted it out because I couldn’t hold it in anymore. “Also, just in case you want to know, I slept with Dylan, and even if you didn’t want to know, now you know. In his bed, with him, last night—well, more like morning, but let’s go with last night…and then a little bit in the—”

“Wait, wait, wait—hold up,” he sputtered. He was holding his hand up, his eyes blinking and blinking. “You did what?”

“I slept with—”

“Clarify, please. You slept with him in the same bed, or you slept with him, meaning you fucked his brains out? Which one?”

“Well…” I pulled my legs up and hugged them to my chest, lips already curved into a smile. “If we’re talking about fucking brains out, it was probably mine that got fucked out.”

Still with that shocked expression on his face, he dropped down on the couch next to me.

“I guess that means I can’t try to seduce him anymore.”

I burst out laughing and had to put my hand over my mouth to keep quiet. Then I sobered and my grin disappeared. “I feel so bad for feeling this happy when Kayla is going through this. I didn’t plan for it to…”

“Zoe, if it were left up to you, you’d probably wait ten years before you made a move. I already know there was no planning involved.”

“He was so good to me yesterday, Jared. As soon as I walked into the apartment, I just crumpled and he picked up my pieces. And then…” I loved Jared to pieces, and he was one of my best friends, but for some reason I didn’t want to share every single detail of what had happened after we made it home. The way he held me, the way he hugged me in the shower, the way we fit so perfectly—it all felt private, like it was just ours, mine and Dylan’s.

“Then it happened,” Jared finished for me.

“Something like that.”

“Now it makes more sense.”

“What does that mean?”

Before he could answer, Becky came running in, a small pink mirror in her hand as she whisper-yelled at us. “I found it! Zoe, I found it!”

“Oh, that’s a beautiful mirror, Miss Bluebird. Now, let’s see what you did to my hair.”

After she demanded I put her to bed, I checked my hair more thoroughly in the bathroom mirror and had to spend a few minutes calming everything down.

As I was walking past Jared’s room, Kayla called my name.

“Is everything okay? I thought you were sleeping.” I walked in and sat on the edge of the bed as she sat up.

“Heard Becky talking to you guys. You’re still here?”

“Yeah, just wanted to stay around a bit longer.” After a long stretch of silence, I asked, “How are you doing?” I’d been worried I wasn’t coming up with the right questions the entire day.

“I’m good.” She sighed. “I’m better, let’s go with that. You can leave, Zoe. It’s late. You don’t have to wait around.”

“Don’t worry about me. I’ll leave whenever.”

She sighed but nodded. “Mom and Dad are coming tomorrow.” This time it was my turn to nod. “I’m not sure if I’m gonna come back here in January, Zoe. I’m not even sure I can handle finals.”

I wanted to protest, wanted to say it was the stupidest idea I’d ever heard, but it wasn’t. I wanted a chance to spend ten minutes alone in a room with Keith, but I knew it wouldn’t undo the hurt my friend was going through.

Keeping my eyes focused on the dark gray bedding, I choked up. “I want to beg you to come back, KayKay, but I know I can’t.”

“I just don’t think I want to…actually, I don’t think I can is a better answer. I think, and my parents think…”

“I understand, and I want you to do whatever will heal you and make you happy again. You think you’ll stay in Texas, then?”