Page 150 of When You Blush

She smiles big, showing off a gap in her teeth where she recently lost one of them, and runs off to the dance floor.

I sense her before I see her, and every muscle tightens.

Juliet sits across from me and takes her shoe off, rubbing the arch of her foot.

“You can’t keep hating me,” she says, and just the sound of her voice sets every hair on my body on end.

I don’t reply. I can’t. Something is lodged in my throat.

“It’s been fifteen years. I live here, Brooks. This is my home, and these are my friends.”

I cross my arms over my chest as resentment bubbles up in my stomach.

“I mean, I get it. We don’t have to be friends.”

“We’re nothing,” I finally grind out, andher face falls.

Fuck.

I don’t want to feel anything for her. I don’t want to feel bad for her. I don’t want towanther.

“I can’t hide away when I’m not at work and have no life. That’s what I’m trying to say.” She slides her shoe back on and leans back in the chair, mirroring me with her arms crossed under breasts that have only gotten better with time. “I won’t hide. I didn’t do what?—”

“I don’t want your fucking words.” I lean forward, sure to keep my voice low so only she can hear me. “I don’t give a shit what you have to say. You’re right. It’s been a long time. Live your life, Jules, I don’t fucking care. Just ignore me. If we’re in the same place at the same time,I don’t exist for you.Do you hear me? I don’t want to talk to you. I don’t feel anything for you.”

She blinks, swallows, and then nods. “Okay.”

“You’re nothing.”You were everything.“And that’s the way it’s going to stay.”