My Favorite Half-Night Stand (Page 25)

R.

I sit back in my chair. I don’t even know what to call this emotion in my chest. Fondness melted with anger and hurt. This wasn’t just a quick note after he was with me. This is a letter.

I bend, cupping my forehead. How much leeway do I get here to be mad? On the one hand, we’d just had sex—twice—and then he left to go write another woman. On the other hand, I am that woman, and am lying to him every time I pretend I’m not. Neither of us is innocent here, but at least I’m only sleeping with Reid and writing Reid. He’s sleeping with me and writing two other—!

I scroll back through his message again, zooming in.

“Uh, what are you doing?”

I swallow a scream when I turn and see Ed standing over me with a leftover rib in his hand. His eyes are glued to my screen.

“Working!” I shove the phone into my pocket, hoping he doesn’t notice the way the cord is stretched taut between me the wall. I rest a casual elbow on the table and absently twist a piece of my hair. “I just needed to get my laptop.”

Ed makes Disappointed Seth Rogen Face at me. “So where is it?”

“Where’s what?”

Frowning, I track him as he walks to where my laptop bag is still hanging by the door, and back as he sets it on the table. God damn it.

Ed pulls out the chair next to me and sits. He takes a bite of rib, chews, swallows, thinks. “It’s funny because it looks like you’re pretending to be Catherine, and it sounds like you had sex with Reid last night.”

I bark out a laugh that echoes in the empty kitchen. “What! That’s insane! How much did you have to drink?”

I stand and move to step around him, only to be stopped short by the cord jerking me backward.

“Mills,” he says, “I’m in the room next to yours, and in case you haven’t noticed, the walls are pretty thin. I heard all about some ‘spot’ you wanted him to ‘keep hitting.’ I hope you both refreshed with electrolytes afterward, because”—he whistles—“wow.”

“I . . .” My eyes dart around the kitchen, hoping the correct response will materialize on one of the community flyers on the fridge. “Okay, there’s a good explanation for all that.”

Ed scoots back, propping his feet on the edge of the table. “I’m ready when you are.”

Defeat and panic make me insane. I grab Ed by the shoulders. “Don’t tell him I’m Catherine,” I say in a burst. “If he finds out . . . I . . .” I shake my head and start again, “He . . .”

To his credit, Ed doesn’t seem to be taking much joy from my mortification. He sits up and holds his hands out in front of him. “What were you thinking? That you didn’t want him to like Daisy?”

“Yes?”

“But you wanted him to like Catherine?”

I nod emphatically. I know the answer to this question. “Yes.”

“But there isn’t a Catherine.”

“No. I mean, yes. It’s my middle name . . .”

Ed rolls his eyes. “Well in that case, it’s totally okay. So what happens if he does like Catherine? Won’t he eventually want to meet her? I mean, you? Since you’re Catherine.”

I glance back over his shoulder and hiss, “Can you stop saying Catherine so many times?”

He glares at me. “Do you like him?”

“Reid? What? No.” I double down on this answer, even though it feels a lot like lying. “Not like that.”

“I love how offended you look, considering what I had to listen to last night.” He stands and walks to the fridge, opening the door and pulling out a beer. “I am not drunk enough for this yet.”

“Ed, it’s like seven in the morning.”

He wheels on me. “I will not be judged by you!”

Holding up my hands in defense, I tell him through a laugh, “Fine, sorry, sorry.”

He cracks the bottle open and returns to his seat. “Now you. Out with it.”

“Okay.” Deep breath. Calm down. “I started an account because you guys gave me shit about how boring mine was, and also I was getting matched with a lot of assholes. But then Reid somehow matched with me—as Cat. I thought he’d figure it out because I made some stupid crack about Monopoly. And Girls Trip. And cats. But he didn’t!”

I wait.

Ed blinks. “You are not blaming Reid here for being too dumb to know he’s talking to you online.”

Yes. “No.” I groan, dropping my head to my arms on the table. “When you guys started talking about how Catherine must be ugly, I guess I got a little competitive.”

“Well, at least it sounds like you had a proportionate response. What could possibly go wrong?”

“Shut up. I know.”

“We were all doing this together,” he says. “Am I the only person taking this dating plan seriously?”

When I sit up again, he’s looking at me with Sad Ed eyes, and I can barely stand it. “I’m taking it seriously. I promise. It just . . .” I flounder. “Once I started being Cat it felt—I don’t know—easier to be more open? Is that weird?”

“Not really,” he admits. “I think I get why you’d want to keep it to yourself. But . . . it’s Reid. You know? You’re lying to Reid. That’s like lying to your dad or something.”

“No, Ed, it’s nothing like that. Please don’t put Reid and dads—”

“It’s bad, is what I’m saying.”

“I know how bad it is,” I hiss, and the truth rolls out of me without warning, “but it’s also sort of nice.”

He tilts his head down, staring up at me through thick eyebrows. “It’s ‘nice’?”

I feel my cheeks heat. My explanation comes out meek: “I like being able to talk to Reid like this. Is that terrible?”

Ed stares at me with gentle pity. “You are a mess, you know this, right?”

I sit up. “You won’t tell him, will you?”

I can’t even fathom what I’d do if Reid found out. Am I in too deep? I mean . . . it doesn’t feel like a runaway train yet. It feels like we’re getting to know each other, like a sweet entrée into . . . a different place for us. But the idea of Ed saying something to Reid before I can figure out how to fix this so thoroughly nauseates me that it chases away any residual hurt-anger that Reid left my bed to go write Cat. I am, without a doubt, the bad guy here.

Ed runs a hand through his hair and looks around the room. “I won’t say anything. But this kind of thing is sort of hard to juggle, Mills.”

Chapter ten

reid

Millie has to walk past my bedroom to get to the stairs, and I hear her passing by around seven in the morning. I know it’s her because I hear her shushing Bailey and cleverly avoiding the squeakiest spots in the hallway—something Alex and Ed would never think to do.

It’s hot—Mom habitually overheats the house—too hot to stay under the covers, too hot to stay in my own skin with the cacophony of thoughts skidding around inside my head after last night with Millie.

Once was a fun accident.

Twice is two data points, and my brain scratches around trying to find a pattern.

Both times we were hanging out with friends.

Both times there was alcohol—although neither of us was drunk last night.

Both times there was—what? Mention of dates, other people, or the lack of partners in our lives?

And last night wasn’t even a single quickie, in and out, back to our respective rooms. It was a night together. We went up around eleven and I snuck out around three—long after everyone else had gone to bed—tiptoeing down the hall, and leaving Millie naked and visibly comatose on her bed as if a storm had blown through.

Was leaving a bad idea? Or would it have been awkward to wake up in bed together? Especially if we had to explain it to anyone else. I feel faintly nauseous, like this could go very bad very quickly. I know conversations about relationships and feelings aren’t in Millie’s wheelhouse, but in this case I feel like we need to have one.

Downstairs, only Millie and Ed are up. I heard the murmur of voices, but they’ve since moved to the back patio, and when I join them I wish I could say I’m surprised to find Ed with a beer in his hand at seven thirty in the morning, but I’m not. Millie is staring out at the vineyards. Ed is so intensely engrossed in Dad’s morning delivery of the New York Times that he doesn’t even look up when I step out onto the back patio.

“Mills,” I say.

She turns her face to me, giving me a bright smile. “Morning, sunshine!”

I draw back reflexively, jarred. The greeting is too loud, too over-the-top. Especially considering that the last real sound I heard her make was a long, relieved exhale before she passed out face-first into the mattress.

Her eyes flicker over to Ed, and then back to me. “What’s up?”

“Wanna go for a walk?” I ask, lifting my chin to indicate the tidy rows of vineyards that seem to stretch for an eternity.

She looks down at her bare feet, thinking it over for a few seconds, and then hops up. “Sure!” Again, too loud. “Just a sec. I’ll throw on some shoes.”