Page 117 of Mr. Swoony

“It probably sucks.” I sound like a whiner.

“I’m sure it’s great. Now let’s finish this. I assume you don’t want to tell the story twice, so we’ll save the talk about my shithead brother and finish this thing so it’s ready with three forks when Jade gets here.” Kyleigh smiles at me, and when I join her on the other side of the counter, she opens her arms and hugs me. “He’s a good guy. But sometimes good guys do some really stupid shit.” She squeezes me tightly. “I told him I’m going to knee him in the nuts if you’re not my sister-in-law one day because you can’t put up with his idiotic behavior.”

I laugh. “Thanks. I know he’s a good guy, but I’m so sick of men acting like I’m some delicate flower.”

She nods. “I gotcha.”

Fifteen minutes later, there’s another knock on the door. Kyleigh opens it, sticking her head out into the stairway while Jade walks in.

“You’re the only one who can talk sense into him,” Kyleigh shouts up the stairs.

“Thanks for the confidence, babe,” Rowan shouts back.

Jade drops her purse on the floor and sheds her coat, tossing it on the back of the chair before she wraps me up in a hug. “Men are assholes. I told Henry he better make sure I don’t follow him up there and punch Conor in the gut.”

I smile at both my oldest best friend and my newest best friend. “Thanks, girls. I really appreciate the girl power.”

“Cake?” Jade’s eyes bug out of her head.

“It was supposed to be for Conor, so I say we smash it in his bed.” Kyleigh gets an evil look in her eye.

“You’re very destructive,” I say.

“Hey, I have a lifetime of noogies to pay him back for.” She scoops up another heap of frosting and spreads it on the two-layer cake. “I’m kidding anyway. We’re going to eat it of course.”

“You made a cake. Cross it off your list.” Jade pats me on the back.

When she says list, all I can think of is Conor bringing home those cake supplies so I could cross it off my list. God, I already miss him, but I’m so mad at him.

Once the caked is iced, Kyleigh digs three forks out of the drawer and hands them out to us. “Now tell us what happened and who this girl is.”

We circle the cake on the stools, and I tell them the entire story Conor told me about Florida and how she’s tracked him down here.

Afterward, Jade runs her hand down my upper arm. “I get it. I do. And you definitely need to have a conversation, but…” She looks at Kyleigh.

“What?”

“You’re his first,” Kyleigh says, raising her fork. “Which is no excuse. I’m not making excuses for him lying to you and not trusting you with the information, but he’s new to this whole girlfriend thing.”

“I’m really shocked at how well he’s been doing,” Jade says more to Kyleigh than me.

“The jersey thing floored me.” Kyleigh pierces the cake with her fork and takes another bite.

“Just the whole way he’s been with you. You didn’t see him before.” Jade takes another bite. “Honestly, this is a good cake, Eloise.”

I shrug, but it’s edible, so that’s an improvement at least. “What do you mean I didn’t see him before?”

They look at one another again, and I groan.

“He wasn’t looking for a girlfriend. It’s not like he had a rotating door of women, but he gave no one a chance. Then one night under the stars with you, and bam, he’s ready to buy a ring.” Kyleigh smiles. “He has good taste though. You’re marriage material. The others, I’m not so sure.”

“My problem is that he broke my trust. I felt his anxiety with the season starting. He was so worried what his schedule would do to us, and I took that as a lack of trust on my part.”

Jade shakes her head. “That’s not it. I think they feel the distance more than us sometimes. Not to say we don’t miss them, but we’re living our lives while they’re at away games in a hotel or on a plane or a bus. We all have careers, I have Bodhi, a house that’s being renovated. But to them, we’re just sitting here twiddling our thumbs waiting for them to return.”

We all laugh.

“Jade’s right. You know how many times Rowan calls me while he’s away? Sometimes if he struggles napping, he expects me to talk to him until he has to get on the bus to go to the rink. As though I don’t have things to do.” Kyleigh shakes her head.

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