Page 119 of Party Favors

It was like I had almost had everything I’d ever wanted and he’d just yanked it away from me.

I couldn’t have said how long I lay there for, but eventually Vella came home. When she entered the room, she had one hand over her eyes. “I’m home! And I’m loudly announcing it just in case!”

“Max isn’t here,” I said.

She dropped her hand. “Why are you lying there like a starfish? Are you having to rest after finally sliding into home base?” At my blank expression she added, “Did you score a home run?”

“Only if a home run is when you hit a foul ball that knocks out a little old lady in the stands and the bat breaks and impales the catcher. Why are we talking about sex like it’s baseball?”

“I was doing it for your virgin ears,” she said. She grabbed a chair and brought it over to my bed. “What happened?”

“One minute we were making out and then he just stopped. I thought guys didn’t do that.”

“They usually don’t,” she said, looking faintly alarmed. “Most guys wouldn’t stop even if an asteroid from outer space landed on them. Did you kick him someplace you shouldn’t have?”

“No, I ... I don’t think so.”

“Maybe he’s married?” she offered. “I had a guy abandon me early in an evening once because he had to get home to the wife he didn’t tell me he had.”

“You seriously find the worst people to date.”

“I am in complete agreement with you. But something had to have happened with Max.”

“Well, I told him that I loved him, and if a crime reporter had been describing it, they would have said that he immediately fled the scene.”

“Wait, you told him you loved him?”

“Yes,” I said, worried about her incredulous tone.

“Everly! Why would you do that?”

“You were the one saying that I was in love with him!”

She rolled her eyes. “Which you are, but as my uncle Morty used to say, great Jehoshaphat! I didnottell you to tell Max. Have you met a man before? You never fire unless fired upon first.”

“I wasn’t shooting at him, I was being honest with him about how I felt.” I hadn’t realized that it would be such a bad thing to tell him. I should have known better. But I had been caught up and not thinking all that clearly. “And we have shared so many intimate things with each other about ourselves—things from our past that no one else knows, our secret hopes and dreams. He doesn’t seem to have any problem with those. But we get close physically and he shuts down.”

“It usually works the other way around, just so you know. I expected better from him. I never would have figured Max for a walking cliché. You say ‘I love you’ and he runs out of here like his hair was on fire. Which I might do the next time I see him. Coward.”

“The saddest part is that this is probably the best relationship I’ve ever had with a man. Not that it’s been much of a horse race.”

She patted me on the arm. “Do you want to watchThe Bionic Womanwith me?”

“Okay.” I tested my limbs and all the feeling seemed to have returned to them. Vella put the chair away and I got up slowly and made my way over to the couch.

It probably wasn’t fair to Max that I had gone fromyes, let’s be more than friendstooh, and by the way, I’m also in love with youin a single day.

As someone who had spent most of her life worrying about what other people thought and putting their feelings first, I hadn’t done that at all here. It hadn’t occurred to me how Max might take my confession. I probably should have considered it before I said something.

Then again, I couldn’t regret telling him. In my quest to be more like Kat, I wanted to be more open about my feelings and the things I wanted, and this was part of it. I did love Max and I wanted him to know that.

Even if it scared him.

My phone started ringing and Vella was the one who located it in my purse, which I had dropped on the floor when I came into the apartment. She glanced at the screen and her eyebrows raised as she said, “It’s Max!”

My heart pounded hard and slow and I had to swallow the bitter taste in my mouth. I was afraid of what he was going to say. I waited until the last possible moment and then I answered. “Hello?”

“Everly? I am trying to learn from my mistakes and communicate better. I didn’t want to just disappear on you again.”

---