Page 125 of Party Favors

“Out now,” she said.

Otis grumbled and got to his feet, shooting me a dirty look on his way out. He slammed the door shut.

“I thought you were done with him,” I said.

“That was like a goodbye make-out session.”

“How was he supposed to hear you say goodbye when you had his ear in your mouth?” I asked, grateful for this tiny distraction from the unbearable pain pressing down on my chest.

“Osmosis?”

But I was too defeated to argue with her that she didn’t understand how osmosis worked. Instead I dropped my bag and wearily took off my shoes. I went over to curl up on the couch next to her. To my surprise she grabbed the blanket and put it over me.

“Why do you look like a sad raccoon?” she asked. “And who do I need to stab?”

“I got fired tonight.” I quickly explained how that had happened.

“Then I quit in solidarity,” she said.

“Who are you going to call and tell that you quit?” It was the weekend; there wasn’t anyone at the office.

“No one.”

“Then how will they know?”

“They’ll figure it out pretty quickly when I don’t show up Monday morning. But I know that’s not why you’re this upset. What happened?”

The story of what Max had done tumbled out of me, but I told it robotically, because I was so exhausted that I couldn’t cry through it like I wanted to. I didn’t have anything left. My tear ducts had tapped out.

The ache in my throat and chest didn’t ease, though. Neither did the stabbing pain in my heart.

When I finished, Vella said, “He pretended to be from Monterra? Like that famous actor’s wife who pretended she was from Spain but she was just a basic girl from Boston? Is Max from Boston?”

“I don’t know where he’s from.” I wondered if everything he’d told me had been a lie. “This is why you couldn’t find anything about Max Colby online. He doesn’t exist.”

She took her phone out and did a search and made a squeaking sound. “Maximilian Wainscott is like private-jet-and-a-mansion-on-every-continent rich. There are so many photos of him online, so many stories on gossip sites. Wow.”

No wonder he’d never told me where he lived. This was probably why I hadn’t ever seen his apartment. Why he never gave me any details about his family. Max probably could have picked my mom and Meemaw out of a lineup, I had told him so much about them.

Why hadn’t I realized how many things he kept from me? I’d been so distracted by my love for him that I hadn’t even noticed.

“What do you want me to tell him when he comes here?” she asked.

“Why would you think he’d come here?”

“Because he’s in love with you, too.”

I shook my head, hard. “He can’t love me. He never would have lied to me if he did. And I told him to leave me alone. That I didn’t want to talk to him and that this was over.”

She nodded thoughtfully. “I think he’ll stay clear for a little while, but he loves you too much to keep completely away from you. But I’m proud of you for standing up for yourself and a boundary that’s important to you.”

“What do you mean?”

“Everly of a month ago would have found a way to make this all okay. You wouldn’t have held Max accountable for what he’d done. And I know making boundaries is hard. Especially for someone like you.”

I nodded. She was right. People-pleasing me would have made excuses for Max. And maybe I hadn’t handled this in the best way, but it was better than letting people walk all over me.

“Maybe I overreacted, though.” I grimaced. There was that people-pleaser part of me that she’d just mentioned, still wanting to make things okay. To take blame for something that wasn’t my fault.

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