Page 90 of Maid of Dishonor

A laugh bursts out of me at this, my cheeks heating, the pulse starting to dance in my veins. “Like you’re one to talk,” I say. “You’re no better! You do that thing where when you’re sweaty, you lift up your shirt to wipe your face—”

“You like that, huh?” he says, grinning over at me.

“Shut up,” I say, my face turning even more red. “You know you look good. And that sexy little smirk you do, and the bedroom eyes?”

“I donothavebedroom eyes—” he scoffs.

“You do too,” I cut him off. “Don’t fight me on this. I know a creepy amount about you. Iwillwin.”

He laughs at this. “Fine,” he says. “Agree to disagree. You should know, though, that I will now be trying to use the ‘sexy little smirk’ and ‘bedroom eyes’ on you whenever I can.”

Oh, no! Carter wants to make attractive faces at me? However will I survive?

“Do your worst” is all I say.

We drive the rest of the way to Maya’s in silence, our fingers intertwined, shooting little smiles at each other every now and then. We are apparentlythatcouple, and to be honest, I don’t hate it.

We do tone it down once we get there, though, although neither of us verbalize it. We unlink our fingers when Carter knocks on the door, and instead of standing pressed up against his side, I reluctantly scoot over a few inches.

It just seems sort of cruel to rub our honeymoon phase in Maya’s face when she’s currently undergoing her own relationship crisis—that “crisis” being that she’s engaged to the worst human ever.

When she opens the door, she doesn’t greet us. She actually doesn’t say anything at all. She just steps aside and gestures wordlessly, letting us in. So we sidle past her, exchanging covert looks as we all move to her living room. It feels strangely formal, the way we sit ourselves on the couch and then wait for her to do the same with her usual sofa across from ours. Like we’re gathering together, waiting for an important meeting to start.

The feeling is drawn out when no one speaks; it’s just us looking at Maya and Maya looking at us. There are still tear tracks on her face, but at the moment no actual crying is happening. And though I’m tempted to ask what’s going on, to ask what’s wrong, something stops me.

Finally, Maya speaks. Or rather, she explodes; the words erupt from her as though they’re fire on her tongue and they must be expelled.

“I can’t do it,” she blurts out. “I can’t.” She shakes her head, several strands of hair escaping from her loose ponytail in the process. “I can’t do it.”

Hope rises in my chest, fresh and green like spring, but I stall it before it gets too far. “What do you mean?” I say slowly, and beside me, Carter nods.

“Yeah,” he says, his body tensing. “What’s going on?”

The answering silence is so anticipatory that I can almost imagine Carter is crossing his fingers behind his back—or that, like me, he’s chanting to himself,Say it! Say it! Say it!Still, the room is quiet, save for the tapping of Carter’s toe as we wait.

“Do you know,” Maya says, staring at the poster on the wall, “why I was so upset about your omens? The tarot card and the horoscope and all that?” She swallows thickly, and when her gaze finally finds mine, I see the tears threatening to fall. Then she buries her face in her hands and says in a muffled voice, “Because they weren’t real.”

She was upset…because they weren’t real? That same hope rises even further in my chest. Because that must mean—

“You’re not going to marry Chet,” I say softly, and next to me I feel Carter straighten up.

Slowly, she shakes her head. Then, when she reemerges from her hands, she says, “I don’t think Ican.” She’s fully crying now, and I wipe impatiently at my own stinging eyes.

“So, wait,” Carter says. “Just to make sure—the wedding is off?”

Maya hesitates, her lower lip still trembling, and then she nods.

And you’d think the Cardinals had just won the World Series with how explosively Carter reacts. In a completely inappropriate display, he jumps up and fist punches the air in victory. “Yes!” he shouts. “Yes! I knew it!”

But he breaks off when he sees me glaring at him. Maya might have chosen to call off the wedding, but she’sright here, and she’s clearly not feeling great.

“Right,” he says, sitting down immediately. “Right. Um.” Wincing, he rubs the back of his neck. “I’m…sorry.”

Maya gives a sort of snort-laugh and says, “Yeah. Clearly.”

He sighs, deflating a little, and moves over to her couch to sit next to her. Putting his arm around her shoulders, he says, “Crap. I’m sorry, Maya. I really am. I won’t lie and say I think the wedding was a good idea, but I am sorry you’re hurting.”

It’s a much better response than celebratory fist pumps.

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