Page 22 of Just Another Meet Cute
He sighed loudly. “It’s not. At least not with my family. But it’s the price I have to pay to get my weekly dose of ph?. Otherwise, my entire week is screwed up.”
I laughed. “Well, we wouldn’t want that to happen, would we?”
“Definitely not.”
A low and muffled girl’s voice called out over on his end. “Ryan, what are you—wait, are you on the phone withher?”
“Yes …”
“Let me—”
“No, you can’t—”
There was a loudthudnoise and then silence. “Hello? Ryan?”
“Hi, Nina!” The girl’s voice was loud now and slightly high-pitched. “I’m Ryan’s sister, Kathy.”
“Uh, hi.”
“I’m so glad to finally talk to you. Ryan’s been going on and on about you since you two met.” There was a distinct low groan in the background. “And I seriously mean on and on. The dude won’t shut up about how awesome you are.”
My cheeks instantly flushed from her gushing. “Thanks, I guess.”
Kathy let out a gasp. “Why don’t you come over to the house now? I have tomeet the heroine who saved my dear Anh. I’ll repay you with a homemade bowl of life-changing ph?. It’s only fair.”
“I don’t know if I should—”
“You know what? You’re right. Our ph? is better than saving Ryan’s measly life. Oh well, you should still come over anyway. I’ll text you our address!”
Before I could say no again, Ryan’s voice came back on the phone. “I’m sorry about her. She can be so annoying sometimes. No, wait, all the time.”
“Hey!”
I couldn’t help laughing. “It’s okay. She seems nice. I like her.”
Ryan let out a heavy sigh. “You may change your mind once you meet her later … or another day. You really don’t have to come over if you don’t want to.”
“Yes, you do!” Kathy piped up in the background.
“Would you shut—” There was some scuffling and muffled voices before his phone hung up on me.
Okay …
I waited another minute or two to see if Ryan would call me back, but he didn’t. He did send me a text with a sad face and a tear though. Two seconds later, my phone buzzed again as I received another text. This time it was from an unknown number with an address with a ton of smiley emojis and exclamation points.
My finger fiddled with my phone as I debated what to do. Somehow, this felt like a sign. Like this was the perfect opportunity to come clean. I could go over to his house to return his jacket. Just be like, “This ph? is delicious; by the way, remember this jacket? It’s a funny story. It’s yours, and I’m the girl from the hike. Surprise!”
Okay, maybe notexactlylike that.
Still, maybe everything would turn out okay. I mean, Ryan would probably understand. After all, the fact that we had met before wasn’tthatbig of a deal. Maybe he would even think it’s funny.
As long as I didn’t tell himeverything, just enough to ease my guilt. The entire truth might be pushing it. Especially the gym stuff and three-day laundromat stakeout. Besides, like Linh said, stalking or not, Ididsave his life. I think I deserved to keep that little bit to myself as a reward.
Making my decision, I quickly texted Ryan that I’d be at his house in half an hour. “It should be okay. No, itwillbe okay,” I muttered to myself.
Hopefully if I said that enough times, then it would end up being true.
No turning back now.
