Page 20 of The Ex Effect
I stood, moved toward the coat closet and fiddled with the squeaky door handle. Of course, part of this was simply seeing Morgan’s name pop up over and over on my screen. Even though the shock dulled, I always tensed before pulling up the messages.
“So, what are you going to do?” she asked.
“Honestly, I don’t know. If I’m the reason that Tommy doesn’t get the wedding he and Olivia want, I’ll feel like shit,” I said. “But spending a summer with my ex is not how I envisioned this trip back home. I’m trying to put things to rest, not stir up any drama.”
Maybe I was the asshole here, though. Besides packing up Peaches’s house, I did have the time. And it was pretty obvious that Pete and Patty’s place was the couple’s last option. Working outside for the summer sounded pretty damn good, too. But inside, I knew I was holding back because of this deep-seated anger towards Morgan. When she broke up with me all those years ago, I held on to that grudge like a bulldog. She crushed me, to the deepest part of my soul, and still had not apologized. Doing her a massive favor like this felt like I was tipping the scales in her favor again. Doing what she wanted to do, because she said. Just like when we were together.
“I think you’ll make the right decision,” Quinn said.
She didn’t need to say any more. I knew exactly what she meant.Dammit.
“All right, blue-whale-in-the-room question.”
I grinned. “You do know the phrase iselephantin the room, right? I’d hate for you to be in a boardroom and drop that little zinger.”
“Um, yes, but a blue whale is bigger than an elephant, so I’m starting a trend,” Quinn huffed. “Besides, the people at work are humorless, so I test things on you to see if they’ll land in the real world.”
“It didn’t land.”
“Good to know.” Quinn sipped again. “Sooo, have you heard from the big dogs yet?”
The big dogs. AKABirch & Willow. My dream. Mylove. Even though it had only been a few weeks—and they said it would take at least a month or two—I had a delusion that my portfolio and interview chops blew everyone else out of the water, and the hiring manager had slammed her hands on the desk and loudly declared, “I don’t need to see any more. We found the one!”
I lowered myself to the ground and ran my hands through the shaggy carpet. “Not yet.”
Quinn paused. “It’s going to happen. Lunar year, moons aligned, stars everywhere,going to happen.”
“Oh no. You’ve been watching too many reels while I’m gone.”
“Well, what the hell else can I do at night when you’re not here to read me a bedtime story?”
I chuckled. “By bedtime story, you mean our true crime docuseries on Netflix.”
“Obvi,” Quinn said. “For real, though, you’re super gifted. It’ll happen, manifesting or not. You got this.”
God, I missed my little sister. When she moved in with me after everything that went down in New York, it had been a mutually beneficial financial decision. But now I couldn’t imagine a better roommate. “I really don’t hate you.”
“I really don’t hate you, either,” Quinn said. “I gotta go.”
I treated myself to a few more moments of quiet before diving in to organizing.Okay, okay… where do I start?Closets, bathroom, kitchen, or garage.Oh!Linen closet.
The closet held ratty towels tumbling over themselves, bins of products and medicines, rags, a half dozen empty spray bottles. I popped my hands on my hips for a moment, then started dropping towels into a bin.
Wait. Towels would make a good insulator for glass. I slid the box against the wall and moved to the kitchen instead but pivoted. The kitchen had too many items with too many memories, and the linen closet had no emotional attachment. I could do everything else besides the towels.
Good plan. I snapped open a garbage bag and moved to dump the container of meds into it.Wait.Can you just throw expired meds in the garbage, or would that seep into the landfills? Is this something I should turn in to the local fire or police station? The last thing I need is to mess with the pristine air around here and have karma pay me a visit.
I googled expired medication disposal. Christ, there was a ton of information. Articles on state rules and guidelines, prescription meds vs syrups vs pills, landfills, and poisoning the earth and…
Maybe I should just finish the kitchen. Or maybe I should take down all the paintings. Yes! Good idea. But would I want to keep any of them? Hmmm. I might want to, but we don’t have a ton of space in our two-bedroom apartment. Maybe I’ll ask?—
Stop it. God damn my brain sometimes. I grabbed a notepad from the nightstand and scribbled.
Bedroom
