Page 54 of Kiss Me Ever After
Amber chewed thoughtfully on a crisp. “I wondered about having a party here, but Mum’s not keen. She doesn’t want to come back to a trashed house.”
“If you invite the right people though that won’t happen.”
“You know what it’s like around here, someone tells someone, who tells someone else and before you know it, the party’s on local news as an anti-social behaviour story.”
“I didn’t have that problem.”
“Candace still turned up though, didn’t she?”
Since Candace had spoken to me at my party with her veiled threat, none of us had seen her. It was almost as if she’d disappeared. Whatever it was she had over me obviously wasn’t that important.
“True. Lucky for me Curtis has never shagged her.” Amber clutched her chest and raised her eyes to the skies.
“Thank God. What about Alex?”
“Don’t know, don’t care. Although I credit my brother with some sense. I never found her here, so if they did it was at hers.”
A pang of guilt hit me for slut shaming Candace. I don’t know what Justin saw in her when they were together. She didn’t matter now, though. Whatever they had was history and, in the past, whereas Justin and I were all about the future.
“Back to your birthday then.” I took another swig of wine. Organising Amber was worse than herding cats.
“Oh God, I don’t know. I’m going to be twenty-three. It’s not as if it’s a special birthday or anything.” She sighed.
“Maybe twenty-three is the new twenty-one. Whatever we do, we’ll make it special and you’ll be the centre of attention.”
Amber placed a hand on her chest. “What? It’s all about little old me?”
“No different to any other day really,” I teased.
She threw a handful of crisps at me, scattering them all over the table. “It will need to be epic. The last party of your summer. Maybe we can combine it with your going away party?”
My heart sank. As of now, I didn’t know if I had a place to live, so it was difficult to know when I would be going away. “No,” I said, firmly. “I can’t take the limelight away from you. We’ll do something else for me when the time comes.”
“You will come back here though, won’t you? I mean, it’s not like you’re leaving forever.”
“Justin will be here, of course I’ll be back. You probably won’t be able to get rid of me.”
“Good. I’ll still miss you though.” Amber smiled.
“I’m sure Justin will feel the same. You can comfort each other during the hard times.” I laughed. “Not too much though, because me and Curtis would be jealous.”
My phone pinged. I pulled it out of my pocket to see a message from my Mum asking if I’d heard anything about the apartment. As I started to reply, a call came through. It was a number I didn’t recognise. My fingers itched. Could it be the news I was waiting for? I abandoned my message and stabbed the screen to accept the call.
“Hello?” My voice came out more high-pitched than usual.
“Oh hi, is that Lennon?” A male voice. It was familiar, but I couldn’t place who it belonged to.
“Yes.”
“Great, I’m pleased to have got hold of you. This is Lucas, I’m calling following your viewing this morning.”
Immediately, I felt sick. Lucas was about to make or break my summer.
25
Justin
“Christ, you’re miserable tonight.”Alex slammed a pint down in front of me. “What’s wrong? Bright lights of London too much for you?”
