Page 76 of The Fantasy League
She must have run to find me, because not even a minute later I heard the front door slap shut and heavy steps trampling toward the bedroom.
When she opened the bathroom door and found me in a puddle of despair, she didn’t say a word or ask a single question. Instead, she just scooped me up into her arms and held me as I cried away every ounce of heartbreak.
I didn’t know much in life, but I knew one thing for certain. If soul mates were real, she was unequivocally mine.
“Lea sent me the article. I swear to whatever gods are above that I’m going to chop both of his balls off and force him to watch as I slice them with a mandolin.” Rage filled her voice.
“Don’t waste your time. It was all a ruse anyway.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I lied,” I admitted. “Abel didn’t actually ask me to be his girlfriend. Well, he did but he asked me to be hisfakegirlfriend to help trick the tabloids into thinking that he was in a relationship to get the team off his back.”
“Scarlett, why would you agree to that?”
“He offered me his house.” I sighed, suddenly feeling foolish at how all of this sounded saying it out loud. “I knew I could never afford to move into this neighborhood and we both know that I can’t live in your backyard forever, so when he offered me his house, I guess it just seemed like the only way for me to still stay close to you.”
“Scar…” she said softly, wiping the tearstains on my cheeks with her thumb. “You thought I didn’t want to live next to you anymore?”
“Well, yeah…” I slouched my shoulders. “I mean, you bought the most expensive house in the wealthiest neighborhood in town. It seemed like as good of a sign as any.”
She let out a ragged breath. “I probably should’ve told you sooner, but when I bought this house, Ialsobought the house next door that Rita lives in. It wasn’t for sale at the time, but I talked her into it and she’s been renting it from me for the last few months”—which I knew from experience meant Rita wasn’t paying a dime—“I was planning to surprise you with it once the old hag finally kicked the bucket.”
“Mae!”
“Oh, give me a break, she’s ninety-eight! She can’t have that much life left in her. She’s the one who said that if she had any say in it, she wouldn’t make it to her next birthday!” We both laughed. “I would’ve told you sooner if I’d known how you felt. You’re my sister, Scar… I hate to break it to you but we’re stuck together.”
We both did our best to hold back the tears that welled in our eyes.
All this time I thought that she’d given up on the idea of us raising our families together. But she bought a house for me. Right next door to hers. Like we’d always dreamed of.
My chin quivered, trying to hold back a sob. “Thank you.”
“I’d do anything for you, Scar.” She hugged me tightly and neither of us let go for a long while. “I do have one question though. If this whole thing with you and Abel was all fake… why are we crying on the bathroom floor right now?”
I pulled back from our hug and flickered my gaze to the tile floors. “Because somewhere along the way, I became an idiot, and it stopped being fake for me.” I sniffled. “We hooked up in Malibu and he convinced me that he wanted us to be together. Which in my love-drunk state I thought meant together, together, but I’m starting to think he just meant as friends with benefits.”
“Was his dick big at least? It’d be a shame to waste tears over a man with a small dick.”
“Mae!” I squealed with a laugh.
She was the only person who could make me laugh whenever something horrible was going on in my life. The day after Mom passed, instead of focusing on funeral arrangements and listening to detached condolences from distant friends and relatives, she and Dads took turns doing stand-up comedy routines until I peed my pants laughing… twice.
“I didn’t see it. We just fooled around.”
“That’s a damn shame.” Mae rolled her eyes, which made me laugh again despite the tears that were rolling down my cheeks. “You’ll make it through this, Scar. You always do.”
* * *
I couldn’t sleep.
Mae passed out in my bed hours ago while I tossed and turned underneath the covers. Exhaustion swept through my body, and my brain worked overtime trying to piece together answers to the questions that I would never get the chance to ask.
I hated that part of heartbreak. That piece of time where you sat in limbo between figuring out your new reality while silently mourning your old one.
In a way, falling out of love is like reading a good book. You become so attached to a character and how they make you feel. You follow alongside part of their story and somewhere along the way, they become a part of you, so you do everything in your power to prolong the ending. No matter how inevitable it may be. And the heartbreak of reality after you’ve removed yourself from their world is only worsened by the delay.
The only difference between books and real-life heartbreak was that in real life, it happened quickly. In the sixty seconds it took to read an article and see the smile on his face in the photos,the culmination of the love I’d come to have for him over the last three months came to naught.
