Page 6 of Finding Jack
Fat chance. Paul was a chronic insomniac who rarely slept more than four hours a night, but I nodded. “I totally get it. I’ll call you tomorrow.”
He hugged me and pressed a short kiss against my lips, so short that I could tell how tired he really was. Paul usually left me with pretty great goodnight kisses. I’d told that to Ranée once in an effort to defend him, and she said it was probably because he’d done an intensive kissing technique analysis complete with diagrams.
Okay, that was almost believable. But I didn’t care because I was the beneficiary of either his analysis, his experience, or his natural talent. Or all three. Good kissing was good kissing.
I fell asleep before Ranée got home, and she was still asleep when I woke up, so I set to work trying to crack the prank mystery without her. It was still up on her Facebook wall with about fifty reactions and a string of questions. “Who is this?” “Cute couple!” “Did she break up with Paul?”
I contemplated dragging Ranée out of bed for answers, but there were friendlier rattlesnakes than a just-woken Ranée.
I examined the picture more closely. It was another Photoshop, but how’d this Jack guy do it? I didn’t own a silver dress like the one “I” was wearing in the picture.
I did a Google image search for the restaurant name and hit the jackpot deep on the tenth page. Or the “Jack”pot. I snorted at my own joke. He’d stuck our heads onto another couple who’d celebrated on a different night at Pacifica. There was the sparkly silver dress but on a brunette, and there was the button-down shirt on some other dude.
He was tagged in the picture too.
Wait.
I didn’t even have to wait for Ranée to wake up to solve this. I clicked on his name to find the messaging link. Time to stop this idiocy.
EMILY: The photos are weird. Knock it off.
I got the “…” typing dots. Then they disappeared. Then they reappeared. It happened at least three more times. Finally, a message popped up.
JACK: Hi.
EMILY: Stop
JACK: Sure.
JACK: But
JACK: What are we talking about?
EMILY: The pictures on Ranée’s FB.
JACK: Uh…brb.
JACK: Those were not me.
EMILY: That’s not you in the picture?
JACK: No, that’s me.
EMILY: Did you Photoshop that picture?
JACK: Yes.
EMILY: Then take it down.
JACK: I didn’t post that. Isn’t Ranée your roommate? Can’t you take this up with her?
My fingers hesitated over the keyboard. It was a fair question. But Ranée had refused to delete it so far. And there was the whole issue of her being scary in the morning.
I dropped my hands to my lap. Now I felt kind of dumb for yelling at this guy for doing what Ranée had asked. I was about to close the laptop and wait for her to wake up so I could yell at her instead when another DM popped up.
JACK: Are they really freaking you out?
EMILY: Yes to the millionth power.
