Page 87 of Bro Smooth
“Have the doctors come out to give you an update yet on how everything is going?” asks Elliot, taking one of my hands in both of his.
“Uh.” I can see the receptionist watching us, probably wondering if she should call security. I give her a little wave and smile to let her know I’m okay. “What are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be on your way to Seattle?”
“We’ve been worried about you,” Felix tells me, running a hand along my jawline and cupping it gently around the back of my neck. “You haven’t been answering our calls and texts, we didn’t know what was going on.”
“We came to your campus. We’re sorry, we didn’t mean to stalk you, but we didn’t know what else to do,” says Sebastian.
“I blocked your numbers,” I say softly. I’d ghosted them specifically because I didn’t want to do the hard thing and end things with them to their faces. I’d taken the coward’s way out because I knew I wouldn’t be able to say it to their faces. “We’d gotten through my list. I figured it was best if we just stopped seeing each other. I didn’t know how to tell you.”
“Well, it hurt,” murmurs Felix, dropping his hand and taking a step back, like he’s afraid I’ll push him away. “I can’t believe you just cut us out like that without saying anything. I know you didn’t want to call what we were doing dating, but what we had was special, at least to us. We thought you knew that. We never thought you’d just disappear on us without even saying goodbye.” The others nod their agreement. Their pain is etchedacross their faces, and my heart twists seeing and knowing I put it there.
“Even if you don’t want us anymore the way we were, we still want to be your friend,” says Lukas.
“It’ll be hard, but we want you in our lives, however you’re comfortable being there,” says Elliot.
Fuck, I miss them.
Tears are brimming behind my eyelids, but I blink them away as something occurs to me. “Wait, so you went to my school, but how did you know I was here?”
“Your roommate, Ronnie,” says Lukas.
“Ronnie told you where I am?” That doesn’t sound like her. Ronnie keeps referring to them as “the assholes” every time she catches me watching videos of them.
“Well,” hedges Sebastian, “not at first.”
“Definitely not at first,” agrees Elliot, his eyes wide. “At first, she ran over to us at warp speed and yelled at us. A lot.”
Okay, that sounds much more like her.
Felix shudders. “She’s quite terrifying.”
I crack a grin at that, imagining the scene.
“We explained everything to her,” he continues.
“And we’re sure you had your reasons for not telling her the whole story, and we’re sorry for telling her. Now she’s mad at you and made us promise to tell you that you’re, quote, ‘in for it later,’” says Lukas. “We’re also sorry she’s mad at you because of us.”
Fuck. I’m definitely going to have a lot of explaining to do to Ronnie. That’s going to be a rough conversation.
“We really are sorry, but we explained to Ronnie,” says Felix.
“The whole thing was very confusing.” Sebastian brings the conversation back around to the story.
“Yes, it was very confusing,” agrees Felix. “But we explained to Ronnie that we hadn’t broken up with you.”
“You couldn’t have. We weren’t dating,” I say, my voice so small I’m not sure they’ll even hear it.” And we did get Ronnie to promise not to take her anger out on you until your mom is doing better,” Elliot says. Maybe they didn’t hear me. It’s probably for the best.
I shake my head, forcing myself to focus on the basics. “Okay, so now I understand how you knew where I was, but that still doesn’t explain why you’re here.”
“Because your mom is in the hospital and you shouldn’t be here alone,” says Sebastian. Confusion knits his brows together as he tries to figure out why I don’t understand.
“But shouldn’t you be leaving today for Worlds?” I glance at the clock on the wall, calculating how much time I might have with them before they absolutely need to leave, even as I’m telling myself I have no right to want them to stay after everything I’ve put them through.
“You’re more important,” says Lukas, taking my hand and leading me back to my seat.
“I’m not. You might not get another chance at the title.” They’ve worked most of their lives to get to this moment and they can’t give it up. Not for me, or for anyone.
“The only title we want is one from you,” says Felix, sitting on my other side and taking my hand.
