Total pages in book: 18
Estimated words: 16403 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 82(@200wpm)___ 66(@250wpm)___ 55(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 16403 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 82(@200wpm)___ 66(@250wpm)___ 55(@300wpm)
I wipe my face and keep my hands busy, fiddling with the clasp of my watch, focusing on the tiny mechanism rather than looking at him. "I wanted to give Gram her present before the party."
"Good call." He settles on the edge of his bed, and I can feel him watching me as I step out of the bathroom. "Everything okay? You seem..."
"Did you know Gram set us up?"
Heath goes still for a moment and bursts out laughing. "I know. She's not as good an actress as she thinks."
He has no idea. No clue that everything has changed in the space of an afternoon, that the ground has shifted beneath us in a way that can't be undone.
Finally, I look up and meet his eyes for the first time since he walked into the room.
"So did you sleep with me out of pity, or because I was simply available? Or both?"
6
HEATH
The word "pity" comes out of her mouth and I just stare at her.
"Pity?"
I can't process it. Can't make sense of what she's asking or where it's coming from. She asked if I slept with her out of pity or because she was available, and I'm sitting here trying to work backwards to how we got from last night to this.
"What are you talking about, Harriet?"
She won't look at me. Her whole body is turned toward the window, shoulders pulled in tight, and she's doing something with her watch, turning it around her wrist over and over.
"Was I your second choice? Did you sleep with me because you couldn't have her?"
"Her who?"
But even as I ask it, something cold starts spreading in my chest because I think I know where this is going.
"Penelope."
Suddenly, I'm a teenager again, confused as hell because everyone kept assuming something that was never true. But Harriet's not a teen. She's twenty-eight and she's been carrying this around for how long?
"You think I was in love with Penelope." I scrub a hand across my face. "Jesus, Harriet. Is that why you ran ten years ago? You thought I was settling for you?"
She finally looks at me then, and her eyes are wet. "Weren't you?"
I have to sit down on the edge of my bed.
"I need you to tell me everything," I say. "Whatever you think I did, whatever you heard, all of it. Because I'm completely lost here."
She wipes her cheek with the back of her hand. "Remember that bookstore job we talked about? I kept overhearing things through the wall. Cross Cakes was right next door."
Right. The thin walls in those old downtown buildings. I nod for her to keep going.
"I heard her talking to you. 'Why are you so obsessed with me, Heath?' and 'You always know where to find me even when school's out.' It sounded like she was trying to get you to back off, and you kept coming around anyway."
Ah, shit.
The pieces start clicking together and I feel sick. All those conversations where Penelope was giving me shit about Harriet, and Harriet was on the other side of the wall hearing it backwards.
"And everyone knew," she continues. "Everyone knew you wanted her. The golden boy and the popular girl, right? Except she was with Cole Matthews, so you couldn't have her. And then that night when I realized you might actually kiss me, I just—" Harriet swallows hard. "I couldn't be the girl you kissed because the one you wanted wasn't available."
She stops talking and I just sit there taking it in.
"You've got it completely backwards, Harriet."
She laughs, but there's no humor in it. "Do I?"
"I was on that block because you were there. At the bookstore. I got you that job partly so you'd be there and I'd have a reason to keep showing up."
Her thumb stops moving on her watch. "What?"
"Those conversations you heard? Penelope wasn't trying to get me to back off from her. She was giving me shit about being obsessed with you. 'Why are you so obsessed with me' was her making fun of me for asking about you all the time, hounding her about what you were doing next door."
Harriet's eyes widen, her forehead scrunching, and I keep going.
"She was my back channel. I'd ask her where you hung out, who you were with, if you were seeing anyone. She called herself my Chief Information Officer as a joke. Every line you heard and filed away as evidence that I was chasing her was actually about you."
"But she was with Cole—"
"Penelope tried to make it work with Cole and couldn't. She likes girls, Harriet. Always has. The whole assumed pairing with me never made sense because we were never anything but friends."
Her shoulders drop. "The hug today. You looked—"
"She told me she's bringing her girlfriend to lunch tomorrow to meet her parents for the first time. I hugged her because I'm proud of her and happy for her."