47. Mira

47

MIRA

I flop back on my bed and stare at the ceiling.

The ceiling at my old apartment had the decency to have a yellow water stain in the corner next to my closet. I always appreciated that. It gave me something to focus on while I laid on my bed and relived every mistake I've ever made in chronological order.

But Zane's condo is too nice for that. The ceiling is stain-free.

"As blank and lifeless as my plans tonight," I mumble.

I'm not completely pathetic. I had the option of plans. Zane poked his distractingly gorgeous head in an hour ago and asked if I wanted to grab dinner with him and Aiden.

Of course I do! Every night for the rest of our lives? Sign me up.

"No thanks," I said instead. "I'm going to hide out in my room tonight. Quiet night in."

"‘ Quiet night in ,'" I mutter, mocking past me for having the willpower to say no.

I drag my pillow over my face and barely resist screaming into it because: one, there is no camera in my room, but the cameras in the hallway might pick up the sound. The last thing I need right now is Zane calling me to see if I'm okay. His concern would prickle the soft, delicate place where I've stashed my feelings for both him and Aiden.

And two, because I'm not the main character in a teenage comedy who just got grounded and can't go to prom.

I throw my pillow off of my face. "I'm a grown woman," I announce to the empty, water-stainless ceiling.

It does not give a shit.

So I do what any grown woman would do when she's suffering the consequences of her own actions because she might be a tiny bit in love with a man she can never have and who does not love her in return.

I listen to Olivia Rodrigo and clean my makeup brushes.

I'm almost done when Olivia getting her driver's license is interrupted by loud, persistent knocking on the front door.

I pad barefoot into the hallway to answer, and I'm halfway there when I realize… I'm not scared.

For years, anyone knocking on my door unexpectedly sent me diving for a kitchen knife. But I feel safe in Zane's condo.

Yet another thing I'm going to lose when it's time to tuck tail and run: a sense of security.

I peek through the peephole and find Taylor is standing in the hallway, arms loaded down with her purse and two duffel bags exploding with fur and sequins.

Turns out, I should have been scared.

"Put down the dresses and step away from the door!" I call out like a SWAT lieutenant.

She cackles. "Let me in."

"Not unless you promise me I don't have to wear anything restrictive. Or anything with glitter."

"Mira," she moans, "this stuff is heavy. Let me in!"

She'll break down the door if I don't open it, which is the only reason I unlock it.

Taylor practically falls through the door, simultaneously shoving a duffel bag in my hands. "This one is for you. I was clearing out my closet and these are more your style anyway. Put one on and you and I are going—" She looks at me for the first time and loses her train of thought. "Why do you look like that?"

I glance down at myself. Sure, my old flannel pajama bottoms have seen better days and my big t-shirt could double as a family-sized tent, but it's not that bad.

"‘Not that bad'?" Taylor spits back at me, which confirms that I accidentally said that part out loud. "You do realize other people live in this house, right? They could see you like this, Mira. Actually, forget other people— You could see yourself like this." She squeezes my bicep. "Your poor eyes."

I shake her off. "I was having a night in. Alone ."

"I know. Daniel told me. Owen is babysitting Aiden tonight so Daniel and Zane can go out. I figured, if the boys get to go out and have some fun, that we should have fun, too!" She pushes past me, charging down the hall to my bedroom.

"I was having fun."

But Taylor slams to a stop outside my door, her ear cocked like a hunting dog on the scent. Suddenly, she whips around to face me. "You're wearing ratty clothes and listening to Olivia Rodrigo. What did Zane do to you?!"

"He didn't do anything. I told you: I'm enjoying my own company tonight."

She wrinkles her nose. "If that is a euphemism for personal sexy time, then we've got to get you better pajamas. This look can't be turning you on."

"Tay!" I shove her into my room and slam the door. I don't need this conversation archived forever in Zane's security footage. "I was cleaning my makeup brushes. And some of us don't think about sex twenty-four-seven. Some of us exist outside the male gaze and like wearing comfortable pajamas that don't end up in wedgies that need to be surgically removed."

"You're on a feminist power trip," she says with a nod and a fist pump of solidarity. "Got it. I'm with you, sister. But I do kindly request that you exist inside my gaze, which means wearing something that doesn't make my eyes burn."

I sag forward. "Is there any point in arguing?"

"Only if you want to delay the inevitable." She digs in a duffel bag and comes back up with a silver minidress. "I vote you wear this one."

I snatch it out of her hands with a sigh. "Fine. But I'm going to be back home and in bed by 11:00 PM. Not a minute later!"

"Sure, sure." She waves me towards the bathroom. "Run a brush through your hair while you're in there. Also, don't bother with your makeup. I'll do it."

"Do you want to brush my teeth for me, too?" I drawl.

"Sure, but I draw the line at wiping your ass. You're the one with the kid, not me."

"Aiden isn't mine," I mumble as I close the door.

But it doesn't feel nearly as true as it should.

"See?" Taylor bumps my hip, almost knocking me out of the high bar stool it took me five minutes and several accidental moonings to climb into. "Isn't this more fun than being alone in your terrible flannels?"

"Define ‘fun.'" I take a sip of my drink and wince. "God, what even is this? I asked for lemonade."

"And I tipped the bartender to put some vodka in it." She presses a finger to the corner of my mouth and manually turns my frown upside down. "We're having a night out, Mira! You have to drink with me. Don't worry; I'll pay for your ride home. It'll be fine."

Coincidentally, that's exactly what Taylor said when we pulled up to the newest cocktail lounge in the city on its opening weekend and I saw the line wrapping around the block.

It'll be fine.

What about when I checked the menu and saw prices that would make a Kardashian-Jenner blush? You guessed it.

It'll be fine.

I slide my drink away. "I'm not worried about driving; I'm worried about going home drunk."

"Since when?" she snorts. "I swear I'm still hungover from that time we went to that sports bar for apps and a college baseball team came in. Do you remember that? I've never been sent so many free drinks in my life."

I smile. "It's only because you kept walking over and kissing them on the cheek to thank them for the drinks. You were egging them on."

Taylor drank through half the bar that night, but I started discreetly getting rid of mine well before I was wasted. I can't afford to lose control of myself. Life taught me a long time ago that no one is going to watch my back the way I will.

But that was in the days when my only worry was who might be creeping up behind me. Now, one of my worries sleeps right down the hall. I'm vulnerable enough to Zane as it is; I don't need to add alcohol to the equation.

"Do you think we can score some free drinks tonight?" Taylor glances around the dimly-lit room like a serial killer looking for her next victim.

I wave her off. "I didn't even want this first one. Plus, being around other humans is already too much on a night I planned to spend alone. I can't actually talk to other people."

"If you're doing it right, you don't need to talk." She locks eyes with a man across the room and waggles her fingers. His eyes go wide and he waves back… just as the woman he's with comes back from the bathroom and scowls at us. Taylor chokes on a laugh. "See? A lot can be said without saying a word."

"How do I say, ‘Don't talk to me. I'm in a complicated non-relationship and I want to be left alone'?'"

Taylor swivels in her chair to face me. "What did Zane do?"

"I was just kidding, Tay. He didn't do?—"

She grabs my hand out of the air. "The homely pajamas, Olivia Rodrigo, and now, the ‘complicated non-relationship' talk. Whatever is going on, I need you to spill or else."

"Or else what?"

She smiles wickedly. "Or else our next stop will be a karaoke bar."

Oh, the humanity.

"You're an emotional terrorist." But I sigh and raise my hands in surrender. "I might like my fake boyfriend in a real way, and I don't know what to do about it."

Taylor frowns. "And?"

"‘And' what?" I snap. "It's complicated!"

"Well, duh. But you've liked him too much almost since the moment you met him. I didn't realize that was news to you."

I struggle for words and take another drink of my spiked lemonade instead.

"You like him, Mimi. There's nothing wrong with that." Taylor shakes my shoulder. "It's about time you had a serious relationship."

"Whoa, whoa!" I wave a warning finger between us. "This is not a serious relationship. Which is exactly why there is something wrong with my feelings. Zane is paying me to live with him. This is a job . A job I can't afford to fuck up with emotions."

"Don't say ‘emotions' like they're an STD. It's good to feel things. Normal, actually. Nine out of ten people feel something at least once in their lives."

"What about the other ten percent?"

"Psychopaths," she says flatly. "But you aren't a psychopath, so why can't you be with him?"

"Because he doesn't want to be with me!" I yelp a little too forcefully. Even the slightly-too-loud music pumping through the speakers can't quite drown me out, and I draw stares. I shrink down. "I'm a temporary thing for Zane. He made that clear from the beginning. It's a ruse, nothing more."

"How do you know ? Have you asked?"

I blink at her for several silent seconds. "I would rather gnaw my own fingers off than ask him that."

She groans. "You are so repressed. Do you know that? It can't be good for your skin. Do you have a retinoid cream? I can loan you one if you?—"

"You two ladies look like you could use a drink." A man leans around Taylor's shoulder with a smile. "And my friend and I need a place to sit. What do you say we pool our resources?"

A bearded man with his hands in his pockets is standing nervously behind his friend. He gives me a tight smile and quickly looks away.

It's almost enough for me to want to throw him a bone and agree just to be nice, but I'm not in the mood. I'm also not known for being nice.

"Thanks, but no thanks."

The first guy with the Finance Bro blazer leans in even closer, looking at Taylor. "And what do you have to say? Do you let your friend do all the talking?"

Taylor starts to open her mouth, then her eyes catch on something across the room and she goes unusually quiet. I follow her gaze…

And my stomach bottoms out.

Daniel and Zane are sitting in a shadowy corner of the bar. I know they haven't seen us yet, which means we still have time to run.

But Taylor has other ideas.

She slaps on a smile and pats the stool next to me. "Save your money, boys. But there's something else you can help us out with."

He sits down and slings his heavy arm over my shoulders. His breath smells like the floor of a bar. "What would that be?"

"My friend here has a question she's afraid to ask." I start to shake my head frantically, but Taylor nods and plows onward. "But with a little body language, she won't have to."

The other man plops down next to Taylor.

Guess there's no going back now.