Playing It Safe(83)

A knock on the door—actually more like a pounding—wakes me up. I have no idea how long I’ve been asleep this time, so I glance over at the clock on the cable box by the television to see that it’s a little after eleven o’clock in the morning. The pounding on the door starts up again, so I slowly peel myself up off the floor and go to see who it is.

Before I peek through the peephole, there is a second where I hope it’s Alex waiting for me on the other side. But it’s not.

I open the door to find Lisette and Sarah standing in front of me, both in their work attire since it’s a Friday morning and they should be at work. Come to think of it, I should be at work. Ugh, whatever, this is my official notification to myself that I’m taking a mental day.

My voice sounding hoarse, I ask both of them, “What are you doing here?”

They barrel in, not speaking a word, and both sit down on my couch, staring up at me as I’m still holding the door open.

I close the door and lean against it while rubbing my eyes. “Seriously, guys, aren’t you supposed to be at work?”

“Aren’t you supposed to be at work?” Lisette asks in a quiet voice.

“I’m taking the day off.”

“It would have been nice if you would have let me know or at least answered one of my calls or texts this morning when I was trying to figure out where the hell you were,” she says, her voice growing more agitated by the second.

“Looks like you found me,” I mutter, then direct my attention to Sarah. “I understand why she’s here, but how did you get here?”

“Darren.”

My head pops up at that. “Excuse me? What the hell does my brother have to do with you being here?”

“He called me at the gallery to ask me out. While we were talking, he told me what happened last night after I left you guys at Taurus,” she explains in a rush. “So I called Lisette to see if she’d heard from you, and I told her what happened last night. Then she kept trying to get in touch with you, and then … well that’s it. We came here.”

My brain just exploded.

“Okay, let’s try this again. Slowly this time so I can understand.” I rub the heels of my hands against my eyes and move to sit on the coffee table to face them. “You’re telling me that my brother Darren called you to ask you out on a date?”

“Yup!” she chirps happily. “First thing this morning at the gallery. I guess I made quite an impression on him last night!”

She raises her hand to high-five me, but I don’t reciprocate, which causes her to frown. So she turns her hand toward Lisette, who indulges her and gets her to smile again.

“Sarah,” I say in a hesitant voice. “My brother told you what happened last night? All of it?”

“He did, and I’m so sorry, Julia.” Sarah’s hand shoots out and pats my knee like I was a small child. “And by the way, he’s all kinds of worried about you, so you might want to call him.”

I dart my eyes to Lisette, who’s watching me like a hawk. I point to Sarah when I ask Lisette, “She told you everything?”

“She did. I’m so sorry.”

Obviously, they don’t know the worst of it.

I start to chew on my bottom lip, and then Sarah chimes in. “Yeah, Alex hasn’t shown up for work and isn’t answering any calls or texts either.”

“How did you get out of work then?”

“I told the office manager I had to buy tampons.”

I can’t help it. I start to laugh my ass off because this is now the second time in a month that she’s used that excuse. “You do realize that you can’t keep using that excuse.”

She waves me off and rolls her eyes at me. “Pfft! Anytime you mention your period to a man, he clams right up. Works like a charm every time.”

Once my laughter dies down my mood changes drastically, and I go right into crying, covering my face as the both of them sit there not knowing what to do since they’ve never seen me like this. Hell, I’ve never seen me like this!

“I’m a terrible person,” I admit out loud and through my tears.

Lisette speaks up first. “No, you’re not. How were you supposed to know about that woman?”

“Yeah,” Sarah agrees softly. “That’s kind of messed up.”

I shake my head and drop my hands. “You guys don’t get it. I really f*cked up.”

Both of them look confused, as well they should be. So I proceed to tell them exactly what happened last night. Every last gory detail up until I passed out on the hardwood floor.

After a long silence once I’m done retelling the night’s events, Lisette looks me dead in the eye and says, “Julia, I love you with all my heart, but what you did last night, even for you, is really messed up. What the hell were you thinking?”

I open my mouth to explain, but she cuts me off. “You know what? Save it! Because I know what you’re going to say.”

“Lisette, I—”

“Don’t ‘Lisette’ me, Julia! I told you to give him a chance, and you’re sitting there telling me that he basically did nothing wrong and you still sent him packing?”

She goes to stand, but Sarah grabs a hold of her arm and pulls her back down.