“Nope, not happening.” I picked up her keys from the kitchen counter and tossed them into her hands. “You can leave now,” I stated calmly in the same icy tone she had been using with me. Like she never gave a shit about me. She didn’t even like Gunther! She was always complaining about him hogging the bed or having to take him out on walks. I knew she was just trying to get at me even more for whatever reason, but this time I wasn’t letting her walk all over me.
She looked like she was going to argue with me but finally clenched her fist around her keys and turned towards the door. “Fine, Nick. You and Gunther have fun with your boring life, with your loser friends, and your control freak parents. Sounds like a grand old time, and I can’t believe I wasted so much of my life with you.” It was like she needed to twist the knife just a little harder before she slammed the door shut with such force, the picture frames on the coffee table gave a rattle.
I collapsed onto the worn leather couch that had been one of the first things we had bought together, running a hand through my hair, trying to think about when in the hell everything had become such a fucked up mess.
My phone rang, and for whatever fucked up reason, I almost wished it were Kara calling to say she had played one of her dumb ass jokes on me and to meet her at the bar down the road for a beer. She had always had a wry sense of humor that most people didn’t get, and one of the reasons my family and friends had never really liked her. Instead I heard the voice of my best friend, one of the last people I wanted to talk to right now.
“Dude, get your ass down to Clammy’s. There’s a beer calling your name, Grant and Riley are on their way.”
“Now’s not really a good time, Danny.” I heard a loud grunt come through the phone, and then he mumbled something as a barstool squeaked loudly, the sounds of the bar fading away.
“What’s the matter fuck head, need to get permission first? Do I need to come over and ask Kara if Nicky’s allowed to come out and play for a little while? I promise not to get you too fucked up. C’mon, dude, it’s been too long. Does she only let you out like once a month?”
“That’s not the problem this time,” I replied, before hearing a long pause and him laughing loudly, gulping in a few deep breaths of air before he was able to finally calm down.
Danny and I had been best friends, really, since before we were born. Our moms had went to school together and ended up pregnant within months of each other, so according to them, we were destined to be best friends and that’s pretty much how it happened. So, I didn’t even need to ask what was so funny because I already knew that he had figured it out that quickly. How, I have no fucking clue, since I clearly hadn’t seen it coming.
“Well…about time,” he managed to finally say. “You know I never liked that bitch, all emo and shit. I still swear to this day she has a voodoo doll of me hidden somewhere. And now, you can come have that beer and cry about her leaving you. Do you really want to sit in your apartment all alone, drowning in misery? You were always too good for her, dude. You’ll still find someone right for you one of these days.”
I had to double-check my phone to make sure I was actually talking to Danny. I had never heard anything like that come out of his mouth before. In high school, he was the hotshot jock that played every sport, had every girl, and never once was serious about anything. It actually seemed like he…cared? Or maybe he was just happy that I was finally free to drink with him whenever he hit me up.
I blew out a breath, knowing I would probably regret it in the morning, but a drink or five really sounded good right about now, and the silence in the apartment was almost deafening. “Fine, I’ll be down that way in five.”
Chapter 3
Ally
Growing up, everyone had always teased me that I was too calm about everything. Almost any situation that was thrown at me, I was able to keep my head on straight, let things roll off my back, and always come up with some kind of solution to solve the problem.
Maybe it was all of the “Zen bullshit,” as Leah liked to call it, that I had picked up over the years. Breathing was sort of my thing; it calmed me down and brought relaxation. I had even dabbled in yoga for a bit, but being on the road almost constantly in a cramped bus didn’t leave me with much opportunity, or room, to keep up with it.
If I had ever had any breaking points in my life, last night was one of them. I kept replaying the past four years over and over in my head. Where had it all gone wrong? What had I done wrong? Was this the first time something like this had happened, or had I been ignoring some kind of signs that Teddy had been doing this all along behind my back? I knew the kind of guy he was when we had our shotgun wedding, but I thought I could change him, or really, that he had already changed.
If any of my family or friends ever found out what I had done last night, they would probably be locking me up in a mental institution this very minute.