“Ew. That’s my mom’s nickname for me. Please don’t impersonate my mother. Anyway, what’s your news?”
I honestly have no idea what he’s going to tell me. That Marian married her Cubs player? That he has an idea for a screenplay? That he’s terminally ill and wants one last goodbye?
“You’re winning,” he says.
“Winning what?”
“The bet.”
“Because you’ve finally admitted to yourself I won’t be your date to our twentieth reunion?”
“No. Because Jon and Kevin are dating.”
“What?” I yell so loudly that the YouTuber next to me interrupts her livestream and glares.
“I know.” I can hear a smile in his voice.
“Aww, that makes me so happy!”
“Me too. Though I can’t believe you were right about them.”
I can. They are the rare fated couple on which all those “ships passing in the night” romances are based.
“I told you, I’m good at this,” I say. “Are you with them right now?”
“I was all day, but I left to call you—oh fuck.” I hear scrabbling noises, then more curses.
“Seth? Everything okay?”
He expels a breath. “God damn it. I left something with Jon.”
“Something important?”
“Yeah,” he says, his voice strained. “Pretty important. Look, I gotta go.”
“Okey dokey. Talk in six months?”
But he’s already ended the call.
I immediately open my messages.
Molly: Guys
Molly: Wow
Dezzie: What?
Molly: Seth Rubenstein just called me
Dezzie: “Seth Rubenstein” lol. Like there’s some other Seth
Molly: He called to say jon and kevin from high school are dating!
Alyssa:!!!
Dezzie: I always thought they had a thing
Molly: Me toooooo
I wish Seth were here so I could gloat to his face.
But he’s not. Sebastian is here. And he is walking toward me, clad in a fluffy white robe.
He flops down next to me. “Hey, babe.”
“Hey. How was your massage?”
“So great.”
He removes his robe to reveal his perfect, massage-oiled musculature and takes his sunscreen, giant water bottle, and book out of his tote bag. He only reads self-help books about woo-woo shit like manifesting, as far as I can tell.
“What do you want to do for dinner tonight?” I ask. “Shall we go into town? I heard the food at Dahlia is incredible.”
He puts his hand on my thigh. “Why don’t we stay in and order room service?”
He means stay in and have sex in our suite. Which we also did last night.
This is not unappealing, but people can both eat food in a restaurant and have sex in one evening.
