Page 80 of Lessons in Cruelty

“Fine you fucking drama queen.” She glances away and then focuses my phone on me again. “Okay, okay. Say you’ve stolen something.”

“Like what?”

“Like…someone’s wallet.”

My arms constrict even tighter around my chest. “Fuck off.”

“Seriously?”

I look away, fuming. “Delete your socials,” I tell her.

“You can’t make me suffer a consequence.”

“Well, I’m not letting you be cruel to me, either.”

Melissa scoffs, then looks taken aback when I just keep staring at her. “Haven, come on. I’m not deleting my accounts. They’re…” she swallows. “I network with them and stuff.” Her chin lifts. “You wouldn’t understand. I mean, you have like a total of five messages on your phone. Like, ever.”

“It’s a new phone,” I grate.

Melissa looks away, and then her shoulders slump. “Wow.”

“What?”

She’s shaking her head. “I guess those weren’t rumors,” she whispers, going over to her phone to press pause.

When she looks at me over her shoulder, there’s a crease of concern between her brows. “Is it the tequila, or is this starting to feel like some kind of fucked up experiment?”

I shake off my irritation and nod at her. “Yeah, shit. That went from zero to a hundred in sixty seconds.” I drop my head, rub my eyelids, wave her over. “You’re right, I’m being a drama queen. I’ll say the thing about stealing the wallet.”

“Yeah, fuck that,” she says, then switches the camera to selfie mode. “Hey, Professor, so I can’t exactly film this since it’s happening on my phone, but I’ll do a screenshot for you and include it in the submission.”

“Melissa?” I push to my feet. “What are you doing?”

She shrugs, but her eyes are on her phone. “I don’t even mind. Hardly go in this account anymore because of Man-Child’s DMs.” She snorts. “Jesus, forty-seven. And I checked this like two days ago. Can you believe this shit?”

Her nails tap against the glass as she busies herself on her phone, then she sets it up on the dresser again.

“Right, last round. You ready, Haven?”

“You seriously just deleted your account?”

She shrugs. “About time for a detox.”

I win the next round of rock, paper, scissors, but I don’t feel happy about it. My stomach is churning so much, it’s turned everything inside into tequila-and-oreo flavored butter.

“Aw, fuck,” I mutter when I read the last card. “This is bullshit.”

Melissa sits up prim and proper, watching me with glassy eyes. “That bad, huh?”

I blow out a breath, then glance at the two slips of papers and the sticker that fell out earlier when Melissa upended the envelope.

Why does it feel like that happened a fucking century ago?

Wild Card

Write down a secret your partner hides from others.

Seal it inside the envelope without letting them see.