Page 3 of One Week With You
“Say again?” I near shouted, leaning forward to hear better while I scraped back my damp, frizzy hair into a ponytail as best as I could without a mirror.
“I think we should break up,” Michael repeated.
Yep. I’d heard him right the first time.
“You’re dumping me?” I asked needlessly and laughed into my cosmo before taking another swig. This day was shaping up to be one for the books. The shitty book where everything shitty happened.
Michael winced at the thud of my glass hitting the tabletop. I should’ve known. He’d signalled his intentions pretty well when he sat on the opposite side of the booth – it might as well have been a mile away – and hadn’t removed his coat, still damp and speckled with rain. He’d looked everywhere but at me as I’d ordered our drinks, even though I hadn’t seen him in three weeks and this dress made my boobs look fabulous. Okay, so I had a whole drowned rat vibe going on currently but still. I couldn’t even remember if he’d touched me but that didn’t bode well either.
Shit.
“I’m sorry, Tee,” he said, though his tone betrayed him.
“It’s Talia,” I replied flatly. Only my siblings called me Tee, and that was because our younger brother, Jacob, couldn’t pronounce my name when we were kids.
Michael huffed. “There’s no need to get snippy. We can be adults about this. I just think we’ve run our course, you know? Things have been a bit… stale.”
I blinked at him, irritated by the way his nose wrinkled in disgust when he touched the tabletop. I wasn’t about to admit we’drun our coursethree months ago. Or pretty much a month after we’d started dating. Or that the wordstalewas being generous. I’d blame myself for staying too long in another dead-end relationship tomorrow, and all the days after that.
Tonight was for wallowing and drinks.
“Okay,” I said with a shrug, then knocked back the rest of my drink. Tilting my head back, I held the cocktail glass upside down and opened my mouth wide.
“Stop that!” Michael hissed, glancing at the neighbouring tables as I wiggled my tongue out to catch the last drop of alcohol as it rolled down the rim.Eh, whatever. I was jobless now, which meant I was going to savour every last bit of this ridiculously overpriced cocktail because it was probably my last for a while.
I’d have to go back to my budget student diet of baked beans on toast and cheap bottles of vodka that tasted like nail polish remover. Or worse – no booze at all. No more designer shoes or handbags. No more ordering food in. That stupidly expensive anti-ageing eye cream would have to go too. Not that it did anything. Money was about to be tighter than the current pinch of Michael’s mouth.
Fuck. Jobless.
And now boyfriend-less.
On the same damn day.
Life was great sometimes until it wasn’t.
My laugh sounded empty and flat, a mirror of my insides. I glared across the table. “If I’m embarrassing you, leave. No one’s stopping you. The door’s right there.”
“So that’s it?” Micheal’s eyes widened. “Six months over, just like that? No discussion about it?”
I couldn’t believe the gall of the man. “I told you I lost my job and your response was to dump me. Forgive me if I’m not in a chatty mood. And if you expected me to beg, you don’t know me very well. Also, don’t forget, we can be adults about this.”
“Wow.” He sat back, the leather seat squeaking slightly. “You really are a heartless bitch.”
I wasn’t. I knew I wasn’t, but my heart caught the jab anyway. There were a million ways I could’ve lashed out, but I refused to give him the satisfaction by sinking to his level. Instead, I swallowed the sting, smiled, clutched my chest and said, “Aw, thank you!”
Michael shook his head. “Whatever,” he mumbled and slid out of the booth to leave. “Thanks for nothing.”
I discreetly gave his back the middle finger before I grabbed the bar food menu.Fuck it.A portion of fries was cheaper than a cosmo. If I couldn’t get drunk on alcohol, I’d get drunk on carbs.
CHAPTER2
RAFE
Fucking bullshit.
I slammed my phone face down and took a swig of beer, though it did nothing to dilute the annoyance burning the back of my throat. The first chance I’d had in weeks to hang out with my best friend, have some beers and decompress a bit, and now this shit? Unbelievable.
“What the hell was that?” Leo shouted at the TV, throwing both arms wide. “It’s clearly offside. Wanker.”
