“Why? Pushing your buttons is my favorite thing to do.”
“Don’t you have some older dicks to chase?” I exhaled heavily, and she gave me a sinister smile. She liked when she annoyed me. She even liked when I put her down, because she craved the male attention.
Monica was a case of rich girl with daddy issues. It didn’t help that her father was actually a huge dick. Same with my father. I wondered if there was a correlation to that: rich dads being dicks. The more wealth, the bigger the dick.
When Monica told her father one of his business partners felt her up at a holiday party, he called her a liar. I knew she wasn’t lying, though, because I’d seen her go to her bedroom that night and fall apart. People didn’t cry like that unless there was some truth to the story. It turned out it wasn’t the first time one of her father’s partners had messed around with her without permission, yet every time she went to him about it, he called her dramatic and desperate for attention.
So she became exactly what her father told her she was: dramatic and desperate for attention.
She clamored for attention from the men her dad claimed never wanted her. She had issues with her daddy, so she slept with men his age. She even called them daddy in bed, which was disturbing on so many levels.
Once, she called me daddy in bed, and I stopped screwing her right there. I didn’t want to feed her demons; I wanted to help shut my own up for a while.
Monica pushed her tongue into her cheek and cocked an eyebrow. “What? Are you jealous?”
She wished, hoped, and prayed.
I wasn’t.
“Monica, you do know we aren’t together, right? You can do whatever you want with whomever you want. We aren’t a thing.” I was good at making it perfectly clear to girls what we were—or more so, what we were not. I never misled them with the idea we’d be anything serious because I didn’t do serious.
There was only so much free space in my head, and I knew I wasn’t relationship material. I didn’t have the energy to be someone’s someone—just someone’s fuck buddy. Honestly, I wouldn’t have even said buddy. I wasn’t their friend or confidant, and I never would be.
Monica winked my way like she thought I was the cat and she was the mouse I was trying to chase. I blamed myself, really. The worst thing a broken person could do was hook up with another broken person. Ten times out of ten, it turned into a deeper disaster.
Monica pulled out her cell phone and started texting nonstop, blabbering about something or other as her lips flapped open and shut. She talked about other people and how ugly, stupid, or poor they were. As attractive as she was, she was one of the ugliest people I’d ever seen.
Couldn’t really judge her on that, though. When I was drugged up, I was a bigger dick than I was now. It turned out your level of compassion for others when you’re high is extremely low. I had said and done a lot of shit I was certain karma would get me for at some point down the line.
“Rumor is there’s a party at your place this Saturday,” Greyson said as he walked through the front door with Hank and Raine.Thank God.Sitting alone with Monica was a nightmare.
“A party?” I asked Greyson.
Greyson walked over and showed me a text from Monica about a party.Figures.I was sure that same message had gone out to a ton of other people, and no matter what, they were going to show up at my house. So, lo and behold, it appeared I was hosting a party.
Happy birthday, Lance.
Regardless, I was happy Hank, Greyson, and Raine arrived. I had a lot of people who came to my house to hang out, but none of them were truly my friends, other than those three. If my heart had any goodness left, it was because of them.
Greyson and I grew up on the same block. He’d been my best friend since I learned how to walk. Hank and I met in Little League, and he’d been a constant for me since then. He and Raine started dating when they were like eleven years old, and so the Fantastic Four crew was created.
We just so happened to have a few side characters like Monica, Tracey, and Shay who would rotate through the friend group every now and again. I couldn’t stand Monica and Tracey. I found them annoying. But I deeply loathed Shay Gable. That woman drove me wild, and not in a good way.
I was a big fan of Raine, but her greatest character flaw was being best friends with Shay. God, how I hated Shay Gable.
If there was only one thing in life I knew for certain, it was that.
I’d known her for years now. Her grandmother, Maria, was my housekeeper for over fifteen years, and when I was young, she brought Shay over sometimes when her parents were unable to watch her.
From day one, we never jelled. You know how people have instant friendships? She and I had an instant hateship. I hated her and her goody-two-shoes personality. Ever since we werekids, Shay never misbehaved. She was always getting good grades, always making friends wherever she went. She didn’t touch drugs, and she partied sober. She probably said her prayers and kissed her grandma before bed, too.
Little Miss Perfect.
More like Little Miss Fake.
I didn’t buy her good-girl act.
Nobody could be that good. Nobody could have so few demons in their closet.