By the time I arrived at Billie Rose’s parents’ ranch, I had spent seven days pretending I was fine even though I was the opposite of fine. Work helped because I was pulled into the structure of a busy day. At home, I was just a girl staring at her phone, refusing to answer the man she missed so badly it felt like a physical ache. Hunter texted every day. I never answered. Not because I didn’t want to, but because I wanted too much.
“Wow,” Billie said the second I stepped onto the patio. “You look emotionally dehydrated.”
I stopped beside the pool gate. “Hello to you too.”
She stood by a lounge chair in a bikini and oversized sunglasses, holding a drink with a tiny umbrella in it even though it was barely noon. Liv floated on a raft in the pool. Taylor sat on the edge with her feet in the water. Wren was under an umbrella, looking like someone had forced her to relax.
Taylor’s eyes moved over my face. “You aren’t sleeping.”
“Am too,” I answered like I was five.
Billie snorted.
Liv pushed her sunglasses onto her head. “Come sit.”
All four of them stared at me. I dropped my bag onto a chair.
“Okay, I’m not fine.” It was obvious so why try to hide it?
“Progress,” Wren said.
“You guys did a horrible job of hiding your relationship,” she added with a grin.
“TMI,” I countered with a blush. She clearly must have noticed us sneak into the towel closet.
Wren winced. “Sorry, but you guys were the real deal.”
I sat on the lounge chair and took the iced tea Billie handed me. “Please don’t psychoanalyze me.”
“Too late,” Billie said. “We already started before you got here.”
“Great,” I murmured.
Taylor leaned back on her hands. “Have you talked to him?”
I looked down at my drink. “No.”
“Have you read his messages?” she continued.
I hated how fast my throat tightened. “Yes.”
Billie softened. “And?”
“And he misses me.” I shrugged. “But missing me doesn’t fix the root of the problem. He walked out of my parents’ house without finding a real solution. Feelings don’t matter if he doesn’t know how to stand beside me when things get hard.”
“That’s totally fair,” Taylor said.
I stared at the pool; at the way the sunlight broke across the water.
“Maybe he feels bad and wants to make it up to you,” Billie Rose said.
“Sending me messages about how much he misses me doesn’t fix the root of the problem,” I noted.
Liv’s face went soft. “That’s a very solid point. He has to do more than miss you.”
“I can’t make him do anything. He has to want us badly enough to try,” I said.
Billie sat beside me. “Do you miss him?”