I grabbed his tablet and tossed it across the room and onto the couch.
“Hey,” he said, but it was on a chuckle and with his smile still in place.
“Jordan just dumped me.”
Zach’s brow rose again. “I didn’t realize you were dating.”
“We weren’t.”
“Oh.”
I blinked.
Zach smiled uncomfortably.
And then I sighed, dragging a hand over my face. “You don’t get it.”
“Afraid not,” he agreed on a laugh.
“What good are you, Zach?”
“Oh, he’s completely useless,” Gemma said, joining us from the bedroom. Her long, brunette hair was still wet from the shower, dripping water over her petite shoulders as she bent to press a kiss on Zach’s cheek. “But I keep him around because he’s kind of cute.”
“Kind of?” Zach said, pinching her side. Gemma giggled and pretended like she wanted to get away, but in the end, she wound up wrapped up in his arms and leaning her hip against his thigh. She was a tiny little thing in his arms, and they might as well have had heart-eye emojis for faces in that moment with the way they looked at each other all gooey-ooey like.
I wanted to gag as much as I wanted to swoon. Those two were so cute together it made me nauseous.
Gemma had been through enough shit to last her a lifetime, and I truly believed Zach was her reward for never calling her ex out on his transgressions. The motherfucker cheated on her and then told her he had terminal cancer. She never even got to call him out on it. Or rather, she chose not to, deciding instead to stand by his side as he lived out the last months of his life.
The other woman showed up to the funeral, and Gemma didn’t kill her.
File this under reasons Gemma is better than me.
It took a while for her to heal, but a couple years ago, I convinced her to get on a dating app. The premise was that she would take a new, different guy to each Chicago Bears home game. Gemma was a season pass holder, and to be honest, I hated sports so much that this was partly to get her out and dating again, and partly to make sure it wasn’t me who’d have to fill the seat next to her.
Zach was the lucky bartender who overheard me getting Gemma in the dating app scene, and he volunteered to be her practice round… but let’s just say he wasn’t satisfied with just one game.
And the rest was history.
Now, the lovebirds were just months away from their wedding, and as much as I missed my best friend having nothing but time for me, I loved Zach so much that I couldn’t even be mad.
They were meant for each other.
“Why don’t you have coffee in your hand?” Gemma asked me.
“Because I had a different wake-up call this morning. One in the form of Jordan dumping me.”
Gemma frowned. “Wait, you guys were dating?”
I slapped my forehead. “Come on, bestie. You know more than anyone that I don’t date.”
“Right… so…” Gemma might as well have had smoke coming out of her ears as she tried to figure out my dilemma, and she and Zach shared confused looks.
I sighed. “We’ve just had an arrangement, that’s all. For the last year and a half, we’ve been banging on a consistent basis. Do you know how hard it is to find an insanely hot guy who is also educated, professional, and single? And then, to find that kind of guy and him not be anxious to tie you down? He was perfect.” I pouted, flopping back in my seat. “And then he went and got himself a girlfriend.”
I mumbled under my breath, and Gemma quirked a brow. “What did you just say?”
“I said stupid potato-headed motherfucker,” I repeated.
Zach barked out a laugh. “Do all your exes get adorable pet names like that?”
“He’s not my ex,” I defended, crossing my arms. “And I didn’t realize his head looked like a potato until he was breaking up with me.”
“Convenient timing,” Zach commented.
I flicked him off.
“Hey, I’m sorry,” Gemma said sincerely, leaving Zach’s arms to wrap hers around me, instead. She rested her chin on my head as I leaned into her. “Did you tell him you didn’t want to split up?”
“No. What would the point be? He wants something serious.”
“And you don’t?” she asked. “Even after more than a year of being with him?”
“You already know the answer to that.”
Gemma sighed softly, patting my arm. Not many people in my life knew the real reasons why I blew off any kind of relationship, but Gemma was one of them. The poor girl had known me and my college ex well. We’d always hung out with her and Carlo, a little foursome, double dating all the time and being all sorts of adorable.
Gemma and Carlo got engaged right after college, and I just knew that the ring from Nathan would come next.
Instead, he dumped me.
You’re a good time, Belle, but you’re not exactly the girl you take home to Mom, if you know what I mean…
And I did. I knew exactly what he meant.
I was good for sex, for fun, for spring break and frat parties and wearing his jersey number while I screamed like a little fan girl in the stands at every single game he played. And that’s where the road ended for me.
It was a moment in my life that could have destroyed me. And, though I’d deny this to anyone who ever asked, other than Gemma — it did break me. For months, I wallowed and felt sorry for myself and tortured myself replaying every minute of my and Nathan’s relationship. I was searching for clues, for the errors I made, for what I did that was so bad that he had filed me into a category where a ring and a wedding and a little house full of babies was off
