Sick Like Me (Sick Like #1)

Chapter 12

TWELVE

Thankfully I didn’t have to pay for dinner after dishing out money on the dress. It was much more expensive than I first expected it would be, but luckily I had been saving my money to invest in new art supplies. Ones I doubted I would use for a while, based on my recent track record of avoiding doing anything creative.

I could buy the supplies some other time, I promised myself as I handed my card over to the cashier after reading the till screen, my lips parting in surprise.

In response to the loss of money that I hadn’t been expecting, Peyton paid for my food. So I went all out. I ordered fried zucchini sticks for starters, then a margherita pizza for my main with a side of cheesy garlic bread—for all of us to share, not just for me. I knew I was a fat bitch, but I wasn’t that selfish.

For dessert, I had a cheese cake with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. And throughout the meal, I had two Oreo milkshakes, and a refillable raspberry flavoured Coke.

After we had our fill of food and drinks, we decided to drive around a bit so we could natter away, filling each other in on any and all gossip we had—which was surprising we even had any left since usually as soon as we had something to share, we posted it into the group chat we shared.

After we noticed the sun began to set, we decided it was best to make our way back home.

The offer was silent, but Stefan decided not to stay the night with Peyton and I. So we drove to his side of town, dropping him off at his girlfriend’s house. While he lived the opposite side of town away from us and felt guilty Peyton had to drive so far, she assured him it was nothing and that his company more than made up for it.

I didn’t miss him slip a twenty pound note into her purse when she wasn’t looking though. I smiled to myself at the action. He hadn’t known I had seen him, so it was better to keep his secret. She would just use it on Nova anyway, and he knew that. It wasn’t going to be wasted.

As Peyton stopped the car when we pulled up down the driveway, I was surprised to find what looked like a mini mansion at the end. But my awe had to wait, I rushed to jump out of the back seat and made my way to the passenger door.

I threw the door open and stood expectantly, waiting for Stefan to exit the vehicle. He looked up at me, only just unclipping his seat belt. He raised an eyebrow, standing from the seat at long last.

“I didn’t know Peyton’s rides included a door handler. How lucky am I to not have to open a door?” He teased, and then held his closed fist to me. I closed my own, then connected our knuckles in our usual greeting and goodbye motion. “See you at work butty.”

“Yeah, see you soon,” I smiled as I moved to get into the seat, then I slammed the door closed behind me. I rolled the window down, waving dramatically before I rushed to connect my phone to the bluetooth the second he disconnected.

My music began playing quietly through the speakers. I turned to face him. “You know you can invite her, right?” I nodded my head in the direction of the house behind him.

Stefan had once told me his girlfriend’s parents were very rich, and very posh. He even said he put on a posher accent when he was around them just so he could fit in with them a little more. It was sad to hear that, but if it meant keeping his girlfriend happy, he didn’t care what he had to do.

Stefan raised a quizzical eyebrow at first, but then seemingly realised and left out a silent ‘ah’. He then reached for the car and gently patted sill where the window sat inside. “I’m not going to risk making you a third wheel butty. We can have some us time anyway, we don’t hang out often just the two of us.”

“Our team will be there, it won’t be ‘just the two of us’,” I laughed. I then folded my fingers at the knuckles a few times in a motion of trying to shoo him away. “Now go, before your girlfriend gets mad.”

Stefan stood back from the car and nodded his head before he gave a broad wave. “Don’t forget to hang that dress up the second you get home,” His eyes flickered to the cloth clothing bag hanging from the hook on the rear passenger side of Peyton’s car. “Got it?”

I held out my hand with my pinky finger extended. And then with that, Peyton made a turn in the vehicle on the large driveway, then we made our way back down it to the freedom of the main road.

I threw myself into the sofa, closing my eyes as I sank into the large feather pillows surrounding me. I let out a dramatic sigh, hearing the ruffle of a material bag disrupt my peace.

“You can’t just leave this dress in my car, you know. You have to, like, actually hang it up and take care of it before the event,” Peyton sounded scolding, to which I waved my hand dismissively.

“You promised Stefan, you can’t let him down,” She sounded as if she was trying to scold me like you would a child, but I couldn’t care less. If the dress got wrinkled, well then I still had plenty of time to hang it up. The wrinkles would fall from it naturally in that time… I hoped.

Peyton stood by the living room door and raised the hook to hang the dress over the door, the bottom of the dress not touching the floor for even a single second.

She cared more about the dress than I did.

She then walked over to the free space beside me and rested her leg down first, then she sat on her leg. She lent back against the back of the sofa and closed her eyes. She let out a sigh.

“Thank fuck Will took her to see his parents this weekend. I needed the time alone, and she needed a trip out of the house,” Peyton mumbled, sounding more as if she were speaking to herself rather than me. But I still responded to her comment.

“How is she feeling now? Have the doctors said anything else they can recommend? I remember when my wisdom tooth came through and I was in agony but she can’t even explain to you when she’s in pain. Must be hard,” I let out a sigh after I finished speaking.

Peyton gave a simple mhm before the room fell into silence. I kept my eyes on the ceiling, wishing July would come and go already. I wanted to be back to my peaceful weekends, no impending work events to worry about.

I felt my phone vibrate in my pocket, and I knew it was likely Owen who had messaged me. But I was in no mood to reply to his messages. I wanted to be free from my phone for a few more hours.

Peyton then broke the silence. “You and Kota… How is that going? Do you think… You’ll make plans to see each other this time?” She asked, her words careful and considered .

I bit the inside of my cheek, debating what to say. “He warned me already he was a workaholic, so I get it. I am too. But he…” I closed my eyes for a brief second, raising my hand to rub my forehead. I wondered how vulnerable I should be. But I never kept anything from her, and no matter what I said, I knew she would be reasonable while also trying to sympathise with me.

“It pisses me off so much and I know you’ll tell me to forget about him but sometimes he takes days to reply. I could message him once a day a greeting like good morning or good evening, and he still won’t reply. It’s like he forgets I exist until it’s like a Tuesday and he’s had a long day at work and wants to tell me what to do while sexting me,” I laid out my feelings, feelings I knew I would never have the guts to tell him.

“He doesn’t want a relationship, and you need to remind yourself of that. I know it hurts, and it’s a painful or harsh reminder, but it’s a useful one,” Peyton spoke her reason, but then as I opened my eyes and turned my head to look at her, I noticed a mischievous grin on her lips. “Sparing me no dirty details, what sort of things do you guys… Text about?”

A couple of glasses of wine later and I was reading through my text messages with Owen to Peyton, telling her the details and glossing over some with contained content of a certain topic. Then I did the same with Kota.

Peyton had decided it was going to be a night of ‘revelation’. She sat us down at the kitchen table with notebooks before us, the page split down the middle with Kota on one side, and Owen on the other.

“We’re going to make a list of all the good things about each man first, and then we’re going to make a list about all the bad things,” Peyton stated, handing me a pink glitter pen .

I rolled my eyes, but smiled and joined in with her antics anyway. She seemed to be having fun, and it was nice to see. I felt a bit vulnerable letting my… I didn’t even know what I could call it.

Neither of them counted as ‘love lives’ as one didn’t want a relationship, and one I wasn’t even sure I was going to keep seeing.

It was complicated, and while I didn’t want a simple, easy relationship, I didn’t want complicated either. I wanted something dry and cut, where I knew where I sat with him, and where he sat with me.

What I really wanted was Kota Vernon to fuck me, but also be utterly obsessed with me as if his life depended on my very existence.

He had fed into the delusion I allowed myself to think when he confessed he had kept my number over the years, however when he took days to message me back, it knocked me back a few notches.

I wanted to befriend him, get to know every little dirty secret he kept from the world. I wanted to be someone, something , to him. But then he went and reminded me he had other women he was talking to.

Sure, I was being hypocritical by being upset he had other women. I had Owen. But deep down I knew Owen wasn’t the one for me and that was never going to go anywhere in the long run.

I didn’t think that meant Kota was the one for me. It just meant that because he matched my needs so much, and knew what I wanted without judgement, that I thought we may had been compatible.

There was no harm in having a little fun with him, right? But I wasn’t wired for just ‘fun’. I needed intense passion and obsession. I was addicted to him, and a part of me wanted him to feel the same way about me .

A part of me knew he was likely going to hurt me again, and as I sat at Peyton’s dining table, I felt a sting behind my nose before my eyesight felt like it was getting glossy.

I was fucked up for how I approached relationships, I knew that. Everyone wanted romance and love, fireworks and fun. I wanted to be destroyed, and built back up just for it to happen again.

I picked up my phone and locked the screen, deciding it was enough, that we should stop reading my messages.

“Ash?” Peyton asked surprised, then her eyes flickered from my phone in my hand to my face. She saw my eyes, and she must had known how I was feeling. She sighed softly, then she placed her pen down.

Without another word, she stood and made her way to the fridge. Seconds later, she came back with a fresh bottle of jammy red for us to drink.

I knew the wine was probably what was making me so emotional at the time, but I didn’t care. I was realising that maybe I really did mean nothing to this man and when he was degrading me over text messages, he wasn’t just degrading me for our mutual pleasure… He was revealing how he really felt about me.

That he thought I was worthless, and I meant nothing to him—that I was just a set of wholes for him to use as he wished, when he wished. Until he would get bored, and move onto the next.

I was just another next, I told myself in that moment.

I felt my lower lip quiver, but I refused to cry. I picked up the bottle of wine and poured myself a new glass. I poured so much, half of the bottle was gone and in my glass.

I picked the glass up by the stem and brought it to my lips, then I tilted my head back and took a large gulp. Wine wasn’t a good drink to try to down, but we had ran out of lemonade quite early into the night and downing vodka with mixer wasn’t an option.

“You’re going to be okay, you know that, right?” Peyton said after several minutes of silence between us, the only sound in the house the music playing from the TV in the living room.

I swallowed and nodded my head. Then I forced a smiled. “I know.” But my voice quiver and gave me up.

I lent my head back with my eyes staring at the ceiling, begging me not to cry. My hands were pressed palms down into the table top. I let out a sob, but at the way I held my head, my eyes found it hard to let loose any tears.

“Oh, babe,” Peyton sighed as she pulled her chair closer to mine. She rest her head on my shoulder, her hand reaching for one of mine. She grabbed it, entwining our fingers.

“Maybe we should get married, fuck men,” Peyton let out a small laugh, to which I laughed and nodded quickly.

“I wish we could.”