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25: Caprese Pt. 1

I'm sitting on Eliza's comfy desk chair, spinning here and there as she's practicing some scales on her guitar, cursing every time she gets a note wrong. After a while, she huffs and tosses the beautiful Fender at the edge of her bed.

"I can't stop thinking about Alex," she says, slightly kicking her guitar.

"Well, now that he broke up with Sofia I could hook you two up. He had a crush on you in Middle School."

Eliza rolls her eyes. "I want to kill that bitch. Kalisthenis too, actually. I used to like him but he's his brother's brother after all."

I cross my arms. "Don't say that! You don't know in how much pain he is!"

Eliza squints at me, her light green eyes looking darker through her black lashes. "Do you?"

If there's a person I can't ever fool, it's Eliza. All it takes is a slip-up from me and her high-achieving brain catches it immediately, analyzing a thousand possible scenarios and determining which are most likely before I can even blurt out a distractive lie.

"As a matter of fact, I do."

She nods. "How?"

I let out a defeated sigh before spilling everything to her. All about me knowing it for months, talking about it with Kal and Sofia, and -quite honestly- encouraging them both to keep it to themselves. Eliza's face reddens with anger the more I talk, just as my own reddens from embarrassment.

"I can't believe you did this to Alex! I thought you were protecting him!"

"But can't you understand my thought process? I wanted to protect him, and the best way was to hide the truth."

Eliza tilts her head to the side, shrugging. "I can understand that. Still, it would have been easier if you told him then. It was March, he had at least one month to get over it and take his exams."

My eyebrows shoot up. "Do you really think he would have gotten over it in time?"

Eliza thinks about it for a moment before shaking her head and tightening her ponytail. "You should really tell him now, though. Unless you can live with the guilt."

My shoulders fall. "I can't. It was easier when he didn't know but now... I can't even justify myself."

"That's right," Eliza says.

"Thanks for the pep talk."

Eliza rolls her eyes but laughs. She clears her throat and smiles. "Summer, Alex will forgive you if you tell him your reasons, and that forgiveness will come sooner the sooner you tell him the truth. Before you know it, the four of you will be eating all the sugar in the world and watching those cheesy superhero movies."

A hesitant smile spreads itself on my lips. "You think so?"

"I know so, but you have to tell him quickly, alright?" Eliza yawns and stretches her arms. "I guess I should go to bed now."

I get up from the chair. "Yeah, me too."

"Tell Kal I said hello."

I stop in my tracks, turning on my heel. "What do you mean?"

Eliza smirks. "I know what you two do at night."

My jaw drops.

"Relax, I'm not going to tell anyone."

I frown. Eliza knows we're going after drug dealers and she's covering up for me? She ratted me out when I was sneaking out to go to the cinema when I was sixteen and she still hasn't snitched me now? She must have lots of faith in me.