It all started with a game

Chapter 20

"Ugh, this is mortifying. It's a Friday night and I'm stuck inside crying over a girl."

"You can still come on vacation with us? Thenyou can cry over a girl in Italy instead of home. Much more poetic."

By home Mateo was obviously referring to his place, because that's where I've been staying the entirety of the last month. I hadn't bothered to go back to my house; my mother was in one of her 'kill everything that so much as breathes' kind of moods, so I've been hiding out at Mateo's, even though he's not here. "Nah, it's cool. I'll be fine. I don't want to kill the fun. You two enjoy the trip."

Mateo sighed. "You know we don't care. You wanna sit around and mope all day, come mope at the beach. Come on, man, you love the beach."

I haven't been to the beach in a month. I am truly pathetic. "It's alright. I'll be fine, really. You don't have to worry about me."

"I am worried about you. I've never seen you like this before."

I let out a frustrated sigh, nearly killing the stress ball I'd been using over the last few weeks. The poor thing looked about ready to crumble apart. "Why can't she just text me saying that she hates me and never wants to see me again? At least then I'd know. This is torture. I keep thinking she's going to randomly text me and tell me that—" I cut myself off before I could finish my sentence, and give Mateo every clue he needed, if he hadn't already figured it out. Who am I kidding, he knows me better than I know myself, of course he knows.

"Tell you what?"

Tell me that she misses me too. I cleared my throat, sitting up from the couch. "Nothing. You know, I should get going. I'm expecting a very angry text from my mother. This is right around the time she sends them."

Mateo laughed. "Sure, whatever you say. But for the record, I'm sure she misses you too."

I think we've been friends for too long. "I hate you."

"Love you too, mate. I'll talk to you later."

I hung up, tossing my phone to the side.

I picked up the book from the coffee table, opening it to it's marked page. I'd seen Beatrice read it before so I figured it was a good one to read to find out what kind of stuff she liked. I've had a lot of extra time in the last month and I've spent the majority of it reading the romance novels that she loves so much. I don't terribly get the point but I was learning a lot, I guess. That would be my seventh book. I have never read so much in my entire life; before that, I'm fairly certain I had only read three novels.

I feel like I'm going completely insane. That must be why I'm acting this way; I mean, everytime my phone buzzes I can feel my heart rate skyrocket only to nearly stop every time it's not her, and it's never her.

My phone pinged again, just confirming my prior statement. My mothers name popped up with a very lengthy message that basically just told me I needed to come home now or I was in big trouble. Is this what they meant when they said karma would get you if you lie? Because that's just bogus. I screenshotted the message, sending it to Mateo with an 'I told you she would'. Mateo replied back instantly.

The Idiot That Keeps Me From Getting Myself Killed: We both know you had no idea she was actually going to text you.

I did not, but at least now I can pretend I did, not that Mateo would ever believe me. The guy knows me way too well for that.

I didn't bother replying to my mother as I grabbed my coat and keys. Whatever she wanted had to be important if she demanded me home; she usually finds a reason for me not to be home. The less we see each other, the better.