Page 20 of Yes, Love

“Ava! Baby, I’ve been calling for hours! It scares me when you don’t answer on Sunday mornings! Sunday is our day.”

I sighed and collapsed on my bed. “Mom, you haven’t been calling for hours. I was in the shower for thirty minutes, and I’m fine.”

“Okay, I just worry about you. The spotlight seems like too much for you, baby. Your smile looks tired, and some of those people that comment on your videos are so icky! The things they say to you make me so angry—”

“Mom!” I interrupted. “Don’t read all the comments!” I’d been dealing with the trolls for years, and they hardly bothered me anymore. They weren’t saying anything I hadn’t already said to myself.

“But you read the comments.”

“Only some of them, you know, just enough that I can reply and look approachable.” If we were on a simple phone call, I would have rolled my eyes, but I kept my expression in check since my mom could see my face. I knew why she did facetime calls. She couldn’t tell if I was lying about being fine from my voice alone. “So, how’s dad?”

“He’s fine. Working too much, as always.” She pursed her lips and let out a sigh.

My dad was an overworked lawyer, and I’d lost count of how many fights they’d had about his long hours. The word workaholic got thrown around a lot while I was growing up. Back then, I sided with my mom. Lately, though, I understood my father a lot better. To get ahead, you had to burn the midnight oil when no one else would. “How do you like that new car he bought you last month, though?”

That was a sassy, shitty thing to say to my mom, but she ignored it, just like she ignored every bad thing I’d ever done since that night. She coddled me, still. As a teenager, I used it to my advantage to get every little thing I wanted.

Now, it simply made my heart hurt. She couldn’t treat me like her daughter anymore. I was her fragile, little monster.

“When do we get to meet Dominic?” She quickly changed the subject, hardly letting her disapproval at my sassy comment register on her face.

I blinked slowly. “Mom, you have to stay off my Instagram.”

“Oh, come on, baby. I need more info than what you give me on Sunday mornings! He looks like a nice young man, although some of those pics you two post are pretty racy, Ava.” Her big blue eyes widened. “I’m still happy for you. You haven’t posted about being in a relationship for years! Not since Jayden, and you never even brought him over.”

I blinked again. Was Jayden really the last boyfriend I’d had? God, he sucked. He stuck his dick in any warm hole he could find. After he gave me chlamydia, I dumped his ass. He wasn’t even that good in bed. He was always in a hurry to get himself off, very unlike Dominic. Mmm… Dom took good care of me last night.

“What’s that smile for?” My mom grinned back at me.

I snorted. “Nothing, mom. I’m not bringing Dominic over because….” I couldn’t lie to my mom. “He’s not really my boyfriend. It’s a PR stunt.” My mom would love Dominic, though. As the self-proclaimed president of the Benedict Cumberbatch Fanclub, Dom’s accent would turn her into a giggly pile of mush.

“Oh.” Her face fell. “I don’t know if that sounds mentally healthy, Ava.”

“Moooom!” I groaned. “Please don’t stress about my mental health. I promise I’m okay.”

“Baby, I have to stress and ask about it. You’re too good at pretending to be fine when there’s a storm raging in your head.”

I let out a long slow breath. “There’s no storm right now, momma. I’m good. I promise.” And at that exact moment, there wasn’t. My head was clear, and my thoughts were my own.

My mom squinted and moved the camera closer to her face. “Well, I can’t tell from here. I better come over and hang out today.”

I laughed and rolled my eyes. “Fine!”

“Love you, baby. I’ll be there soon.”

“Love you, too.” We did love each other. She loved me even though I was her fragile monster. I loved her even though her worry over me reached suffocating levels. And we both loved dad, even though he worked too much. Was it dysfunctional to love through all the messy, ugly parts? Or was it beautiful?

I ended the call and walked toward my closet to get dressed. I ran my hands along all of my gorgeous clothes in rich fabrics and bright colors before grabbing a t-shirt and a pair of sweatpants. I deserved a day off from being pretty Ava.

I wandered down to the kitchen without bothering to put any makeup on or dry my hair. The empty smoothie cup still sat on my counter. I smiled and bit my lip as I tossed it in the trash. Holy shit. Dom was such a gentle and romantic lover, and he seriously knew his way around a clit. And he saw me in a mud mask this morning and told me I was adorable.

Ava, don’t. I couldn’t keep falling for guys just because they were nice to me.

Eleven

Dominic

Good sex really was a magic cure-all. Wrong. It wasn’t good sex. It was great sex. I’d been in a fantastic mood since fucking my official fake girlfriend three days ago. Just the thought of her wet, warm pussy was making me hard at the breakfast table.