Page 21 of PS: I Hate You
“Sometimes something big happens. And it makes you look at your life. And you realize you’ve been living it wrong,” he says, holding my eyes. “That you let something go on longer than it should have.”
“Wait. Wait wait wait.” I wave a hand in front of his annoying face, trying to get his intense gaze to focus elsewhere. “You’re telling me you got divorced when Joshdied? Like, last week, you signed the papers?”
Dom shakes his head slowly. “We signed them months ago. His diagnosis was the big thing. That’s what had us realizing it needed to happen.”
My mind absorbs this information about as well as my underwear sopped up seawater. I take it in but have trouble grasping it.
I wave at the bartender until the guy pockets his phone and notices me pointing to my empty glass and holding up two fingers. Once I know more gin is on the way, I let myself refocus on Dom’s confession.
“You’re telling me it wasn’t some big betrayal? You two just decided, ‘Eh, not working for us anymore’?” I keep my voice careful onthe question, making sure I don’t display any particular emotion preemptively. Before I even know what I’m feeling.
“Something like that.” Dom lifts a single massive shoulder, then lets it drop before picking up his beer for a deep pull.
So casual. So easy, the way he shrugs off a years-long relationship. A relationship that devastated nineteen-year-old me and left a shadow of self-disgust that lingers to this day.
“The end of an era,” I mutter, not mournful in the least.
How can I be when the largest stain on that era was me?
A single night when Dominic Perry felt so grateful—or maybe so bad—for little, desperate Maddie Sanderson that he gave her a mind-melting orgasm. My first orgasm. A sexual experience that altered my universe and was apparently so unappealing, Dom felt the need to propose to a different woman the next day.
The ultimate pity finger bang.
Was it so bad that I drove him into a loveless marriage?
The bartender sets my two G&Ts in front of me, and I immediately down the first, then reach for the next one.
Dom’s only response is to drink more of his beer. The last of it, in fact.
I expect him to push the one I’d foisted on him aside and request a water. That’s what a responsible person would do, knowing after this we need to drive however many hours back to Pennsylvania.
Instead, Dom scoops up the IPA I barely touched and takes a swig. An evil urge has me raising my hand for the bartender to return.
Looks like I’m getting drunk with Dominic Perry.
Chapter
Six
We drink too much to drive. The bartender seems unconcerned about overserving us, and I put too much stock into Mr.Responsible Asshole eventually cutting me off. I was sure Dom would turn down the first shot I ordered for him.
If not the first, then definitely the second.
No way would he throw back the third…
The only thing that stops the steady flow of beer, gin, and tequila is closing time.
We stumble our way to a motel that was obviously meant to serve summer beach guests rather than winter funeral attendees. Everything is painted aqua blue and covered in seashells and draped in fishing nets.
For a brief moment, my alcohol-soaked brain panics at the thought of sharing a room with Dom. Then he asks the front desk worker for two rooms, and I realize we’re not at a roadside inn in some historical romance novel, so of course there’s going to be multiple rooms available.
When the young guy glances between the two of us with a skeptical expression as he hands over our key cards, I can tell what’s going on in his mind.
Why are these two wasted people springing for an extra room when they’re obviously going to hook up?
I have too much gin in me to let him continue thinking such an incorrect thought.
Leaning an elbow on the desk, I extend my body over the surface and get ready to blow his mind.