New story
I dunno.
Warning: Some language and trigger for self-harming.
Chapter 1
It was just another Tuesday.
Well, of course it was. It was a normal day. Tuesdays were nothing new. It wasn’t like she hadn't experienced a Tuesday before.
She wasn’t sure where this line of thinking was supposed to go. She took another sip of water, chewing on the tip of the straw, feeling it pinch her gums on the right side of her mouth. She was always doing that, chewing on the inside of her cheek until it got too painful, then regretting it later.
People were enjoying their meals, clinking glasses in celebration, laughing, talking about their days and their friends and their jobs. One couple in the corner was fighting; the girl was waving her arms around, her face red with anger, as the boy sat motionless, looking embarrassed to be seen in public with such a crazy person. Another couple was in a small booth in the corner of the restaurant, locked together in a passionate embrace, whispering words of love to each other in-between kisses. She hated couples like that. She wished they would just do that at home.
One of the waiters waved from a table nearby and she snapped to attention, sighing inwardly. This was her exciting job-wait for someone to signal her, grab her large gray plastic bucket, and rush over to clear the table. It wasn’t the best job, but it paid the bills. She hated cleaning, but it was the only job she had been able to get after graduating. What was even the point of getting her biochemistry degree if none of the research facilities in a sixty mile radius were hiring? The city was big enough, but apparently not big enough for her.
As she cleared the table, she found herself drifting into her thoughts again. Recently they were of her boyfriend-no, sorry, ex-boyfriend. She was still getting used to saying that. Well, thinking it anyway. It had been a week but she hadn’t told anyone yet, not even her best friend. He would want to know, because she knew he had feelings for her, but she didn’t want to open that door again. She already had to break his heart once, during high school. She didn’t want to do it again. That’s why she was always in a relationship. Being single invited temptation. They had learned that the hard way over the years.
She finished clearing the table and carried the bucket back to the kitchen, setting it next to the sink. Luckily there was another girl working that night who loved to wash dishes, and she turned and smiled, reaching into the bin. She smiled back and pushed through the swinging doors back into the dining area.
It wasn’t too busy tonight, for which she was grateful. She hated busy nights. She also hated slow nights. It really depended on her mood. Tonight was one of those nights where slow was better. Slow let her think. Obsess. Try to figure out what went wrong.
He had said he loved her, but wasn’t in love with her. What the fuck was that supposed to mean, anyway? She had sat there, speechless, not even feeling upset. It had been a long time coming, she supposed. They hadn’t been spending much time together lately, and the time they had together was spent fighting over stupid stuff, like what sort of milk to buy (for the record, soy milk wasn’t real milk, but don’t tell him that more than once). Fighting made her feel alive. It gave her something to feel about. But he hadn’t understood that. No one did, really. It’s why she was destined to end up alone. No one could put up with her for long. Her longest relationship clocked in around eleven months-she’d never made it to a one-year anniversary, and she was nearing her 31st birthday. How pathetic.
She still wasn’t too upset about it. She knew she should tell people, but she’d spent the last week hiding away, mulling things over, feeling sorry for herself and lying in bed, listening to old boy band music. They really understood love, didn’t they? They must have, they all sang enough songs about it. She wished she had that sort of relationship, just once, where the boy worshipped everything about her and sang songs about her beauty.
What a load of shit.
She wasn’t that pretty. She wasn’t ugly, and she knew that, but she wasn’t a model by any means. Average height, five-foot-something. Short, cropped hair, colored black in a fit of frustration because the blonde dye looked terrible. Her original chestnut brown was ugly and she hated it since grade school, but her mother had a rule about not dying her hair until she was out of the house because ‘the toxins in the dye are terrible for you.’ What a hypocrite; she had been dying the gray away since she could remember.
Her face was angular but in an interesting way--a Reese Witherspoon sort of look, which complimented the short hairstyle. She had learned to cut her own hair in high school. The first experiment resulted in bangs, before they came into style. After many bouts of trial and error, she had settled on an asymmetrical bob, longer on the sides and shorter in the back, and luckily her bangs had grown out quickly. Once they were long enough to pin the side, that’s where they had stayed. Now no one could tell she’d ever had to suffer through them.
She didn’t wear much make-up, just enough to make herself stand out. Blues, purples, bright colors of eyeliner and eye shadow to make her blue eyes pop, highlighted against her tanned skin. She loved the sun, and it loved her back. Somehow she always had the perfect tan and never got sunburned, no matter how long she stayed outside. It made her friends jealous and she always got a good laugh out of their annoyed reactions.
A buzz vibrated from the back pocket of her jeans and she started, breaking out of her thoughts. She reached back and pulled out her phone, flipping it open. She was the only one of her friends without a fancy smartphone, but she didn’t care. Texting didn’t require a data plan, and she wasn’t much for technology. It was such a pain in the ass trying to keep up, so she had given up quite a long time ago.
He was calling her. He dumped her a week ago, and now he was calling? Where did get off doing that? She hit the END button and hung up on him, anger washing over her. What was she, a booty call now? Or maybe he wanted his stuff back. Oh no, maybe he couldn’t live without his box of shitty heavy metal CDs and video games. Fuck Battlefield, or whatever the latest excuse was. He spent more time with those games than her the last month of their relationship. Normally she didn’t mind video games, and would even play sometimes, but when they got more attention than her, she minded.
No, it was over. She wasn’t going to waste any more energy on him.
The loud laugh of someone caught her attention and she looked over to see a young girl playfully pushing the shoulder of her date, running her fingers along his arm. Ugh. What obvious flirting. It pissed her off and was just obnoxious to boot. Save that for somewhere else. He was way out of her league anyway. He was actually kind of cute…
“Hey! I think you’re off work now. It’s nine.”
She looked up and saw one of the cooks waving at her from the kitchen doors a few feet away. Glancing up at the clock, she realized with massive relief that he was right, and she grinned at him. She jumped up and practically ran towards the break room, letting the door slam behind her as she ripped off her work shirt and pulled her t-shirt out of her locker, pulling it over her head. She ran a hand through her hair to smooth it from the static electricity and grabbed her purse, firmly shutting the locker door.
Her car was parked at the far end of the lot, per regulation that the employees leave the good parking spots for customers. She didn’t care, because it was usually nice to have the short walk after a shift. It gave her a chance to stretch her legs. As she approached her trusty Honda Civic, she pulled her keys out of her purse and pressed the unlock button on the key ring. The car beeped its familiar beep and she opened the door, sliding inside, tossing her purse onto the passenger seat. As the car roared to life her iPod began to blare the song it had been playing when she turned off the car last, one of her favorite songs, an angry tune screamed by a girl with some great guitar riffs in the middle. It always made her feel better when she was upset.
Her phone buzzed again as she was putting on her seat belt and she ignored it, knowing he was just calling her again. She wasn’t falling for that again. She shifted into reverse and pulled out of the lot, heading for her apartment.
They had been getting close to moving in together, but now she was glad that hadn’t happened. She’d had to deal with that once before with a previous boyfriend, and living together while she found a new place had been a nightmare. The awkward silences, the obvious avoiding of the other person, it was too much to handle. And he’d had the nerve to bring home a girl after only three weeks, while she was home watching TV. The date had probably ended shortly after she punched him in the stomach and stormed out, ignoring the stream of cuss words flung at her by the bleach-blonde bimbo in her short leopard-print skirt. Honestly, leopard-print? Talk about having no standards, the both of them.
Traffic was light at this time of night and she made it home relatively quickly, parking in her assigned parking space in the apartment lot. She grabbed her purse and locked the car, trudging up the stairs to her single-bedroom apartment with the burned-out porch light. She unlocked and pushed open the door, threw her purse and phone onto the black pleather loveseat, and headed straight for the fridge. A six-pack of chilled beer was waiting for her and she grabbed one, popped the top off with the magnetic bottle opener on the fridge, and took a long drink, already feeling her stress melt away. Her phone began to buzz a third time and she slammed the beer bottle onto the counter, storming over to the couch to pick up the phone. She flipped it open and hit the TALK button, putting it to her ear.
“God damn it, Ben, I told you to leave me alone.”
“Why have you been ignoring my calls, baby?”
He was drunk. Great. He hardly ever drank, unless he was legitimately upset. She gritted her teeth and sunk down onto the loveseat, settling against her small decorative pillow shaped like a moose. It had been a gag gift from a boyfriend many years earlier but she could never bring herself to throw it away. It always looked so sad, staring up at her from the couch cushions. She loved it unconditionally.
“Why are you drinking?”
“Because you dumped me!”
“You broke up with me, if I remember. Said you were bored with me and wanted someone fun.”
“Come on, baby-”
“Oh, don’t start with that ‘baby’ shit, Ben. I’m over you. Don’t call me again.” She flipped the phone shut and threw it across the room, watching it bounce on the carpet. She shook her head and stood up, grabbing her bottle from the kitchen counter. She headed into the bathroom and set the bottle next to the sink, picking up her razor from behind the faucet. Carefully peeling the razor away from the plastic frame, she set the frame down and ran a finger along the razor’s edge. A thin line of blood appeared and she smiled, relishing the feeling.
She hadn’t done it often. Just once or twice recently, a couple of times a few years earlier, only when she was really upset. The feeling was nice, the feeling of control she felt when taking the blade to her skin. Ben had caught her once, but she claimed it was an accident. At least it was on her leg, her upper thigh, where hardly anyone would see the cut. Whatever. She didn’t really care anyway.
A knock on the door sounded throughout the small apartment and she dropped the blade, watching it bounce around in the sink. Annoyed, she grabbed a towel and wiped her finger, grabbed her beer and went to open the door. She swung it open to reveal her best friend standing there, leaning against the doorframe, looking irritated.
“Paul?”
“Yeah, thanks for answering my fucking texts,” he responded, pushing his way past her. He picked up her phone from the floor and flipped it open, hitting a couple buttons. “Yup, there they are. Too busy getting drunk?” He handed her the phone and she tossed it on a small chair to her left.
“I just got home. What’s your problem?” She shut the door and took another drink from the bottle, setting it on a shelf of a nearby bookcase. “Want one?”
“No thanks. You know I don’t drink.”
“Never too late to start.”
“Zip it, Kris. Can’t you take anything seriously?”
She bristled. She hated when he was upset, because it made her feel shitty about herself. “Sorry. What’s wrong?”
“Nothing in particular. Just not feeling up to fighting right now, okay?” He moved over to the loveseat and flung himself dramatically over the small cushions. He was so gangly, having never really filled out after reaching six foot three. His wavy brown hair was messed up and shoved in a couple different directions, like he had just showered and forgotten to comb it, which was likely. “Where’s Ben? I haven’t seen him in a while.”
“Yeah, we broke up.”
She watched him raise an eyebrow in surprise. “I thought this one was going well. What happened?”
“He dumped me. I don’t care. I’m over it.” She sat down on the floor and sprawled out, tapping her foot against the vintage wooden table resting between the loveseat and the big screen television. “It wasn’t going well for the last month anyway.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No you aren’t.”
An awkward silence filled the living room and she regretted her implication.
“He was a jerk anyway. Never liked him.” Paul sounded irritated again.
“Yeah, I know.”
“Want to go rent a movie or something?” He checked his watch and sat up. “It’s only 9:30. The movie store should still be open.”
“I’m not in the mood. I just wanted to be alone.” She took a deep breath. “He called me earlier. He was drunk.”
“Hah, really? I thought he didn’t drink much.”
“Yeah, he doesn’t. I’m kind of worried.”
“Don’t worry about it, Kris. He’s not your problem anymore.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“Tell you what. I’ll go get a movie. I promise I’ll pick something good, something funny. You order a pizza, we’ll stay in. I’ll be back in a bit.” He got off the loveseat and walked over to her, offering her a hand. She took it and he helped her up, brushing a piece of carpet lint off her shoulder. She smiled and he smiled back, pulling her into a hug. A moment later, he leaned back and dipped his head, aiming towards her face.
She glanced to the side, pulling away. “Damn it, Paul, not right now.”
“Sorry.” He smiled sheepishly, letting her go. “Had to try, you know?”
“Just go. I’ll clean up and order some food.”
He nodded and left, shutting the door a little too hard behind him. She sighed and went back into the bathroom, assembling her razor once again and placing it in its original spot. She turned off the light, went into the bedroom, and changed into a pair of flannel sleeping pants and thin nightshirt. She went back into the living room and picked up her phone, calling the local pizza place, placing an order for a large pizza with everything on it. The loveseat felt more comfortable than usual as she hung up, tucking her phone into the top of her bra so she wouldn't miss any more texts. It was closer than setting it on the table. It was a weird habit she’d picked up over the years. Paul thought it was cute. He was the only one.
Warning: Some language and trigger for self-harming.
Chapter 1
It was just another Tuesday.
Well, of course it was. It was a normal day. Tuesdays were nothing new. It wasn’t like she hadn't experienced a Tuesday before.
She wasn’t sure where this line of thinking was supposed to go. She took another sip of water, chewing on the tip of the straw, feeling it pinch her gums on the right side of her mouth. She was always doing that, chewing on the inside of her cheek until it got too painful, then regretting it later.
People were enjoying their meals, clinking glasses in celebration, laughing, talking about their days and their friends and their jobs. One couple in the corner was fighting; the girl was waving her arms around, her face red with anger, as the boy sat motionless, looking embarrassed to be seen in public with such a crazy person. Another couple was in a small booth in the corner of the restaurant, locked together in a passionate embrace, whispering words of love to each other in-between kisses. She hated couples like that. She wished they would just do that at home.
One of the waiters waved from a table nearby and she snapped to attention, sighing inwardly. This was her exciting job-wait for someone to signal her, grab her large gray plastic bucket, and rush over to clear the table. It wasn’t the best job, but it paid the bills. She hated cleaning, but it was the only job she had been able to get after graduating. What was even the point of getting her biochemistry degree if none of the research facilities in a sixty mile radius were hiring? The city was big enough, but apparently not big enough for her.
As she cleared the table, she found herself drifting into her thoughts again. Recently they were of her boyfriend-no, sorry, ex-boyfriend. She was still getting used to saying that. Well, thinking it anyway. It had been a week but she hadn’t told anyone yet, not even her best friend. He would want to know, because she knew he had feelings for her, but she didn’t want to open that door again. She already had to break his heart once, during high school. She didn’t want to do it again. That’s why she was always in a relationship. Being single invited temptation. They had learned that the hard way over the years.
She finished clearing the table and carried the bucket back to the kitchen, setting it next to the sink. Luckily there was another girl working that night who loved to wash dishes, and she turned and smiled, reaching into the bin. She smiled back and pushed through the swinging doors back into the dining area.
It wasn’t too busy tonight, for which she was grateful. She hated busy nights. She also hated slow nights. It really depended on her mood. Tonight was one of those nights where slow was better. Slow let her think. Obsess. Try to figure out what went wrong.
He had said he loved her, but wasn’t in love with her. What the fuck was that supposed to mean, anyway? She had sat there, speechless, not even feeling upset. It had been a long time coming, she supposed. They hadn’t been spending much time together lately, and the time they had together was spent fighting over stupid stuff, like what sort of milk to buy (for the record, soy milk wasn’t real milk, but don’t tell him that more than once). Fighting made her feel alive. It gave her something to feel about. But he hadn’t understood that. No one did, really. It’s why she was destined to end up alone. No one could put up with her for long. Her longest relationship clocked in around eleven months-she’d never made it to a one-year anniversary, and she was nearing her 31st birthday. How pathetic.
She still wasn’t too upset about it. She knew she should tell people, but she’d spent the last week hiding away, mulling things over, feeling sorry for herself and lying in bed, listening to old boy band music. They really understood love, didn’t they? They must have, they all sang enough songs about it. She wished she had that sort of relationship, just once, where the boy worshipped everything about her and sang songs about her beauty.
What a load of shit.
She wasn’t that pretty. She wasn’t ugly, and she knew that, but she wasn’t a model by any means. Average height, five-foot-something. Short, cropped hair, colored black in a fit of frustration because the blonde dye looked terrible. Her original chestnut brown was ugly and she hated it since grade school, but her mother had a rule about not dying her hair until she was out of the house because ‘the toxins in the dye are terrible for you.’ What a hypocrite; she had been dying the gray away since she could remember.
Her face was angular but in an interesting way--a Reese Witherspoon sort of look, which complimented the short hairstyle. She had learned to cut her own hair in high school. The first experiment resulted in bangs, before they came into style. After many bouts of trial and error, she had settled on an asymmetrical bob, longer on the sides and shorter in the back, and luckily her bangs had grown out quickly. Once they were long enough to pin the side, that’s where they had stayed. Now no one could tell she’d ever had to suffer through them.
She didn’t wear much make-up, just enough to make herself stand out. Blues, purples, bright colors of eyeliner and eye shadow to make her blue eyes pop, highlighted against her tanned skin. She loved the sun, and it loved her back. Somehow she always had the perfect tan and never got sunburned, no matter how long she stayed outside. It made her friends jealous and she always got a good laugh out of their annoyed reactions.
A buzz vibrated from the back pocket of her jeans and she started, breaking out of her thoughts. She reached back and pulled out her phone, flipping it open. She was the only one of her friends without a fancy smartphone, but she didn’t care. Texting didn’t require a data plan, and she wasn’t much for technology. It was such a pain in the ass trying to keep up, so she had given up quite a long time ago.
He was calling her. He dumped her a week ago, and now he was calling? Where did get off doing that? She hit the END button and hung up on him, anger washing over her. What was she, a booty call now? Or maybe he wanted his stuff back. Oh no, maybe he couldn’t live without his box of shitty heavy metal CDs and video games. Fuck Battlefield, or whatever the latest excuse was. He spent more time with those games than her the last month of their relationship. Normally she didn’t mind video games, and would even play sometimes, but when they got more attention than her, she minded.
No, it was over. She wasn’t going to waste any more energy on him.
The loud laugh of someone caught her attention and she looked over to see a young girl playfully pushing the shoulder of her date, running her fingers along his arm. Ugh. What obvious flirting. It pissed her off and was just obnoxious to boot. Save that for somewhere else. He was way out of her league anyway. He was actually kind of cute…
“Hey! I think you’re off work now. It’s nine.”
She looked up and saw one of the cooks waving at her from the kitchen doors a few feet away. Glancing up at the clock, she realized with massive relief that he was right, and she grinned at him. She jumped up and practically ran towards the break room, letting the door slam behind her as she ripped off her work shirt and pulled her t-shirt out of her locker, pulling it over her head. She ran a hand through her hair to smooth it from the static electricity and grabbed her purse, firmly shutting the locker door.
Her car was parked at the far end of the lot, per regulation that the employees leave the good parking spots for customers. She didn’t care, because it was usually nice to have the short walk after a shift. It gave her a chance to stretch her legs. As she approached her trusty Honda Civic, she pulled her keys out of her purse and pressed the unlock button on the key ring. The car beeped its familiar beep and she opened the door, sliding inside, tossing her purse onto the passenger seat. As the car roared to life her iPod began to blare the song it had been playing when she turned off the car last, one of her favorite songs, an angry tune screamed by a girl with some great guitar riffs in the middle. It always made her feel better when she was upset.
Her phone buzzed again as she was putting on her seat belt and she ignored it, knowing he was just calling her again. She wasn’t falling for that again. She shifted into reverse and pulled out of the lot, heading for her apartment.
They had been getting close to moving in together, but now she was glad that hadn’t happened. She’d had to deal with that once before with a previous boyfriend, and living together while she found a new place had been a nightmare. The awkward silences, the obvious avoiding of the other person, it was too much to handle. And he’d had the nerve to bring home a girl after only three weeks, while she was home watching TV. The date had probably ended shortly after she punched him in the stomach and stormed out, ignoring the stream of cuss words flung at her by the bleach-blonde bimbo in her short leopard-print skirt. Honestly, leopard-print? Talk about having no standards, the both of them.
Traffic was light at this time of night and she made it home relatively quickly, parking in her assigned parking space in the apartment lot. She grabbed her purse and locked the car, trudging up the stairs to her single-bedroom apartment with the burned-out porch light. She unlocked and pushed open the door, threw her purse and phone onto the black pleather loveseat, and headed straight for the fridge. A six-pack of chilled beer was waiting for her and she grabbed one, popped the top off with the magnetic bottle opener on the fridge, and took a long drink, already feeling her stress melt away. Her phone began to buzz a third time and she slammed the beer bottle onto the counter, storming over to the couch to pick up the phone. She flipped it open and hit the TALK button, putting it to her ear.
“God damn it, Ben, I told you to leave me alone.”
“Why have you been ignoring my calls, baby?”
He was drunk. Great. He hardly ever drank, unless he was legitimately upset. She gritted her teeth and sunk down onto the loveseat, settling against her small decorative pillow shaped like a moose. It had been a gag gift from a boyfriend many years earlier but she could never bring herself to throw it away. It always looked so sad, staring up at her from the couch cushions. She loved it unconditionally.
“Why are you drinking?”
“Because you dumped me!”
“You broke up with me, if I remember. Said you were bored with me and wanted someone fun.”
“Come on, baby-”
“Oh, don’t start with that ‘baby’ shit, Ben. I’m over you. Don’t call me again.” She flipped the phone shut and threw it across the room, watching it bounce on the carpet. She shook her head and stood up, grabbing her bottle from the kitchen counter. She headed into the bathroom and set the bottle next to the sink, picking up her razor from behind the faucet. Carefully peeling the razor away from the plastic frame, she set the frame down and ran a finger along the razor’s edge. A thin line of blood appeared and she smiled, relishing the feeling.
She hadn’t done it often. Just once or twice recently, a couple of times a few years earlier, only when she was really upset. The feeling was nice, the feeling of control she felt when taking the blade to her skin. Ben had caught her once, but she claimed it was an accident. At least it was on her leg, her upper thigh, where hardly anyone would see the cut. Whatever. She didn’t really care anyway.
A knock on the door sounded throughout the small apartment and she dropped the blade, watching it bounce around in the sink. Annoyed, she grabbed a towel and wiped her finger, grabbed her beer and went to open the door. She swung it open to reveal her best friend standing there, leaning against the doorframe, looking irritated.
“Paul?”
“Yeah, thanks for answering my fucking texts,” he responded, pushing his way past her. He picked up her phone from the floor and flipped it open, hitting a couple buttons. “Yup, there they are. Too busy getting drunk?” He handed her the phone and she tossed it on a small chair to her left.
“I just got home. What’s your problem?” She shut the door and took another drink from the bottle, setting it on a shelf of a nearby bookcase. “Want one?”
“No thanks. You know I don’t drink.”
“Never too late to start.”
“Zip it, Kris. Can’t you take anything seriously?”
She bristled. She hated when he was upset, because it made her feel shitty about herself. “Sorry. What’s wrong?”
“Nothing in particular. Just not feeling up to fighting right now, okay?” He moved over to the loveseat and flung himself dramatically over the small cushions. He was so gangly, having never really filled out after reaching six foot three. His wavy brown hair was messed up and shoved in a couple different directions, like he had just showered and forgotten to comb it, which was likely. “Where’s Ben? I haven’t seen him in a while.”
“Yeah, we broke up.”
She watched him raise an eyebrow in surprise. “I thought this one was going well. What happened?”
“He dumped me. I don’t care. I’m over it.” She sat down on the floor and sprawled out, tapping her foot against the vintage wooden table resting between the loveseat and the big screen television. “It wasn’t going well for the last month anyway.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No you aren’t.”
An awkward silence filled the living room and she regretted her implication.
“He was a jerk anyway. Never liked him.” Paul sounded irritated again.
“Yeah, I know.”
“Want to go rent a movie or something?” He checked his watch and sat up. “It’s only 9:30. The movie store should still be open.”
“I’m not in the mood. I just wanted to be alone.” She took a deep breath. “He called me earlier. He was drunk.”
“Hah, really? I thought he didn’t drink much.”
“Yeah, he doesn’t. I’m kind of worried.”
“Don’t worry about it, Kris. He’s not your problem anymore.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“Tell you what. I’ll go get a movie. I promise I’ll pick something good, something funny. You order a pizza, we’ll stay in. I’ll be back in a bit.” He got off the loveseat and walked over to her, offering her a hand. She took it and he helped her up, brushing a piece of carpet lint off her shoulder. She smiled and he smiled back, pulling her into a hug. A moment later, he leaned back and dipped his head, aiming towards her face.
She glanced to the side, pulling away. “Damn it, Paul, not right now.”
“Sorry.” He smiled sheepishly, letting her go. “Had to try, you know?”
“Just go. I’ll clean up and order some food.”
He nodded and left, shutting the door a little too hard behind him. She sighed and went back into the bathroom, assembling her razor once again and placing it in its original spot. She turned off the light, went into the bedroom, and changed into a pair of flannel sleeping pants and thin nightshirt. She went back into the living room and picked up her phone, calling the local pizza place, placing an order for a large pizza with everything on it. The loveseat felt more comfortable than usual as she hung up, tucking her phone into the top of her bra so she wouldn't miss any more texts. It was closer than setting it on the table. It was a weird habit she’d picked up over the years. Paul thought it was cute. He was the only one.