Best Friends Never by Isabelle Drake

Author:Isabelle Drake [Drake, Isabelle]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Young Adult Fiction
Publisher: Totally Entwined Group Ltd
Published: 2016-09-25T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Nine

Bedtime Stories

Lexi inched the door open, stepped through, then turned to gently push it closed. Once she was inside, she heard the hum of her phone. It came then went, then came again. And again. No way was she going to answer it. She wasn’t even going to look. If it was Jazz, she’d understand why Lexi wasn’t in the mood to talk. With Ash gone, the loneliness and anxiety had already crept back. All she wanted was to climb into the shelter of her covers and wait for the oblivion of sleep. Tomorrow she’d deal with the fallout from the party. With Monica. Sort out whatever was left of herself.

The house was dark, except for a single red light glowing from the kitchen counter. When she went over to snap off the coffee maker she spotted her mother slumped over the kitchen table, asleep beside an empty Wayne State mug.

Lexi paused, questions crawling through her mind.

Why didn’t her mom see she could get someone better than Dale?

How long until she herself snapped, ended up helpless and pathetic too?

Queasiness curled through Lexi’s stomach. She couldn’t let that happen.

But what if what Ash said was true—that there were some things you couldn’t control?

She gently nudged her mom, but she woke with a start anyway.

“Dale?” she mumbled, pushing her hair off her cheeks.

Lexi’s heart sank. Of course he was the first person she thought of. “No, Mom. It’s me.”

“Oh, Lexi. Hi, honey.” She looked up with sleep-filled eyes smudged with mascara. Even though she was hurting, she still felt sad for her mom. Over and over she let Dale disappoint her. She rubbed her mom’s shoulders, realizing she wasn’t going to tell her about Peter until morning. “Go to bed. You’ll get a stiff neck sleeping like that.”

She pushed herself upright, searching the kitchen with her puffy, tear-stained eyes.

“Go to bed,” Lexi repeated, as gently as she could. “It’s late.”

Defeat lingered in her gaze. “I’m waiting for Dale. I don’t know where he is, he hasn’t called.”

Figures.

“We went to bed, but when I woke up, he was gone.” She looked into her empty coffee cup as though she might find some answers in the cold sludge at the bottom. “You go to bed, sweetie. I’m going to wait up for him.”

She couldn’t remember the last time she’d kissed her mom, but right then she felt so sorry for her that she bent down, placing her lips on her temple. Even though her own world was falling apart, she didn’t feel as miserable as her mom looked. And at least she still had the confidence to fight back, to do something.

And now she had Ash.

“You should go to bed, Mom.”

“Don’t worry about me.” She ran her fingers under her eyelashes, trying to wipe away the makeup smudges making her look hollow. “Your mail stack’s getting pretty big,” she said, forcing her voice to a high, falsely cheerful pitch. “Lots of important-looking college stuff. Why don’t you take it up with you?”

Like that matters.

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