The Art of Losing by Lizzy Mason

Author:Lizzy Mason
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction
Publisher: Soho Press
Published: 2018-11-09T21:37:29+00:00

Eight Months Ago

When Mike called that day, I could hear in his voice that something was wrong. He asked to come over for a little while, when normally he would have just texted me to say that he was already on his way.

My parents were playing golf, so I told him he could come over. When he got to the house, he rang the doorbell. He hadn’t done that since the homecoming dance that fall. He’d brought me a corsage, but he knew Audrey didn’t have a date, so he’d brought one for her, too. She’d kept it next to her mirror, dried and hanging upside down.

But that day, he came only with his guilt, his head hanging, his shoulders slumped. Full of shame, he asked me to sit next to him on the front stoop. I think it was easier for him to admit what he’d done when we weren’t face-to-face.

“Last night, at the party, I kissed someone,” he said.

My ears got hot first, as if they’d been burned by the information. The heat traveled to my cheeks, then down my neck to my chest. The tears that slid from my eyes should’ve turned to steam.

I didn’t know what to say. I was so shocked that any words got stuck in my throat on the way out.

“Who?” I finally managed to whisper.

He didn’t want to tell me at first, but I glared at him until he did. “Sofia,” he said, adding quickly, “but it wasn’t her fault.”

“So it was yours?”

Mike’s face turned pale. “No! It was just . . . we were drunk, and she was flirting, and I got confused. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“How could you do this?” I said. “Do you want to break up?” My heart ached just saying those words.

“No!” he said, kneeling on the asphalt in front of me, his hands on my knees. “I don’t want to break up. I just . . .” His voice trailed off as he slumped to the ground.

“What, Mike?” I said. Sobbed, really.

“You didn’t know me before I came to DC, but I wasn’t someone that girls wanted to hook up with. I was overweight and smart and I read comics. No one was interested . . . until I started playing lacrosse in seventh grade. You’re the first girl I’d ever kissed.”

He wasn’t looking at me, and his eyes were glued to the concrete stairs, but I let my face register my shock anyway. He had never mentioned that, not in the many hours we had spent making out. But that didn’t change the fact that he’d cheated.

“So what?” I said.

“So I love you,” he practically shouted. He was on his knees in front of me, begging, but I had pride. I wasn’t giving in. Yet.

My silence rankled him.

“This wouldn’t have happened if you’d just come to the party with me last night,” he said resentfully as he sat back on his heels.

A flash of rage burned through me. “Are you kidding me?” I yelled.

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