“Thanks for this,” I said, tucking my legs up underneath me.
“Of course. What are friends for?” She smiled. “So, how are you feeling about all of this?”
I shrugged. “Horrible. Pretty much horrible.”
“Ugh! I could imagine. Penn said that you two had a blow-up fight.”
“Yeah,” I said, taking another sip. “I just kind of lost it. I need to talk to him. Make things right.”
“Natalie…” Katherine said. Her eyes darted to the ground and then back up at me. “I really need to tell you something.”
My stomach dropped at the way she’d said those words. What could she possibly need to tell me?
“Do you?”
“This whole thing with Penn…I really don’t think it’s a good idea.”
My brain froze. Was she really trying to pull this right now?
“Oh, yeah? Why do you think that?”
“He’s just…he’s done this sort of thing before, and I don’t want to see you get hurt.”
“What sort of thing? Dated the help?”
Katherine furrowed her brows. “Well, yeah. I mean, he’s slept with the help before at least. Led them on. But he’s really not what you think he is.”
“Katherine, you should stop. I don’t need to hear this right now.”
“I mean, I hate that all of this started over a silly bet.”
I narrowed my eyes and tilted my head. “A bet? What bet?”
“It was stupid,” she said with a halfhearted laugh. “Penn swore he could get you into bed and make you fall for him. We tried to talk him out of it, but, well…he wants what he wants.”
My mouth went dry. This couldn’t be real. Who actually bet on things? Let alone on whether or not you could sleep with someone? We had already slept together. What kind of prize was that? It didn’t even make sense. That was something dumb jocks did in high school or maybe college. But we were…adults. The whole thing just sounded absurd.
“I’m really sorry. I felt like you should know.”
I finally looked back up at Katherine. Really looked at her. That sad, sympathetic routine. The light in her eyes that didn’t match her expression. Her mouth that tilted just slightly in the corners.
She wasn’t concerned. She wanted me to believe this. She wanted me to fall into her trap.
What had Lewis said? If Katherine knew we were dating, she would do anything to keep us apart. She would be worse, so much worse.
Had she been hiding her true character? Was this the depth of her deceit?
“I don’t believe you,” I said, my voice low and even.
“Natalie, it’s true!” she gasped.
“You would do anything to keep us apart,” I spat in her direction. “Anything. You are clearly in love with Penn and cannot stand the fact that he would pick me, a nobody, over you. Well, your lies are not going to change my mind about him.”
“I swear. It’s true. If you don’t ask Penn, then ask the rest of the crew. They were there that night. They’ll tell you it’s true.”
Suddenly, I couldn’t hold back any longer. I was laughing. A manic laugh. This was not real. This was not real life.
“Get out,” I told her.
“Natalie…”
“I said, get out!” I yelled at her. “I don’t want to hear another word out of your mouth. You aren’t my friend. You aren’t Penn’s friend. You’re a leech, a disease, a fake, and a fraud.”
Katherine straightened. “We’ll see about that.”
When she left, I collapsed back into the couch. My breathing was uneven. My fury returning in force. A bet? Was she out of her mind? Was that the best that she could do?
Then for a fraction of a second, it hit me. I wondered, Could it be true? Could all of this be a result of some stupid bet?
I bit on my lip. I didn’t want to give credence to Katherine’s tall tale, but maybe I should find out…just to be sure.
Penn
36
When I entered Lewis’s apartment, he and Lark were sitting in the living room, watching some detective show. They both glanced up at my entrance and then went back to their show.
“Hey,” Lewis said.
Lark put her hand up in a form of a wave.
“Hey.” I wanted to just dive into this conversation. After what had happened with my mother and Natalie, I needed to actually figure out how to make this right.
But then I sat down and saw Lark’s eyes were red and puffy. She had a box of tissues at her side and was curled up in a ball in sweats.