Who We Could Be - Chelsea M. Cameron Page 0,30

I said, not even remembering what she’d just said a few seconds earlier. Tessa grabbed the phone as I finger-combed my braid out. Today was going to require so much coffee. I hoped they brought enough, or else I’d have to make some with the little pods in the room to get me going.

My best friend didn’t seem to need any coffee, she was bright and full of energy and I had to grit my teeth not to yell at her for being so chipper and perky.

“So,” she said, at last coming to rest on the bed like a hummingbird finally taking a break, “what’s your agenda for today?”

“Let’s have breakfast first,” I said. I wasn’t ready to do anything else yet.

“Oh come on, tell me.” Her eyes sparkled, and then she grabbed for my phone.

“Give it back!” I yelled, reaching for the phone as she stood up on the bed, holding it toward the ceiling. There was no way I was getting up and fighting for it.

“Fine, whatever. It’s not like I wasn’t going to tell you after I’d had some coffee anyway. I also changed my passcode.”

“Too bad for you, but I know all your password patterns.” She unlocked the phone and waved it in my direction.

“That’s why you have two-factor authentication,” she said, bouncing slightly and making the bed move in waves.

“Can you stop please?” I asked. If things didn’t improve, I was on the fast-track for a migraine.

“Sure,” she said, sitting at the edge of the bed and facing me, scrolling through my phone. I didn’t have anything on there I didn’t want her to see, and it wasn’t worth the effort to snatch it back from her.

“Oh, this is more detailed than I thought. Well done.”

“I like being organized,” I said.

“I know.”

A knock at the door interrupted us and the food arrived. Thank goodness. I went for the coffee first and downed a cup before I even touched any of the food.

“Come on,” Tessa said, pulling the cart out toward the balcony. I had to help her with the door, and there was barely enough room for two chairs and the cart, but she seemed happy, so who was I to argue?

“See this? This is perfect.” Tessa turned her face up to the sun, and it set her hair on fire. If I said that I wasn’t jealous of her hair color, it would be a lie. I’d always been horribly envious. Even when we’d been younger and she’d gotten teased for it and I’d had to comfort her and tell her how lovely it was. Like gold and sunsets mixed together.

I pulled my legs up and set my plate on them, taking little bites here and there. I was hungry, but eating wasn’t exactly a priority. Things were still so...

Unsettled. All those thoughts that didn’t make sense, but made all the sense. Tessa hummed happily as she devoured her plate in giant bites and then stared out at the world around us as she sipped her coffee, one knee pulled up.

“So, what are the chances of me talking you out of doing everything you had on that list?” she asked, finally turning to look at me.

“Slim to none. You’re on my trip, remember? Did you even look at what I had on there? So much of it’s for you.” I’d added antique stores and weird shops I knew she’d like, and even selected restaurants that had her favorite things. In fact, there was less on that list for me than there was for her. Everything had been easier that way. What I’d planned for me and TJ didn’t matter anymore, and it didn’t interest me.

“I hope we can at least take an hour or two of unscheduled time for spontaneous things.” I wasn’t a fan of spontaneous things, and she knew that.

“What kind of spontaneous things?”

She sighed. “That’s the point, Ford. You don’t know what they’re going to be. Don’t you have an English degree?” I threw a grape at her.

“Yes, I know what the word spontaneous means. I’m just not a fan.” I shuddered.

“But can’t spontaneous things be great sometimes?” she said, leaning forward and plucking a strawberry off the plate and biting into it. The juice stained her lips a little.

“Was it fun when we were almost attacked that family of racoons when we tried to sneak onto the beach to go to that party that one time? Was it fun when we got a flat tire in the middle of fucking