xxi. two hearts with one lie

I lean back, blinking rapidly. It takes me a moment to reply because I have to make sure I heard the name right.

“You said *Lorenxo*?” I point above me to where I know he’s still on the top deck. Just to make sure we’re talking about the same person here.
Reese nods.

I go through my head again. I’ve never been with anyone while drunk… I don’t think. I wasn’t even drinking freshman year or any time before that.

I shake my head. “No… why?” His lack of reply draws my attention to him again. I take in his blank expression and hands gripping the edges of the towel dangling down his chest. “Is that the reason?” My mouth falls open when he nods. “I’ve never even spoken to him until he and Gina,” I wave it off as everything catches up to me and I start sputtering. “Wait- what? Where did that even come from?”

If that had been a rumor over the years, I completely missed it and my girls never brought it up. Or I possibly hit my head at some point during my life and forgot this information.

“You haven’t?” Reese says again with subdued surprise.

I gawk at him, my hands flailing with my next words. “No! Like I would get in bed with that sadist!” His surprise is clear as day now. “Was this some kind of rumor I missed?”

Reese stutters. He actually stutters over his words and has to clear his throat a few times. His face tinges pink and a small part of me that isn’t pissed acknowledges how cute that is.

When my stare gets too overbearing, he throws his head back with a heavy breath, then says, “He told me freshman year.”

“He-” I stop, letting out an incredulous laugh and going through my head again. Maybe I forgot? Was it too dark at one point and I mixed up faces… “No,” I answer my question aloud, pressing my fingers to my forehead. “No, I have never had sex with Lorenxo Diez and I am going to rip his tongue from his head.”

I head for the stairs, cursing under my breath and in my head. If he thought Gina hated him-

“Wait! Kira!”

Reese catches up to me when I’m on the upper deck searching the endless faces for his *best friend*. He chuckles, a nervous, strained sound, and the fabric of his shirt brushes against my arm. “I’m sure he was just joking-”

I turn to him. “This is a joke to you?”

I don’t know what he sees on my face but he shakes his head, his drying hair flopping with the movement. “Me? No. You have every right to be angry, carry on.”

I spot Lorenxo at the far end of the deck in a booth with Gina across from him. I’m too pissed to care that she’s smiling at him—I should possibly ease off—that this might be a breakthrough. I march over there with purpose and when I’m close enough, all I want to do is grab his dark hair and smack his face into the table. I don’t. Violence doesn’t solve much.

Instead, I slide into the booth next to Gina, clasping my hands on the oak-colored wood and smile. Smiling wide and as sweet as I can manage. Lorenxo looks at me and it takes all my strength not to hop across the table and bitch slap him.

“Sorry to interrupt,” I say, “but something has come to my attention that I simply *cannot* ignore.”

“Is… everything okay?” Gina asks. Lorenxo sits back, eyeing me.

“So I- um,” I laugh, scraping my nail over the bridge of my nose and dropping my gaze to the tabletop before looking back up at him. “I heard that um, apparently, you and I,” I gesture back and forth between me and him, “had sex freshman year.”

His eyes narrow in confusion. I see the moment it clicks for him; when his head snaps to Reese who’s standing a foot from the edge of the table. I snap my fingers to pull Lorenxo’s attention back to me.

“Don’t look at him, we’re having a conversation. Because I must have been blackout drunk since I don’t remember this happening. So if you could…” I gesture to him then cross my arms, watching him open and close his mouth several times.

Gina’s tone is low and unsure when she says, “This is a joke, right?”

My blood boils under my skin but I force myself to keep it together. I won’t make a scene at Von’s party. People are already staring.

“I was a kid,” is the first thing he says making me squint at him. “It was ninth grade and I was pathetic.” I agree with the last part by nodding but keep my mouth closed and wait for the actual reason. I can tell he has more to say and he’s trying to get out of saying it but I won’t give him the leeway. “And I… Clearmont was bragging about how you two…” he trails off with a shrug.

“Really?” My voice shakes. I expect the worst from Calvin, so it’s not like I’m surprised, just disappointed in Lorenxo. “You felt so left out you had to lie about that?”

This wasn’t only about me and it had nothing to do with Reese. For Lorenxo to say something like that it makes me see him differently and I was starting to acknowledge him as a decent human being. Sans him having bruises everywhere every time I see him.

“Kira, I’m sorry. It’s not even something I latched on to. I forgot I’d even said that for years-”

“Someone didn’t.” I tilt my head toward Reese. Lorenxo glances at his friend. “But this isn’t even about him, it’s that guys do this all the time. And if it was true, I probably wouldn’t have cared that you said it but it’s not and that’s disgusting.”

“I know, I’m sorry. It’s not-” Lorenxo stops, looking at Gina when she slides to the other end of the booth and stands to leave. “JoBeth-”

“No, this drama is just not for me,” she says, her hands gesturing wildly.

Since meeting him, seeing him in this moment is the most I’ve gotten to witness the variety of his emotions. And it’s all because of Gina. I don’t feel bad about it and I understand that the past is in the past but this is just… not okay.

Lorenxo looks back at me and manages a blank expression but still looks tired. “We could’ve had this conversation in private.”

I bite back the reply that’s bound to hurt his feelings and instead say, “She’s my best friend, she would’ve found out about it today anyway.” I don’t tell him that there’s a good chance she would’ve despised his guts a lot more if I had told her later.

Sighing, I run my hands down my face. “Look,” I say, pushing my damp hair off my shoulders, “in this instance, I’m not judging you on this one stupid thing you’ve done in your past. I’m just disappointed that’s all. And sure, we’re not friends but I thought we were getting there, at least.” I got up, pulling my cover-up tight around my body.

“That’s because we were,” he says, his voice raising an octave.

I don’t want to be pushy and dramatic but this guy, who’s still a stranger to me, crapped all over my day with something so small. Something that happened years ago. But I can’t help but think of all the girls being bullied and shamed for petty, meaningless lies like this. I turned out to be one of the lucky ones. Something so small can make a negative difference in someone’s life and that’s where it becomes a problem for me.

I find Gina standing by one of the refreshment tables with a cup in hand and looking out at the water.

Stopping next to her, I nudge her with my shoulder. “Hey. Sorry, I kind of crapped all over your moment but he pissed me off.” When she doesn’t respond, I lean forward to see her face. “You okay?”

It takes a moment for her to say something and the silence makes me a little nervous. Gina’s the kind to keep her anger and emotions bottled up because she wants to handle it on her own. We all do actually, but Gina takes it to a whole other level. We’ve seen her break down because of it and it’s not pretty.

“Did you sleep with him?”

I jerk back as if she slapped me. “Excuse me?”

Gina turns on me and arches an eyebrow. She stands there and she waits for me to reply as if she didn’t hear him apologize for lying and me very much denying the allegation.

I let out a dry laugh. “What the fuck.”

Gina—my best friend, someone who knows me better than most of my extended family—stares at me, unapologetic. “Kira, I’ve seen how you act around Reese and I wouldn’t put it past Lorenxo to lie either.”

My mouth is hanging open at that and I don’t even know what to do—what to *say*.

“Are you fucking kidding me right now?” The initial shock has worn off and I am livid. “So this,” I gesture to her, “is what years of friendship comes down to?”

“I don’t hear you denying it,” she says, her tone accusing.

My next words come out in a ball of hurt and anger. “Because I don’t need to explain shit to you.” Her expression blanks in that way it does when she’s riled up enough to spit fire. “Cause you know what? You’ve been dying to find a reason not to like him and here it is! You’re standing here acting like you didn’t hear our conversation, as if I wouldn’t have told you guys I slept with him years ago. If I had! You’ve never even liked the guy before now, Gina.”

There’s so much more I want to say. Like how she’s so hung up on Lorenxo that she thinks I would lie about something like that just to save face in front of my crush. How she’s willing to think the absolute low of me to make herself feel better about liking a guy that isn’t her type.

It’s the fact that she’s willing to do this to me, to attack me, instead of accepting her feelings… If she thinks Lorenxo would lie and say he didn’t have sex with me, why is it so hard to believe he could lie and say he did? It’s so fucking small, but coming from her, it guts me.

“Why would I have to keep it to myself?” I say, losing all my fight. Something in my chest tightens as I stare at her. Still, she doesn’t show remorse or regret. “And you know Calvin’s the only guy that-” There’d been no one else that year and she knows that. She knows why. “Whatever.” I shake my head before walking away.