GUESS WHAT, SLUT? I’M PREGNANT WITH JOSH’S BABY. WHY DON’T YOU GO FIND A MAN OF YOUR OWN, YOU NASTY PIG!!!!! GET SOME MORALS AND CLASS, SLUT. AND DON’T EVER TOUCH MY MAN AGAIN.
LILLIAN
The words swam before my shocked eyes. It had to be a joke. I wanted it so much to be someone’s sick sense of humor. It just had to be, only it wasn’t. I felt the venom of the words seeping through my skin, infecting my flesh and poisoning my blood.
Breathlessly, I stared at the scanned photo of an ultrasound. The mother’s name was on the photo, too. Lillian Taylor. The photo was taken three days ago.
He had a girlfriend.
Oh shit. He had a fucking girlfriend.
A pregnant girlfriend.
I’d felt my world was falling apart around me twice before. When my parents announced their divorce and when Grandma died.
But this email… It was like a whole new level of world-shattering. I was in a threesome and I didn’t even know it. I had somehow become the hated other woman. That creature that steals other women’s men. Me? Just when I was thinking about taking things to the next level with Josh, I find out he’s a fucking two-timing piece of shit.
I trusted him and he turned out to be no better than my slutty neighbor. Maybe even worse. At least that guy never let them expect anything more than a screaming orgasm. To think Josh had been lying to me all along hurt.
How could he have done what we did—lying in bed with me, kissing me, looking into my eyes and telling me how important I was becoming to him while he was having unprotected sex with a woman who sent out all-caps emails?
Thank God, we always used a condom.
I looked down at my hands. They were shaking. With anger. The liar. He was such a fucking liar. All those long lingering looks. There was no way I could sit at my desk for the rest of the day and pretend I didn’t know about her when all I wanted to do was go up to him and throat-punch him. How dare he? How long had Lillian been in the picture? The fact that she knew about me and I didn’t know about her, meant she’d been in the picture the whole time.
I lifted my head and looked around me. Everyone else had their heads down and seemed to be engrossed in their work. I needed to be professional about this. Be cool, Mimi. You’re not the first fool to get played. Be professional. No need to fuck up your career over a cheating prick.
I took three deep breaths. I could be professional about this. I could play this game. Three calming breaths was obviously not enough because my blood was still boiling.
Alice popped her head around my cubicle.
I whipped my head around. “What?” I growled.
Her eyes widened. “Never mind,” she muttered and slunk away.
I took another three breaths. Calm down, Mimi. You worked long and hard at this job. You’re going to be out of this cubicle and into your own glass office in a few months. Mustn’t jeopardize that. Oh no, no, no. No fucking man was worth that.
Three more extra-deep breaths.
But, nope. I couldn’t be professional about it. I needed to talk to that lowlife or I would explode. I stood. My legs were shaking. Actually, everything shook. Even my insides. My stomach roiled.
I took another steadying breath.
He was definitely not worth losing my breakfast over. I paid good money for that egg white sandwich, and even if I was going to lose it, I want to lose it on his shirt-front. My head turned automatically in the direction of his office. He waved and winked at me.
Bastard. Cheating, lying bastard!
But I had more chutzpah in me than I realized: I waved back.
I picked up my cell phone from my bag, straightened my skirt, and with my head held up high, I walked past all the glass offices towards the restrooms. As I passed his office, I pretended I had just received a call and made out as if I was completely engrossed in my fake telephone conversation.
By the time I reached the washroom, my whole body was rigid with fury. Wow! I’d never been so spectacularly cheated on before. I stood in front of the mirror and looked at myself. How amazing to see that I looked so normal on the outside while inside I was churning so much I could start making butter. I called my best-friend, Megan. She was always the first one I called whenever something great, bad, or in between happened. The girl could have been in the middle of the biggest deal of her life, but she would’ve dropped everything for me. And I’d do the same for her.
“I’m sorry to bother you at work,” I said, “but everything just went to hell here.”
“Why? What happened?” she asked in an urgent whisper. If she was whispering it meant other people were in the next room.
“Josh has a girlfriend and she’s pregnant.”
“What? The little snake,” she shouted, then remembered herself and dropped back down to a fierce whisper. “That two-timing, creepy jerk. I knew he was no good. How did you find out?” I heard her footsteps. She must be leaving her office and going out of earshot.
“She sent me an all-caps email, that’s how,” I replied, my voice shaking with shock.
“Oh. My. God. Forward it to me,” she demanded in her normal voice.
“Megan?”
“What? I’d love to see what an email from a wronged girlfriend all in caps looks like.”
“This is serious. I’m so angry I feel like killing him.”
“Um…okay. What are you going to do?”
“Confront him.”
“What? Like now?” she asks incredulously.
“No, next year. Of course, now.”
“I think you better wait until after office hours, babe,” she suggests seriously.
“I don’t think I can last that long. I’ll explode.”
“Of course, you can wait. You need your job, Mimi. Fuck him. He doesn’t deserve you and he’s definitely not worth losing your job over.”
“No, I’m going to confront that lying rat right now,” I yelled
“No,” she yelled right back. “If you do, things are going to get so uncomfortable you’re just going to end up without a job.”
“Whatever,” I said.
“Don’t do it,’ she warned, but I rang off, and marched to Josh’s office.
Mimi
He was alone. How many times had I looked through those glass walls and smiled at him? How many times had he smiled back when he felt my eyes on him? I used to fantasize about going in, locking the door behind me, pulling the blinds shut, and straddling him, right there in his chair. Or, maybe letting him take me on the desk. All sorts of things. Now I wanted to lock the door and kick his face in.
Feeling the weight of my stare, he looked up and smiled.
I closed the glass door behind me and locked it. “Funny thing,” I said, as I walked over and started pulling the blinds closed. His eyes lit up. Ass wipe thought I was coming to give him a blowjob under the desk.
“Oh, come to Big Daddy,” he smirked and I actually felt physically sick. Funny how I would have thought that was sexy at one time—maybe ten minutes earlier. Right now, letting me anywhere near his dick could result in serious, probably untreatable injury.
I wished I could hurt him as much as I was hurting just then. I swallowed hard. The fury was like a stone in my throat. “Maybe you should check with your girlfriend first.”
“What?” he asked, and his voice must have risen an entire octave.
“Are you honestly gonna pretend you don’t know who I mean? You’re going to sit there, and act like I don’t know what I’m talking about?”
He stood, hands out. “Mimi, is this a joke?”
“I haven’t gotten to the funny part yet,” I said. “I got an email from a woman who claims to be pregnant with your child.”
His first reaction actually made me doubt myself. Either he was a damn good actor or Lillian Taylor was a wholesale liar. He looked at me as if I had turned into a giant scaly lizard. “What on God’s sweet earth are you talking about?”
The sensation of hope that fluttered inside me was almost as strong as th
e sense of guilt. I hadn’t given him a chance to defend himself. She could be some crazy lunatic. I didn’t have a shred of proof other than a stupid scan with her name on it. That proved nothing. What if I had jumped to the wrong conclusion?
With much less certainty than I had come into the room with, I walked up to him and showed him my phone.
He gasped. Unlike his original fake surprise, I believed this expression of shock.
“She’s pregnant?” He stared up at me his eyes wide and shining. “Hell, who knew? I’m shooting live rounds. Why didn’t she tell me?” he crowed. There was a strange mixture of joy, hope, and exasperation in his voice. It told me everything I needed to know.
I felt as if I was in an alternate reality. I wanted to break something. Preferably, his legs. Or neck. Or at the very least, bash his head in with the spiky end of my shoe. Multiple times. I’d probably ruin it, but it would be worth it if I could see his brain flow out.
“So, you are seeing someone else,” I said through clenched teeth.
He looked distractedly at the phone sitting on his table before dragging his eyes back to me. The fucking bastard couldn’t wait to call her!
“Look,” he cajoled. “I never said we were exclusive.”
My gut burned. “What?”
He shrugged. “Come on, Mimi. You’re a grown woman. I thought you knew we were just messing about.”
I took a step back and stared at him with hatred. “You told me I was special.”
“You are special.”
“To you,” I reminded.
“Well, it was a heat of the moment thing.”
“You told me you were single.”
He shifted uncomfortably. “Well, technically I am single.”
I shook my head incredulously. “I don’t believe this.”
He looked at me with bovine stupidity. “Come on, Mimi. None of this needs to get awkward. We just lived a little.”
“Lived a little?” I exploded. “I can’t believe you could be so callous. How could you lie like that?”
I might as well have been talking to myself. From the moment I mentioned his fetus, everything else went out the window. He ran his hands through his short, curly brown hair—hair I’d tangled in my fingers—and hit his chair with a soft thump when he fell into it. His eyes darted back and forth.
“Hello?” I waved my arms back and forth furiously.
“Oh, yeah. Um. I’m sorry…but this has really thrown me.” He laughed nervously, clearly in shock. He didn’t care about me at all and never would.
I watched him make an effort to placate me. “We had some fun. Let’s just put it behind us and… um… go back to what things were like before any of this happened. We’re a good team and there’s no need to spoil that. Obviously, I’m really sorry if I hurt your feelings.”
I hated it when someone used the word ‘if’ and ‘hurt your feelings’ in the same sentence. What the fuck? That means you don’t even recognize that you did, but even if I didn’t take that into consideration his little speech must have been the fakest, lamest, most insincere apology in the history of mankind.
How could I have been so blind not see what a slippery weasel he really was? At least weasels were cute. He wasn’t even worth my anger. I straightened my spine and threw him a fake smile.
“Don’t worry about it. I lied too. You know, that little problem of yours, the one that makes you eat pussy instead of fucking it, it’s not normal, and you really should see a professional about it.”
His eyes bulged as I smiled broadly and sailed out of the door with my head held high.
Mimi
I closed the door and raced to my cubicle. One of my other superiors jumped out of the way just in time to avoid getting run over. Great. Now, I’d have to explain why I was a total mess when I next saw him.
My hands were shaking with nerves, but I felt strangely victorious as I sank onto my chair. I had a ton of things I need to get through. There was a report that had to be in before lunchtime tomorrow and I was nowhere near ready to present it. I still had to attend the crappy status meeting at half-past twelve, but I didn’t feel any pressure.
Instead, I knew I had to get out of the office. There was a cute little bar down the road. I should go and have a glass of something to settle my nerves. I picked up my purse. My cell phone rang.
“Have you done it?” Megan asked in an awed voice.
“Yes,” I said coolly.
“What happened?” she whispered back. “Did you get fired?”
“No.”
“Did you quit?”
“No, but I thought about it for a split second.”
“Do we need to meet for lunch? Maybe a liquid lunch?”
“Hell, yes.” I checked the time and told Megan I’d meet her at our favorite spot, situated halfway between our offices. Then I left my cubicle holding my stomach as I did. I made it a point to walk slowly past my direct boss’s office.
“Mimi?” Tracee called.
I turned to look at her. “Yes?”
“Come in here, please.”
I walked in with my hand still placed on my stomach.
“Are you all right?”
I shook my head, wincing as I did. “I’m not feeling very well,” I whispered. “I thought I could push through and come in and be fine, but I think I ate something bad over the weekend.”
“Oh, no. You should get out of here, just in case it’s contagious.” Bingo. The biggest germaphobe in the office. She even stood and increased the distance between us.
“If you can spare me, that would be amazing.”
“Sure. You never call out. Go home, get some rest.” I thanked her and walked out. I could see her rushing to open one of her drawers. Probably to disinfect herself. I didn’t care. I shut down my laptop, got my things and hauled ass.
Mimi
“He said that?” Megan’s mouth fell open. She was already holding a glass of wine since I’d ordered for her. I hadn’t even waited for her to show up. I was on glass number two.
I nodded, my head resting on one hand. “He didn’t even try to explain. I think he was too busy flipping out over the baby. You know?”
“That douchebag! What a complete fucking tool!” she ranted. Typical Megan, never pulling punches. Normally, I’d giggle and remind her we were in public, but I didn’t care just then.
“How could I have let him trick me like that? I thought I was too smart to fall for a guy like him.”
“Did you really fall for him?” she asked.
I saw sympathy written all over her face and felt a bit sorry for myself “I don’t know. I thought I could have been, I guess. I thought we were about to take things to the next level.”
“Oh, honey.” She put a hand over mine. “I could fucking kill that man for what he did to you.” She raised her other hand and signaled for more drinks. I didn’t bother to stop her. My work day was officially over, anyway.
“I wonder how the girlfriend found out about you?” she asked.
“I don’t know and I don’t care, but I’m glad she did. I am. I really am. It makes my skin crawl to think I was the other woman this whole time. I hate that I let him do that to me.” I shivered at the thought.
“You’ll get through this,” she said, nodding her head so hard her springy red curls shook in every direction. “It’s not your fault, either, so I won’t hear any of that. You didn’t walk into this meaning to hurt anybody. He lied to you. You thought you were starting something good. Nobody could blame you for that. Besides,” she added with a wink, “being the other woman isn’t the end of the world.”
I blinked once, then twice. “Wait. What?”
“What?” she asked, shrugging.
“You were the other woman?”
“I thought you knew that story!” She took off her blazer, which was a clue that the story was going to be a good one, then pulled her curls into a loose twist. I settled in for the story, grateful for the excuse to stop thinking about my
own misery.
“Okay. So, you remember my first boss at the ad agency?”
“The one who reminded you of Jon Hamm in Mad Men?” I rolled my eyes, remembering the hours I had to listen to her going on about what a genius he was and how incredibly lucky she was to have such a brilliant mentor. And, of course, all about what a gorgeous hunk of man he was. Then, I gasped. “Wait. Are you telling me you slept with him?”
She smirked.
“You didn’t tell me!”
“I knew you’d get all judgy.”
“I wouldn’t have! I swear to God! Do you think I’m that sort of person?” I asked, aghast.
“Okay, so maybe I was projecting. I don’t know. I think deep down I was feeling guilty. It wasn’t a secret that he was married—his wife’s picture was on his desk.” She crinkled her nose. “I didn’t mean for it to happen, but at the end of the day, I justified it to myself that I didn’t owe her any loyalty. I didn’t put the ring on her finger. If he wanted to cheat on her, it was between the two of them.”
“But you always said sleeping with the boss was a disaster waiting to happen.”
She took a sip of her wine. “It is. Why do you think I left?”
“Did she find out?”
“No idea. I knew I didn’t want to do it anymore, and being in the same space as he was had become awkward. So, I left but the end wasn’t pretty.”
“I cannot believe you let five years pass without telling me this. What else have you been holding back?” I leaned forward, suddenly more interested in her life than I was in my own.
Her green eyes sparkled. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”
“Yes. I would like to know. Which is why I’m asking.”
“What about you?” she countered. “You always get all shaky and jumpy whenever I mention Rich’s friend, Alex.”
I felt my cheeks go red. “That was a long time ago.”
“So, you did sleep with him, you little liar! I knew it!”
“I wasn’t exactly proud of myself,” I said, looking around as if anybody would care even if they overheard. The lunch crowd was heavy, but it seemed like everybody was too busy with their own lives to care about mine. That was one thing about living in the city: rarely, if ever, did people waste their time paying attention to what happened around them. There were just too many people, too many conversations.
Kissing Booth Page 18