My alarm blared and I reached over to click it off.
The glare of the sun hitting my blinds woke me. I scrubbed at my face and squinted as I pried my eyes open.
Welcome back to Leland.
I stretched, loosening tight muscles that had washed every dirty crevice in my new rental house the day before. I’d even pulled down the weird mallard duck wallpaper in the den. I felt accomplished and ready to tackle the day, even though I had Professor Whitt this morning and my stupid-jock-ex would be there.
I turned my head to check out the time again and met the beady gaze of a huge brown spider that sat next to my head on the pillow.
My scream pierced the morning silence, the sound ricocheting off the walls and probably waking the old lady who lived down the street. Of course the spider didn’t like this. He skittered off my pillow and down between the cracks of the headboard.
Shuddering in revulsion, I bolted out of bed, stumbled over last night’s shoes, and promptly stubbed my big toe on the wooden dresser. I yelped, fell to the floor, and poked at the red-hot pain that was my appendage. Only me. And only on the first day of class. Ugh.
I eyed my bed accusingly, willing the spider to come out and face what he’d done. Dammit. Now I’d have to sleep on the couch for the rest of the semester.
My phone rang, and I limped over to scoop it up. My bestie Isabella was on the ID.
“Morning, Sugartits!” she sang into my ear.
I winced. “Please. I haven’t had coffee yet.”
“Can’t help it. I had sex last night, and it was phe-nom-e-nal.” She drew the last word out and made a crazy meow sound at the end. I held the phone out from my ear to lessen her sound effects.
“Imagine that,” I said wryly. “Who’s the lucky guy?”
She rattled off some boy from the Tau house she’d met at a back to school party. She described him in vivid detail, right down to the piercing on his privates.
“You think I’m a slut, don’t you?” she asked after a few moments.
“Of course not.” Because that’s what friends say.
She kept chatting, clearly in the mood for socializing, even though I could hear customers in the background of the local Starbucks where she worked. How she didn’t get fired, I had no clue.
“I bet he has a buddy,” she added.
“Don’t they all?”
She harrumphed in disgust. “You need to hop on over and meet that sexy neighbor of yours. Hello, Mr. Quarterback. I bet he’s got some backfield in motion. I bet you could score with him. Heck, I bet he knows how to ball—”
“Stop,” I said. “I don’t do athletes anymore. It’s a hard rule. And if it had been my choice, I wouldn’t have rented a house across the street from him.”
“Hello, have you seen how wide his shoulders are—without the pads? Day-um.”
I heard a slurping sound and pictured her sucking down a latte or a steaming mug of hot chocolate. “What are you drinking?”
“Caramel Macchiato.”
I cursed. I loved that drink.
“I’m also eating a raspberry white-chocolate muffin. It’s delicious. There’s this amazing cream cheese in the middle of it—”
“I hate you. I really, really do.” Sweets were my thing, and the image of a muffin made my belly grumble. Not surprising since my dinner last night had consisted of a peanut butter and jelly sandwich—’cause it was cheap and pretty much all I’d had in the house.
Padding to the kitchen with the phone pressed to my ear, I came to a dead halt in front of the stained coffee maker I’d inherited from my grandmother Mimi when she’d upgraded. My heart dropped. I’d forgotten my grocery run last night. I wailed.
“What’s wrong?” Isabella asked.
“Dammit. I was so tired last night, I forgot to stop at the market.” I pressed my forehead against the coolness of the fridge and banged it. “I don’t have any coffee, there’s a giant spider under my bed, my ex is going to be in class, and my toe is falling off. I’m gonna die!”
“God, I love the way your voice gets extra Southern when you get upset. Do I need to come over and give you a pep talk?”
“Maybe.”
She cleared her throat. “You’re Sunny freaking Blaine and you always have your shit together. You’ve paid your own way through college. You’re not Italian yet you make the meanest lasagna in the whole state of Georgia—maybe the world. You don’t care what people think, case in point: yoga pants are your dress up clothes. You drink coffee like I shoot tequila. You once stole a car. You are a badass mama jama, and I’d be your lesbian lover in a heartbeat if I went that way—and if you went that way. I’m so jealous of your blond hair that I dream of shaving you bald—”
“Now it’s weird.” I smiled even though she couldn’t see me. “I feel better, though. Lunch at Hotdog Haven soon?”
“Yeah,” she said around her chews. “I’ll tell you about frat boy’s big wiener.”
I groaned. “Thank you for that parting image.”
We said our goodbyes, and I got off the phone and limped to the bathroom. A small room with an antique claw tub, it had a certain eclectic charm with pale blue walls and a myriad of rainbow and unicorn decals leftover from the previous renters. I hadn’t the heart to take them all down. The biggest one, a white unicorn, was stuck right next to the mirror over the sink. With a glittery pink mane and long eyelashes, he was fit for a princess—so unlike my own childhood. Perhaps that’s why I kept him.
I sent him a nod. “Morning, Charlie. Let’s hope this day doesn’t get any worse.”
It did.
After wrapping my toe in a waterproof Hello Kitty Band-Aid, I put my long hair in a bath cap and hopped in the tub, which had been modernized with a shower head on the wall above it and a shower curtain on an oval rod hanging from the ceiling. I turned the water temp to hot and just stood there, gut churning. Today I was facing Bart for the first time since we’d broken up.
Later while I was brushing my teeth, I glanced out the window next to the tub and saw a disheveled brunette bounce out of Mr. Quarterback’s door, stumble off the porch, and fall in the azalea bushes. I snickered. She crawled up, brushed herself off, and weaved along the sidewalk, obviously still trashed as she dug in her purse for what I assumed were her keys. She was the second girl this week who’d done the walk of shame from his house. The brunette finally made it to her BMW, got in, and cranked it up. Gunning the engine, she lost control and sideswiped my poor Camry parked on the street.
My mouth plopped open, and my forgotten toothbrush fell to the floor. I’d just paid the clunker off this summer!
She threw her car in reverse and backed up, scraping along the side of my car, making me cringe at the sound of grinding metal. Then she sped off.
Fuck! I stared up at the dingy popcorn ceiling and blinked my tears away.
And so it begins. The football player and I were finally going to meet.
I was going to murder him.