Free Twelve Truths and a Lie by Christina Lee Page A

my ribcage. “But I don’t think it would go well.”
    She picked at the chocolate chips in her dessert. “Why not?”
    “Because you said so yourself,” I replied, the idea of it making me want to vomit. “You’re not a person who can be with somebody you don’t know for just one night.”
    She shrugged, steeling her jaw. As if I had just challenged her. “We’ll see.”
    Well, fuck me.

11
    Aurora
    I was at lunch with a co-worker at a little diner around the corner from the Belleview offices. “So, what are your plans this weekend?”
    “Meeting my pals at the bar tonight and then yoga class tomorrow,” I said before biting into my chicken salad sandwich.
    “I love that you get together with your friends on a regular basis,” she said. “It seems harder to make plans the busier you get. And if you add kids to the mix, forget it.”
    My thoughts flew first to Nicole, who tried so hard to juggle it all and then to Sydney. How a missed period could’ve also happened to me when I’d been sexually active and how I hoped it didn’t result in a pregnancy for her. Not until she was ready. And not with a guy who was betrothed to somebody else.
    We trudged back to work and after a couple of no-shows, which seemed to happen regularly on Fridays in our industry, I finished my session notes and packed up to go home.
    I felt excitement and anxiety coursing through me. I didn’t know what to expect tonight when I met my friends out at Flanagan’s for our usual monthly get-together. It was as if Cameron and I shared a secret, which we hadn’t exactly planned on, but we simply weren’t ready to confess anything to our friends.
    I pulled on my favorite jeans and blousy top and grabbed my keys. Maybe Cameron wouldn’t even show up. We hadn’t discussed it at all in our texts this week.
    When I stepped inside the bar, Sydney, Nicole, and her husband, Michael, were already seated at the large round table, pitchers of beer in front of them.
    “Hey you,” Nicole said, waving me over.
    I hugged each of my friends and then sat down near Sydney.
    I noticed only a glass of water held a place in front of her at the table. I made eyes at her, and she shrugged and shook her head to ward me off. This was not the time to bring it up anyway. But her taking such a precaution only meant that she was nervous. She said she was going to give her period another week before she took any kind of pregnancy test. It seemed too early anyway. But maybe not by today’s technology.
    Should I divulge what Cameron told me about his roommate? Did she already know since she’d been intimate with him?
    As Nicole and Michael shared about their workweeks, Maddie and Cameron showed up, along with one of Maddie’s engineering co-workers. Cameron sat down in a seat directly across the table from me. Our eyes met and held as a crimson line crawled up his neck. He adjusted the collar on his shirt looking as uncomfortable as me in that instant.
    After another pitcher of beer, Nicole began a game of kill, marry, or screw using celebrity names. Sydney pretended to sip at the beer Maddie had poured her as she mumbled thanks and kept her eyes mostly averted from his. If he hadn’t had his co-worker there, who was yammering in his ear the whole time, it might’ve been even more awkward for them at this table.
    Cameron’s answers to Nicole’s game questions were interesting indeed. All his celebrity choices for screwing had been brunettes. It made me wonder if his ex was brunette, since he spent the better part of a year beneath the sheets, working her out of his system.
    My chest felt crowded with an emotion I couldn’t quite place my finger on. It wasn’t quite jealousy, more like sadness and protectiveness over the fact that he had been dumped so ruthlessly by a woman who didn’t appreciate his great qualities.
    Cameron was making fun of Maddie for saying he’d kill any girl in the game who seemed high maintenance, and when Sydney dipped her head, I