Free Pretty Hate (New Adult Novel) by Ava Ayers Page B

my face.
    “I’m not fucking choking!” I said as I wrestled my arms away from him.
    “She’s not choking,” Rebel Love said. “She wouldn’t be able to talk.”
    “W-What the fuck is a lady-friend?” I said as I tried to breathe.
    “Huh?” he said.
    “Nicolas...I called Nicolas and a girl answered his phone and--”
    “Oh boy,” Ivory-Lou said and looked at Rebel Love.
    “No! It wasn’t bad. She seemed like a friend, they were diving...it doesn’t matter. Anyway, she said he said I was his lady-friend. What’s that mean?”
    “Compound word...lady and friend...self-explanatory,” Ivory-Lou said and stood up.
    “I’m not asking for the goddamn etymology! I want to know if lady-friend is the same as girlfriend !” I said as I got off the floor.
    “Nope,” Ivory-Lou said.
    “Yes,” Rebel Love said.
    “Well, I guess I better noogle it! Our mother is a fucking bitch, by the way,” I said as I walked past Rebel Love toward my room.
    “That is nothing new,” she said and sighed.
    I opened Facebook and sent Nicolas an email: I miss you , it said. And then I refreshed eighty times to see if he read it.
    As my anxiety amped, I looked at his Facebook page and searched his friends for girls who were named Willow or Kim. I found Willow. She was gorgeous. There were twelve Kims to choose from and none of those options were good.
    “Is he friends with every beautiful girl on the planet?” I said as I trolled through his friend list.
    I then scrolled back and studied three years of posts: what did he have to say, who posted on his page, who commented and who “liked.” I then followed the paths...clicked on the girls who posted a lot, clicked on the girls who “liked” a lot, clicked on the beautiful girls and then scoured their pages if they were open. At the end of four hours, I had more tabs opened than Chili’s on a Friday night.
    When I saw the message alert pop up on the screen, I held my breath as I read his response to my I miss you . It was only this: Got your message. Really hot here. How’s the weather there?
    No, I miss you too , no, Can’t wait to see you , no, xoxo . I did not respond.
    And I lost it.
    Back to his page, the deductive portion of my madness kicked in and I became a statistician. I tried to figure out who may or may not be on the trip with him. I narrowed the fifty or so girls I was most concerned about down to thirteen girls who were present most often on Nicolas’ page.
    I bookmarked them. I clicked the links on their pages. I watched every YouTube video they posted, read every eCard, every event invitation and looked at every picture. I Googled, in quotes, their names. I stalked their Pinterest pages, MySpace, YouTube, Instagram and goddamned LinkedIn. I stalked their friends. I crossed out the ones who had boyfriends.
    The ten candidates I was left with were all beautiful, all well-read and all well-traveled.
    “Isn’t he friends with any poor people?” I said as I looked at my 59 th Zurich vacay picture.
    They made homemade salt scrubs and bamboo wind chimes and quiches with chia seeds. They wore shawls and bathed in almond milk and did yoga. They all seemed to paint and sing and write and they had studios where they pursued their art. They were friends with authors and musicians and their parents . One was nearly indistinguishable from the other. Each one of these perfect specimens took perfect photos. Their outfits matched, their nail polish was not chipped and they had amazing taste in shoes. They seemed to have fun all the time. And they were not me.
    I connected every post they made and every picture they posted to Nicolas. When Jessie Carter posted: On a date with??? , the ??? was quite obviously Nicolas Miles. When Amanda Lawrence posted a YouTube video of Radiohead doing Creep , it was a dedication to Nicolas Miles. When Nicole Amodio posted a picture of a full moon with a caption that read: Thinking of my lover..., the lover... was Nicolas Miles.
    When my