“I don’t know,” April said. “We’ve talked about giving a relationship a try once things with the library are sorted out. But that could take months. With everything else that’s going on, it just seems impossible that we could ever actually be together.”
“Impossible? I’m sure it’ll be hard, but it’s far from impossible,” Eliza said. “The two of you will be able to work things out. Just hang in there and be patient.”
“I hope you’re right.”
“I am.” Eliza gave April a reassuring pat on the arm. “Now, I can handle the rest of this. Why don’t you go home?”
“Are you sure? I don’t mind helping out some more.”
“It’s okay. It’s Friday night. You should go home and put your feet up.”
“That does sound nice.” With the charity ball last weekend, it had been a while since she’d had any downtime.
April said goodbye to Eliza and headed toward her apartment. Her mind drifted to Vicki. April wondered what it would be like to spend a quiet Friday night in with her, like a normal couple, without all the craziness that came with their present relationship. Of course, even if they were a normal couple, their relationship would probably still be crazy. Two headstrong women like them? Where there were sparks, there was bound to be fire. But April liked fire.
April wasn’t even halfway home before her phone rang. It was Lexi.
“April, hi,” she said. “How are you?”
“I’m fine,” April replied. It was a strange question for Lexi to ask, considering they’d seen each other at work a few hours ago.
“Are you at home right now?”
“I’m on my way back from Eliza’s, I’ll be home soon. Why?” Something in Lexi’s voice had her worried.
“I’m coming over, I’ll explain when I get there.”
“Don’t you have a date?” April was sure that Lexi had mentioned she had plans tonight.
“I did. It’s fine.”
“Lexi, what’s going on?”
“It’s nothing. Look, I’ll be there in half an hour, okay?” Lexi hung up.
April stared at her phone, frowning. She hoped that Lexi was okay.
She reached her apartment a few minutes later. She had some time to kill before Lexi arrived, so she sat down with her laptop and checked her social media feed. Although most of the discussion surrounding the library had died down, there was some local chatter about the Oakmont Street project in general, as well as other developments going on around West Heights. As April scrolled through her feed idly, a post caught her eye.
Her stomach dropped. It was the photo from the ball, with April and Vicki in the background. And someone had drawn a big red circl
e around them.
Shit. April looked at the name of the person who posted the photo. It was a woman who April didn’t know, but they had a handful of mutual friends. April scanned the comments underneath the photo.
That’s Victoria Blake. She’s one of the top brass at Oasis. What’s April doing with her?
What a liar. Acting like she cares about West Heights while she’s in league with the developers.
She’s a lesbian? I always knew there was something weird about her in high school.
What a fucking hypocrite.
April felt a clenching in her chest. The rest of the comments were more of the same. She didn’t even know who half the people commenting were. But that didn’t make their words hurt any less. April had been called names before. Ganged up on. Bullied. And all those memories were flooding back.
April took a few deep breaths. Everything was fine. She was fine. And she needed to tell Vicki about this. She picked up the phone and dialed Vicki’s number. But the phone kept ringing and ringing until it went to voicemail. She tried again. The same thing happened.
April sent Vicki a message.