STUFFED (The Slate Brothers 2)

His eyes regard me with coldness and mistrust.

I shake my head and reach for his hand; he pulls it away. “Carson, no,” I say, shaking my head, tears forming in my eyes. “That’s what I wanted to tell you. I didn’t really write it. It’s Devin— he was the one that put it together. He used these scraps from my story, which was originally what I promised you it’d be—“

“Your name is on it, Astrid. You might have pulled one over on me before, pretending to be a clueless reporter in the locker room, but you’re not doing it again.”

“I wasn’t undercover! I mean, I was, but I didn’t know— Devin used me. He sent me there on purpose, but I didn’t know. I really thought I was just filling in.”

“The fine arts reporter? Filling in for a seasoned sports writer?” Carson asks, rolling his eyes.

“It sounds stupid now, I know, but at the time— look, you can’t just turn down assignments!” I plead. “Carson, please. Please, please, please, listen to me. I didn’t want this. I didn’t mean to do any of this.”

Carson coughs and looks away, like he can’t bear to even meet my eyes. “Astrid, I have no idea whether you wanted this or not— but you damn sure did it.”

“Let me show you my article. The one I wanted to run—“

I don’t get a chance to finish, because Carson turns around, slings his hands into his pockets, and walks away.

He doesn’t need to actually say it out loud— it’s crystal clear.

We’re over.

16

Things really shouldn’t be able to get any worse, but they do.

First, I quit the paper, because fuck Devin and fuck everything he touches because he is the worst human ever and if I somehow become a scientist and discover a new kind of sexually transmitted disease, I’m naming it after him.

Of course, Devin’s version of the story runs, and while Carson is definitely made the villain in plenty of people’s eyes, there are just as many who— thanks to the team publicity department— think I betrayed his trust, essentially catfished him, and slept with him for the story. People have shouted Sluts For Slate! at me across campus more times than I can count.

Carson still won’t talk to me, no matter how many apologetic, pleading, desperate texts and emails I send him.

And finally, the cherry on top of it all…my parents find out about everything.

Thankfully, Jess and Arianna have been running interference for the last twenty-four hours, so they’re the ones who get to my cell phone first and see the caller ID.

“Whoa— nope, nope, nope. Don’t touch that one,” Jess says, silencing my phone and turning the television back up.

We’re been watching a lot of reality TV, because Arianna says there’s no better cure for a breakup than marathoning The Bachelorette (“You get to watch her break up with thirty guys. It’s like revenge porn for breakups”).

“Wait, who was it?” I ask.

Jess throws popcorn at me playfully. “Your mom. I assume that’s a hard pass?”

I bite my lip. “They texted earlier. They saw the story.”

“And I assume they’re not happy?” Arianna says, cringing.

“I have no idea, actually. It’s sort of a law story. Kind of. Maybe they think it’s a step toward law school,” I say, rolling my eyes. “I should call them back. If you think they won’t come down here in person to talk to me, you’re really underestimating them.”

“Okay, but I’m pausing this. Don’t think you can get out of the last group date episode you’ve got another thing coming,” Arianna says, and gets up to pour herself another glass of box wine (which she also says is the best cure for a breakup) (and I think she might actually be right about this one).

In my bedroom, I steel myself for the many directions this conversation could go, pretty much none of them good, and call my mother back. She answers the phone, and an instant later I can tell I’ve been put on speaker.

“Can you hear us?” my mother asks. “Your father is here.”

“Can she hear me?” my dad yells.

“That’s what I just asked!” my mother screams back.

I sigh. “I can hear you both.”

“Well, good. Astrid, we read the article you wrote about Carson Slate. We need to discuss this,” my father says stiffly. “I don’t like that you used yourself as…as…as bait to get a story on that boy.”

“That’s not really how it went,” I mumble. I pull up the story— the version they read— so I can better anticipate their concerns. While I’ve read my own version of the story a half dozen times, I haven’t read this one again since sitting in the stairwell. It’s too difficult, too painful to read something so heartless and cruel. When I read my version of the story, it hurts in a different way, a melancholy sort of way— it reminds me of what I had with Carson, for a while there. Of the person I know he really is.