Read Online A Toast to the Good Times by Liz Reinhardt, Steph Campbell - Free Book Online Page A

to worry about except exploding into the best time, staying out under the dull stars as long as we could manage to keep our eyes open, drinking until our heads spun, crashing on some random bed or couch, or, if we were drunk enough, in some tub or on the bare floor.
    “I was planning on sleeping with you that night,” she says, her hands folded tightly on the scratched, dull laminate.
    “Excuse me?” The memories of debauchery fall away, and I attempt to replace some of the chaos with even one clear image of her from that night: what she was wearing, some moment we shared, some quiet, secret opportunity that got interrupted.
    But I’ve got nothing.
    “I was planning...to...um, to fuck you.” She tries to make it sound all brazen, but she looks totally uncomfortable with her word choice. “I was planning to drag your hot ass into one of Jagger’s guest rooms, and I had these tiny little lacy underthings on...I covered myself in this powder, this sexy powder that was all sweet because it was made with honey or something and you’re supposed to be able to lick it off.”
    She tries to laugh at herself, but the sound that comes out of her mouth is too shaken and cracked to register as anything close to a real laugh.
    “Toni.” I slide my hands across the laminate and she drops hers, still folded tight, into her lap and away from my touch. “What happened?”
    “Wow.” She looks up and takes a deep breath. “You really don’t remember?”
    I’m still so shocked by her announcement, I have no clue what my face looks like, but she must be able to read the truth in my blank look.
    She lets out a long breath that seems to deflate her a little. “Wow. So, this was kind of what I was afraid of, but I had this really stupid minute where I believed that maybe I was so wrong, and I was just remembering things...like, with all the mixed-up emotional crap of that night...”
    A few long, awkward seconds tick by.
    “You should tell me.”
    I watch her press her long blonde hair back, and that gorgeous face, so sure and brave on the train, suddenly looks stripped of any confidence.
    My neck burns when I realize I was the one who stripped all that beautiful strength away.
    That I started doing it when we were in high school , and I’m still the one who does that to her now.
    I suck.
    I sucked yesterday and I suck today and, apparently, I’ve been sucking hard since I was a stupid teenager.
    “You were only a little drunk. I thought it was no big thing. You’d tried to get me to sleep with you when you seemed so much drunker. But I guess that night was just a whole new level. Anyway, I got all ready...um, meaning I got almost naked...and you were, uh, supposed to meet me in this room. And I waited, like, forever. Finally the door opened, but it was Dominick and that Tracey girl, the one from Sparta he’d had a crush on forever? And they were all embarrassed, and I was wearing, like, half a foot of lace and some edible powder...”
    She ducks her head so her hair curtains her face and hides her features.
    Not that there’s any need to actually see her face to know exactly how humiliated she is.
    It’s incredible how the powerful, smart, sexy New York City version of Toni who jumped me on the train has just crumbled, and, even though I don’t remember that night at the party at all, I feel like it’s being replayed, fresh and raw for my horror. Her embarrassment kills me, and I feel a tsunami of shame that’s dragging me under fast and hard.
    “I had no idea, Toni. I didn’t realize.”
    Before she replies in a way that will make me want to find the nearest bridge fast, the waitress comes over and sets our plates down.
    The fries I was starving for a minute ago aren’t remotely appetizing. I push the plate towards Toni and expect her to push it back, but she doesn’t.
    She hooks a finger along the hot lip and yanks it closer, grabs at the crispy, still-sizzling edges of a few fries, and pulls them out in all their