"Get out. We're done. You've mooched off me for the last time." She opened the door and stood there, waiting for him to leave.
He heaved himself to his feet, arranging his face in the charming smile that had blinded her at first. "Babe, you're just tired - "
"Damn straight. Tired of you. Come on." She made shooing motions. "Out."
"Jen, come on - "
"No. That was it. You had no intention of paying for the beer, and I have no intention of giving you another chance."
"If it meant that much to you, all you had to do was say so. You don't have to go off the deep end," he charged, the charming smile vanishing and a scowl taking its place.
"Yes, I do. I like the deep end. The water's nice and cold there. Out."
"We can work - "
"No, we can't, Dylan. This was your last chance." She glared at him. "You either walk out this door, or I'm calling the cops."
"All right, all right." He stepped onto the miniscule porch, then turned to face her. "I was getting tired of you, anyway. Bitch."
She closed the door in his face, then jumped as he slammed his fist into the wood. That was evidently his parting gesture, because about ten seconds later she heard his car start, and she watched through a tiny opening in the curtains as he backed out of the drive way and left.
All right. Finally. She was boyfriendless, and it felt good. Better than good. The sense of relief and freedom finally showed up and she took a deep breath, feeling as if a ton had been lifted from her shoulders. She should have stood up for herself sooner, saved herself some grief. Another lesson learned.
First things first. She walked back down to where she'd parked the Goose, and pulled it into her driveway where it belonged. Then, as soon as she was safely inside her place and the doors were locked, the curtains snugly pulled, she called her best friend, Michelle, as she went back to the bedroom and began stripping out of her clothes. Breaking up with a boyfriend was definitely something a best friend should hear immediately.
"Dylan's history," she said as soon as Michelle answered. "I just gave him the boot."
"What happened?" Michelle sounded shocked. "Was he cheating on you?"
"Not that I know of, but that doesn't mean he wasn't. I got tired of him mooching."
"Damn. He's so good-looking, too." The shock faded into regret, and a sigh came down the phone line.
Jenner sat down on the bed to peel off her sweaty jeans, holding the phone cradled between her head and shoulders. "Yeah, but stupid. Let's not leave out stupid."
Michelle was quiet for a moment - barely - then her voice picked up enthusiasm. "So! The night's young, and you're free. Want to go out?"
That was why she'd called Michelle, Jenner thought. Michelle was always up for a party, and she needed to get out of the Dylan rut she'd let herself sink into. She forgot about her aching feet. She was twenty-three, she had just dumped a loser, and she'd get over being tired. She wanted to celebrate. "Sure. Give me time to shower. I'll meet you at the Bird," she said, naming their pre-Dylan favorite bar.
"Woo hoo!" Michelle shouted. "Bird, watch out! We're back!"
She and Michelle made a pretty hot team, if she did say so herself. Michelle was barely over five feet tall, with a mass of curly black hair, big brown eyes, and curves in all the right places. Jenner herself was of medium height and on the skinny side, but when she took time with her hair and makeup and put on something short and tight, she held her own. An hour later, they hit the door at Bird's, whooping with delight and singing "Hit the Road, Jack," inviting all the women present to sing along in the chorus. Jenner changed "Jack" to "Dylan," which didn't work quite as well, but who cared? She was having fun, and there was no shortage of guys wanting to dance with her.
She ended up stumbling home at dawn, thankful for the first time that she worked second shift and could get in some sleep. She hadn't drunk that much, just a couple of beers over the past five hours, but fatigue had sucker-punched her. Maybe twenty-three wasn't as young as she'd thought it was, because while she'd bounced back for a while, the bounce hadn't been all that high and now she could barely put one foot in front of the other.
She did remember to set the alarm clock, fell facedown across her bed, and didn't move until the alarm went off eight hours later. She lay in bed blinking at the ceiling and trying to remember what day it was. Finally everything clicked - oh, yeah, it was Friday - and the first thought that followed was that Dylan was gone, gone, gone. The second thought was that she had to go to work. She jumped up and hit the shower, humming a happy little song in honor of her freedom, and with remarkable good humor put on a clean ugly blue shirt. Not even the shirt could depress her today.
Why hadn't she realized before how over she and Dylan were? Why had she let him keep hanging around? Sure, it hadn't actually been that long, but she'd let the situation go on a good four or five weeks longer than she should have, kind of hoping it would improve when she knew damn good and well it wouldn't. It never did. She had to learn to see around that big blind spot she had. Well, not quite a blind spot. She'd known Dylan wasn't what she'd wanted him to be, just like her dad wasn't the dad she wanted. She'd given up on good old dad a long time ago, but at first, for a couple of weeks, Dylan had shown real promise. Then reality had set in, and it hadn't been pretty.
She got through her shift at work, and faced the weekend off with the same sense of lightheartedness. She could do what she wanted, when she wanted. And what she wanted was to go out again with Michelle, so they made another night of it and closed down Bird's again.