Page 50 of Forever is the Sweetest Con
Chapter Nineteen
My worst nightmare appears at the beach path. She’s tall, fit, and devastatingly beautiful. And she’s looking at Kei like she wants to eat him for dinner.
“You know her?” I say, not really wanting to know the answer.
“She’s my ex.”
Kei’s perfect-on-paper person is hisex? The one he’s still in love with? Oh wonderful, amazing, just fucking great. And it gets worse as she gets closer. Clear, glowing, tanned skin. Long, tousled brown hair, kissed by the sun. Piercing green eyes. The long legs and curves of an absolute bombshell.
Which is exactly what she is. Here to blow up everything we’ve built.
She approaches Kei and kisses him on both cheeks. “Meu amor, I have missed you.” She stands on the other side of him, not even acknowledging my existence. Kei stands rigid between us.
It feels like there’s a drone between my ears, a faint but persistent buzzing that cancels out all other sounds around me. At one point, a muscly, clean-cut guy with blindingly white teeth and a paw print tattoo on his bicep appears before me. He gives me a hopeful smile as he leans in to kiss my cheek.
Is this my perfect-on-paper person? He’s standing so close to me, like he’s staking his claim, but I can barely register him. Alessandra’spresence on Kei’s other arm looms so large that I find it impossible to focus on anything else.
I glance around. Everyone looks miserable. The POPPs seem like they’re trying to keep a brave face, but the animosity toward them is palpable. The only people who are happy are Tyler and Gabby. They’re fucking delighted to watch it all burn down.
Once everyone has been matched with their POPP, Natasha continues her spiel. “This afternoon, you’ll do your rostered chores with your bunkmate, as per usual, but then, in lieu of a challenge, you have a choice: go on a romantic date with your POPP or spend some quality time with your bunkmate.” There are several audible groans. Natasha looks gleeful while the rest of us are despondent. “We’ll ring the bell when it’s time to decide if you’re going on the date or not. So, off you go! Have fun!”
Kei doesn’t look at me as we walk to the Chore Board. We’re on waste management, which means dealing with the garbage and the compost, the most reviled chore at camp.
We go around to the back of the Mess Hall where the garbage bins are located. We silently start pulling out bags and tossing them onto a wagon, which we’ll have to wheel to the perimeter of the camp for pick-up.
“Are we going to talk about this?” I ask, annoyed that he seems willing to pretend nothing is happening.
“Sure,” he replies, without making eye contact.
“Okay, I’ll start. I guess I just feel, let’s say,perplexedby the fact that you literally named your ex-girlfriend as your perfect person. Like, if she’s so perfect for you, then why did you break up? Why bother coming here, if she’s all you really want?” I’m confused by the hurt in my voice. Sure, it will be convincing for the viewers, but I was going for annoyed, not wounded.
Kei sighs heavily. “Look, when I filled out that questionnaire, I was in a bad place. Me and Allie had only just gone bad, and I was prettytorn up. And the thing is, at the time, I really did think she was perfect for me.”
“Is this supposed to be making me feel better?”
“Perfect on paper and perfect in reality are two very different things. On paper, at least in a one-page questionnaire, sheiseverything I’m looking for. But the reality of her, or the reality ofus, at least, is that we’re terrible together.” He looks so anguished, I want to give him a hug, pull him in and tell him it’s okay.
“She cheated,” he says. “And it made me crazy. I stayed with her, but I couldn’t trust her. I turned into a different person—jealous, suspicious—and it ate away at my confidence.”
I shift uncomfortably. I remember how devastated my mom was when she found out my dad was cheating. How it was like the light in her just went out. I should have learned then to never trust anyone with my heart like that.
Kei picks up one of the handles of the wagon and gestures for me to grab the other. We head toward the dumpsters.
“So, things ended pretty badly?”
“That’s the thing.”
“What?”
“We didn’t really break up. It just sort of fizzled out. I needed some time, and she gave that to me. We got together a few times, you know—”
“Booty calls,” I say, never one to parse words.
“I guess.” He pauses. “More like giving in to an addiction.”
Great, Kei was addicted to having sex with Alessandra. That’s wonderful.
“And then it just went longer and longer between—”
