Hotline Fling

45: The Same

Juneau's POV

"Juneau." Sloan's eyes squinted, the blue more vibrant than the gray sky overhead. "You look really good."

My only response was I stood still, not even a blink, like my meathead, appearance-obsessed, condescending, eat-more-protein-bars ex hadn't just complimented me. How the fuck could he possibly think that? Was it my stab wound scar, licking my Damian-wounded heart, mourning my deceased cat, or freshly fired look?

"You look..." Sloan wore a gym tracksuit top and shorts that looked ridiculous on anyone older than high school, white socks, and sandals. Sunglasses were perched on the top of his brown-haired head, which was even more stupid than the socks under his sandals because, first, he wasn't using them outside, and second, winter.

"...the same," I finished.

Sloan looked even puffier than I remembered. His shoulders threatened to swallow up his neck, and I wasn't sure if he fit through a standard-sized doorway anymore. What had I ever seen in him? His bulging, sculpted arms were bigger like he carried melons for biceps with veins raised on them. His shorter neck looked as if it was being eaten by his huge shoulder muscles.

His eyes darted down to my hands. "What's with the box?"

My now former job, given its context between us, was the last thing I wanted to talk to him about. "What do you want, Sloan?"

"Can I take you to dinner?" he blurted out.

He had to be kidding. Given I unleashed what needed to be said until my throat was raw and sore from all our mutual screaming, I had nothing to say to him. Nothing. With his wide eyes and rushed-out words, his question surprised us both, but he should've expected my head to shake.

"No, I don't think that's a good idea." My calm reply contrasted the red flag warning bells that fired off in my frazzled brain. Needlelike cold sensations pricked at my cheeks, and I puffed a steamy breath between us.

"I want to apologize." He puffed up his chest and crossed the melons over it. "You were...right. I deserved everything you said and did."

"Great," my voice was drier than the air making my teeth chatter. "Thank me by moving on then, Sloan."

"I have," he said in a quiet, guilt-soaked tone. "I want to say I'm sorry. I wasn't kind to you, Juneau."

Wow. That was–wow. My empathetic side was shot to shit, and my petty side was extremely grateful that he was another girl's problem, not mine. For anyone within his airspace, I appreciated him seeing the error in his ways. Despite that, I wanted nothing to do with him, so I forced a smile. "That's great. Have a good life, Sloan."

"You too, Juneau." He paused like he had more to say, but I was done listening and marched away.

The bitter sting of an ex moving on into a new relationship, like a possible life status upgrade, gnawed in me while I walked home. My ankles wobbled over the uneven bricks, rattling the orchid in my box. Sloan finding someone else and looking his version of put together while I was a mess was unnerving. Totally un-fucking fair.

With a sigh, I stopped by the mailbox area. As if Fate wanted more misery rammed up my ass, a few bills were stuck in mine.

"Miss Olstead?" a voice wavered.

I tossed my envelopes into my work box of shame. "Yes?"

An elderly man grasped a similar orchid in his weathered hands, a beautiful lilac purple with darker purple stripes down the petals. A pair of round glasses enlarged his creased gray eyes. "I believe this is yours? It was put in front of my doorway," he said in a soft, kind voice. "So lovely, orchids."