Birthday Flowers | The Kissing Booth

31. Confidantes & Conversations

Sunday (Elle)

I'm sitting on the couch with my laptop when I see the door open and hear Mickey yell from behind it.

"I'M HOME. EVERYONE PUT CLOTHES ON."

I snort. "You're safe, Mickey. Nobody's naked."

"Well, that's disappointing. Why did I even bother leaving you the apartment all weekend if nobody got naked?"

"Oh, don't worry. Your sacrifice was greatly appreciated and very much taken advantage of. But Noah left for the airport an hour ago."

Mickey sets down her bags and roots through one of the kitchen cupboards.

"Do you want anything from the kitchen?"

"I don't know... maybe those cookies you lied to me about?"

"Yeah, I'm sure you were terribly disappointed." Mickey comments dryly as she plops down next to me on the couch with a bag of pretzels. "Soooooo?"

"Sooooooo, what?" I'm concentrating very hard on my laptop screen to avoid meeting her eyes.

"Oh, come on. I put up with all your moping last week, I aided and abetted Noah's surprise appearance, and then I disappeared the entire weekend. I'm owed some details."

"There will be no details, Mickey." I'm struggling to keep a blank expression.

"You're no fun. Fine, I'll just have to draw my own conclusions from any change to your grumpiness levels."

"I'm not at all grumpy."

"Yeah, I bet."

I finally give in to the laughter I'd been holding back. "Seriously, Mickey, what do you want me to say? I already told you, your absence was appreciated and made the most of."

"Fine, I don't actually want those details. But how was... everything else?"

"Noah set up a surprise lunch with June, so now she knows. And then Noah told his dad. So that was all kind of major."

"Let me guess—June was thrilled, Matthew less so."

Mickey came with me to a family lunch once. June loved her to pieces, while Matthew spent a solid ten minutes grilling her about whether trying to make it as an actress was a reasonable plan for after graduation.

"Pretty much. I wasn't there for the Matthew conversation, but—argh, why are you looking at me like that?" Mickey is smirking.

"I kind of already knew you'd told June. She texted me this morning wanting to know what the baby shower plans were. And telling me to make sure you got more sleep because you looked tired."

"Seriously? How does she have your number? And is there any Flynn left you're not talking about me to?"

"I promise I'm not talking to Matthew. And June's had my number since that lunch."

"We had an agreement, Mickey. No going behind my back."

"You're going to need to talk to Lee and June about that. They're the ones who've been contacting me. And anyway, I always tell you about it. Like right now."

"I see you left Noah out of that defense of your meddling."

"Oh yeah, those communications you can blame me for. I'll stop if you really want me to, but it's mostly just me sending him pictures so he doesn't miss out on how cute you look right now."

"I love how you qualify that—how cute I look right now. Because soon I'm just going to look like a pumpkin with legs."

"Somehow I suspect he'll think you're the cutest pumpkin with legs ever. Anyway, June's over the moon and if you don't want the world's girliest baby shower you need to tell me right now so I can rein her in before she goes off the rails."