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Prologue

Rise and shine, motherfucker

-Coffee Cup

Nathan

The day before college graduation

“I need you to make a pact with me,” I said as I stared at the wo me

The same woman that I never could quite pull myself away from Could never quite pull all the claws out of my skin before she sank yet another one in deeper

“What?” Reggie asked, just as drunk as I was

She was also not the wo me

That wo about her life on Facebook About how she had cancer and was about to go through ht not help her

“Don’t let her fucktears just like I always do and I know that I’ll lose,” I e that I’d received from Eerie, my own personal hell, and shoved it into my pocket

I looked around at the bright sparkling lights that Las Vegas had to offer

“And how do you propose that I do that?” Reggie snorted “You have a toxic relationship with her Just walk away”

I looked down at the paperwork in ht before and shook ”

Reggie rolled her eyes “Listen, I have a solution But you’re not going to like it”

Reggie and I had never gotten along But, despite the fact that we hadn’t, I knew one thing forever and always—she would have my back No matter what

Which was the entire point of having this conversation

Though,to offer, I would’veelse

My drunk brain wasn’t firing on all cylinders, though, and I’d never really been able to tell Reggie no

Two years later

“What do I do?” I asked

“We get a lawyer,” ht her”

I groaned and rubbed ainst my face as I tried to make sense of all of this

“Start over” My e of her nose “Why did you do this?”

I looked over at Reggie who’d been reh all of this

“I didn’t knohat to say,” I ad tears You kno I am with the tears”