The Forever of Ella and Micha

peeks out. I’ve missed that ass a lot.
    At the top of the stairway, she glances over her shoulder and catches me eyeballing her. She puts her hands behind her and whirls her back toward the wall. “Did you have me walk up first to check out my butt? I thought we were going to be friends.”
    I shrug, not giving a shit that she caught me. “I used to check out your ass all the time before when we were just friends. You just never noticed.”
    She combs her fingers through her auburn hair. “You’re going to make this hard, aren’t you?”
    “Probably,” I admit to her honestly and her face falls. Quickly, so she can’t stop me, I sweep some of her hair out of her eyes and lightly kiss her cheek, winking at her when I step back. “Relax, though. I won’t rip your clothes off until you ask me to.”
    “You’re relentless.” She restrains a grin. “And it’s not going to help me if you keep touching me and looking at me like that. I want to get better for you, but I have to take it easy with complex situations until I learn how to deal with them. Think of it as like when an alcoholic is recovering and they’re told not to get into a relationship until they can handle stuff rationally.”
    “Did your therapist say that to you?”
    “Yeah.”
    Sighing, I shove open the door and hold up a couple of my fingers. “Alright, I’ll be on my best behavior. Scout’s honor.”
    She bends my fingers back playfully as she rolls her eyes and then steps into the house. She observes the old leather sofa Ethan stole from his mom’s house, the television on a crate, and the table in the dining room, which is between the kitchen and the living room.
    “This is so a guy’s apartment.” She sniffs the air and then flinches, fanning her hand in front of her face. “It even smells like a guy.”
    I pinch her ass and she lets out a squeal. “It smells manly.” I strut off to the kitchen before she can get mad at me for my little stunt.
    She starts chatting with Lila and Ethan while I peel the tape off the dishes box on the kitchen table and take out a stack of plates. From the counter, my phone rings. It’s the hospital from New York where I took the blood test.
    Reluctantly, I answer it. “Hello.”
    “Hi,” a woman with a squeaky voice says. “Is this Micha Scott?”
    I slant my back against the counter and stare at the wall. “It is.”
    “This is Amy, from the NYU Medical Center,” she says. “I called to tell you that your test results confirmed you’re a candidate for the transplant.”
    “Okay, thanks for letting me know.” I hang up on her, clutching the phone in my hand. “
Fuck
.”
    Ethan pops his head into the kitchen. “We’re going to go get something to eat. You down… Are you okay? You look weird.”
    “I’m fine.” I chuck my phone onto the table and the back pops off. “And yeah, dinner sounds good to me.”
    He nods his head at the front door where Ella and Lila are waiting. “Let’s roll then.”
    Once he walks out, I sneak quite a few large swigs of vodka from a bottle I dig out of one of the boxes, then stuff a couple of mini bottles into my pocket. The hospital calling is a painful reminder that my father only came to me when he needed something from me. But that’s not the real problem. I’ve accepted that he won’t ever see me as anything more than a person he used to know. What’s getting me riled up is that deep down, I don’t want to do it for him. I want to make him suffer and that feeling is eating away at me.
    I don’t want to feel like that, but I can’t turn off the resentment.
    Ethan steps back into the kitchen with an irritated expression on his face. “What are you doing? Let’s go. I’m freaking hungry.”
    “I’m coming. Jeez, keep your panties on.” I storm for the door. “And we’re not driving in that damn Mustang.”

Ella
    Micha’s pissed off about the Mustang and makes a big dramatic speech about how he’s not riding in it. No way in hell. Uh-huh. The more the night goes on, it becomes clear that his anger is from something deeper, and the car is just a cover-up.
    When Ethan turns into the parking lot, I decide that karma hates me, because it’s the restaurant we dropped Blake off at earlier—the one he works at.
    I scoot forward in the backseat of the truck and fold my arms on top of the console. “I don’t want to eat here.”
    “Why not?” Micha glances at the restaurant’s neon signs and flashy decorations hanging from the