Lost in Love

  DEDICATION

  To Emily van Beek

  for dreaming big with me

  and turning those dreams into reality

  CONTENTS

  Dedication

  One: Sadie

  Two: Darcy

  Three: Rosanna

  Four: Sadie

  Five: Darcy

  Six: Rosanna

  Seven: Sadie

  Eight: Darcy

  Nine: Rosanna

  Ten: Sadie

  Eleven: Darcy

  Twelve: Rosanna

  Thirteen: Sadie

  Fourteen: Darcy

  Fifteen: Rosanna

  Sixteen: Sadie

  Seventeen: Darcy

  Eighteen: Rosanna

  Nineteen: Sadie

  Twenty: Darcy

  Twenty-One: Rosanna

  Twenty-Two: Sadie

  Twenty-Three: Darcy

  Twenty-Four: Rosanna

  Twenty-Five: Sadie

  Twenty-Six: Darcy

  Twenty-Seven: Rosanna

  Twenty-Eight: Sadie

  Twenty-Nine: Darcy

  Thirty: Rosanna

  Thirty-One: Sadie

  Thirty-Two: Darcy

  Thirty-Three: Rosanna

  Thirty-Four: Sadie

  Thirty-Five: Darcy

  Thirty-Six: Rosanna

  Acknowledgments

  Back Ads

  About the Author

  Books by Susane Colasanti

  Credits

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  ONE

  SADIE

  MONDAYS ARE HARSH. YOU DON’T want to go to school. You don’t want to go to work. And what’s with getting up so freaking early? Mondays bust in after Sunday nights, those murky nights that are always infused with dread. Mondays are a nagging reminder that your real life isn’t as exhilarating as the movie version of your life. Not even close. Especially when compared to the adventures you’re pretty sure everyone else is having.

  But I’m one of those annoying people who actually like Mondays. Mondays have always symbolized starting over to me. What better chance for a fresh start than the beginning of a shiny new week?

  Except for this Monday. Today is the worst Monday in the history of calendars. I can’t believe Saturday was only two days ago. A boy slept over in my room—in my bed—for the first time. Austin was spending the whole weekend at my place. It felt like one of those really good dreams you never want to end. We were having a blissful New York City weekend where we could do whatever we wanted. The city belonged to us and we belonged to each other.

  Until Saturday night. When I found out Austin is married.

  Tears seep onto the bright stripes of my pillowcase. I brought my pillow out to the couch yesterday morning. I’ve been sacked out here binge-watching movies and shows ever since. My brain can’t handle anything else. I cannot function like a normal person. Even lying on my bed is too painful. I already called out sick from my internship today. Even if there wasn’t a chance of running into Austin in our building, there’s no way I’m showing up at the office with my eyes all red and puffy from the kind of relentless crying that might never end. I just want to lie on this couch forever.

  How pathetic am I? All miserable and heartbroken over some boy. Only . . . Austin wasn’t some boy. With him, I felt the way I’d always wanted to feel. We were perfect for each other. Or so it seemed. Now I’m a binge-watching hot mess on the couch. All I need is a pint of Ben & Jerry’s to complete this cliché. Or chocolates to throw at the screen whenever the leading man finally kisses the girl.

  Darcy and Rosanna are sneaking looks at me from the open kitchen. They’re pretending to eat breakfast, but they’re really watching and whispering about me. The same way my parents did before I moved out. I didn’t want to deal with what happened to my sister then and I don’t want to deal with Austin now. All I want to do is block out the world. My roommates can whisper all they want. I’m not going anywhere. I didn’t even get up to go to bed last night. I just slept right here on the couch, much to Darcy’s dismay. Darcy and the couch have developed an intimate relationship. She’s not home that much between her summer session classes during the day and staying out all night, but when she is here, she enjoys her lounging time. Sorry, Darcy. The couch is taken indefinitely.

  The thought of going back to my internship twists my stomach into knots. At least no one there knew our secret. Imagine if I had to explain why we broke up on top of worrying that I’m going to run into Austin any second. If he didn’t work on a different floor, I would seriously have to consider quitting.

  “Hey, Sadie,” Rosanna says. Her face is covered with concern. Somehow her camp counselor tee and gray cotton shorts are making her look more tentative than usual. She’s careful not to stand in front of the TV as she takes in the full view of my sorry state. She’s also careful not to stand too close to me. The last time I took a shower was two days ago. “We have to leave. Can I get you anything?”

  “I’m good,” I say, my voice cracking.

  “You sure?”

  The energy it takes to nod exhausts me. Every part of me is weighed down with cinder blocks.

  “Okay, well . . . call Darcy if you need anything. Or you can call camp if you need to get in touch with me.”

  Darcy breezes into the living room on a cloud of her signature Vera Wang Princess fragrance. She has her hair pinned up in a high bun and is rocking a mod red knee-length dress with black polka dots and a wide black belt. The dress looks extra glam with her new black wedges and matching red tote. I’d tell her how cute she looks if I hadn’t just used up all of my energy nodding to Rosanna.

  “You called out sick?” Darcy asks me.

  “Yeah.” It wasn’t even a lie. My eyelids are so heavy I can hardly keep my eyes open. As soon as Darcy and Rosanna leave, I’ll be drifting toward sleep again. Heartbreak is a serious illness.

  “I say we track Austin down and hurt him,” she proclaims. “Didn’t you tell me he likes Breaking Bad? How about we get the hookup on some of that ricin?”

  “Let me think on it.” Darcy might be only half joking about the powdered poison that dissolves in someone’s drink and leaves no trace.

  “You get a little more time to mope. Then we are physically removing you from this couch and reuniting you with the outdoors. Right, Rosanna?”

  “Right.” Rosanna is trying to be supportive, but I can tell she’s nervous that I might actually take Darcy up on that ricin.

  “Comfort food tonight,” Darcy says. “We’re ordering in. My treat.”

  “Sure you don’t need anything?” Rosanna asks me again.

  Two weeks ago, I didn’t even know these girls. The University of New York’s housing department placed us together in this apartment for the summer. I could have ended up with anyone. Instead I was placed with two incredible roommates who couldn’t be more different, but are equally concerned about me. Almost as if karma started restoring balance before the Austin travesty even happened.

  “Don’t worry about me,” I tell them. “I’ll be okay.”

  After they leave, I sink back into my pillow, plunging into memories I would rather forget. The smaller things bother me the most. I held Austin’s hand, the same hand where his wedding ring should have been, walking along Hudson River Park as I let the excitement of our epic love story wash over me. Then he said the view of the Manhattan skyline was better from Hoboken than Jersey City. Now it’s clear he wanted to keep me away from Jersey City, where he lives, to avoid running into people he knew.

  Like his wife.

  I remember this couple I saw at Coffee Shop. They were obviously so in love. The way she gazed into his eyes. The way he stroked her arm so tenderly. You could tell they we
re soul mates just by looking at them. They were meant to be together. It felt like I had the same connection with Austin.

  But I was wrong. I never knew who Austin really was.

  And now I never will.

  TWO

  DARCY

  “HAS SHE BEEN THERE ALL night?” I whisper to Rosanna.

  “I think so,” she whispers back.

  Our vantage point behind the breakfast bar provides us with a stark view of a disheveled Sadie on an even more disheveled couch. Half of the matching mugs she bought for the apartment are scattered around the floor and coffee table. The mugs’ cheerful stripes are a sharp contrast to the Girl Formerly Known as Sadie. Balled-up tissues are strewn everywhere. Even on top of her. She’s sprawled on the couch in a crooked diagonal, with her feet dangling off the edge, watching Crazy, Stupid, Love. The tank and shorts of her Forever 21 pajama set (a super cute set that has “Love is all around you” printed all over the shorts) are beyond rumpled. Poor thing. She doesn’t even have the motivation to change. All signs point to lack of showering. Sadie is the last person I’d have expected to see shattered by boy drama. Or any drama, really. She’s the most positive person I know.

  “How can we help her?” Rosanna whispers.

  “Well, eventually we have to throw her in the shower,” I say. No question there.

  “I’m really worried. It’s like her whole life was destroyed overnight.”

  I hate to admit it, but I kind of knew Sadie was going to crash and burn. There was no way I knew Austin was lying about his life or anything. I just knew her relationship would come to an end. When relationships are crashing and burning all around you, you tend to not be that optimistic about love.

  “The best way to help her is to be there for her,” I whisper to Rosanna.

  Her bagel pops out of the toaster. She goes to put it on a plate, then comes back over to the breakfast bar where we’ve been huddled together. Rosanna takes the lid off her tub of Breakstone’s whipped butter. She slowly scrapes a knife along the top of the butter and spreads it thinly on the bagel. She’s so precise you’d think she was conducting brain surgery. How can she not be sick of bagels? She eats them like every day. Maybe she couldn’t get good bagels back in Chicago, where she’s from.

  “What are you doing tonight?” I ask.

  “Nothing.”

  “So D isn’t whisking you off anywhere before South Beach?” That boy is totally spoiling her. D is taking Rosanna to Miami for Fourth of July weekend. I’m sure they’ll be staying at the most exclusive hotel and eating at the best restaurants. That’s how D rolls. D and all the other trust-fund kids aspiring to investment banker status. I was surprised Rosanna agreed to go. When it comes to boy adventures, she and I are on opposite ends of the pleasure spectrum. She’s only going because D reserved separate rooms for them.

  We sit on our stools at the bar, Rosanna crunching on her toasted bagel, me spooning my boysenberry yogurt, looking everywhere but at what could be mistaken for a dead body on the couch. My heart aches for Sadie. It sucks that boys have the power to break even the strongest girls. I wish I didn’t know how she feels. I wish no one had to know how she feels.

  “There’s not much we can do for her,” I say. “She just has to feel it.” Time is the only thing that can heal the devastation of boy betrayal. Not that I had enough time to get over mine. . . .

  As much as I wanted to be over Logan before he showed up at my door Saturday night, I wasn’t. There was a little less aching in my chest when I thought about him, but the pain was still there.

  The first time Logan kissed me was near the end of our first date. We were hanging out on Ocean Front Walk after dinner and Logan was talking about how college is not his thing. He didn’t know what his thing was, but he was only twenty-one so there was plenty of time to figure it out. Maybe he would join a circus. Or a band, even though he didn’t play an instrument. Or maybe he would be a nomad, picking up odd jobs in odder towns until he was ready to move on to his next unknown destination. I loved the way he had no problem going with the flow. How he refused to let anyone force him into being someone he’s not. We were connecting on a hundred different levels, all firing synapses and racing heartbeats.

  And then there was a moment. The electric crackle of our charged conversation defused to a hypnotic hum. Logan leaned back against a palm tree, pulling me toward him. He put his arms around me. And then he kissed me. He tasted like honey.

  Maybe I would have been over Logan if he had waited a year to fly across the country and announce what an idiot he was for dumping me right before I moved here. But he didn’t. And I wasn’t. He came all the way from California to tell me he wanted me back after only a couple weeks. I swear I felt like one of those flustered-but-adorable girls from a Nora Ephron movie. When does the boy ever come after the girl he dumped in real life?

  Not that this changes my opinion of relationships in any way. Relationships are destined for failure. Everything has to end eventually. But it validates what I already knew. Logan is here in New York because what we had meant something. Before he threw it all away.

  I don’t know if I can trust him again. I don’t know if I can give up Summer Fun Darcy to be exclusive with the boy who broke my heart. All I know is that giving Logan a second chance is the right thing to do. However long it takes, he deserves the chance to show how he really feels.

  Logan was my heart. Could he be again?

  I wish I could swoop in on Sadie the way Logan swooped in on me and take away her pain. We were talking with Rosanna about going to the beach this weekend. But that was before the scandalous exposure of Austin’s double life. Sadie doesn’t want to go to the beach now. She doesn’t even want to get off the couch. And Rosanna will be away with D.

  After we say goodbye to Sadie, we head down the long flights of our fourth-floor walk-up: me clomping along in my three-inch wedges and Rosanna bouncing in her comfy sneakers. Comfort does not interest me. The price of fashion includes deft maneuvering on everything from steep stairs to cobblestone streets. I wouldn’t have it any other way. When it comes to couture, the more alarming the better.

  Rosanna’s subway stop is in the same direction as UNY, so we walk together for a few blocks. I quickly call Logan to cancel our plans for tonight. We were going to hit up some static dancing at this Polish rec center. You know, typical Monday night stuff. When my call goes to voice mail, I explain that Sadie needs some emergency girl time, but I’d love to see him tomorrow night if he’s free. Logan got the hookup on a friend of a friend’s apartment in Chelsea. The apartment belongs to an older guy, like twenty-five, who travels a lot for work. All Logan has to do is take care of the plants, bring in the mail, and pay part of the rent. I guess Logan had a decent amount saved before he came here, because he’s still looking for a job.

  The boy drama gloom inside our apartment distracted us from realizing what a gorgeous day it is. I smile in the morning sunshine as I saunter down 5th Avenue. But then a boy who looks like Jude passes us. The shock of that first millisecond wipes the smile right off my face. My heart is slamming out an entire repertoire on the steel drum. It takes a few seconds for my body to register that I did not just encounter Jude. I don’t have to figure out what to say to him. I don’t have to watch him walk away dejected again. My adrenaline level returns to normal. I’m off the hook for now.

  Jude has been ignoring my messages. Which might be a good thing, considering I have no idea what’s going to come out of my mouth when I talk to him. I know I owe him an explanation. The question is how much to explain.

  THREE

  ROSANNA

  WHEN WE GET TO MY subway stop and Darcy branches off toward class, I start obsessing over the call I’m going to make at work. All weekend I’ve been dying to call the Upper East Side camp to get Addison’s number. I cannot wait to find out what her damage is. She has to tell me why she wants to hurt me. Why would a person I don’t even know hate me? This whole Nasty Girl thing is stressing me
out so much I can’t even enjoy the anticipation of going away with D. My mind still can’t wrap itself around the fact that we are going to South Beach together.

  D could not be a sweeter, more generous person. The first thing I did when he called Sunday night and invited me to South Beach was refuse. There was no way I could let him pay for such an elaborate trip. I told him that I would love to go away with him one day, but I couldn’t afford to yet.

  “We’re going,” D said. “I want to treat you the way you deserve to be treated.”

  “But it’s not right that you would have to pay for everything.”

  “Oh, it’s right. I want to take you away for a trip you will never forget.”

  “Could we wait until I can save up enough to pay my way? Or at least pay for most of it?”

  “Aren’t you putting yourself through college? Haven’t you taken out student loans?”

  He was right. I was delusional to think I could afford to go anywhere before I’m thirty.

  “Let me do this for you,” D said. “You’d be doing me the favor. I want to go away, but I don’t want to go alone. I really want you to come with me. Please let me take you?”

  We went back and forth for a long time. But I finally accepted that D really did want to treat me. And it’s not like he couldn’t afford to. Donovan Clark is from a rich family. He can afford to do anything.

  All I want to do is get on the subway and lose myself in a few minutes of swooning over D. But I can’t. Because Addison is so nasty she’s even invading my fantasy life.

  The Lower East Side day camp where I’m a counselor is affiliated with a camp on the Upper East Side where Addison works. There was a party for the counselors and staff of both camps. Addison threw me a nasty glare as soon as I got there. Like she hated me even though I’d never seen her before. Then she intentionally spilled red punch all over my best going-out top (which was white, of course) and went over to a group of girls and started laughing.

  And then she ran into Mica, the only counselor at camp I’ve clicked with, and told her all these nasty lies about me. Lies about things I’ve said and done that came out of nowhere. Mica believed everything Addison said. Now she won’t talk to me.