After Forever by Jasinda Wilder Read Free Book Online

forehead and cheeks. She wore a pair of white spandex shorts, cross-trainers with ankle socks, and a black Northface fleece. Then she shucked her coat and tossed it on the table. All she had on up top was a sports bra. Purple. Tight. And… not quite up to the task of enclosing everything it was supposed to.
    “Excuse my appearance,” she said. “I was on the way home from the gym. Thought of you.” She winced as if she’d said something wrong. “Thought of you, in the sense that I thought maybe the shit in your fridge had gone bad, since you’ve been gone for a couple of weeks, and it might be hard for you to shop, or cook, and—” She was rambling, clearly embarrassed. “Not that I’m just sitting around thinking of you, or anything…shit. This isn’t going well. I’m—I’m just gonna gome. Gome? Go home. I’m going to go home. God, I’m such a fucking spazz.” She grabbed her coat and scurried toward the front door. I’d noticed she tended to swear more than Ever, who only cursed when really upset, or in bed.  
    “Eden, wait. It’s fine. You’re—you’re fine. Please stay. Have some pizza. I’m—I wasn’t looking forward to eating alone anyway.”
    She hesitated with the door open and her foot on the threshold, staring down the hallway, as if it somehow held her rescue. “I should go.”
    I shrugged. Part of me was screaming, telling me to let her go. Let her leave. The other part was begging me to ask her to stay. She was company. A friendly face. Someone to talk to. “I mean, it’s up to you,” I said. “Just…I wouldn’t mind the company.”
    She hesitated another moment, and then shut the door. She shut it slowly, letting it click closed with a certain strange finality. She set her coat back on the table. “Plates?”
    I pointed at the sink. “Cupboard over the sink. There’s some paper ones in there. No way in hell I’m doing dishes anytime soon.”
    She brought the box and a couple of plates and the roll of paper towels, and then went back for two cans of the soda she’d brought me. We ate in silence, both of us clearly hungry. We finished all but two slices of the large pizza, which kind of impressed me. I’d never met a girl who could eat like that. Of course, the only two girls I’d ever really known were Luisa and Ever, and both of them were light eaters. With all the talk Ever had done in her letters about how Eden was so figure conscious and health and fitness obsessed, I hadn’t expected her to eat as much as she did, or be willing to be seen in public wearing what she was.  
    There was a thought I’d had, a question that I’d never had the courage to ask. Finally, I couldn’t take the wondering anymore. “Eden? Did you know Ever was pregnant?”
    She set her can down and wiped her hands on a sheet of paper towel. “No. Did you?”
    I shook my head. “I was wondering if she’d talked to you about it.”
    Ever shrugged. “Not to me, no.”
    “Do you think she knew?”
    Ever sighed. “I’d like to think no. I mean, if she didn’t tell either of us, then I can’t imagine she knew. That’s not the kind of thing she’d keep secret. Not from me.” She gave me an apologetic glance. “She might have kept it from you for a while, if she was scared to tell you, but…she’d tell me. And I’d have known something was up with her. I mean, we’re twins. We know things about each other. We can sense when the other is keeping a secret. Sometimes I can tell when she’s upset even when I’m not in the same room as her. That’s happened a lot. I’ll be in class or practicing and I just—I know she needs me.”  
    “Did you—did you sense anything, when it happened?”  
    She shrugged again, but it was a tiny, uncertain gesture, and she kept her head down, her braid hanging over one shoulder. “Yeah. I knew.”
    “You knew?” I asked. “You knew what?”
    “That something had happened.” Her voice dropped to a murmur. “I felt…it felt like someone