This is a long chapter, with lots of story building. Things will speed up quickly after this, I promise. If you haven't read the first four chapters, I would suggest starting there, but don't let me tell you what to do.
I hope you enjoy.
-Penny
***
"Seriously, Seneca, I can not believe you didn't tell me about breaking up with Chip the second it happened!" Olivia exclaimed into her still-asleep brain. "He called and cried for, like, an hour! And that's after I ignored him the first four times. FOUR! Dammit Seneca, that's so totally not cool. I didn't even know he knew my phone number!"
Seneca sighed, wiping her eyes as she lay the phone on the bed next to her ear. She rolled over and tried to read the time on it with bleary eyes. She gave up and rolled over, closing her eyes against the morning, and her best friend.
"Good morning to you, too, Olivia. You know it isn't even nine yet, right? On Sunday, right?" She smacked her lips, her mouth felt sleep-sticky.
"So sorry, but maybe it's because your ex-fiance called me like five times last night! He said he called you, too. Where were you? I tried to call you, too, but it went straight to your voicemail."
She groaned. "Hold on, Liv. Give me like, five minutes or something, I need to wake up. I'll call you right back."
Olivia snorted. "You'd better, or I'm going to...I don't know. I'll call your mom. I'll tell her about Chip!" she threatened. "Kennedy really liked him."
"No she didn't!"
Olivia chuckled. "Fine, she didn't, but I'll tell her anyway. You know how she hates getting her Seneca news from me."
"Alright, I will, I promise," she muttered as she hung up on her best friend.
Despite being her best friend, Olivia didn't know her secrets. She didn't know about her birth mother and the fire, didn't know the reality about how Kennedy adopted her, or even the truth about Kennedy.
If she had her way, Olivia would remain blissfully ignorant of the finer details of Seneca's condition forever. There was no way they'd still be friends if she knew the truth about Seneca.
Still, it made her feel guilty, all the lies and half truths. She just couldn't risk losing Olivia.
So, how in the hell was she gonna explain last night? How would she explain Godwin?
She wouldn't. She sighed, hating Chip for this, too. But Godwin...
Just thinking about him set her heart aflutter. She longed to see him again. She'd meet him at the bench in her secret garden again on Tuesday. It wasn't so far away, but it felt like too long, forever long.
Seneca sat up, scratching her fingers through her tangled mop of bed-head. She stretched, feeling refreshed. She felt good, good about herself and good about life. It was a feeling she wasn't accustomed to. She could get used to it, she thought with a short laugh, as long as it meant she kept meeting up with Godwin.
Her phone buzzed. Chip. She hit decline, sending him to voicemail. Guilt gnawed at her stomach, but she didn't want to talk to him ever again. Her phone vibrated a moment later, then notifies her she had seven new voicemails. Her stomach clenched, a majority of them were probably from him. Was there a way to delete them all without listening to them?
She pushed herself out of bed and took an extra long shower, enjoying the feel of the hot water on her skin, forcing herself to focus on it and not the guilt from how she dumped Chip. The heat reminded her of Godwin's touch and she closed her eyes, imagining how his fingers would feel on her skin.
Her fingers found her wet folds and she squeaked in surprise. Her hand moved on its own, and she pulled it back quickly, ashamed. She forced herself out of the shower after that, not sure if she could trust herself not to do it again.
She called Olivia back. "Sorry, Liv. I was still half asleep. And, before you bite my head off, sorry I didn't call you after I broke up with Chip. I was kind of, ah, on radio silence."
"No, I get it, but you owe me, Seneca! A whole hour I will never get back!" There was a challenge in her tone.
"I know, I know," she sighed, resting the phone on her shoulder while trying to measure out loose tea into her manatee-shaped tea infuser. She filled a teacup with water and placed it into the microwave for a minute and a half. "I'm sorry! I just couldn't. God, I couldn't marry him, Liv. He was so he was so needy and selfish. I just couldn't do it."
Olivia snorted through the phone. "Well, why'd ya say yes then?"
"Liv, I already told you!" She opened the fridge, looking for something to eat. "He was just so pushy, and everyone there was so... You weren't there, Liv! All those eyes staring into my soul, Judgy-McJudgerson style. There was no way I coulda refused under that kinda pressure!
"And, for the record, I didn't actually say yes. He assumed I did, because that's who he is, the giant selfish man-child. He wants picket fences and puppies and babies and I just can't!" She pulled out a yogurt and shut the refrigerator.
"Puppies I can see, but, damn, girl, I can't imagine you all barefoot and pregnant. Don't get me wrong, I will always have your back. This just blindsided me. I can't believe you didn't call me! I thought you loved me..." she whined, pretending to be hurt.
"Liv!" Seneca whined. "Of course I love you! I'm calling you now, aren't I? It just happened so fast, like a blur."
Olivia harrumphed, keeping her on the hook. "Chip cried for like an hour. An entire hour, which I will never get back, Seneca! An entire hour. Sixty minutes. Three hundred and sixty seconds."
"Liv, it's a good thing you're an art major, ya know?"
"What?"
She sniffed. "An hour is three thousand, six hundred seconds. You dropped a zero."
"Now you're just slicing hairs." Olivia paused. "You aren't going to change your mind, right? I'm not sure if I can do this again."
"Oh. My. God. No! I am never, ever, ever going back! I'm so glad I never brought him back here, Liv. Like, for realsies." The microwave beeped, signaling her water was hot enough for steeping, so she took it out and dropped her mana-tea into the mug. "I'd have to move. And change my name. Maybe get into the witness protection program. Do they do that? For weirdo ex-boyfriends?"
"Witness protection? OMJesus, Seneca, he couldn't have been that bad!" Olivia chastised.
"He totally was," Seneca defended. "You didn't date him!"
"But, those abs, though..."
Seneca snorted. "Abs aren't everything. I learned that recently."
"But they're your thing!" Olivia objected.
Seneca bit her lip, thinking of Godwin. "Maybe... Maybe I found a new thing."
