Dumped in Four Hours

My best friend came back from ten years in the future to tell me two things. One: the boy I'd been dating for exactly four hours was going to ruin my life.

Two: the man I'm going to marry has been quietly, secretly in love with me for twelve years. And I've never met him. So I did the only reasonable thing.

I dumped the fourhour boyfriend by text and blocked his number. Same day. Chapter 1 My best friend crossed ten years of time to stop a summer that ends in blood.

And the first thing she asked me to do was dump the boy I'd waited three years to have. Tessa and I grew up together.

Close enough that if she ever got scammed into a pyramid scheme, the first person she'd recruit under her would, without question, be me.

So when she told me she'd come back from ten years in the future, my first reaction wasn't that she'd fried her brain.

It was, "Then why didn't you come back two days earlier and give me the essay prompt for finals?" Tessa looked at me like I was hopeless. "If I'd come back two days earlier, I'd have had to sit the exams myself.

At my level? Take a wild guess how that goes." Fair. We sat in mutual silence for a beat. "Sadie," she said. "I need your help." Here was the thing.

She'd come back to save her future husband. It was going to happen this summer. The night the exam results came out, our city was going to wake up to something monstrous.

The honorstudent patricide. August was the top scorer in the state.

He'd also grown up under his father's fists, watching that man beat his mother half to death more times than anyone should ever have to count, the pressure stacking higher and higher.

That night, after his father raised a knife at his mother one more time, August took the knife and killed him.

The whole city would lose its mind. "I want to stop it before it happens," Tessa said. I nodded, serious now. "Tell me how I help." "August doesn't know me yet.

So for this, I need your husband. The two of them were close in high school. With his help, we cut the work in half." Forgive a girl who'd just walked out of her final exams.

The words your husband landed, and my face went hot. "…Who's my husband?" I asked, small. "Grayson?" "Roman." My eyes went wide. "I don't even know him." "I swear," Tessa said. "I just came from your wedding.

He told the whole room he'd loved you for twelve years. Do the math on that. He's been quietly gone for you since high school." I just stared. "Grayson?" Tessa tried instead.

Then she made a sound like she'd bitten into something rotten. "Cheating scumbag. Did it more times than I could count.

PUA'd you into the ground, had you crying yourself sick, sank you into a depression it took years to climb out of.

The only reason you came through it at all was Roman." She let that sit. I still couldn't make myself believe it.

Because in my version of the world, Grayson was the boy the whole school wanted. Handsome. Brilliant. Sang like a dream. I'd been gone for him all three years of high school.

And he'd finally been won over, promised he'd be with me the second exams ended. As of right now, I'd been officially dating him for less than four hours.

I'd been bracing for the sweet part.

Instead my best friend upended a bucket of ice water over my head. "You can't stand to let him go?" Tessa asked. "It's just that I only got with him today," I said, weak.

Tessa took a breath and went straight for the kill. "You two break up junior year of college. He dumps you.

Reason being, your family goes broke and he already has a foot out the door. "That whole relationship, he's running two or three other girls on the side.

So." She leveled me a look. "If you still want to give him a shot, be my guest." I had my phone in my hand before she finished.

As luck would have it, Grayson picked that exact moment to text. Grayson: [Babe, miss you so much.] Under Tessa's watchful eye, I typed back, fingers flying. Me: [Thought it over.

We're really not a match. Let's break up.] Grayson sent back a single: [?] I wasn't waiting around for the followup. Block. Delete. One clean motion.

Tessa beamed at me like a proud parent, and I let out a long breath. One boyfriend, gone.

Somewhere out there was a boy who'd supposedly loved me for twelve years, whose face I couldn't have picked out of a crowd.

And somewhere ahead of us was a summer that ended in blood, and it was my job to make sure it never got there. Chapter 2 Less than twenty days until results.

The next morning we were at the hotpot restaurant where August worked, playing customers. He was our server. Every other server wore the black logo tee.

August wore a longsleeved shirt under the apron, in July. He bent to hand us hot towels, and up close I saw why.

A long, deep old scar ran from behind his right ear down under his collar. Tessa told me he wore long sleeves all summer because his arms were mapped with them too. Cane welts.

Cigarette burns. Brutal. The kind of thing you don't look straight at. I studied him carefully. Singlelidded eyes, hair cropped short, a profile cut sharp.

Some people just come with the pressure turned low around them, and he was one of them. He served us with his head bowed, and I didn't dare get too loud. I glanced over at Tessa.

Her eyes were already brimming. "Hey. Hey." I kept my voice down once August had walked off. "Pull it together. We've got a job to do." Tessa nodded.

The job, technically, was to get ourselves hired here. Get close to August. Close enough to stop what was coming.

I scanned the code to order, turning over how to make us stick, when Tessa's foot caught me hard in the shin. Your husband, she mouthed.

After last night's allnighter, the words your husband didn't move me at all anymore. I looked up at the boy standing off to the side. Same server tee as the rest.

His whole face caught the light and went luminous, pale and clean. Fine features, long lashes lowered.

Something in his expression looked nervous, his eyes fixed dead ahead on a single glass of lemonade. The lemonade was full. It was about to spill over. He kept pouring.

His pale profile went slowly red under my stare. The water ran over the rim. He went redder, flustered now, and snatched a towel to mop up the mess he'd made.

Tessa took the opening. "You guys hiring any summer help?" Roman was quiet for two seconds. "Far as I know, we're not really short on people." Tessa kicked me again.

I caught up fast. "Could you maybe ask, though? We'd really love to work here." He stammered. "They might be hiring after all.

I'll go check." While we waited on his answer, another wave of people crowded through the door. I spotted Grayson in half a second. He had a way of standing out.

I dropped my head fast. Didn't matter. He'd come for me, and he crossed the floor toward our table like he had it on a string.

He planted himself beside us and pitched his voice low and small. "Babe. Last night.

What was that about?" "It was about breaking up." I looked at him headon, and there was nothing left in me when I did.

Last night Tessa had walked me through Grayson's entire catalog, and twotiming was the mildest entry on it. Hearing it back had curled my hands into fists.

Loving him one more day would mean something was genuinely wrong with my brain.

Grayson's eyes went red on the spot. "But we just got together." "Are you playing with me?" His voice went pitiful. "You're crazy about me. We waited so long for this.

How do you just walk away?" Waited so long. Like I was a reward he'd finally unlocked. Grayson didn't beg. Grayson had never begged for anything in his life.

So why was he begging now. Chapter 3 The Grayson I remembered didn't love me. Not like this. Not enough to go redeyed over a single breakup text. He was proud.

The kind of proud that checks its reflection in every window he passes. Break up with him and he'd shrug, fix his hair, and quietly thank you for saving him the trouble.

He did not chase. He definitely did not chase across a packed restaurant with an audience watching. So the thought landed before I could stop it. What if Grayson came back too?

Once I'd thought it, I couldn't unthink it. Every angle of him tilted a few degrees wrong. Take right now. He was claiming me. Out loud. In public.

Last night Tessa had walked me through his greatest hits, and somewhere on that list: he'd never once put me on his socials. Never introduced me to a friend, a cousin, anyone.

I was a secret with an expiration date. And here he was, waving a hand at his whole table like it cost him nothing. "Go ahead and eat.

I'm gonna smooth things over with my girlfriend." The restaurant lost it. Whistles. A whole chorus of oooooh.

He leaned into the noise, and into me, voice dropping low and syrupy. "Babe. Let's not break up.

Okay?" I didn't get to answer. "I won't agree to it," he said, still smiling, and something under the smile had teeth. "You're not breaking up with me.

Not in this life." My skin went cold a beat before my brain caught up. I looked at Tessa. Tessa looked at me. We watched the same shock surface in each other's eyes. Okay.

New problem. Buy time. Just buy time until I could think. "Do you even know what you did wrong?" I asked him.

He shook his head, blank as a fresh notebook. "That's the problem." I let it sit. "If you can't figure out what you did wrong, don't talk to me." "Babe—" "Was there something else?" Cold, flat, bored. "Because if not, you're interrupting dinner.

Mine and my friend's." His eyes flicked to Tessa. Then he pulled out his phone. "Readd me.

Add me back, and I'll go." The fastest way to get rid of a problem is to hand it the smallest thing it's asking for. I added him. No hesitation. One tap. He left.

The table did not relax. I didn't trust the air not to have ears, so I went quiet and let my thumbs do the talking. Me: [Is he like you?] Me: [Grayson.

Is he your kind of thing.] Me: [Because he suddenly loves me. A lot. Overnight.] I was almost sure of the exact second it flipped. Babe, I miss you. That text.

He'd never called me babe before it, not once. Four hours of dating and I'd been the one reaching, the one texting first, the one waiting on read.

Then some switch threw, and the cold one ran warm, and now I was the one backing toward the door. Tessa typed carefully. Tessa: [It's possible.] Then a wall of text.

Tessa: [After you got together with Roman, Grayson kept coming back around. Said he regretted everything.

Said he'd been stupid, that he never realized how much he loved you, that he wanted you back. The day you married Roman, he showed up and made a scene.] Tessa: [Sadie.

He might be here for you.] My stomach pulled tight. I did not want a scumbag with a second wind trailing after me.

I hadn't even finished drafting a plan when the server set down two iced fruit teas we hadn't ordered. "From the gentleman at that table," she said. "He already covered your check." I looked up.

Straight into Grayson's eyes. "What do we do?" Tessa whispered. "He's not letting go. He's locked on." His stare stayed with me long after I looked away.

That slow, patient, tongueflick of a look. The kind a snake saves for something it has already decided to swallow. A thorn, set right between my shoulder blades.

That was the phrase that surfaced. And somewhere down in all that crawling unease, an idea lifted its head. Chapter 4 "So let him chase," I said.

Tessa's mouth fell open. "…What?" I met her blank look and shrugged. "Think about it. However hard he tries, I am never going to fall for him again. Honestly?

That sounds kind of fun." She caught up fast. "If Grayson really did come back, then right now he's dead certain you're crazy about him." Because right now was supposed to be the version of me that loved him most.

I smiled. "Except I don't. Not anymore." Turns out there's a very specific joy in deciding a man is completely disposable.

And when you know he cheated his way through the version of you that used to cry over him, that joy doubles. Once I added him back, the messages came in a flood. Apologies.

Sweet nothings. Little love songs recorded in the voice I used to lose my mind over, sent one after another, devotion on a timer.

Tessa got so scared I'd cave that she started reciting his crimes into my ear like a rosary. She didn't need to. I wasn't moved. If anything, I was entertained.

A man who'd spent an entire relationship inventing new ways to hurt me was now pouring his whole soul into loving me instead. Tell me that isn't funny. So it became a segment.

Appointment viewing. Every night, Tessa and I sat down and reviewed Grayson's Greatest Hits of the Day.

Tessa lived for it. "Back when he had you crying yourself sick, this is exactly what he had coming," she said. "Honestly? Thank god he came back.

How else would we get to torture him like this?" I nodded. She wasn't wrong. My side of things was going great. Tessa's side was not.

Thanks to Roman, we were both officially on the hotpot restaurant's payroll now, which meant every spare minute, Tessa had exactly one job. Get close to August.

The trouble was that getting close to August was like trying to hold water in a fist. Outside of Roman, he barely spoke to anyone past what the shift required.

He kept himself parked just out of reach of anything that might turn into a feeling. Say something and he'd answer. Ask for help and he'd help. Then the door would swing shut again.

Tessa kept walking into that door. Day after day, her smile getting thinner.

So I went to Roman. "Is there any way you could get the two of them a little closer?" His eyes went wide, the tips of his ears went pink, and I remembered. Right.

He takes everything I say and carries it somewhere I can't follow. "My friend kind of likes your friend," I explained. "But you know.

Your friend is a glacier." "You want to set them up?" Roman asked. I sighed. "I'm not even asking for them to end up together.

I'd settle for August not treating her like a rash." He studied me for a long moment. "I'll try." And then the impossible happened.

The next day, at lunch, August crossed the room on his own two feet and asked Tessa to come with him.

The invitation came out stiff and graceless, but Tessa lit up like the Fourth of July and went.

I watched them disappear down the hall, then grabbed my tray and made a beeline for Roman. "Okay. How.

How did you pull that off." "August hates being handled," Roman said. "He has to want it himself, or he digs in.

So." "So?" "So I told him I like you." He said it to the tabletop, not to me. "And I asked him to help me make a few chances to be near you." "…So?" My eyes kept widening. "You're always with your friend.

Joined at the hip." Still not looking up. "I told him the only time I ever get you to myself is when someone pulls her away." It clicked.

On the surface, August thought he was doing Roman a favor. Clearing me out of the way so Roman could make his move. Underneath, Roman and I were the ones setting August up.

Which meant the whole scheme to shove those two together came with a builtin side effect. It kept leaving Roman and me alone in a room. Genius.

Quiet, earsgonepink, absolutemenace genius. I was going to have a problem with this boy. Chapter 5 "Are you mad?" Roman asked, nervous.

He stumbled through it. "I just figured it was the only way to get August to make a move on his own. It's pretend, obviously.

But I know you have a boyfriend, and if he'd mind me saying it—" "I don't have a boyfriend," I said, cutting in.

Roman blinked at me, thrown. "I don't mind," I said. "This is good." Mostly I was thinking he was awfully good at building his own openings.

Thanks to Roman's roundabout little strategy, Tessa and August's hours together shot up. And I got to know Roman better by the day.

Early on, I could barely tell he had a thing for me. He never let anything ambiguous slip. He spoke carefully, moved carefully, kept exactly the right distance.

Except for the part where the sight of me turned him red, he was airtight. Now, though, a little of it started leaking through. Probably because he'd heard I was single.

Like the small flower he brought me at the start of a shift. When I wouldn't take it, he doubled down and claimed he'd just grabbed it off the side of the road. Right.

Because roadsides are famous for their champagne roses. Under my teasing, he went pink and explained, "August thinks I like you.

I have to act the part so he buys it." Sure you do, I thought. Keep telling yourself that. Being around Roman was a little like working a proof. I already knew the conclusion.

He liked me. But why he liked me, and what that would end up looking like, was all still unsolved. Hunting down the evidence was fun.

So was watching him strain to keep his real thoughts buried.

Sometimes I needled him on purpose, dropped something like keep this up and I'm going to start thinking you like me, just to watch him go red and scramble for some flimsy excuse.

It made even a shift pleasant. I figured it would all keep gliding along like that. Right up until the day Grayson came storming into the restaurant.

I had a mop in my hands, about to do the floors, when he shoved me straight into the empty supply closet.

He pulled the door shut behind us. "If somebody hadn't sent me a photo, I wouldn't have believed it. You're actually here." His voice dropped low. "Why? Why are you here?

You and him aren't even supposed to know each other yet…" If I'd genuinely been in the dark, none of that would have made sense to me. But I understood him fine.

He was saying Roman and I shouldn't have met yet. I kept my face blank. "I have no idea what you're talking about." Grayson stepped in and grabbed my shoulders. "Babe.

Do you know something?" His confusion cracked open. "You're supposed to like me. Right now you like me more than you ever have. Why is it different?

Why aren't you the same as before?" I was about to shove him off when the door opened behind him. August walked in. Returning cleaning supplies, probably.

He stopped short at the sight of us. His hand tightened on the mop. His eyes went sharp in an instant. "Do you need help?" he asked me.

I opened my mouth to say yes, then caught Grayson staring dead at August's face.

Something crossed his expression. "Is it because of him?" He turned back to me, like he was confirming an answer he'd already landed on. "You came back to rewrite how his story ends.

Didn't you." Chapter 6 "Then what? What did you say