Read Online The Hating Game by Sally Thorne - Free Book Online Page B

for drinks at the sports bar on Federal Avenue. And: You’re never going to be my boss.”
    â€œWhat a total coincidence. I’m going there to watch the game tonight. At seven.”
    My clever fib was a tactical error. I study him but can’t tell where his face ends and the lie begins.
    â€œMaybe I’ll see you there,” he continues. He is diabolical.
    â€œSure, maybe,” I make my voice bored so he can’t tell I’m simultaneously fuming and panicking.
    â€œSo this dream—a man was in it, right?”
    â€œOh, yes indeed.” My eyes travel across Joshua without my permission. I think I can see the shape of his collarbone. “It was highly erotic.”
    â€œI should compose an email to Jeanette,” he says faintly aftera pause and a throat-clearing rasp. He does a poor imitation of typing on his keyboard without even looking at the screen.
    â€œDid I say erotic? I meant esoteric. I get those mixed up.”
    He narrows one eye. “Your dream was . . . mysterious?”
    Here goes nothing. It’s time to take my chances with the human lie detector.
    â€œIt was full of symbols and hidden meaning. I was lost in a garden, and there was a man there. Someone I spend a lot of time with, but this time he seemed like a stranger.”
    â€œContinue,” Joshua says. It’s so strange to talk to him when his face isn’t a mask of boredom.
    I cross my legs as elegantly as I can manage and his eyes flash under my desk, then back to my face.
    â€œI was wearing nothing but bedsheets,” I say in a confiding tone, then pause.
    â€œThis is strictly between us, right?”
    He nods, spellbound, and I mentally high-five myself for winning Word Tennis.
    I need to prolong this moment; it’s not often I gain the upper hand. I put on lipstick using the wall as a mirror. The color is called Flamethrower and it’s my trademark. Vicious, violent, poisonous red. Slit-wrists red. The color of the devil’s underpants, according to Dad. I have so many tubes that I always have a tube within a three-foot radius. I am black and white, but thanks to Flamethrower, I can be Technicolor. I live in terror of it being discontinued by the manufacturer, hence my hoarding.
    â€œSo I’m walking through this garden and the man is right behind me.” Today I am a pathological liar. This is what Joshua Templeman does to me.
    â€œHe’s right behind me. Like, up against me. Pressed up againstmy ass.” I stand and slap my own butt loud enough to make my point. The words ring so true, because mostly it is true. Joshua nods slowly, his throat constricting in a swallow as his eyes trail down my dress.
    â€œI seem to recognize his voice.” I pause for thirty seconds, blotting my lips, holding it up to admire the little red heart-shaped mark on the tissue before scrunching it and putting it in the wastebasket near my toes. I start reapplying.
    â€œDo you always have to do that twice?” Joshua is growing irritated by this stilted storytelling. He taps his fingertips impatiently on the desk.
    I wink. “Don’t want it kissing off, now do I?”
    â€œWho is this date with, exactly? What’s his name?”
    â€œA guy . You’re changing the subject, but that’s okay. Sorry for boring you.” I sit down and click the mouse until my computer whirs to life.
    â€œNo, no,” Joshua says faintly, like he is completely out of air. “I’m not bored.”
    â€œOkay, so I’m in the garden, and it’s . . . all reflective. Like it’s covered in mirrors.”
    He nods, elbow sliding forward on the desk, chin in hand. He is inching his chair back.
    â€œAnd I . . .” I pause, and glance at him. “Never mind.”
    â€œWhat?” He barks it so loud I bounce an inch out of my seat.
    â€œI say, Who are you? Why do you want me so badly? And when he tells me his name, I was so shocked . .