She dropped her eyes. “Yup.”

He looked at Jared’s closed door and then back at Lara. “You’re not getting back together?”

“Nope. That’s not why I came over tonight.” She sighed and leaned against the wall, checking her manicure. “I actually came over to apologize to him. I haven’t been on my best behavior lately. This has been an absolutely terrible few years for me.” She gave him a wry smile. “Perhaps you’ve noticed.”

He was hesitant to agree, but he couldn’t lie to her. “Uh, there’s been a few indicators.”

She chuckled, but sobered quickly. “I’m not going to try to justify my behavior. But just know there’s been reasons for it. Some of them Jared-related and some of them not.”

He cleared his throat. “Everybody’s got their stuff.”

Her eyes flicked up to Quentin’s. “I came to apologize to Jared, but while I’m at it, I probably owe you one too.”

This was a curveball. Quentin rose up. “For what?”

She laughed and sauntered over to the couch, her heels clicking with each step. “Oh, please. We both know I’ve not exactly been a treat these last few years.”

She collapsed onto the couch, landing in a heap.

Quentin lowered himself to the other side of the couch, his eyes on her, trying to gauge her mood.

She rolled her head to catch his eye. “We used to be friends,” she said, almost accusatorially.

For the second time that night, the image of Lara in high school flashed across Quentin’s memory. It was strange because he hadn’t thought about that time in their lives in years. “Yeah. We had freshman algebra together,” he reminisced.

“You and I were friends before Jared and I had even really gotten to know one another. The first time I came over to your all’s house, it was to hang with you, not Jared.”

“That’s right.” How had he forgotten that?

“We used to hang out, the three of us.”

“Yeah.” Quentin scratched at his stubble.

“But then a few years ago, you just completely stopped wanting to be around us. What was up with that?” She sat up a little bit, smoothing her hair back.

Quentin chose his words carefully. “It was harder once me and Jared lived together. It seemed like you two were fighting a lot and there was nowhere for me to get a break from it.”

“I get that,” she said quietly. “Jared and I were going through a lot of stuff. Both together and separately. And I guess our fights did get a little more...bombastic. But it was more than that. Even when things were good with us, it was like you could barely stand to be around us.”

Quentin wasn’t sure what to say to that, so he just scratched at his stubble again.

“Have you ever wondered why that is?” Lara asked.

He shrugged.

“I have a theory,” she said.

He laughed. “Of course you do. All right, let’s hear it, then.”

“The higher the stakes got for me and Jared, the farther away you got.”