by Mary Adkins
BY PARENTS’ WEEKEND she’d almost forgotten about her difficult conversation with the Birches. She hadn’t mentioned the weekend to them, worried that Audrey would want to come. Without that burden, she was excited to perform for her biggest crowd yet.
She was lacing up her sneakers for a run the morning of the show when Early rushed in, breathless, holding the campus paper.
“Did you hear?” Early asked, shoving it into Bea’s hands. “My mugger got charged with assault. He was the groper! Ugh.” She performed a gagging motion. “I was so fucking lucky.”
“Wait, what?” Bea said, reading the headline: Woods Groper Identified, Gets 60 Days.
Bea skimmed the article. He was eighteen and was therefore charged as an adult. He’d serve sixty days’ jail time for sexual battery and—because the student victim was young for a college student at only sixteen—he would be placed on the sex offender registry for at least ten years, up to thirty.
“Officer Andrews called me and left a message when I was in Comp Sci. He wanted to let me know that I may be needed to testify in the other victim’s case. But it turned out he didn’t need me. Officer Andrews was like, ‘Ben pled,’ as if I know who Ben is! I don’t know his name just because he stole my phone, dude.”
Ben, Bea thought. Hearing his name rattled her. A kid.
“The girl ID’d him in a lineup. Apparently he tried to take her wallet, and when she said no, he grabbed for her boobs. Also, did you see that she’s only sixteen? And at Carter? She must be a genius.”
“He’s a kid, too,” Bea said.
“Bea,” Early said, crossing her arms. “He’s eighteen. So, no, technically he isn’t. He’s a thief and a perv. You don’t have to defend him right now.”
Bea bent over to tie her second shoe and looked up at her roommate. “I’m just saying, witness identification is super unreliable, and now this kid is going to be on the sex offender registry until he’s thirty. Or longer.”
Early dropped her arms. They dangled as she studied Bea.
“Women don’t lie about assault, remember? The suggestion that they do is antifeminist propaganda.”
“I’m not saying I think she lied about being groped.”
Early rested against the end of her bed as her chin began to quiver. “Bea, I was scared that day. It was scary. Do you get that?”
“I do!” Bea said, not sure she did.
“I didn’t want to be afraid.” Early wiped her eyes. “But you can’t actually help your feelings. Even if you learn all the statistics in the world. They are what they are.”
STARTING FROM THE trailhead nearest to her dorm, Bea would reach the fourth mile of her six-mile run just after she passed under the Bridge. Here was the stretch she found most challenging: 1.5 miles of dirt road tracing the soccer and baseball fields before dipping back into the woods for the last stint.
Usually, she slowed to a walk or at least a light jog, for a portion of it, but today she decided she was going to run the whole damn thing.
She sprang forward to the rhythm of her pop mix, each stride launching her closer to the glistening blue phone that she used as her carrot. Once she reached that phone, she was almost done. The phone grew larger, then was next to her, then behind her, until the stretch’s elusive end point was finally in sight. She pumped her arms, hurling her body into a sprint for the homestretch, then veered left with the trail and back into the towering trees on all sides, where she scampered to a dusty halt and screamed. At once she was sailing through the air, skidding across the pebbly dirt.
From the ground, she yanked and twisted her head back to find, feet from where she landed—nothing. It wasn’t a person, just a piece of dark clothing hung on a tree branch, at human height. She pushed herself up to sitting. Both of her knees were bloody, and her palms were scratched up.
She stood and tenderly brushed off her legs and hands.
So things were frightening sometimes.
Did it mean she was going to quit? No. Because sometimes things were hard and you were alone on your journey, but that didn’t mean you whined about it and blamed someone else for it. Sometimes you could be scared, but you kept going forward anyway because you knew it was the right thing to do. Sometimes you had another mile to go.
Bea searched for and found the AirPod that had dropped from her ear in her fall. Then she turned her music back on, gritted her teeth, and started to run—even faster now, even harder.
18
Stayja
OCTOBER
Over fall break Stayja had sent Tyler her admissions essay, asking for his thoughts. When he hadn’t responded, she told herself it was because he was in St. John. He was probably partying on a beach somewhere. She wouldn’t want to read someone’s essay either if she was on vacation.
Then fall break ended, and the students all returned to campus, including him—he’d posted a photo on Instagram of prepackaged hard-boiled eggs from the airport with a caption about how gross airport food was. #butstarving.
She didn’t officially follow him. She wasn’t sure he’d want her to, so she stalked him in secret. Besides, she never posted anything herself anyway. She preferred being a quiet observer to an active user when it came to social media.
She’d sent him four texts total—one during break and three after—none of which he’d responded to. She knew what others would say it meant, but she refused to believe he was ghosting her suddenly after all they’d been through. It didn’t make sense. The other photos he’d posted from St. John over the break—yes, they were of him with other girls, blondes like her and one whose resemblance to her was startling, in fact. But just because he was pictured with his arms around them in an outdoor, beachfront bar didn’t mean he was hooking up with them. Right? Or even if he was, as much as it stung to think about that, it didn’t mean that he no longer wanted Stayja in his life.
Meanwhile, there was the fucking IRS bill. She’d called the IRS after a late-night Google session had informed her that they’ll let you pay off a bill on a payment plan, and she’d been on hold for over an hour when Frank came in and she’d had to hang up. She’d asked him for new W-4 paperwork, putting zero allowances this time. She had no idea how much that meant her paycheck would decrease going forward, just that it would. Of course, it would. She’d have six grand to pay off on a smaller paycheck.
Stayja rolled down the window and lit a cigarette, resisting the urge to check his Instagram for the third time in ten minutes.
Whenever her phone vibrated, her eyes flew up from whatever she was doing to find messages from, invariably, the same three people: bus broke down waiting for it to get fixed (her mother); coming (Nicole); how r u today beautiful? (LA).
Had Tyler stopped finding her teeth cute?
where r u, she texted Nicole. She was taking Nicole to get her license renewed. Chet had gotten her DUI purged from her record, which meant she could drive again—except that her license was about to expire. Now that Nicole was working at the bookstore, her hours fell earlier than Stayja’s—she started at eleven and ended at seven. Once she had the license, she’d ride with LA to work, then drive herself home in Stayja’s Corolla, and then return to pick up Stayja each evening at ten.
Finally Nicole appeared, jogging to the car, her bag bouncing on her shoulder.
“I hope this doesn’t take forever,” Stayja said.
“Oh, it will,” Nicole said, rolling down her window and lighting up. “It’s the DMV.”
Her phone buzzed in her lap. She jumped and scrambled for it.
“Jesus!” Nicole said. “Can you focus on driving, please? Hand it over.” Reluctantly, Stayja passed Nicole her phone.
“Dear Stayja,” Nicole began to read. “There comes a time when a person must be honest about their feelings. I need you to know how I feel about you. . . .”
Stayja felt a blossoming in her chest—could it be? It was too good to be true—until Nicole continued, “I know you told me six months ago that you and I are never going to happen, but I am una
ble to go on without you.”
Twice a year or so, LA professed his love for Stayja using vocabulary plucked straight out of Hallmark cards and TV westerns. Every time, he wrote the declaration from scratch, as if it weren’t composed of the same canned phrases and syrupy words. He always seemed shocked when Stayja didn’t reciprocate.
“This is from LA,” Stayja said, rolling her eyes and trying to hide her disappointment from her cousin.
“Do you want me to keep going? It’s about six more paragraphs long.”
“No, please don’t,” Stayja said.
“Why don’t you just tell him you’re dating someone now? Then maybe he’ll leave you alone.”
Stayja shrugged.
“How’s Chet?” she asked to change the subject.
“Leaving his wife!” Nicole said happily.
“Wow,” Stayja said. “Doesn’t he have a kid?”
“Yeah,” Nicole said, ashing her cigarette as they pulled to a stop at a light.
“Are you going to, like, marry him? How old’s the kid?”
“I don’t know,” Nicole said. “Maybe. He’d only have the kid some of the time. It’s not like I would be the mom. The kid is, like, four or seven.”
Stayja turned on her left blinker.
“You think you’re ready to be a stepmom when you don’t even know how old the kid is?” Stayja said and instantly regretted it. She had such a hard time holding her tongue when it came to Nicole. She’d resolve to be nicer, to be more accepting and less critical. She was aware of how often she came down hard on her cousin, and she knew it was annoying. But Nicole had an uncanny ability to push her buttons. It just happened.
Nicole turned to look out the window. Ignoring Stayja’s comment, she said, “I don’t need to take the car tonight. I’m staying on campus late. I’ll get a ride or take a cab or something.”
“Okay,” Stayja said. She could tell Nicole wanted her to ask why, but she didn’t want to give her cousin the satisfaction.
“I’m hanging out with Annie,” Nicole finally said. “We’re going to watch Sex and the City. She’d never even heard of it.”
TWO MONTHS OF weekly transfusions, which Donna had learned to give herself at home, had breathed new life into her, the fresh blood reviving some of her old, pre-COPD energy. While only a fraction of the former Donna had returned, Stayja had been pleased to arrive home multiple nights in October to find that her mother had tackled household projects that previously she would have found overwhelming: rearranging the living room furniture, resewing the buttons on their coats, and even sponge painting the kitchen walls.
When Stayja asked where she got the paint, Donna had said, “Adrienne took me to Lowe’s,” as if their running errands together again, too, was no big deal. This was how Stayja learned that her mother and Adrienne had made up.
“Want to watch Sex and the City?” Stayja said later that night, sitting with Donna in the living room. They used LA’s Netflix password.
“Sex and the what? Why would I want to watch that?” Donna said.
“It’s a rite of passage, Mom,” Stayja said. “And it’s from your generation. I don’t know how you missed it.”
“Ha!” Donna said, munching on a bowl of canned peaches. “I passed through before there was such a thing as rites of passage. You know what my rite of passage was? Frasier. Now, that was some good television.”
“We can watch Frasier,” Stayja said. “I can’t find Sex and the City on Netflix anyway.”
“Great!” Donna said, standing. “I’m gonna make us some popcorn.”
Stayja cued up the show, then opened Instagram. From the kitchen came the sound of popcorn popping and the cozy smell of butter.
He hadn’t posted any new photos.
She dropped her phone and sighed. Then she had an idea. She picked it back up and pulled up the photos he’d posted from fall break, the ones with blondes. They were tagged. She followed the tags to their accounts, searching for him in any pictures others had posted in public accounts. Finding nothing, she did the same thing with the girls pictured in earlier photos, then earlier, then earlier.
Donna returned, and they started the show, but Stayja kept digging.
Forty-five minutes in, at the start of their third episode, she found one. On the previous weekend, he was with a group of guys—two black, two white—all beaming at the camera.
Donna started cackling. “Did you see what Niles said to Daphne? You have to rewind. Rewind. You missed it.”
“I’m okay,” Stayja said.
“Rewind!” Donna commanded.
As Stayja sped the show backward, she wondered what Nicole and Annie were doing. If they were having fun. Of course, they were. Fun was Nicole’s best skill.
AND, THEN, ONE night near the end of October, he was back.
She was at work when she saw his text. Come over after work?
She waited as long as possible before replying, then went with a casual if you want, but I can’t stay late.
She spent her break hurrying to QuikMart to buy toothpaste and a toothbrush and a razor and shaving cream and then shaving her armpits and bikini line in the handicapped stall.
After work, she caught the door as another student was entering and followed him into the building. She found Tyler in his room, tanner, with sun-kissed hair, and ecstatic.
“Remember the party I told you about? The black and white party?”
It took her a moment. He sat at his desk, facing his monitor, typing.
“Come here.” He leaned back so she could see his laptop screen on which a headline read: Black and White Party Is Black and White Triumph, Just What Carter Needs. Beneath it was a photo of a mass of students outside, all dressed, appropriately in black and white.
“Congratulations,” she said. “That’s great.”
She remained standing as he began telling her about how it was the most highly attended event of the semester so far, excluding football games, and how he had gotten to meet his idol, some rapper. He’d danced on the stage. People came from all over, not just Carter students.
Then why hadn’t he invited her?
“Hey, did you get my essay?” she said. Her application was due in just under two weeks.
He looked at her blankly.
“Remember that program you thought I should apply for? At Gibson? I texted you my essay. I thought maybe you would read it for me.”
“No prob,” he said. “I remember now. Sure thing.”
“You could read it right now,” she said. “It’s just on my phone.”
He hesitated, then turned back to his computer.
“Cool, while I read that, will you read this?” He clicked, and a document flew open on the screen. At the top of it was the photo she’d found—the one of him with the guys. “It’s an op-ed I’m going to send in to the paper. It’d be good to get your take on it.”
“Sure,” she said, taking a seat at his desk as he took her phone and plopped down on his couch. As she started to read, she became aware that he was watching her. She turned.
“What?” she asked.
“I’m just nervous what you’ll think.”
She resumed reading. The article was about the party he’d thrown but also other things. How it was so important to promote diversity, given who was president. How divided the country was. He used the word “inclusion” a lot and “walking the talk.”
“What would you say the theme is?” he asked.
“Um, it feels like it’s sort of about a lot of things,” she said.
“It’s not about a lot of things. It’s about unity.”
“You asked my opinion. I’m just telling you.”
“Did you read the whole thing?”
“Yes, and I don’t know what President Trump has to do with the party you just threw.” Her annoyance with him for ghosting her and not even apologizing for it was rearing its head.
He stared at her.
“Who did you vote for in the last election?�
�� he asked, a dare in his voice.
“I didn’t,” she said. “I had to work.”
“I mean, you could have voted absentee. Who would you have voted for?” he asked.
“Trump, probably,” she said.
“Oh, my God,” he said.
“What? I’m a Republican,” she said, openly frustrated. “Don’t be patronizing.”
“You’re a Republican?!” he exclaimed. “That doesn’t make any sense!”
She shrugged and looked back at the computer screen, wishing she’d just fucking lied and told him the essay was fine.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I should have worded that differently.” He paused, then in a controlled, careful tone, he said, as if he were an interviewer on public radio, “Why do you identify as Republican?”
“Because the government sucks. I’m sick of paying taxes and not getting shit for it.”
Tyler was shaking his head. “You have the wrong guy. The government isn’t your enemy. Conservative ideology does nothing for people like you.”
Stayja glared at him, her pulse quickening. “That’s really fucking condescending,” she said.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I just mean, if you’re skeptical about public benefits because you think they don’t help you enough, well, conservative policies aren’t going to help you either.”
She let out a groan. She’d already had a long day—and she’d spent the end of her shift arguing with a student over whether she could make him an espresso even though she’d already cleaned the machine and shut down the register.
“Hey,” he said, his tone softer. “Come here.”
She didn’t move.
“You look hot in that shirt,” he said. “Do you maybe want to take it off?” He was grinning.
“I’m tired,” she said. “I’m going to head home.”
“Fine,” he said. “I’ll take mine off.” He pulled his T-shirt over his head and tossed it into the mini basketball hoop hanging on the back of his door. Then he picked up her phone, which she’d set on the coffee table, and started taking selfies while flexing and puckering his lips.
Stayja found herself smiling. He walked over to the desk. He picked her up, just scooped her up like a baby—he was stronger than he looked. He took her to the bed and dropped her on it.