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OVULATED: Pregnancy Romance Collection

Page 17

by Snow Novels


  “D’you dress up like a clown and make balloon animals, Andre?” one of his jock friends yells.

  The class erupts into whistles and catcalls. Andre is glowering. “Watch it, Rob…” he snarls as he flips the bird at his Delta O brother.

  “Alright, alright” Prof Reed speaks loudly across the chatter that has broken out. “So we have established that Mr. Foeks… Andre... actually might have a heart behind his tough muscular exterior!”

  The students respond with more catcalls and laughter, but she waves her hands for calm, regaining control.

  “Now! That’s quite enough! Sarai, please continue. And stick to the facts of the experiment this time, please.”

  The class rustles into silence, and Andre sits, still scowling sulkily as I quickly describe our aims, the two groups, and the results we achieved. There is a polite smatter of applause as I return to my seat, and Prof Reed calls on the next group. Andre is pointedly ignoring me; but this is not a “you’re invisible and unimportant” type of ignoring, I can feel his anger pulsing towards me. I grin inwardly. I got to him.

  Chapter Seven

  Midterms start in earnest, and it seems like I’m either in the lab studying, or taking an exam. Sleeping and eating are unimportant as I work hard, trying to maintain my perfect GPA. I’m really worried about my upcoming Statistics paper. I normally love math, have even have been known to play with algebraic equations for the hell of it. Stats combine the human element of Psych with the logics of math, so I should love them. But I don’t. I get an 84 on the practice test, sending me into a minor freak-out. So at 2:00am the morning before the test, I’m still in the lab stressing over a problem that should be simple… but isn’t.

  The knock on the door scares me. I ignore it, but whoever it is knocks louder.

  “Sarai! You in there?” I recognize the deep, throaty voice and my heart lurches. I bend back over the paper, think: Go away!

  There’s a thud against the frosted glass of the door, and I see a large shape leaning up against it trying to look in. Andre calls again,“Sarai! I can see there’s lights on.”

  I sigh and open the door. He looks exhausted, and there are scratches down his cheek. A red stain is splashed across his white t-shirt. He catches me staring and answers my unspoken question. “Yeah, it’s wine. RaRa and I had a fight.”

  “So why’d you come here?” I’m blocking the doorway, preventing him from entering. He looks up and down the corridor.

  “Can I just come inside, please?” he pleads, running his hand through his black hair. He wears it shaved on the sides, the longer thick curls in the middle usually swept back and held in a tight tiny ponytail at the back of his head. Tonight they’re loose, falling across his eyes in tangled dark waves. He smiles and turns on the charm, “You know I’m harmless, Sarai. You know the real Andre, remember?”

  It works. I sigh, and against my better judgement stand aside to let him in. He wonders across to “our” table and flicks through the books I have lying open there.

  “I kinda miss our lab sessions, partner,” he murmurs, looking into my eyes as I move towards him. I slam the book shut, clipping his fingers.

  “Really?” I say sarcastically. “I don’t remember you participating much.”

  “Ouch!” He mock winces, sucking on his long muscled finger suggestively. “Still frenemies, I guess?” He’s smiling at me invitingly, and I’m wondering what the hell he wants.

  “You sure you don’t want to be just friends?” he says, smiling and patting the stool next to him.

  Shit, he is flirting with me! And worse, part of me wants fall for it. I have a weird urge to go sit on his lap and let him bounce me on his knee while I giggle and stroke his obviously wounded ego. But luckily that part of me is easily controlled.

  “What the hell did you come here for, Andre?” I say, a little too curtly. His whole demeanor changes. I might as well have said “Cut the crap,” because that’s the effect it has.

  “I had an argument with RaRa. I think she’s cheating on me,” he says flatly.

  “And…?” I ask, still failing to see what this has to do with me.

  “I need someone who knows her to tell me the truth. Jules, Jessie, Anya... they all tell me “of course not, Andre… You’re too fine to cheat on, Andre” But get real – no way they’d tell on their Queen Bee. Shit, they’re probably drawing straws in private for who gets me next!” He drops his head into his hands.

  “Coach has been on my case, see. I’d been missing too many practices to be with RaRa, and I fumbled a pass in the game with Mo State. He reamed me out and threated to pull my scholarship if I didn’t shape up. So I have to go to practice, and quit partying so much. RaRa is pissed. If she has practice and I wanna go somewhere, well bad luck me. But if I tell her I can’t go to some sorority whatever because I have to rest for a big game, or run sprints with the team, then I am in the shits for days.”

  He looks up at me as if waiting for my response, but my Stats book is sitting on the desk screaming at me that I need to study. I try to be nice. “I’m sorry, Andre, but I have a midterm tomorrow and I’m kinda having trouble with it. I’m not friends with RaRa. I’ve barely seen her in the last month to be honest. I’m the last person who’d know if she was cheating on you.”

  “So she hasn’t bought another guy back to the room?” His eyes are pleading.

  I shrug helplessly. “Dude, I’m barely ever there myself. She could have a guy there right now for all I know! Now I need to study.”

  But I’ve said the wrong thing. He’s pacing up and down. “I know… I went by the room to look for her – or for you - and no-one answered. I knew if you were there you’d answer the door. But I was freaking out thinking maybe she was in there but with someone else.”

  “Andre, it’s 2:00am, and I really don’t care who RaRa is with, or what she’s doing with them. Please,” I wave my hand across my papers. “I have this problem I just can’t deal with, and my midterm is tomorrow. So I can’t help you.”

  “Yeah, you can.” He picks up the papers and waves one at me. “This the problem you’re stuck on?”

  “Why?” I ask.

  “I have a deal for you – you go to your room and check RaRa’s alone, and I’ll help you solve this problem,” he says, and his face is serious.

  I crack up laughing. “Stats, Andre? You’re a Stats expert?”

  He just looks at me, his face deadpan. “Deal or no?” he says.

  I know there’s no way he can solve this problem I’ve been sweating over since 9:00pm, but at this point I’m willing to try anything. “Okay, okay, deal. But we work on my problem first.”

  “Sure,” he agrees, grabbing a pencil and bending over the paper. Curious, I pull up the second stool and join him, and soon our heads are close together as I explain my logic and we work the problem together. I can smell the musky smell of body spray, sweat, and stale red wine that is coming from his still damp shirt. The red wine is sour, and he wrinkles his nose.

  “That wine stinks,” he apologizes, and strips the t-shirt off, throwing it to the floor. If he expects me to be distracted by the rippling muscles he’s exposed he doesn’t show it, but bends once more over the paper, chewing the end of the pencil.

  “Nah, nah. Look here…” he says, pointing to the weird anomaly that’s been messing with my head. “zero correlation doesn’t mean there’s no relationship. Do a scatter plot…” He rapidly pencils dots onto my graph, “… and you can see there’s a non-linear arc – so zero correlation but a non-linear relationship.”I stare open mouthed as he grins and sits back, obviously extremely satisfied by my astonishment.

  “See, good-looking and with brains,” he crows, back to his usual confident self. I confess I am surprised.

  “So you’ll ace that test tomorrow, and I’m going to slam it against Iowa,” he says, “but first - your side of the deal.”

  I pack my bag and close up the lab, and we walk together across Campus to my dorm. As expected, th
e room is deserted. I don’t know where RaRa is sleeping – if she’s sleeping – but it’s not here. Andre lies back on her bed, and I assume he’s upset.

  “Just ‘coz she’s not here doesn’t mean she’s with another guy. I mean, you had a fight. She’s probably with one of her girlfriends, crying over it.”

  “Or bitching about what an a-hole I am!” He jokes, sitting straight up as if he’s doing crunches. I stare as the muscles on his bare stomach flex.

  He swings around to face me, putting his elbows on his knees. “You know, it would suck and all, but in a way be kinda happy if RaRa is seeing someone else.”

  “What? Why?” I’m surprised, and tell him so. “I thought you guys were set to get married and all. That’s what the entire school thinks, anyway.”

  He laughs. “The entire school is wrong. She’s a psycho nut-job sometimes, you know?”

  I nod. I do know. I’ve seen her melodramatic outbursts at him, and have been on the receiving end of some of them myself.

  “She’s really hot and all…” he grins sheepishly at me, “… but really? I’d probably be glad to have an excuse to dump her. I can’t just do it – you know – without a reason. She’d go kamikaze…”

  He sighs and lies back on RaRa’s bed. “Well, you got exams in the morning. Night…”

  I stare at him as his broad chest rises and falls, his breathing becoming slow and rhythmical. He’s sleeping here? I softly walk over to RaRa’s side of the room, and look down at him. He is sleeping. His breath is shallow, closed eyes showing long black lashes that lie against his coffee cream skin. A light growth of dark stubble accents his strong jaw line, and I have to stop myself from leaning over and gently tracing the dark trail of hair that leads down his muscular torso.

  Ever since he opened up to me, I’ve seen a side of Andre I didn’t know existed, and weirdly, knowing there is a “heart under that tough muscled exterior” makes me find the muscled exterior more attractive than I ever had before. I watch as he stirs slightly in his sleep, and I feel strangely protective of him.

  I lie in my own bed, intensely aware that he is just feet away… alone. I can’t stop thinking about him. I want to help him break out of the Frat boy stereotype he’s obviously trapped himself into. I am worried about him being unhappy. But then I remember who this is. I remind myself of the Andre that rules the Campus with his entourage, who doesn’t even glance up when I walk in on him making out with RaRa. That’s the real Andre. I’m stupid to think there could ever be anything between us. He came to the lab only to see if I knew any dirt on RaRa. He’s sleeping across the room only because it’s easier than walking back to his own dorm. He’s a star on Campus with a hot cheerleader in his bed and hundreds of friends. I’m the one sitting alone in the lab or huddled in the corner of my single bed each night. I’m the one whose life an outside observer would say needed changing, not Andre. Andre who figures in the fantasies of every single woman on Campus. Andre, who quietly slips into my dreams, as I wonder what it would be like if I were in that bed with him…

  Chapter Eight

  He’s gone when I wake up the next morning. RaRa is in the bathroom doing her hair. I don’t ask if she saw Andre. Don’t really want to hear her giggle as she describes the hot make-up sex I somehow managed to sleep through. I happily notice the dark circles under her eyes, how sallow her skin is, the dots of red-acne that are scattered across her shiny forehead. She sees me staring in the mirror and turns, hairbrush in hand.

  “Weirdo! Stop staring.” She looks at me as if I’m some bug that’s crawling across the blue-tiled floor. I smile back and walk into the shower, pulling the curtain closed behind me. A hand reaches out and grabs me. I scream, loudly! “Shhh!” Andre mimes, finger on his lips. I silence my surprise.

  “What’s wrong, freako?” RaRa yells.

  “Nothing… just a roach!” I reply hoarsely, staring at Andre. He’s dressed exactly as he was last night, his khakis creased from wearing them to sleep. He turns the water on, the noise masking his voice.

  “Sorry,” he whispers. “You should have chosen the next stall, I guess!” He grins cheekily.

  I move to leave the shower, but he grabs me. “I don’t want her,” he hisses into my ear and nods through the curtain towards RaRa, “to know I’m here.”

  I raise my eyes questioning, and he replies quietly, “I woke up, was in the bathroom when she came home. I would have come out, but then I heard voices.” He pauses and grimaces. “I think it was Rob…” He shrugs, “whatever… But of course then I couldn’t come out, right? So I’ve been stuck here!” He laughs quietly… “I guess I know what you feel like now.”

  I stare at the pain in his eyes, and I figure that I did sleep through my roommate having hot sex… but it didn’t involve Andre. Shit. He’s looking down at me, and his eyes are reflecting something different, something I haven’t seen before. I follow his gaze, and see the dark stain of my areola through my wet t-shirt. I am suddenly acutely aware of how the water has pressed the fabric against my body revealing every curve.

  “I never thought…” his finger reaches out and traces a circle, making my nipple rise towards him. Andre moves fractionally closer, his breathing slow and heavy as he leans down towards my upturned head. I catch my breath as his lips brush lightly over mine. “Sarai...” he breathes, as our bodies move towards each other involuntarily. His hardness presses against my thigh, and he pulls me towards him, his hands wrapped around my waist as if he wants to merge with me, become part of me. Every nerve in my body is on fire, tingling with anticipation. I want him to kiss me, want him to push me up against the shower wall and…

  The bathroom door slams. Andre jerks upright, startled, and I am released. I step away, flustered, embarrassed as he pulls the curtain aside and peers through cautiously.

  “She’s gone,” he sighs and turns back to me. But the moment has passed, I am cranking the water off and sliding backwards out of the stall.

  “Sarai…?” he reaches for me, but I slip out of his grasp.

  “Class… Exams… I gotta rush,” I explain as I grab my towel and wrap it around me, covering myself.

  He nods. “Later…?” he questions. But I ignore him and head back into the bedroom.

  “You talking to yourself in there?” RaRa surprises me, and I flush even redder than I already am.

  “Um, yeah. Yeah, talking to myself,” I mumble. She shakes her head. “You crazier than I thought girl!” she tells me as she shoves books into her bag. I’m stripping rapidly, dressing for class. I gotta get out of here when she does, can’t be here when Andre steps out of that bathroom. She’s slinging her designer bag over her slim, smooth, shoulder and opening the door.

  “Wait up!” I pant as I shove my feet in my trainers and dash to grab the door before it swings shut. RaRa stops, stares down at my undone laces trailing on the floor. “Whatever,” she says, turning and swaying her hips as she walks down the corridor, completely ignoring that I’m pattering behind her.

  Chapter Nine

  I try and forget Andre as I force myself to focus on my exams. But it’s tough. Even tougher when he walks into the room that night, arm around RaRa. He lets go awkwardly when he sees me, and drops his eyes from my startled, hurt stare. But it’s obvious they’re still together. My stomach has sunk into my shoes, and I wonder if he’s just ignoring that she slept with his friend last night. Or if they argued again, and are here to make-up… I decide I don’t care, but the red flaming across my face says I’m lying. I turn away, shoving books into my over-stuffed backpack as I feel Andre’s eyes staring at my back.

  RaRa is chattering inanely about some cheerleader gossip, oblivious to the tension that is making it hard for me to breath. For once I’m thankful for her self-centered narcissism. I head into the bathroom, closing the door and climb on the toilet, and crank the tiny window above it open, breathing the cold night air slowly. I hope they leave soon. But even more I hope Andre comes into the bathroom… As if.

&nb
sp; I wait, tensed, listening to the voices that come through the thin walls, straining for words. But all I hear is a low hum, that rises and falls as the words come faster and louder. Suddenly they are loud enough to hear:

  “Like you give a fuck about me!” RaRa screams. “At least Rob wants to party. You’re always having to go to practice… to study.” Her voice is condescending and ugly. “You expect me to believe you want to study?!”

  Andre answers, but his tone is low, and all I hear is the rumble of his words. But RaRa’s shrill voice responds clearly: “Why don’t you just date a boring nobody then – like Sarah-ee!”

  Andre’s voice is louder, strong and firm. “It’s Sar-I” he corrects her, and my heart leaps, “… and I just might.” The dorm room door slams.

  I sit on the toilet seat in shock. My heart pounding as his words echo in my ears: “I just might…” A slow smile creeps across my face. Did he mean it? Would he really ask me out?

  The exterior door slams again; RaRa has left. I go back into the now deserted bedroom, and pick-up the throw pillows, replace the hot pink lava lamp that RaRa has thrown across the room. The plastic is cracked, and warm liquid oozes onto my hand. I wipe it off, leaving a pink smear across the tissue, and smile. RaRa loves that lamp, she is going to be pissed.

  I sling my backpack over my shoulder and carefully close the door, heading for the lab. I know I don’t want to be here when RaRa gets back.

  Chapter Ten

  I know I’m hoping for the knock on the lab door, but I still jump when it comes. Andre is freshly showered, dressed in tight levis and the usual white t that doesn’t quite seem to fit over his wide shoulders. His thick curls are slicked back, and a diamond stud glints in his ear. He walks straight into the lab confidently, and sits on the stool, flicking through my papers.

 

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