I come right after, smothering my cries in the skin of her throat, feeling the orgasm pulse through every inch of my body. I want to stay right here forever, sweaty and messy and exhausted, but something propels me to sit up, dispose of the condom, and stay like that, elbows braced on my knees, staring at the door.
“What are you doing?” Andi mumbles. “Lie down.”
I glance over my shoulder. She’s on her back, one arm slung up over her eyes. Her cheeks are pink and her lips are swollen and she’s not asking me for anything. How many times have I been in this situation, enduring awkward post-sex conversation before making my escape? But before I can think of anything to say, Andi lets out a soft snore.
I look at the empty mattress beside her, then look at the door again. I look at my pants and my shoes and the pillow and Andi, deceptively harmless as she dreams. I fell so hard for her that summer. I would have given up everything and stayed in Avilla if she’d asked me to. I feel the tendrils of those feelings threatening to sneak up on me now, slipping their evil fingers around my heart and starting to squeeze.
I think about the foolish hopes I’d harbored, the things I hadn’t had the courage to say, the words I’d been so pathetically grateful I’d kept to myself when she broke my heart. I can’t do that again.
I reach for my pants.
chapter nine
She doesn’t call.
I don’t call her.
We don’t cross paths.
After the whole “you’ve got a crush” conversation, I bail on training with Crosbie, Dane and Choo and keep to myself all weekend. It’s amazing how many reading assignments you can complete when you turn off your phone, lock the door, and, well, read. I polish up my Citizen Kane assignment and email it to Ms. Shaw on Tuesday night, the first time I’ve ever submitted an assignment a full twelve hours early. The first time I ever started one that early, possibly. Maybe because this is the only thing I think I’m starting to understand in my life. You just watch the words and actions, all carefully controlled and presented, and you think about what’s being said and what’s intended and what it all means in the end. And none of it really affects you, because it’s on the screen and you’re in real life and you can pause it and rewind it and turn it off altogether if you don’t like it.
I contemplate not going to class on Wednesday, but it’s one I actually want to attend. Plus it’s a huge auditorium with two entrances, so I figure I can wait until a minute before class starts, enter through the opposite side and sit in the back row, ready to bolt the minute the lights come up. In third grade I swore I would never run from Andrea Walsh again, but she always came up with some new terror to send me sprinting away. Now she likely has no idea what she did—not even I can articulate it—but I’m still running.
I put on my Burnham jacket, grab my bag and head out the front door. The autumn morning is chilly but bright and the frozen grass and leaves crunch underfoot.
“Yo.”
I whirl around on the stoop to find Bertrand standing on the sidewalk. After all this time, I don’t know why I don’t simply expect to find him here. I scowl. “What the hell are you doing here? It’s getting weird. Oh, no, wait. It is weird. It’s been weird.”
“I told you. You’re on my route.”
“Change your route!”
“Come on,” he says, ignoring me. “I’ll walk you to class. It’d be even weirder if I just followed you.”
I sigh but fall in step beside him as we start the trek toward campus.
“How’re things?” he asks. “You liking the class?”
“Yeah. It’s not bad.”
“Any assignments yet?”
“Just one. About Citizen Kane.”
“Good movie.”
“I guess.”
“What was the assignment?”
I tell him what I learned about deep focus. I still think the movie’s boring, but once you see how much thought went into every scene, it gets a bit more interesting.
“You came up with all that?” Bertrand asks as we reach the Klein Building.
“Yeah.”
“You didn’t plagiarize it?”
“No. What are you doing?”
He’s coming inside, smoothing the sides of his ponytail and looking around like he’s casing the place.
“My office is that way,” he says, nodding toward the far end of the crowded hall. “This is a short cut.”
I stop and stare at him. “You want to see Ms. Shaw.”
“I—”
“You have a crush on her!”
“I’m a little old for that, McVey.”
“You’re super old,” I correct him. “But you’re still here to see her.”
“Go to class.”
“Just ask her out. Tell her you think she’s pretty and ask if she wants to get lunch after the lecture. It’s three hours; she’ll probably be starving.”
“No one asked for your advice.” He stops in front of the first set of double doors and gestures for me to enter.
“I sit on the other side now,” I tell him.
“What? Why?”
“Because I—”
“Okay, fine.” He practically shoves me down the hall and when I regain my footing I see why: Ms. Shaw stands next to the other doors, chatting with a couple of students.
“Ask her,” I say out of the corner of my mouth.
“Mind your own business,” he says out the corner of his. “And if you do anything to embarrass me, I’ll yank you out of this class and enroll you in Women’s Studies.”
“I happen to love women.”
We near Ms. Shaw. She’s wearing a dark purple wrap dress and flats, her thick glasses giving her a retro flair. “You know,” I say loudly. “I can’t remember the actress’s name either, Bertrand. Why don’t we ask Ms. Shaw?”
He looks ready to murder me.
Ms. Shaw turns as she and everyone in the vicinity hears.
“Sorry to interrupt,” I say, not sorry at all. “Bertrand—who works here at the school as a course advisor—was just telling me how much he loves Citizen Kane.”
She looks intrigued. “Oh, really?”
“Absolutely. And it’s just killing us that we can’t remember the name of the actress who played Susan. Wasn’t she wonderful?”
Ms. Shaw smiles at Bertrand. “It’s understandable you’d have trouble remembering as she actually went by a couple of names...”
I give Bertrand a wink—he gives me a fulminous glare—and ease around the door to peer into the auditorium. There are still five minutes before class, but because Bertrand’s likely to kill me if I go back outside, I can’t risk stalling in the hallway until the lights go down.
I check the seats Andi and I occupied the past two weeks, but I don’t see her as I slide into a chair in the back row and pull out my book.
“Kellan McVey!” comes an extraordinarily loud whisper. Everyone turns to see Marcela picking her way over people’s knees as she clambers down the row toward me. I look around, paranoid, and there, halfway down this side of the auditorium, is a messy blond bun atop a familiar face. Andi. There are a lot of awful components to this scenario, but the worst one is realizing that the Andi I know—the Andi I knew—would have hurled something at me, or at least stormed up here and cursed me out. This Andi has no reaction whatsoever, she just calmly turns around to face the front.
“What are you doing all the way over here?” Marcela grunts, dropping into the seat beside me. “And where’s your childhood—”
She follows my gaze to where Andi sits, then immediately whirls to glare at me. “What did you do?” she demands.
“Wha—I—Nothing!”
“You definitely did something. Why else would she change seats?”
“I don’t know. Better sightlines?”
“You’re an asshole and you did something, but I don’t have time to dwell on that right now. I need you to invite me to the Alpha Sigma Phi Halloween party.”
“You got
banned from that.”
“It wasn’t a ban, per se—”
“I’m pretty sure I heard Dane say, ‘You are banned from here, Marcela Lopes.’”
“That was just a formality. I need an invite.”
“They haven’t even been sent out yet. And if I invite you, will you leave me alone forever?”
“No. Nate’s going to be there, so I’ll need you to be my date, too.”
“I will not be your—Wait. How is Nate getting in?”
Her expression clouds. “He said he’s going with one of the volleyball players.”
I think about Andi. “How does Nate get all these hot girls?”
“Beats the fuck out of me. Anyway, invitation?”
A tittering laugh interrupts the conversation and we turn to see Ms. Shaw leaving Bertrand as she comes inside to start the class. Bertrand studies his feet for a second, then walks away, a tiny smile on his face.
“If you want Nate so bad, you should just ask him out,” I tell Marcela, deciding I’m on a roll with the love advice this morning.
“I don’t want him,” she protests. “And besides—I did ask him.”
“What? When?”
“Last semester.” She crosses her arms and legs and huffs, and with her pigtails and knee socks, she does a pretty solid moping schoolgirl impression. “We had this big unspoken thing going on, and finally I couldn’t take it anymore. I mean, it was like four months of foreplay. Nora was spending the night at Crosbie’s so I prepared a whole seduction for Nate, and when he showed up at the apartment he just...cringed.”
“Cringed?”
“Yeah. Like, big time. It was mortifying. And if you tell anyone this, I’ll deny it. And kill you.”
“Get in line. Plus who would believe a nerd like that would reject you?”
She studies her fingernails. “Well, he did. Then school wrapped up and I went away for the summer and we’ve hardly spoken since.”
“Listen,” I say, as Ms. Shaw fiddles with the mic. “Speaking from personal experience, the guy dodged a bullet because you’re a fucking psycho. But speaking as someone who reluctantly speaks to you...” I risk a glance at Andi. “Maybe you’re more than he’s ready for.”
“If you’re talking about commitment or whatever, Nate’s been ready for marriage since he was like, five. He already knows what tux he’s wearing.”
“Dear God. What do you see in this guy?”
“Good morning, everyone,” Ms. Shaw says. If I’m not mistaken, she looks a littler perkier than normal. I didn’t really think I-wear-shorts-year-round-and-stalk-students-Bertrand stood a chance with her, but I suppose crazier things have happened.
I shush Marcela as Ms. Shaw talks about the morning’s movie, another black and white film. I sigh when she says it’s a silent film, then perk up when she says it’s called Battleship Potemkin. Battleships are cool in any color. There’s another assignment due next week, similar to the last.
“Invite me to the party and I’ll help you with your homework,” Marcela whispers.
“I’ll invite you to the party if you leave,” I lie.
She socks me in the shoulder. “Deal.”
Battleship Potemkin turns out to be pretty awesome. Before it begins Ms. Shaw tells us about how revolutionary it was and explains why, so I pay attention to these details while I’m watching and ignore the fact that there’s no dialogue.
Another person who needs no words is Andi. It seems we’re on the very same page today, because the second the lights come on she’s out of her seat and out the doors before I’ve even put my book in my bag. She doesn’t spare me a look or pause to flip me off.
I sigh and rub my temples. I feel a major headache coming on, and it might have more to do with guilt than muscle tension. I walk outside, wincing in the bright sunlight, and sigh when I hear my name. I turn in a circle when I hear it again, eventually spotting Dane, Choo and Crosbie at the edge of the walkway.
“What are you guys doing here?”
“Waiting for you,” Crosbie answers. “Marcela told Nora you were here, and we wanted to work out, so we came over.”
I’m torn between wanting to blow them off and the growing ache that threatens to split my head in two. A dozen wind sprints would help enormously. More of their teasing would not. Not when the guilt I’ve been trying to keep at bay has bashed its way through my defenses and is now whaling away at the inside of my skull.
“I don’t have my—”
“I brought you a change of clothes,” Dane says, hoisting up his bag as we start walking toward the track. “And you’re already wearing your sneakers.”
“Is the track—”
“Free,” Choo answers. “I checked.”
“Well then. Super.”
Crosbie shoots me a weird look and falls back as Choo and Dane walk on, Dane explaining to Choo why lining the perimeter of the frat house with tiki torches for the Halloween party would be considered a fire hazard.
“What’s going on?” Crosbie asks.
“Nothing. Why?”
“Marcela said something happened.”
“I hate Marcela.”
“Has she been trying to get you to invite her to the Halloween party?”
“Yeah.”
“Be careful. I saw her looking at couples costumes on her phone.”
“Duly noted.”
“Seriously,” he says, nudging my arm. “What’s going on?”
I hesitate, then chicken out. “Nothing, dude. Just a headache.”
“And that’s it?”
“That’s it.”
We reach the gym and go inside. The familiar smells of sweat and chlorine instantly begin to ease the tension in my neck and shoulders and I know I’ve made the right decision coming here. I can hear the showers running at the back of the room, but it’s otherwise empty as we claim a bench and toss our stuff into lockers. I strip off my clothes and reach for the T-shirt Dane’s extending, glaring at Choo when he snatches it away.
“What the hell?”
“What’s wrong with you, bro?”
I point. “You stole my shirt.”
“Like, ten girls said hi to you on the way here, and you didn’t notice a single one.”
“I—”
“And like, eight of them were hot,” he adds accusingly.
“I have a headache,” I snap. “I wasn’t paying attention.” I snag the T-shirt from his hand and yank it on.
“We know you didn’t hook up with Jackie after Open Mic,” Dane pipes up. “She texted her friend when we were at the bar and said she was alone.”
“So? I—”
“Had a headache?” Crosbie looks so genuinely concerned I almost tell him. Then the showers shut off and I shut up.
“It’s nothing. Let’s go.”
The track is deserted, and the contrast of the red clay, green grass and waves of silver bleachers helps ease the tension just a little bit more. We jog a slow lap to get the blood flowing, then sit on the grass to stretch. I’ve almost convinced myself my headache worries are a thing of the past when I notice the guys exchanging what are supposed to be covert looks.
“What?” I demand. “What awful thing are you planning?”
Crosbie clears his throat. “We need to talk about your feelings.”
“What?”
It’s Choo’s turn. “I know you think we’re just a bunch of really handsome, funny, smart jocks, but we’re also very, very insightful.”
“Wrong on all counts.”
“And now that we know Walsh is your first love...” Dane begins.
“I don’t love her!”
“...and we know Crick came to the bar alone after Open Mic because Walsh said she had a headache...”
I close my eyes.
“And you’ve been avoiding us ever since...”
“And Marcela said Walsh was avoiding you...”
“That means you’re either secretly gay or pining over your first love. Both of which are fine.”
“Do you guys ever talk about anyone who’s not me?”
They look at each other doubtfully. “No. Not really.”
I sigh. “I’m not gay and I don’t love Andi.”
“Uh-huh,” they prompt. “But?”
“There is no ‘but!’ Growing up she was my best friend and my worst enemy, all in one. I never really hooked up with a lot of girls in high school and I didn’t want to come to Burnham a virgin, so the summer before I left, she...helped me out. A bunch of times.”
“Sexually?” Dane confirms.
“Yes. Obviously.”
“And now?” he presses.
“Now what?”
“Is she ‘helping you’ again?”
“No. I—She—”
Their expressions can only be described as pitying. They feel bad for me. I bailed on Andi without explanation and I’m the one they feel sorry for.
“We hooked up after Open Mic Night,” I blurt out. “It wasn’t planned, it just happened.”
They don’t look terribly surprised by the news.
“Was it bad?”
“No, it was fucking awesome. It was... I don’t know how to describe it. It’s like how people must feel when they look at the Mona Lisa and suddenly understand why it’s so famous. It’s like a secret only some people get let in on. I don’t... I don’t know.”
Dane and Choo look confused, but Crosbie nods wisely. “I do,” he says. “It’s having sex with somebody you care about. When it’s not just about getting off and going home. It’s more.”
I scrub my hands over my face as though I can wipe away the shame. “I left,” I mumble through my fingers.
Dane reaches over and pulls down my hands. “You what?”
“I left her,” I repeat, studying my sneakers. “After. When she was sleeping. I just left.”
“You left her a note?” Choo asks hopefully.
“You left to get flowers and came right back?” Dane tries. Their naïve optimism makes me feel even worse. Throws into even starker relief the extent of my selfishness.
Undeclared (Burnham College #2) Page 13