by Elle Kennedy
“No,” I finally say.
“Bro.” He grabs my arm and I shake him loose with a look that says he won’t get to do that again. “You gotta help me out. I’m not kidding. They will come after me.”
“Then run, dude. Hop a bus to Idaho or North Dakota and just fucking hide. I don’t give a shit anymore.”
“You’re serious? You’d leave your best friend hanging—”
“We’re not best friends. And maybe we never were.” I shake my head a few times. “This is your problem to figure out and I don’t want any part of it.”
“I’m sorry, man.” His demeanor shifts. His eyes harden. And now I remember why he used to scare me. “I can’t let you walk away.”
“You don’t want to try me.” I warn, squaring up to him.
There was a time I was just a skinny runt on a skateboard following him around the neighborhood. Not anymore. These days, I could bench this punk and break him over my knee. Better he remembers that before he gets any really stupid ideas.
“Right now, I’m letting you walk away. Next time I see you, things might be different.”
“Nah, brother.” He bares his teeth in a cheerless smile. “See, you forget I still own your ass. Ten grand. Today.”
“You’re out of your mind. I don’t have that kind of money. Even if I did, I wouldn’t give it to you.”
“You can get it,” he says, still determined. “Go and ask stepdaddy for the money.”
“Fuck off.”
Kai sneers at me. “I don’t think that’s how you want to play this, Con. If you don’t get me that money, Daddy Max finds out you’re the one who gave out the alarm code to the mansion and let someone break in and trash the place.” He cocks a brow. “Maybe I even tell him you’re the one who took the missing cash from his office, how’s that sound?”
“You’re a piece of shit, Kai, you know that?”
“Like I said, brother. We can make this easy—just tell Max you need the money for some dumb bullshit. Make something up. You get me the cash and we’re all good. I peace out and everyone’s happy.”
The thing you don’t know as a kid, when your best friends are your whole world and every day is the first and last day of your life, when everything feels urgent and dangerous, every thought and emotion an eruption of planet-colliding force, is that the worst mistake you’ve ever made will outlive all of that. A brief, blinding moment of rage spirals into a lifetime of guilt and regret.
What I hate most about Kai is all the ways I’m just like him. The only difference is that he can admit it.
Dragging a shaky hand through my hair, I keep my gaze fixed on the horizon and force the words out of my tight, burning throat.
“I’ll get you the money.”
27
Taylor
I’ve become one of those girls.
Obsessively checking my phone every five seconds and jumping at the phantom vibration.
Turning the phone off and on again because maybe it’s being buggy and that’s why I haven’t gotten a response to my last three text messages.
Texting myself to make sure they’re going through and then making Sasha text me because I don’t fucking know how phones work.
Hating myself the deeper I fall into this spiral of desperation and self-loathing. Dangling out on this branch above a pit of insecurities.
Yup, one of those girls. Every minute that goes by is another minute I can concoct a new scenario where he’s cheating on me, given up on me, laughing at me. I hate myself. Or rather, I hate what I’ve become because I let myself believe a boy could make me happy.
“Give me your phone.” Sasha, who’s sitting beside me on her bedroom floor with our textbooks spread between us, holds out her hand and makes gimme fingers at me. She’s got I was fed up two hours ago written in her cold, dark eyes.
“No.”
“Now, Taylor.” Oh yes, she’s well past sick of my shit and quickly nearing done with your dumb ass.
“I’ll put it away, okay?” Quickly, I stuff the phone in my back pocket and grab my notebook.
“You put it away six times already. But, weirdly, it won’t seem to stay put away.” She lifts a brow. “Take it out one more time and I’m confiscating, you hear me?”
“I hear you.” And for the next ten minutes, I make a real effort at pretending to study.
I came to the Kappa house this afternoon when I’d run out of other means to distract myself. Conor never texted me when he got back to Hastings from the beach yesterday. We’d made tentative plans to meet up with friends at Malone’s for Saturday night drinks, but afternoon turned into night turned into morning and I still hadn’t heard from him.
I tried texting him again today. Twice. He replied only to say “sorry, something came up,” then ghosted me again when I asked what happened.
Maybe under different circumstances I wouldn’t be getting so worked up, but he’d left in a weird mood on Wednesday night, too. At the time I thought he was upset about that phone call from Kai. But then another notion crawled into my head: that night was the closest we’d come to having sex, and I’d turned him down. Every time we’ve hooked up after Buffalo, I’ve let us push the boundary a little further, but he’s never tried to initiate full-on intercourse.
Until Wednesday night.
He’d been reassuring at the time. He’d said all the right things to put me at ease. But looking back, I wonder if that was only to get me to finish him off. Because once he had that, he bounced.
I let out a shaky breath.
“What?” Sasha pushes her notebook aside and questions me with concerned eyes. “Whatever’s spinning around in your head, just spit it out, girl.”
“Maybe this is…” My teeth dig into my lower lip. “Maybe this is what everyone saw coming?”
She hesitates to answer.
“He told me the night we met he didn’t do girlfriends. That he hadn’t dated anyone for more than a few weeks.” I ignore the sharp clench of my heart. “We’re pretty much pushing that timeframe.”
Her eyes soften. “Is that what you really think?”
“I think he’s gotten tired of blowjobs and at this point would dump me for eight seconds of missionary sex through a sheet.”
Sasha cringes. “Thanks for that visual.”
I swallow my bitterness. “He wouldn’t be the first guy to dump a girl because she doesn’t put out.”
“Never heard of a guy dumping a girl for too many BJs,” she points out.
Which brings it back to the question of monogamy. “Maybe it isn’t the BJs, but who’s giving them…”
“Taylor. I think you’ll just drive yourself crazy trying to imagine what’s going on in his head,” she says.
“Well, I wouldn’t have to imagine if I could get him to return my texts.”
“Listen.” Sasha tries to mask her tone of frustration with something comforting, but it just comes out sounding impatient. She’s trying, but consoling isn’t her thing. “I don’t know him, so I can’t be your dick whisperer, but I will say this: if you really thought he was that guy, you wouldn’t have been wasting your time on him. So that tells me maybe something else is going on.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know, maybe he’s having his guy period. My point is, whatever his deal is, it isn’t you. That isn’t the first place your head should go.”
“No?”
“No, babe. Seems to me like he’s been crazy for you since the moment you two started fake dating. So either he’s dealing with some shit or he’s just an asshole. And if it’s the latter case, you’ll be lucky to be rid of him. So stop stressing. You two will talk at some point and then you can decide. Until then, let it be. You’ve got to start backing yourself, Taylor. No one else can do that for you.”
On the one hand, she’s right. Assuming I’ve done something wrong, that I’m not good enough, is the first place my head always goes. That’s just what happens after you’re bullied and fat-shamed in your formati
ve years.
On the other hand, I don’t know how to be as chill as Sasha. I don’t know how to not let shit get under my skin. How to just turn off the part of my brain that is clawing at the walls.
She has no idea how much I started to care about him, even though I warned myself not to. She doesn’t know all the ways he’d steeped through the layers of my life. You can’t un-dye fabric, dammit. Breakups are destructive and it’s impossible to completely bleach someone out of your existence. There’s always that tint they leave behind, a stain that never leaves you.
I had really hoped I could avoid Conor becoming one of those stains.
“With that said,” she announces, getting up to grab her car keys from her nightstand. “If he does you dirty and you want to set his car on fire or sabotage his skates so he snaps an ankle, I’m here for you, girl.”
A smile touches my lips. I love her. Sasha’s the person I’d want standing beside me with a shovel in the pouring rain while we bury the body.
“Come on, you dumb bitch.” She sticks out her tongue. “We can ride by his house one time on the way to the bar.”
Malone’s is slammed for a Sunday night. There’s a dart tournament going on, and a few minutes ago the entire Sigma Phi house crashed through the doors after clearly pre-partying somewhere else. So far, Sasha’s had to fend off three droopy-eyed drunks, shooting down their pathetic pickup lines like Wonder Woman deflecting bullets with her golden bracelets.
“Remind me why we’re here,” I shout over the group of loud guys chanting “chug, chug, chug!” in a nearby booth.
Sasha pushes another Malibu and pineapple at me and clinks our glasses. “You are in need of dick saturation.”
“I don’t think that’s my problem.” Glumly, I suck down almost my entire cocktail in one long sip, then lean against the bar and people-watch.
“Yeah, well, you’re wrong.” She tosses back her vodka and Red Bull. “Thorough scientific study has proven that when a man has your head messed up, only significant quantities of both dick and alcohol can cure your malfunction.”
“I’m gonna need to see some peer reviews on this data.”
Sasha flips me off.
“I’m just in time.” A tall guy in a Briar Basketball T-shirt appears in front of us. He’s sporting a bright toothpaste commercial smile and print model dimples.
Sasha must not be totally disgusted by him, because she takes the bait. “For what?”
“You two need another drink.” He nods at our nearly empty glasses and waves at the bartender. “Whatever they want, and a rum and Coke, please. Thank you.”
I don’t miss the pensive narrowing of Sasha’s eyes at his please and thank you. See, what’s important to understand about Sasha Lennox is that her best friend growing up was her great-grandmother on her father’s side, who at various stages in her life was a WWII Army mail carrier, a prison GED teacher, and briefly a Catholic nun. Which is to say, a boy with manners gets Sasha halfway to game time by just being polite.
“I’m Eric,” he tells us, flashing those well-maintained teeth at Sasha.
“Sasha,” she says coyly. “This is Taylor. She’d love to meet any tall, dark, and handsome friends you have lying around.”
I give her a cut-it-out glare, which she ignores. She’s too busy drowning in the depths of Eric’s…manners. He gives the all-clear to his buddies at a table across the room, and the two guys wind their way toward us with their beers. Their names are Joel and Danny, and the five of us get cozy and acquainted, Sasha and I craning our necks at the skyscrapers Briar’s recruiting as college basketball players these days.
When Danny shuffles a bit closer to me, Sasha digs her fingernails into my arm as a means of telling me she’s not letting me flee. I nudge her a few feet away so we can talk privately.
“I have a boyfriend,” I remind her. To which Sasha pops a sarcastic eyebrow. “I think.”
“You don’t have to jump on their dicks,” she replies. “Just smile and nod and drink up. A little harmless flirting won’t kill anyone.”
“If I saw Conor flirting with another girl—”
“But you’re not seeing him because he won’t return your texts. So pretend you’re alive for a few hours and enjoy yourself,” she says, pushing a shot at me after Danny insists on ordering us all tequila.
“To basketball,” Sasha raises her shot glass.
“To Kappa Chi,” Eric answers.
“To hockey,” I mutter under my breath.
After we down our shots, Sasha pulls out her phone and holds it up to grab a group selfie of the five of us.
“There,” she chirps.
“There what?”
She crops the image and adds a filter before posting the pic with several choice hashtags.
#girlsnight #kappachi #briaru #fuckpucks #bigballs
“Let Conor ignore this,” she says with a grin.
The thing is, I don’t want revenge. I don’t want to make him jealous or remind him what he’s missing. I just want to understand what changed.
Later, when I’m back at my apartment, getting into bed and trying to talk myself out of texting Conor again, I realize I missed a text from him earlier.
HIM: Sorry. Talk tomorrow. Goodnight.
Somehow, this is worse than him not responding at all.
28
Conor
A shrink would classify my behavior of this past week as self-destructive. Or at least that’s what Hunter’s girlfriend accused me of doing today, and Demi is halfway to being a shrink, so she’s legit. Apparently she ran into Taylor on campus earlier, prompting her to text me something along the lines of, “The fuck did you do to her???”
Which I can only take to mean I’ve managed to ruin Taylor, too. It’s nothing more than what I expected would happen. Exactly what I deserve. Can’t keep spraying perfume on the pile of crap and pretending it doesn’t stink.
I wanted to call her. I drove to Taylor’s apartment after the beach last weekend but couldn’t make myself go inside. I couldn’t lie to her face again and tell her everything’s fine. I’d rather have her think I’m just another asshole jock than know what I really am.
We’ve met up a couple times since then, grabbing coffee between classes on campus, but I’ve avoided her place and haven’t asked her over to mine. The coffee dates are already awkward enough, a solid hour where I can’t think of anything to say and she’s afraid to scare me off. And every text she sends wondering what’s wrong drives the knife a little deeper.
If I were a better person I’d tell her the truth. I’d come clean and let her look at me with those beautiful turquoise eyes full of betrayal and disgust. Let her call me a pathetic loser and watch her finally understand what I’d been too chickenshit to tell her all along: that she deserves better.
TAYLOR: You wanna come over tonight?
But I’m a coward. I keep telling myself that once I get rid of Kai, things with me and Taylor can go back to normal. I’ll make an excuse and she’ll reluctantly forgive me and then I can spend the next month winning her back.
Except every time I see the question mark at the end of her messages it gets harder to imagine facing her again.
Another text flashes on my screen. This time, it’s from Kai.
KAI: You’re wasting time…
I turn the phone over so I don’t have to look at the screen anymore. It’s Monday morning and I shouldn’t still be lying in bed. My philosophy lecture starts in less than an hour. Although I’m doing plenty of philosophizing in my head, so maybe I should just skip. Too much introspection can’t be good for the soul.
I stare up at my bedroom ceiling and draw a ragged breath. Then I drag my lazy ass out of bed and force myself to get dressed.
My phone vibrates again and I pretend not to notice. It’s either Taylor or Kai. Or maybe my mom.
Right now the only person it hurts more to disappoint than Taylor is my mother. I can’t call her asking for that kind of money. I thought I could mus
ter up the balls to call Max directly, feed him some bullshit story about one of my teammates getting into trouble and not wanting to worry Mom about it. Or I could say I wrecked someone’s car. But then I pictured the face he’d make.
Hitting him up for cash would only provide him with more confirmation of what he’d always believed about me: that I was trash, always would be trash, and no amount of money, distance, or education would change that.
So I have no choice. After class, I show up at Hunter’s place and tell him we need to talk.
Demi’s on the couch beside him, shooting me laser eyes. I’ve interrupted them watching some crime documentary on TV, but I know that’s not why she’s glowering at me.
“Don’t tell Taylor I’m here,” I ask her, my voice rough. “Please.”
She inhales and rolls her eyes. “I’m not going to tell you what to do—”
“Good,” I say, then turn on my heel and duck into the kitchen, where I grab a beer from the fridge.
“But you shouldn’t string her along,” Demi finishes the second I return to the living room.
I swallow the lump in my throat. “I’m not.”
“Does she know that?”
I assume it’s a rhetorical question, and if it’s not, doesn’t matter. I didn’t come here to talk to Demi about Taylor.
I take a long swig of the beer and nod at an uncomfortable-looking Hunter. “Can we talk in your room?”
“Sure.”
“I like Taylor!” Demi calls after me as I follow Hunter to the doorway. “Put on your big-boy pants and make things right with her, Conor Edwards.”
“Sorry,” a rueful Hunter says as his girl continues to chastise me when I’m not even in the room.
In Hunter’s bedroom, he takes a seat at his desk while I lean against the door, picking at the label on my bottle. He knows me well enough to get something’s up. Hunter’s my best friend on the team. Hell, probably my best friend anywhere. A week ago, Taylor was right there next to him.