Not That Kind of Girl

by Nia Forrester

  “And so, you talked on the treadmill and fell in love?”

  Ian shakes his head. “We talked on the treadmill and then I finished and got off and said, ‘see you around’ and she got off as well and asked if I wanted to hang out sometime.”

  I am momentarily filled with admiration and envy for Kate. I’m not shy, but I can’t imagine doing that.

  “And you said ‘yes’.”

  “I took her number, she took mine and …” He shrugs. “It just kinda went from there.”

  “Hmm,” I say.

  “What’s that ‘hmm’ mean? How do you meet guys?”

  “I don’t,” I say.

  Ian looks like he doesn’t know whether to believe me.

  “You don’t meet guys?” he repeats.

  “Not really. I mean, in class and stuff obviously, but socially I mean.”

  “How come?”

  I shrug. “I don’t really go out. To parties and … whatever. I don’t go to them much.”

  “How come?” Ian asks again in the same tone of voice as before.

  “Not a priority,” I say.

  Ian nods as if that’s confirmed something for him. “I can tell.”

  I laugh out loud. “What does that mean?”

  “You just don’t seem to care ‘bout all that. You know I see you on campus sometimes?”

  “You do?”

  “Yeah. And you just glide right on by like you’re lookin’ right through me.”

  I think for a moment. It seems unlikely that I would be somewhere and not notice Ian Everett.

  “Don’t worry. I don’t take it personally. Seems like you’re lookin’ right through everyone else as well.”

  “You make it sound like I’m a snob or something.”

  “Nah.” He looks at me and shakes his head. “Not a snob. Just …” He pauses and gives a little smile like he’s remembering something. “You look like you’re thinking deep thoughts.”

  “We’ll go with that,” I say with a firm nod. “That works. If I ignore you on campus that’s what I’m doing. Thinking deep thoughts.”

  “But what if that doesn’t work for me?” he asks. “What if I want to know what’s happening in there?”

  Ian reaches over and gently raps his knuckle on my temple.

  “Easy,” I say, shrugging. “Stop me. And ask.”

  Chapter Four

  We get to the house and immediately are overwhelmed by the competing sounds of conversation, screams, and loud music. There are about twenty people hanging around in small groups, and in the pool. An impressively large grill that I didn’t notice the last time I was here is sending up billowy, fragrant plumes of smoke.

  A guy at the grill holding a pair of tongs looks up as Ian and I approach. There are noisy greetings and a little manly roughhousing for a few seconds and then Ian stands aside to introduce me. The guy with the tongs smiles and looks me over, naked curiosity in his eyes. He doesn’t wait for Ian but wipes his hands on his shorts and extends one to me.

  “I’m Patrick,” he says.

  Patrick is almost as dark-skinned as Ian but has hazel eyes and one of those smiles that make you feel like he’s been waiting his entire life just to meet you. The contrast between his eyes and complexion is mesmerizing. He stares at me in a way that makes me want to drop my gaze to my feet, but I don’t.

  I take his hand and smile back boldly, reminding myself that I am being someone different today. Today I am a girl not intimidated by guys who ooze charisma.

  “Grab a beer,” Patrick tells me. “Make yourself at home. Hot dogs, hamburgers over there … buns, all the fixin’s.”

  “Thanks,” I say.

  “Wanna get in the water?” Ian asks, just over my shoulder. “Or you hungry, or …?”

  I look at him and smile. “I could eat first.”

  We go over to a table where two aluminum trays are filled with hot dogs and hamburgers, and people are milling around, assembling them to their taste.

  “This is a lot of food,” I say.

  “Southern boys are big eaters,” Ian says.

  “This is the second time you felt you had to mention your Southern-ness,” I say, rolling my eyes. “Like anyone could miss it.”

  “Whatchu tryna say?” He laughs.

  “Your accent is …” I widen my eyes. “Unreal.”

  “Can’t help it,” he says, and for a moment his accent deepens further. I get the sense he is proud of it.

  “Tell me about where you’re from,” I say as we round the table, picking up food and adding things to our paper plates.

  “It’s a tiny place in Northeast Alabama called Boon Town.”

  “Boon Town,” I repeat, not sure whether he’s making it up or not.

  “Yup. Population just shy of six thousand. Patrick …” He points out his friend at the grill. “And Wayne …” A guy in the pool tossing a girl in a white bikini over his shoulder. “Are from there too. We look out for each other. You know, Aniyunwiya in the big city.”

  “What?” I lean in. “Ani …”

  “Ani-yun-wiya. Cherokee. All three of us. Half-breeds.”

  My eyes widen at the use of the term, which I would have thought was offensive.

  Ian smiles at my expression. “You know how it is. I can say it, but …”

  We take our food over to the far edge of the pool where it is a little quieter. The music is just as loud, but there are fewer people, so not as many voices. Ian and I sit next to each other on the grass since all the deck chairs are taken. Though the sun is just about to go down, there are pinpricks of sweat on the back of my neck under my hair and at my armpits.

  “Kate told me a little about your … background,” I admit, just before biting into one of my hot dogs.

  Ian rolls his eyes. “I bet.”

  “Your dad is Native, right?”

  He nods.

  “Do you have brothers and sisters?”

  “One brother. Wolf.”

  “Wolf?”

  “It’s a translation of his name, basically. Wahya. In our language, that means wolf.”

  “Wow. And you got stuck with … Ian?” I tease him.

  He laughs. “Actually, my name is Wohali. Ian is just … it’s the name my parents chose for me, to make it … easier.” He looks away when he says that last bit.

  “I think that … Wohali? Is that how you say it?”

  Ian nods.

  “It’s a beautiful name,” I say. “What does it mean?”

  “Eagle.”

  “I don’t think it would suck to have people call me Eagle,” I muse. “Jus’ sayin’. Eagles are majestic and intimidating.”

  “And dangerous,” Ian says. And our eyes meet. Then he looks away and takes a huge bite of his hot dog, almost getting the entire thing into his mouth in one go.

  I’m about to ask if he’s dangerous but he speaks first, talking around the food in his mouth.

  “What about you? Where’re you from?”

  “Nowhere exciting. Just outside of Washington DC. Prince Georges County.”

  “The highest concentration of affluent Black people in America live there,” Ian says, surprising me.

  “Yes,” I say. “But there’s a lot of poverty there as well.”

  “Well, this is America. What would all the ‘haves’ feel like if there weren’t also ‘have-nots’ to remind them how rich they are?” He finishes off his hot dog and sets aside his paper plate where there is still another hot dog waiting to be eaten.

  When I’m done with mine, he picks up his second one and begins to eat it, slower this time.

  “We didn’t think this through,” I say. “Now that we stuffed ourselves, we probably shouldn’t get in the water for a minute.”

  “That’s cool,” Ian shrugs. “I like it right here.”

  He looks at me again, his gaze lingering a few moments longer than necessary and I almost want to ask him to stop doing it, because it makes my stomach flutter which seems patently unjust under
the circumstances.

  “So, where’s Wolf?” I ask. “Your brother.”

  “In the Marines. Signed up just as soon as he was old enough. Been in Afghanistan for five years now.”

  “Wow. That must be … You must worry about him.”

  “Yeah,” Ian says without elaboration.

  We finish our food and he reaches for my paper plate, crumpling it with his and then brushing his hands against each other.

  “Wanna walk this off?” he asks.

  I nod and he hops up, holding the crumpled paper plates in one hand and extending the other to me. I take it and he pulls me to my feet. It takes a few long seconds before he releases my hand and when he does, it is gradually so at the last second, just our fingertips touch.

  “Couple times ‘round the block?”

  “Sure,” I say.

  Many faculty members live in this neighborhood. On the second street we pass, I see one of my professors with a baby strapped to her chest, unloading grocery bags from a station wagon. She glances in Ian’s and my direction and then quickly looks away. I can’t tell if she recognizes me or not, but I’m guessing she knows we’re students and doesn’t want to risk having to make conversation in her private time.

  Ian’s stride is long and slow, and his tread is light. We glance at each other at exactly the same moment and then grin as if we’re sharing a private joke. A bead of perspiration tickles me as it travels down the center of my back and then stops at a spot very low where I assume it is absorbed by the waistband of these stupid jeans. They felt trendy when I put them on, but it’s too hot for jeans unless they’re shorts.

  I guess I wanted to feel and look cool. Now I’m just melting. To avoid turning into a complete sweaty mess, I lift and twist my hair, and pull a ponytail holder from around my wrist to make a quick messy bun. When I’m done, I see that Ian was watching me, but he looks away when he sees me notice him.

  “You’re really pretty.”

  His words almost cause me to trip. My face grows hot, and not just because it’s eighty-four degrees out.

  “Thank you,” I say without looking at him. “But ‘pretty’ is such a meaningless thing to be in general.”

  I don’t know why I say something as stupid as that.

  It’s just that people have told me this before and it had no effect. But Ian says it and it’s as though I’ve been inflated with helium and am drifting high, high above the clouds. It’s as though I am a cloud. Soft and without mass. I don’t want him to know just how much hearing that from him makes a difference so instead of graciously accepting the compliment I come across like a douche.

  “Anyway, I’m guessing it’s not the most interesting thing about you,” Ian says.

  “Then what do you think is?”

  “The most interesting thing? I don’t know yet. But I know I wanna find out.”

  The thrill of hearing that is several dozen times more than the thrill of hearing him call me pretty.

  “Well,” I say. “That’s …”

  I don’t finish. I was going to say, ‘well, that’s going to be difficult.’ But I don’t want to mention Kate again. It would sound like I’m goading him into something, and I’m not. It doesn’t matter, he catches my meaning anyway.

  “Look, if things were different, if … I mean, I think what happened in the pool would’ve been the start of something and not …”

  “The end of something,” I finish for him.

  Ian looks taken aback. “That isn’t what I was gonna say.”

  “What were you going to say?”

  “I was gonna say it wouldn’t have to be so complicated. Not that it was the end.”

  “But it is.”

  “Does it have to be?”

  I shake my head. “Of course. Because …”

  “Then why’re you here?” Ian challenges.

  “Because even though I know it has to end here, maybe I don’t want it to,” I say in a fit of bravery.

  Ian stops walking and then gives me a wry smile. “There,” he says. “That’s it. Right there.”

  “What’re you talking about?” I narrow my eyes.

  “Things like that. The way you just came right out and said that. Things like that make me want to know you. Make me know that there’s an ocean of things I want to know … right behind those eyes.”

  He comes closer to me, and hold still, but my stomach flips a little. How can it not flip, with a guy like Ian Everett standing in front of me talking about the ‘ocean behind my eyes’?

  I take a deep breath, telling myself I’m about to object when I see him start to lean in. But I don’t object. I can’t. Instead, I lean in as well, and tip my head back and feel nothing but sweetness and relief when he kisses me.

  Chapter Five

  “He was one of the reasons I wanted to be part of this program,” Ian says. “To be on the same team as him. To maybe learn from him.”

  “Did you? Learn from him?”

  We’re making our third lap around the block and neither of us has mentioned going back to the pool party. Ian is talking about Kal Carter and why he wanted to come to Penn State. I didn’t have reasons as good as his. It was my “safe school” and since my grades took a little dip senior year, it turned out to be a lucky thing I applied.

  “Yeah. Most disciplined runner I ever saw. His regimen, his diet … everything was on point.”

  “Did you ever beat him?”

  Ian laughs and scratches the back of his neck. He does that, I notice, when he’s uncomfortable, embarrassed, or biding his time.

  “Nah. One time I almost tied with him in the one hundred. I put so much into it, I thought my heart would burst outta my chest and when we were done, he wasn’t even hardly breathing hard.”

  I like listening to Ian talk about running. His entire face lights up.

  “So, I was crushed, right? I mean, I thought that might be my best time ever. And I’m walkin’ away with my head down and he comes over and yokes me like this …” Ian makes a hook with his arm, putting it around my neck and pulling me against him. “And he shook his head and said, ‘c’mon through, young ‘un, come on through!’ I guess that meant he thought I gave him a run for his money. I was high off that for like a week.”

  I look up at Ian and smile. He shakes his head, grinning at the memory.

  “He’s a good dude. I hope he gets that gold in Tokyo.”

  “There’s nothing to stop you from going to the Olympic tryouts, is there?” I ask.

  Ian releases me so we’re just walking next to each other again. “Not really. But I’m never gon’ compete at that level.”

  “Why not?”

  “Heart murmur.”

  I stop walking for a moment and he stops as well, laughing at the expression on my face.

  “It’s not like I’m gon’ drop dead at any minute,” he says. “Just that I’m at higher risk. For an arrhythmia, or SCD if I put too much stress on my heart.”

  “SCD?”

  “Sudden cardiac death.”

  “Sudden cardiac death? Ian,” I say, “then why do you run at all?”

  This makes him laugh out loud. “Why do you think?”

  “I have no frackin’ idea,” I say, looking him in the eye wishing he hadn’t shared this information.

  “Because it brings me joy.”

  And how do I argue with something like that?

  “Joy. That’s a pretty strong word.”

  “You ever flown before, Tiny Tee?”

  “Flown? Like on an airplane?”

  “No. Like a bird.”

  “Can’t say that I have, no.” But I see what he’s getting at.

  “Well, I have. When I run, in those seconds just after I hear that gun? I’m flyin’ high. I don’t even feel the track under me, I’m a bird …”

  I am almost hypnotized by the sound of his voice when he suddenly starts singing Nina Simone: “Birds flyin’ high …”

  I smile at him and shake my head, then Ian pul
ls me toward him, holding one hand in his, wrapping an arm about my waist and we are waltzing in the middle of the street while he sings—off-key—one of the most soulful, mournful, beautiful songs known to man.

  “Y’know what?” I ask him just as he loses grasp of the lyrics and begins humming instead.

  “What?”

  “You have an accent even when you sing.”

  Ian bows his head and I feel his nose brush my damp neck. “And you smell sweet,” he says. “Even when you sweat.”

  There is a moment of self-consciousness when I want to pull away, but he holds me tighter and speaks against my skin. “What d’you think? Time to head back and get in that pool?”

  There are more people at the party when we get back. It’s up to around thirty-five or so is my guess. Fewer are in the pool now that the sun is beginning to set, and more are sitting and standing around, bouncing to the music and eating the food that is still coming non-stop off the grill.

  Ian holds my hand as he tugs me in the direction of his friend who was swimming with the girl in the white bikini earlier. Wayne is taller than he appeared. About six-five is my guess. Almost a head taller than Ian, several heads taller than me.

  “Yo,” Ian says. “Got a room where my girl here can change?”

  “Your girl?” Wayne narrows his eyes and looks me over.

  “She’s Kate’s roommate,” Ian explains.

  Understanding dawns in Wayne’s eyes.

  “Oh. Yeah. Of course. Come this way …” He pauses and waits for me to supply my name.

  “Terri,” I say. “Nice to meet you.”

  I extend a hand and he grins as if there is something quaint about being greeted that way. Then he leans in and gives me a quick hug. He is shirtless, and what guys like to call “ripped” so being hugged by him, however briefly, feels good.

  I’m horny, clearly. All that spontaneous making out during my walk with Ian is shaking my libido awake.

  “I’ll take her.” Ian steps in. “Your room?”

  “Yeah,” Wayne says. He narrows his eyes again and looks from Ian to me and back again. “If anyone’s in there, kick ‘em out.”

  Ian takes my hand again and leads me inside.