“No, that’s okay,” I say. “We can go.”
I halfway expect Megan to push me to go see him, or to want to see him herself, if only to verify that there’s some kind of relationship between him and me. But to my surprise she agrees with me, and the three of us walk back to our dorms.
Chapter 21
Amber
It’s Monday and I’m not sure what concerns me most — that I’m about to show my face at the campus tutoring center again, or that I haven’t heard from Aidan since he said goodbye to me at his house last Wednesday.
I’d started to wonder if the eggs I cooked at his house were bad, and maybe I poisoned Aidan and his dad with the omelets. So I worked up the nerve to text him yesterday, just a quick, Hey, how are you? Are we still on for tutoring tomorrow?, and all he replied was, Yeah, see you there.
Other than that one exchange? Silence.
Was it stupid to think he might be in touch with me, after what we’d shared that afternoon? Maybe it was. No matter how nice he’s been to me, how sweet even, he’s never said anything about wanting anything but sex.
I’m pretty sure I would have gone all the way with him at his house if his dad hadn’t come home early. I want him more than ever now, but if we do have sex, how am I going to feel afterward?
Look at me — I’m upset because he hasn’t been in touch with me for a few days after a study session and some spectacular oral sex. How would I feel if I actually slept with him, and then never heard from him again?
I’d really like to blow this off today. And I would, damn it, if his tutoring skills weren’t as good as, well, all his other skills.
Except that’s a lie. I won’t miss a chance to see him, even just to study.
I find Aidan standing by the front desk inside the tutoring center, talking with another guy. They both look up as I approach, and Aidan smiles at me, but it’s just a normal smile. I don’t see any special meaning in it. I don’t see any signs that his heart jumps when he sees me, like mine just did when I spotted him.
He excuses himself from his conversation and leads me to a table in the main room, where we’ll be surrounded by people. I wonder if this is by choice, or if the individual study rooms are all taken.
“How was class last week?” he asks as soon as we’re seated.
I guess we’re getting right down to business. “It was okay. There was new stuff I’d like to go over with you.”
“All right, let’s have a look.”
He seems strangely subdued, and I want to say something to him, something meaningful, even if only to ask how he’s been, but instead I follow his lead and we dive into chemistry.
We cover the new material, Aidan clarifies the parts I’d been having trouble with, then we move on to practice balancing equations. I’m actually really starting to get the hang of it now. I work through several problems without making a mistake.
“You’re doing great, Amber. You’ve really improved.”
His praise is warm and genuine, but at the same time it seems like he’s not fully here with me. Part of him — the sexy, flirty, hot-as-sin part that I’m so familiar with — is missing. I feel like I’m just another student receiving help from a tutor, not someone he’s made come three times.
“Would you like to set up another extra session this week?” he asks, when the timer on his phone tells us our time is up. His voice is cool and detached. I want to search his face, to figure out what’s behind his changed behavior, but I can’t bring myself to meet his gaze for long.
“I think Mondays will be enough,” I say quickly, as I gather my things. “I’m getting it now.”
Aidan nods. “Okay.”
I don’t hear relief, or disappointment, or really anything at all in his voice. So I don’t wait around for things to get awkward. I simply say goodbye and head out while Aidan is still getting up from the table. He doesn’t call me back, or ask me to wait, and when I push through the doors, I force myself not to blink so that no tears can fall.
He didn’t touch me once during our session. Sure we were in the middle of an open room, but his knee didn’t even bump against mine. There were no sexy smirks, no devilish comments … nothing.
He said it wasn’t bad that I was a good girl, but obviously it is. He’s a player, that sensible side of my brain smugly reminds me. And in the days since I last saw him, he has no doubt been playing, and found someone — maybe more than one someone — he likes playing with better.
Chapter 22
Amber
The week goes by with no communication from Aidan. After the way he acted at our tutoring session, it’s not as if I expected to hear from him. But my heart still held out hope.
I see him a few times on campus, and the pull is as strong as ever, at least on my side. I want to run to him, throw my arms around him and just hold on. I want to feel his strong arms around me again and breathe in his Aidan scent. But of course I don’t. I can’t.
It’s not really a surprise that when I see him, there’s usually a girl with him, or a small group of them. At least they’re different girls every time. It’s ridiculous, but his lack of monogamy gives me some consolation.
On the occasions we make eye contact as I pass by him on campus, he just smiles and nods his head, a perfunctory greeting he’d give to anyone. It feels like a kick in the stomach.
I think back to everything that was said and done between us and wonder what happened to change his behavior. The only thing I keep circling back to is the good girl comment. Was it so clear that I’m inexperienced? Was he expecting more from me last week at his house?
He’s all wrong for you and you knew it from the start, I tell myself, as if I ever had a choice to resist him. I miss him more than I’d have thought possible.
On Saturday, I find myself being nudged awake. When I open my eyes I find the room bright with sun and Megan perched on the edge of my bed.
“Amber, are you okay?”
“Hmmm, yeah.” I roll over and squint up at her.
“It’s nearly noon.” Megan, who thinks the day starts at 11 a.m., knows I’m usually an early riser. “You’re not sick, are you?”
I’m shocked to find that I’ve slept so late, but then I remember my mood when I went to bed last night. Swirling, circling thoughts — that often revolved around me kicking myself for getting hung up on an unattainable heartbreaker — kept me up I don’t know how late.
“I’m fine,” I say, sitting up. “I guess I just needed to catch up on sleep.”
“Okay.” Megan gets up and heads toward the door. “I’ll be back later. Oh, a group of us are going to the movies tonight. Do you want to come?”
“I don’t think so. I have a lot to do.”
Megan leaves, and as she closes the door, a wave of sadness washes over me that makes me want to collapse back into bed and let it swallow me up. But I do have a lot to do, and wallowing in self-pity is not on my list.
I shower and grab lunch, eating because I know I need to, not because I have any sign of an appetite. Then I hit my homework, getting the easier stuff out of the way before moving on to chemistry.
My attitude toward the subject matter has been changing. It started with confusion and frustration, moved on to some tentative understanding, and now I am facing it with willful determination.
I will ace my final, because now it’s tied up with Aidan in my mind, and I at least want something good to come out of my relationship —
At that, I have to stop and laugh at myself. I can’t even say I’ve had a relationship with Aidan.
In any case, I plan to get an A, to show him and myself that I can do it. I pull out my notes and get to work.
Around six, I decide I need to stop. I’m making great progress, but I’m still hitting a few walls and finding gaps in my knowledge. I can feel frustration building up inside me, so I pull my hair back, put on my running shoes and head out to release the stress.
I try to run once a week, and tonight I chart an extra l
ong course, circling around campus, weaving through areas I don’t usually cover, and pushing hard, trying to wear myself out so I won’t be up half the night thinking dark thoughts.
I pass a lot of students heading out for the night, and when I finally get back to the dorm, the building is much quieter than usual. Megan’s come and gone, leaving a pile of discarded outfit choices on her bed. I get cleaned up, and intend to pick up where I left off studying, but when I flip open my notepad, the first thing I see is a list of formulas that Aidan had written down for me to memorize.
I’ve studied them, I know what they mean and what they refer to, but right now they are just marks on a paper, and instead of seeing them, I’m remembering his lean hand gripping the pen, and how I watched the muscles in his forearm flex as he wrote.
It’s Saturday night. Aidan will be on stage later, flexing those muscles and so many more for an adoring crowd.
I stare at the formulas, waiting for them to turn back into something that makes sense, but instead my mind is playing a movie for me, showing me Aidan strutting, shirtless, singing his soulful, sexy songs.
As if his dark eyes are mesmerizing me straight through my memories, I slam my notes closed, put on a little makeup, and head out before I can think too much about what I’m doing.
I know it’s stupid, I know it’s going to hurt, and I know I’m probably going to feel even worse later, but somehow I can’t stop myself. I cross campus, and soon I’m walking among the crowds headed to see Throwback.
I don’t go in until I hear the chanting. I don’t want to risk running into him. I slip in right before the show starts and I stay in the back of the room. The lights are down, and the crowd’s calls continue until the first guitar chords break through the noise. Then the stage is suddenly ablaze and the guys are all out there, Aidan front and center.
They tear into their opening number, a harder rocking song than the one they’d opened with last time, and Aidan howls out the lyrics, almost sounding in pain at times:
You
You’re like fire
Your flame sparks my desire
But you’d best forget my name
I’m not the one who came
For you ...
The crowd seems harder rocking than last time too, matching the band’s energy, even way back here at the back of the room. Aidan looks amazing, of course. Tight jeans stretched across his muscular thighs, pale t-shirt already clinging to his chest.
I watch him work his fans into a frenzy and I blink my eyes, wondering how this is same man who teaches me chemistry and introduced me to his dad. I remember feeling special, knowing those other sides of him, but now I’m almost wishing I didn’t know. Sexy as he is up there, I could look away from another hot lead singer, but I can’t look away from Aidan and all that I know he is.
“Something new. I hope you all liked it,” Aidan says, his mouth close in to the mike, as the first song ends. Responses come in loud cheers and Throwback starts into their second number, one I recognize from their last two shows.
After that first one, most of the songs are ones I’ve heard before, but somehow they all sound darker tonight. Aidan’s singing seems to have a hard edge to it, like the songs are about pain and loss instead of sex and sinning, the way they all sounded that first night I heard him perform. I know I must be projecting my own feelings on what I’m hearing, but I can’t shake the sensation that it’s a different show tonight.
Even though it’s torture to be here, to watch him and hear him, and see all the screaming girls and wonder which one he’ll take home, I stay for the whole show. My heart hasn’t even started to heal, but I stay and let the wound get cut open again.
I don’t hang around afterwards though. As soon as the house lights come on, I head for the exit, and I make sure I’m down the road before the band comes out for autographs. I don’t need to see Aidan flirting with his groupies.
Chapter 23
Amber
Megan’s back at the dorm when I return, and she’s still awake. Shit! I wasn’t thinking, and I’m not prepared to face her after my visit to the bar.
“Hey,” she says, looking me up and down, trying to draw clues from my appearance. “Hot date tonight?”
I try to quickly come up with a story about where I’ve been so that I don’t have to tell her the truth, but my brain is too tired to invent a good excuse. I stare at her and last about five seconds before my face crumbles and I start crying. Damn it!
Megan’s at my side instantly, putting her arms around me. “Aw, honey, what’s wrong?” She rubs my back and it feels good, even though I’m furious that I’ve broken down.
“It’s nothing,” I say, managing to compose myself, grateful that I’ve not quite headed into ugly-cry territory. “I went to see Aidan tonight.”
“What happened? What did he do?” She sounds ready to jump to my defense, and her concern touches me. I know she worships Aidan and the fact that she’s lining up as my friend, rather than his fan, means a lot.
“He didn’t do anything,” I say, and with those words, I start to cry again.
Megan leads me over to the bed, sits next to me and waits patiently, letting me cry. After a few minutes, she says softly, “What’s going on?”
“I don’t know,” I say, after wiping my nose with a tissue she hands me. “I mean, nothing’s going on. I thought something was, and then … nothing. Tonight I went out to watch the band. Just to torture myself.”
“Wow, you went out to the bar alone? You must have it bad,” she says, with a gently mocking tone. Seeing my frown, she continues, “So let me guess. You and Aidan had sex and then he dropped you?”
The fact that she’s ready to be angry on my behalf makes me feel a tiny bit better. “No, we didn’t have sex,” I say. “We did some stuff, but we didn’t even get that far.”
“So what happened?” Megan asks again.
I fill her in on the texting and the study date at Aidan’s house, without going into detail, and then tell her how he hasn’t been in contact, and how he acts like there’s nothing between us when I’ve seen him since then.
“Maybe he’s just busy,” she says. “He’s in his senior year, right? I’m sure he has a lot going on — he’ll have senior projects and graduation stuff on top of his normal classes.”
It’s nice of her to suggest some explanation, and I wish I could believe her, but Megan herself is the one who told me what a player Aidan was on the very night I met him. She knows as well as I do that I had no right to expect any more from him. I know it’s foolish to be grieving over something that never was, but here I am.
Deciding to change the subject, I say, “How was your night?”
“It was fine, but Eric is acting weird.”
“Yeah? How so?”
Megan gets up and starts to put away some of the clothes on her bed. “I don’t know. We’ve always gotten along so well; we can talk about anything. He just seems different, like he’s distracted, or doesn’t want to be around.”
“He always wants to be around you,” I say, laughing a little. Megan shoots me a look. “Maybe he’s just busy,” I say.
“No, he’s not. He’s flying through all his classes. That’s not it. I asked him what was wrong, but he said nothing. There’s something, though; I just don’t know what it is.”
With a shrug, she clips a hanger to a skirt. “I’ll find out eventually, I guess. So what are you going to do about the tutoring?”
“I can’t stop going,” I say. “Part of me wishes I could, but I need his help to make sure I pass chemistry. He’s a really good teacher.” It’s my turn to shrug. “I’ll just have to deal with it. The semester’s almost over, anyway.”
I wish I felt as nonchalant as I sound.
Chapter 24
Aidan
My first tutoring student of the day is not getting my best. I'm distracted, wondering if Amber will show up.
She didn’t text me to confirm our session today, and I know she
has to be wondering what’s up with me. With us. Every time I saw her on campus this week and acted like she was no one special, I felt like a jerk.
What can I do, though? It’s better to hurt her now than to get more involved and really hurt her later. That’s what I tell myself. But every time someone comes through the door of the tutoring center, I look over to see if it’s her. And even though I know sitting next to her and not touching her will be a struggle, I hope she shows. I’d rather suffer than not see her at all.
If only there was some way to spend more time with her without things getting complicated. But no matter how much I like her, she’s a relationship kind of girl, and I am just not that kind of guy.
The tutoring session finally ends, and I hope I did the poor guy some good. I hang out by the front desk, hands in my pockets, watching the door from the corner of my eye. Feeling like some nervous high school kid about to go to the prom.
When Amber finally comes through the door, she looks nothing like the bright-eyed girl who teases me back and calls me on my bullshit. Her shoulders are slumped, her head down.
Then she looks up and sees me. Her shoulders come back, her chin comes up, and she meets my eyes as she approaches.
I know exactly what she’s doing: putting on a brave front, trying not to let me see that I’ve hurt her. But she can’t hide the pain in her beautiful eyes, and knowing I put it there makes me feel like a major asshole.
“Are we on for this morning?” she asks. Her tone is cool and it’s like a knife in my stomach.
“Of course.” I lead her to a table in the center of the room. As we get settled, I wrestle with myself, knowing it’s better not to bring it up, but I can’t keep the words in. “I thought I’d hear from you to confirm our session.”
She sets her notebook down on the table with more force than necessary. “Is there somewhere else you need to be?”
Beast Brothers 2 Page 19