It's All About Us

by Shelley Adina

  Now his gaze locked on me for real. “Privacy. Because Vanessa doesn’t have a roommate.”

  “And I do. And because she doesn’t have a family.”

  “And I do.” He was silent for a moment. “That’s some plan.”

  “Illegal, but effective.”

  “What do you want to do?”

  Dance with you at the Benefactors’ Day ball. Meet your family as your girlfriend. Spend the term with you. Spend the holidays with you.

  Build a relationship, one thing at a time. And first things first.

  “What do you want to do?” I said carefully.

  “What do you think?” There was that sexy grin again, after a long absence.

  I was back in the game.

  “YOU ARE SO not going to do that.” Gillian’s hands dropped from the harp’s strings and an unfinished chord hung in the air, waiting for resolution. “Are you?”

  I couldn’t very well disappear on Friday night and have her call out Security, thinking I’d been abducted. And I didn’t want to lie about what I was doing, either. I’m a terrible liar—the thin-skinned, blushing, hopeless kind who always gets found out.

  “I have to.” How could I explain this so that look would leave Gillian’s face, and yet not break my promise to Callum that I wouldn’t talk about him behind his back? “Today at lunch was the first time he spoke to me since we had a little fight yesterday. We need some time together. And that’s impossible to get around here without some kind of miracle.”

  “You could always go out,” she observed.

  “And do what? Sit in his car? There are always people around in restaurants and theaters.”

  “If you’re just talking, what’s the big deal? That’s what people do in restaurants and theaters.”

  “Maybe we don’t want to just talk.”

  “Uh-huh. At least you wouldn’t get arrested.”

  “I know—” I stopped, a second after I realized she was being sarcastic. “Don’t be a mo guai nuer.”

  She snorted. “There’s being an MGN and being honest. I just think you’re going at this the wrong way.”

  “Oh, like you know so much about it. I don’t see the guys breaking our door down to get to you.” Although I had seen her in the Physics lab a couple more times, talking with Lucas Hayes. Maybe something had gotten going at the prayer circle after I’d left.

  Gillian looked down at the strings and plucked a red one. Middle C hung in the air. “Maybe the guys interested in me have more finesse. Maybe some of us use brains and conversation, not our bodies, to keep a guy that way.”

  “What are you insinuating?”

  “Nothing. I’m just saying, I’m hearing too much about sex and not very much about who Callum is and stuff you do together, that’s all.”

  “Maybe I don’t want to talk about it. He hates when people talk behind his back.”

  She pulled a blue string, and a fourth interval vibrated quietly before she put her hand on the strings to still them. “Telling your roomie what you did on a date isn’t talking behind his back. Is he paranoid, or what?”

  “No!” My voice reverberated like the string, and I took a breath to calm down. “People at our level are visible, that’s all. Other people like to talk about us because they don’t have anything else to talk about. Students, reporters—it’s all the same.”

  “‘Our level’?”

  I nodded. “Callum is oil money. You told me that yourself. Brett Loyola is from this old San Francisco family that owns tons of real estate. Vanessa’s family is in politics, not to mention her semiroyal mom. My family’s in the movie business, and my mom’s family is in banking and retail. The point is, they have enough trouble with the paparazzi reporting on their every move in public without their friends yakking it up about their private ones.”

  “Gosh. Banking. I guess I wouldn’t know anything about that, being from Chinatown and all.”

  I stared at her. Was she being straight or sarcastic? Never mind.

  “The point is, I promised him I wouldn’t talk about us. I only told you about Friday so you wouldn’t freak and report me as a missing person.”

  “Gee, thanks. I so would have done that.”

  “Gillian, knock off the sarcasm, would you?”

  She pushed the harp to the side and got up. “I don’t get how a person so nice can be so self-destructive.”

  I stared at her. “What?”

  “Look at you. You come in here and tell me point-blank you’re planning to (a) break school rules by letting a guy into the girls’ dorm, and (b) break a promise to God by spending the night with him. Don’t you hear what you’re saying?”

  “I’m not breaking my promise or spending the night,” I said as patiently as I could. “We’re spending the evening together. And if he never leaves Vanessa’s room, what difference does it make to the rest of the dorm?”

  “Listen to yourself! What difference does it make to me, knowing what you’re doing and wondering if I should tell Tobin? Huh? Did you think about the position you’re putting me in?”

  “I hope it isn’t the one called ‘rat.’”

  She rolled her eyes. “Great. First I’m an MGN, now I’m a rat.”

  “I said I hope it isn’t. But if you think you should tell Ms. Tobin, then that’s what you have to do.”

  “Don’t be a martyr.”

  I’m not an angry person. My temper has a long leash, and I only lose it a couple of times a year. Despite my best efforts, this was working up to being one of those times. “I’m not. I’m just saying, you have to do what you think is right.”

  “Like you’re doing? Lissa, did it ever occur to you to pray about this?”

  “I have been praying.”

  “Then you must not be listening to the answer. Because if you were, you couldn’t do it. God won’t tempt us more than we can bear, but all bets are off when we deliberately book a room and walk into it.”

  “You’re insinuating again. Come on. Spit out what you really mean.”

  “I mean, are you going to give up your virginity on Friday night?”

  “No, of course not. I told you. I keep my promises.”

  “So you’re just going to be the world’s biggest tease? What is that going to say to Callum about Christian girls?”

  Something in the region of my heart stretched past the breaking point, snapping like a rubber band.

  “That’s enough. I’ve listened to you, and you’ve done nothing but insult me. I’m out of here.”

  I grabbed my wallet out of my tote and hit the door practically at a run. As it swung shut behind me, I heard a discordant sound shiver through the air, as if Gillian had whacked the strings of her harp with the flat of her hand.

  Ha. Good thing she wasn’t anywhere near my hand. I’d show her a thing or two about discord.

  I didn’t really care where I went. Walking at workout speed, I crossed the lawn and headed downhill. I could have gone to Callum’s house, but then I’d have to tell him why I was upset, which would mean confessing that I’d talked about him with Gillian in spite of my promise.

  He was right. I should have kept my mouth shut and let her call Security. They’d never have thought to look in Vanessa’s room, would they? I’d have been safe. And now it was too late for that plan.

  Somehow my subconscious directed me down Fillmore Street to the Starbucks, where I ordered a nice, soothing caramel macchiato. And since I needed major soothing, I made it a venti.

  As I walked back up the street, looking in the shop windows, most of which had closed earlier in the evening, my phone rang, deep in the pocket of my blue school blazer.

  “Hey, Gremmie Girl,” Kaz said.

  “Not.” I grinned at the name he’d called me when I first started surfing. “I’ll beat you to the waves any day.”

  “Ha. Not in Fog City, you won’t.”

  “I’ll have you know I was at the beach yesterday.”

  “Yeah? How’s it lookin’?”

>   “Beautiful. Not too crowded, either. I have to get my stuff from Dad’s.” Callum didn’t have surf racks, but the board might fit inside if we wedged it between the seats of his Prius.

  “Did you go with the boyfriend?”

  “Yes. We had a great time.”

  “Are you with him now? Did I interrupt something?”

  “No. Relax.” I sighed. “I had a fight with my roommate and I’m walking it off with a caramel macchiato.”

  “A fight? With the pretty Asian chick?”

  What, like somehow the two didn’t go together? “The sarcastic, name-calling Asian chick, you mean?”

  “Yow. Catfight!”

  “Shut up. You’re supposed to be on my side.”

  “I am. Totally.” His voice lost the laughter and became gentle. Which was good, because I could really, really use gentle right about then. “What’d you fight about?”

  I was not going to compound my broken promises by telling him. “Nothing. It was stupid.”

  “Didn’t sound stupid to me.”

  “It—” I stopped. “What?”

  “Confession time. I just got off the phone with her.”

  I stopped walking and checked to make sure I was still holding my coffee and not dropping it on the sidewalk in shock. “With Gillian?”

  “She’s worried sick about you.”

  “She is not. She’s a flippin’ backstabber, is what she is. She had no business blabbing about my personal stuff to you.”

  “Because I’m only your oldest friend.”

  “Right!”

  Silence.

  “Awkward,” he said at last. “If you really want me to butt out, I guess I’ll just shut up and go away.”

  “No, don’t do that,” I said on a long sigh. “I’m sorry. It’s just that I promised Callum I wouldn’t talk about him with my friends, and now I’m breaking my promise right and left.”

  “Why’d he make you promise that?”

  I gave him the same explanation I’d given Gillian.

  He snorted in derision. “Lame, man. Lame. He just doesn’t want the witnesses blabbing about his bad behavior, that’s all.”

  “Look, I know you don’t like him on principle, but that’s just not true.”

  “Wanna bet? He’s all over this plan to take over this girl’s room, making you an accessory to broken rules littering the place. And then what does he plan to do with you? Go for the big one—the broken promise to God.”

  Ow, straight to the solar plexus. “No! You’ve got it totally wrong!”

  “Liss, look at this straight, okay? If this were right, would we even be talking about broken rules and broken promises? How can God be anywhere near this situation, if all we can see is bad stuff trailing it like afterburn from Serenity’s engines?”

  I was not in the mood to trade movie metaphors, no matter how old and well-loved. “You’re overreacting. You just can’t be happy for me because I’m in love with somebody else.”

  “You’re not in love, Liss. Love makes you do good things.” He paused. “This is lust, baby.”

  I was just about to use up my year’s quota of temper. “Don’t tell me how I feel.”

  “Someone has to. Since when did you get so desperate, Liss? You never used to be like this. Even with that idiot Aidan, you were still running the show.”

  “Maybe that’s why he dumped me.”

  “And maybe that’s why a dozen guys stood in line when they heard he did. If you were here right now, you could pick and choose. The point is, you don’t have to go begging to anyone, girl.”

  A pang hit me. “Don’t call me that.”

  “Uh, memory check—I’ve been calling you that since junior high.”

  “It’s what Callum calls me.”

  “Oh. Well. Wouldn’t want to trespass on his noun.”

  For some reason, I felt tears prickle in my throat. “Don’t be mean, Kaz. I need you to support me.”

  “I’m sorry.” His voice filled with gentleness again, instead of that aggressive humor he could use like a weapon. “I do support you. One hundred percent. I just don’t support what you’re doing. I think it’s a mistake.”

  “Showing love to someone is a mistake?”

  “No, if you keep it right. But, like I said, there’s a lot of wrong following this around. Can’t you do something different?”

  “Like what?”

  “Bake him cookies?”

  “Kaz . . .”

  “I dunno. You make the best chocolate-chip oatmeal cookies in the ’verse.”

  “Not helping.”

  “You gotta pray, Liss,” he said, turning serious.

  “This isn’t exactly something the Creator of the ’verse—and I don’t mean Joss Whedon—needs to get involved in.”

  “Maybe it’ll help you see a different trajectory.”

  Again, the vision of Callum and me whirling in the spotlight flashed onto the screen in my mind, the only couple in the darkened ballroom.

  “Maybe.” I took a sip of cooling coffee and began to trudge up the hill. “I gotta go, Kaz. This is, like, a thirty-degree slope and I can’t talk and climb at the same time.”

  “Okay. Take care of yourself, girl.”

  “I will.”

  “I’ll be praying for ya. For vision. For resolution.”

  I said good-bye and pocketed the phone. Resolution? Who needed that?

  I’d already resolved what I was going to do. Nothing Kaz said—to the Lord or anybody else—was going to change that.

  Chapter 23

  ONCE THE FLOOR monitor gave the all-clear, Ms. Tobin chased the last student out of the common room and shut off the lights downstairs. Lying on Vanessa’s bed, I watched the strip of light under the door wink out, leaving me with only the glow of the candles I’d lit on the dresser, the computer table, and the second windowsill. The first window was clear and standing open a few inches. Vanessa’s computer sat open on the desk, but I didn’t mess with it. And no matter how big the temptation, I didn’t look in her closet, either.

  My territory was right here, on the bed.

  I had sodas chilling in her little fridge and a bag of chips, a box of Oreos, and some sliced fruit laid out on a tray on the second bed. I didn’t know what kind of movie Callum would be in the mood for, so I’d brought my beloved Firefly DVDs, Pirates of the Caribbean 3, and the newest X-Men to cover all the bases.

  Four days after our last conversation, Gillian still wasn’t talking to me. I’d expected an apology and gotten nothing, and until she was ready to say she was sorry for the things she’d said, I was just as happy not to hear from her. I needed support, not preaching. And as for Kaz, it had been nice to hear he supported me, but the rest I could do without.

  It wasn’t like I was falling into bed with Callum. Okay, strictly speaking, the bed was the only place where we could sit together, oversized pillows being what they were, but we weren’t going to sleep there or anything. All we wanted to do was grab a little privacy. Where, I ask you, was the big sin in that?

  All the same, every nerve in my body felt energized, as though a high-voltage current were running through all of them. It wasn’t fear, exactly. It was more like major anticipation edged with a little bit of danger.

  When the hedge outside the window rustled and I heard tap-tap-tap on the glass, my heart jumped against my ribs. I rolled off the bed and held the curtain aside as Callum pushed open the window. He sat on the sill, swung his legs over, and dropped to the floor.

  When I turned from locking it again and making sure the curtains had no cracks, the sight of him made that melting sensation happen inside me, the way it always did.

  “Hey, girl.” He held out his arms and I went into them without a word. This was where I belonged.

  “You smell good,” I said against his shirt front.

  “You look good. New dress?”

  I shook my head. “An old favorite.”

  “It’s going to be hard to get you out of.”
>
  “Ahem.” Maybe I should clarify exactly what having some privacy meant. “You’re getting ahead of yourself. Want a soda?”

  “Sure.”

  I pulled one out of the fridge and handed it to him. “I have munchies and a bunch of movies, too.”

  “All set for a pajama party.”

  He made it sound like I was twelve, and that was the last impression I wanted. I didn’t want him to see me as a kid, but at the same time, losing the clothes wasn’t exactly on the agenda. At least, I didn’t think it was.

  “Cookies?”

  He put his hands loosely on my waist. “Why would I want to waste time eating?”

  There just wasn’t a good answer to that except the one I gave—a kiss. A geological epoch could have passed while I stood there kissing Callum and I wouldn’t have noticed. When he finally let me go, he leaned over and blew out the candles, leaving only the ones on the dresser burning. The room fell into a romantic, sepia darkness that erased all traces of Vanessa and just left us at the edges of the flickering light.

  He led me to the bed, but in the dimness I ran my foot into the stack of movies on the floor.

  “Ooh!” I said in surprise, and he waited as I kicked them out of our path. Then we sat together on the bed and he kissed me again.

  In his eyes I saw my dreams coming true. His focus on me was absolute. After this, we’d be a couple for sure. You couldn’t share moments like this without it changing you forever.

  I leaned back on the pillow and he followed me. And then I was lost in him, in the things he whispered to me, the things I murmured back, until all that existed was Callum and the dark.

  Chapter 24

  WHEN I WOKE in my own room Saturday morning, I felt drugged.

  I’d tiptoed in sometime after two, and a bleary glance at the clock told me I’d awakened a good four hours too soon. I rolled over and snuggled under the comforter, touching my lips with a finger. They’d had more of a workout last night than they’d had in six months. Aidan had been really hot, but he wasn’t much of a kisser. And I wasn’t, of course, in the habit of kissing Kaz, the only other guy I spent time with.

  Guh. Why was I thinking of Aidan and Kaz right now? I should be sinking back into dreamland and reprising last night.