I probably should have been rereading the stories we were workshopping in my class so they were fresh in my mind, rather than just relying on my notes in the margins. That was what good professors did, but it was becoming clear my time was precious.
Something that became less clear when it came to James.
I guess everything got less clear when it came to James.
As a graduate student, it’s not like my schedule was outrageous or anything. At Miami you only had classes two nights a week, a workshop and a literature immersion, so you could spend the rest of your time writing. As a TA fellow, I also had to spend my time teaching a class, leading a discussion section, and kissing Professor Dylan’s ass while keeping him out of my business. Throw writing as Candy and now James, and it tended to make my schedule feel outrageous.
If I could have let myself be with James in a real way, rather than trying to satisfy myself with just sex, how much more time would he take up? It was a rhetorical question, of course, because the answer could only be all of it.
I found him on one of the benches by the fountain in the center of the atrium and sat down. He didn’t say anything, and I didn’t say anything. I could hear him shifting in his seat, breathing. I could feel his body filling the space next to mine. It was strange—we didn’t even say hi. Maybe it was because we were way past hi. We were probably also way past how are you. Once you’ve seen each other naked—even if you don’t totally remember it—small talk is too small.
Once you’ve asked someone to have sex with you and then climb out your window afterward, small talk is ridiculous.
I couldn’t stop looking at his crotch, thinking about the things the fictional me had done to it. The things my fictional tongue had done to it, with whip cream, with ice cubes.
Finally, when the silence was starting to feel claustrophobic, where if I didn’t say something soon I would suffocate, I turned to him. “You come here often?” I joked. A terrible joke.
“I go to school here,” James said, his voice clearly indicating he was not in the mood. He pulled Lolita out of his backpack and opened to the middle of the book like he was trying to prove it.
I heaved out my laptop and turned it on, my fingers suspended over the keys. Anything to force myself to stay put. It was scary, we were in daylight, in public, and I couldn’t help but wonder if our short, hot history was radiating between us like the heat coming off a range top flipped on high.
Even if other people couldn’t see it, I could definitely feel it.
“I think we need to talk,” I admitted.
“So talk,” he said shortly.
I deserved it. He was a guy who had slept with me and kissed me and then wanted to be with me, and I had tossed that back in his face and said, Only on my terms. He wasn’t avoiding me. He wasn’t telling me he would call me. He was sitting in front of me with eyes like dark, cavernous wells wishing for me to crawl into them.
“I’m sorry about the other night,” I said.
“Which part?” he asked.
“All the parts,” I said, exhaling. “The truth is, I want to be with you, but physically is all I can handle right now.”
“You said that already,” he replied.
“I’m just trying to explain.”
“There’s nothing to explain. I like you.” He paused, waiting for me to respond.
I wanted to say, I like you, too. I wanted to say nothing and kiss his lips till mine hurt in the best way. Instead I said, “I know,” like an asshole, because why admit it if I wasn’t going to let myself do anything about it anyway?
“I also know I can’t like you,” he said, scanning the palm trees growing up out of the fountain. “You won’t let me like you.”
There were so many palm trees here, there was a chance one might be up your butt and you wouldn’t know it. That was what Miami had been to me so far: palm trees and confusing relationships.
“Right,” I said. I looked at his flip-flops, at his bare feet. Perfect pink toes one of Candy’s characters would have said she wanted to suck on.
He stretched his toes. “The thing is, I’m pretty sure you like me, too. But instead, you’re pretending you just want me for my body. Which, don’t get me wrong, normally I could deal with, but there’s something about you, Candice.” His eyes fixed on mine. “Something that deserves more.”
I tried to keep my focus on my laptop screen but failed miserably. “You deserve more, too,” I said.
He concentrated on my lips like he wanted to kiss me. Like he wished we were two other people in another city, without a school between us.
Unfortunately, we were at that school and there were students everywhere. Their own sandals and flip-flops slapping echoes against the cool stone walls.
Unfortunately, there was also me.
He crossed his arms over his chest. “You tell me we can’t be together, but then you’re with me. You tell me you can’t kiss me, but then you kiss me back. You tell me to leave you alone, but then you walk by Buzzers on your way home and tell me you want to have sex with me. Feel free to interrupt and explain your exceptionally confusing behavior at any time.”
“I’m exhibiting confusing behavior because I’m confused,” I said.
“You say confused; I say scared.” I could feel his eyes almost reaching for mine like they were hands, seeing if I would reach back.
“That’s what you wanted to say to me,” I said. “That I’m scared.”
“No,” he said, “you’re the one who wanted to talk to me. Telling you you’re scared is a bonus.”
“Fine,” I admitted, “I am.”
“Now we’re getting somewhere,” he said, tucking a piece of hair behind my ear.
I let him. Let him touch my chin, his fingers slowly moving up to my cheek. For ten seconds I let myself feel what it would be like to totally give in to him, before I pulled away. “It’s not all about this place,” I said quickly. “There are other things keeping us apart.”
I was tired of blaming it all on the University of Miami. It was a reason, but not the real one. I needed to just tell him the truth. I wasn’t ready to be with anyone. Keith had left me with such a messed-up head, that I couldn’t really be with anyone else regardless of the rules.
But if I could admit that to him, open up to him in that way, didn’t it mean I really could?
“Who? Professor Dylan?” he asked, squinting like he knew something.
I felt artic air fill my torso, wondering if James really did know about our almost-kiss, “Keith,” I said, making my words quiet, filling them with their true meaning. “What happened with Keith.”
“Oh,” he said. “So now the grade-A asshole is fucking up my life, too.”
“That’s why he’s a grade-A asshole.” I shrugged.
“I’m nothing like him,” James said.
“You aren’t,” I said, “but I’m nothing like I was before I met him, either.”
“You seem pretty together to me,” he said.
“I am.” I paused. “Just not about this.”
“Where is he now?” James asked.
I examined, unsure why he was asking. “Syracuse University Medical School,” I said.
“Where you went to undergrad with him?”
“Yeah, why?”
James watched me for a moment. I saw his eyes contract in speculation. “Nothing,” he said, turning away from me, “It’s just you’re the one who came here, right, but you say he broke up with you?”
“And?” I asked, but I knew. James meant I was the one who left.
I thought about the character bio I’d written for Keith. Maybe I shouldn’t have been looking for flaws in his character, but in mine. Following your dream is not a flaw, but regardless of everything else that had happened, Keith had probably felt like I deserted him, and James was subtly pointing out I was doing the same thing now.
Forget Fricking Keith keeping me from being with James; it was Fricking Me.
He shook his head�
��a forget it move—and leaned toward me, a smile hitting his lips, “But, like you said, we could still have meaningless sex.”
“I think we both know that’s not possible,” I said.
“Shit. I should have just said yes when I had the chance.”
I laughed, even though I kind of wanted to cry. “You should have.”
I listened to him breathe, watched the side of his face as he contemplated what I said. “I can respect that. I know what it is to be screwed up by someone. You want us to stop this, it’s stopped.”
“Thank you,” I said, almost choking on my words. Hating those words in a new way, because not only were they words of weakness, they were words of fear. He was right—I was scared. I was scared to give myself to someone, even someone who seemed so completely to want me to, even someone who wanted to give himself to me right back.
Maybe I always had been.
“You should have just told me about Keith to begin with,” he said.
“I guess I wanted to see how far to the edge of the diving board I could get without falling in.” It had been true, but it hadn’t been fair to him, to either of us. It also hadn’t really been about Keith at all. And even though it was clear he knew that, too, he was nice enough to still let me use it as my excuse.
“You didn’t fall,” he said. “You jumped.”
“More like I belly flopped.”
“So what do we do now?” he asked, staring at the fountain.
“Act like nothing ever happened?” I shrugged, even though I knew it would be impossible.
“Okay,” he said, batting his eyelashes at me playfully. “I guess now I’m supposed to ask if we can still be friends.”
It was weird. It had been what Professor Dylan had said just days before, but this was different—harder to live with, but necessary. It was friends or lovers. The in between was where things got difficult.
“We were never friends to begin with, so…” I joked, cocking my head sideways.
“Damn, you’re cold,” he said, holding the center of his chest.
“Yes,” I said, “we can still be friends.”
“Maybe we can give that other stuff a shot in another lifetime, Candice,” he said, standing up.
Maybe another time.
Maybe another lifetime.
He walked away from me, backward with both hands up, like he was afraid of what I’d do to him if he didn’t. It was his way of making a joke, but I think we both knew it wasn’t funny.
I also knew that even though it was what my heart thought it needed, it wasn’t really what it wanted, but it wasn’t like those words would come as I watched James literally walk out of my life.
Chapter Eighteen
“You owe me for this,” Mandy said as we got out of her car at Books and Books for Professor Dylan’s reading. Mandy loved books, obviously, but not the kind Professor Dylan wrote, where the romance and sex tended to be an afterthought to the plot rather than the (no pun intended) driving force.
I probably shouldn’t have even asked her to come with me, but I didn’t want to go alone. Correct that, I didn’t want to have to possibly be alone with James, and I didn’t have anyone else to ask. Sure, we were friends now, but how do you do that once you’ve been more than friends? Once you wanted to be more than friends?
Yesterday during workshop, my mind was definitely not on the students as they skewered and poked at each other’s work. It was on what I’d said to James, what he’d said to me. How we were going to try not to say things to each other anymore. Try not to do things with each other anymore.
A skewering was what was waiting next week for me and my piece, and I should have been paying attention to know what to expect. I should have been working on my piece so my expectations could be higher than they were currently, but instead I was going to Professor Dylan’s reading so he could pat my head like a puppy.
So I could prove to him I was the kind of writer he wanted me to be.
We walked into the bookstore. This was not Mandy’s scene: all the English nerds from school and from Miami shoved into one of the last bookstores in the city to celebrate one of the last great authors in the city—the prodigal literary son of the sunshine state.
It was definitely no Eroticon.
“I know, I already owe you,” I said. I did for more reasons than I could list. Mandy had taken care of me in so many ways since I’d come to Miami. A weird combo of mother, sister, best friend, and sex therapist; she was really the only person I could completely count on.
“You do, but don’t worry. I’m keeping a list.”
Even if Mandy didn’t want to be there, she still dressed the part, wearing a light blue linen tank dress and flats. I was in my TA uniform, Capri pants and a tank top covered with a cardigan. It was supposed to seem like I’d come straight from class. Like I didn’t care what I wore, but really I was too afraid to wear anything else. My TA uniform helped remind me who I was—who I needed to be.
Not Candy.
My lack of a cardigan, my switch to jeans, the night at the Cuban joint might have been the whole reason I slept with James in the first place. I’d forgotten who I was. I also couldn’t deny the part the gallon of mojitos had in constructing my blackout.
We headed past the registers and stacked shelves to the reading area in the back. The chairs set up in front of the podium arranged for Professor Dylan were almost completely full.
“He’s got a harem,” Mandy said.
I wasn’t a math major, but it was easy to see almost 80 percent of the seats were filled with girls. Girls, not women; undergrads and grad students like me.
I’d always known he was popular, but this was bordering on Pied-Piper proportions. Would he really have missed me if I didn’t come?
(Very unintended double-entendre alert.)
“No wonder you like him so much.” Mandy whistled, taking in the scene I already had.
“I don’t like him,” I said.
“Whatever, Candy, why else are we here?”
Why was I there? Because Professor Dylan was my faculty advisor and I felt like I had to be, especially after he reminded me about it? Or because I thought I needed to prove to him there was no Candy.
I searched the room. James wasn’t there yet and it was starting in minutes.
“Looking for someone?” Mandy singsonged.
“I’m looking for a seat,” I said.
“A seat with a penis attached to it?” Mandy asked, pushing me playfully.
“Shut up, Mandy,” I said, pushing her back a lot less playfully.
“I know that face, Candy,” she said, wiggling her brows.
“Candy isn’t here right now,” I said, feeling my face tighten.
“No wonder I’m so bored.” She yawned. “Wake me up when Candy can come out and play.”
We found two empty seats without penises attached to them and sat down. Professor Dylan was making the rounds, shaking hands and thanking people for coming. His newest book had been out for two weeks now and was still doing nowhere near as well as his first. I knew because the critics kept talking about it. In addition to being called a “sophomore slump,” the sales had also been called “disappointing.” But that night he didn’t seem to care at all. That night everyone wanted a piece of him, and he was more than willing to give.
I couldn’t stop watching him and I wasn’t even drunk on Mike’s Hard Lemonade. He had an easy charm, was built like a swimmer with long lean muscles tanned from spending more time on the beach than his campus-self gave away. Observing him in his element rather than as an opponent on the other side of his desk reminded me why I was drawn to him in the first place—physically, anyway.
“Close your mouth, Candice,” Mandy whispered.
“Shut up, Mandy,” I said, closing my mouth.
“Candice,” Professor Dylan said, finally reaching me. “I’m so happy to see you.” His voice was genuine. His hand when he shook mine was firm and steady. “Thank you for coming.”
>
Don’t you dare, Candy.
“No problem,” I replied, even though I could feel Mandy next to me squirming at each syllable. I couldn’t help it. I was Candice tonight—the well-behaved, asexual TA.
“Who’s this with you?” Professor Dylan asked, fixing his gaze on Amanda.
“My roommate,” I said. “Amanda,” I added, trying to remind her she’d promised to keep Mandy at home tonight.
I watched as he took her hand.
“Pleasure,” she said, making sure to glance at me when she did. I almost ducked under my seat.
“Are you an avid reader too, Amanda?”
“Oh yes,” she said playing an English-Lit groupie as well as any one of these girls.
“Who’s your favorite author?”
Don’t say it. Don’t say it. Don’t say it, I thought, staring at her with eyes that demanded it, with a nose that breathed it, with lips that gritted it.
“Candy Sloane,” she said.
She freaking said it. My head was dizzy, my mouth dry, my fingers ready to ring her neck; any suspicions Professor Dylan had, had just been given a name.
“Don’t think I’ve heard of her,” he said, touching his broad chin and acting like he was thinking about it.
“You will,” Amanda said, not losing my gaze.
The vote of confidence was great and all, but unfortunately I couldn’t really enjoy it, considering I was about to puke.
Luckily, Professor Dylan moved on to the next group of girls ready to fawn all over him, before he had to see it.
All I needed was for him to look up Candy Sloane. To start being more suspicious than he probably already was.
As soon as he was safely surrounded by scholarly-succubae, I elbowed Amanda. “Are you crazy?” I whispered.
“What? He’s not going to remember. He’s high on his ego right now. Besides,” she admitted, “it’s the truth.”
“I can’t believe you said that, especially after what happened at Eroticon.”
“Nothing happened at Eroticon,” she said. “He never said he saw you, did he?”
“No.” I paused, because he hadn’t. “But it doesn’t mean you can forget the rules. No one can know. No one can ever know.”
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