by Melody Anne
He didn’t seem to catch the annoyance in the words as they tumbled out. Giving me a smile the size of Texas, he pointed at my book bag. “You wouldn’t happen to have an extra pen, would you? Mine appears to be plumb outta ink.”
He shook the pen in his hand and we watched as it escaped his clutches and flew across the room, smacking a girl sitting across the aisle in the cheek. She grabbed her face and turned in our direction. I quickly returned my gaze to my laptop. Holding my breath, I felt Clint’s body tense beside me. I waited a few moments before risking a glance up. The girl had returned to her computer, but her shoulders remained tight, in a way that made me suspect she wouldn’t excuse a second pen to the face.
Without warning, a giggle erupted from my mouth. Clint’s shoulder vibrated against mine as he wiped a tear from one of his spectacularly clear blue eyes.
“Oops,” he said when he’d regained his composure. “So, I guess that means now I really need a pen.”
“Wait. You mean you didn’t actually need one before?”
“No.” His face reddened and he gave me a half smile. “I just wanted to talk to the pretty girl in the corner.”
“Oh.”
I tried to form something more cohesive than that one word, but my brain had trouble conveying any sort of language to my mouth.
I turned back to my computer and Clint nudged my shoulder. “So . . . do you have a pen?”
“Oh. Right.”
I reached for my bag. The leather strap slid through my damp palms and the bag crashed onto the floor, spilling the contents across both my and the cowboy’s feet.
“Dammit.” Bending over to grab everything off the floor, I was grateful that, with my head bowed, Clint hopefully couldn’t see the heat creeping up my cheeks.
I stiffened as I spotted a tampon between the boots beside me. Holding my breath, I tried to determine how to get it back without Clint noticing me reaching between his legs.
Walking my hands across the cold floor, I shifted until my butt was almost off my chair and my fingers grazed his leather-clad toe. I swooped to grab the offending article, but Clint beat me to it. The bright pink packaging disappeared into his palm and I watched, wide-eyed, as he lifted it to his face.
Without a word, I snapped up in my chair and whisked it out of his grasp and into my bag in one move. I returned for the rest of my possessions on the floor, avoiding meeting his eyes. If he said anything, I decided I’d rather not see what it was.
After a few more moments of scraping the floor, I emerged with the rest of my stuff and a dirt-tinged hand. Shoving the items back in my bag, I grimaced at my palm before wiping it on my jeans. I handed Clint the pen, sure my face had to be redder than that of a prepubescent kid in sex ed class.
“Thanks,” Clint said when I finally gathered the courage to look in his direction. “What’s this?”
I groaned when he held up Reggie’s copy of the first Viking Moon book.
“It’s a book.” I grabbed it and shoved it back into the bag. “If you don’t know what one of those is, American Lit might not be the class for you.”
My chair shook with his laughter. “I meant, what’s it about?”
“You’ve never heard of the Viking Moon series?”
He shook his head and I settled back in my seat, my breathing finally returning to some semblance of normalcy.
“It’s a series of books for teens. About Vikings.”
“Vikings doing what?”
Clint leaned back in his chair, his eyes never leaving my face. I glanced at the front of the room. Our professor was talking to a perky blonde, her head bobbing and her hand on his wrist. He shook her off and rubbed his neck, but she slid closer.
Turning back to Clint, I released a sigh. “It’s about two feuding Viking families. And a teenage boy and girl from each family are in love with each other. It’s like Romeo and Juliet. But, you know, with Vikings.”
Clint wrinkled his nose like I had dragged a bag of rotting garbage across his lap. “There’s no cowboys, or horses, or duels at dawn?”
“Well, they’re Norsemen from, like, the 800s, so no.”
“And people read this crap?”
I crossed my arms and huffed. “Yes, they do.”
I returned my attention to Professor Creed. He guided the blonde back to her seat, a hand against the small of her back. Her mouth continued to move, even as he backed away to his desk.
Clint pulled a ball of lined paper out of his pocket. As he unfolded it, I saw it was covered with messy writing. He flipped through the creased pages till he found a blank one and proceeded to flatten it with his palm.
I looked at the sea of laptops around us, then back at him. “You’re taking notes by hand?”
“Yup.” He nodded. “No one appreciates the written word anymore. Everything is computers and machines. I believe there’s something beautiful about handwriting.”
He scrawled the date at the top of the page and I held my breath to suppress a giggle. There was nothing beautiful about his handwriting.
I opened my mouth to reply and sensed a shift in the room as everyone faced forward. Following their lead, I aimed my gaze at Professor Creed, who had already started his lecture. I hit the Record button on my app before turning back to my computer. Making sure the cowboy was lost in the lesson, I closed the blank document and flicked through pictures of Gavin Hartley online.
I stopped on a still from his last movie, in which he’d played a firefighter. His pants hung low around his hips, with only red suspenders keeping them up. Over his shoulder he carried an ax, much the same way I’d imagine Dag would carry one. He had a boyish face—the product of being only twenty-one—with deep blue eyes and chiseled cheeks.
Obviously, he visited the gym more than my annual treks that were required to maintain the façade of using my membership. His well-defined chest sloped into a ridged stomach. The sweat glistening against his torso accented each and every curve, including the V that extended along his hips and beneath the waist of his pants.
I fanned myself with Reggie’s book and crossed my legs. Chewing my lip, I clicked through photo after photo of the movie star.
In one month, I would have the chance to meet the man of my dreams—literally. Except he’d be expecting someone else entirely. And I had no idea how to be her.
One month wasn’t nearly enough time.
After class ended, I shrugged my book bag over my shoulder and slipped past Clint, who was still trying to catch up writing his notes. I walked carefully down the steps toward the front of the room, determined not to repeat yesterday’s beanbag episode by not paying attention.
Reaching into my bag, I pulled out a novel and bit my lip.
This was dumb. This was the stupidest thing I could do. I needed to leave.
I turned to make my way back up the stairs and someone tapped me on the shoulder. I spun around, and my mouth froze in what had to be an incredibly unattractive open position.
“Is that mine?” Professor Creed asked.
“Huh?”
“Your book. Is it mine?” He plucked the novel out of my hand. It was Carnivore’s Teeth, my favorite of his, and the last one he’d written.
I licked my lips. “Uh, yeah. I was hoping you might sign it? I mean, if that’s okay, Professor Creed.”
“Duncan, please.” He smiled again. “And of course I’ll sign it. What’s your name? I promise I’ll try to remember everyone’s names by the end of the semester.”
“Elise,” I said. “Elise Jameson.”
The smiled dropped from his face. His speech slowed to an embarrassing pace. “Oh, Elise. My goodness. They told me about you. Why were you sitting all the way at the back? You should be up front.”
Great. He thought I was some idiot who required special attention.
“Well,” I said, clearing my throat. “When you can’t hear, it doesn’t matter how close to the front you are. Besides, I read lips pretty well, and I have an app that takes dictation
for me. It’s fine.”
Glancing down at his book, he nodded and opened the cover. He said something, but I had no idea what it was, as he was bent so far over the book, I couldn’t quite make out the shape of his lips.
I shifted from one foot to the other as he wrote. His handwriting was smooth and clear, with a little script, but letters straight enough to make them look masculine. Exactly the type of writing I would’ve expected from him.
He straightened and pushed his glasses up his nose before he handed me the book.
“Thanks,” I said, hoping he hadn’t said anything of major importance while he’d been scribbling, like all the answers for the final exam or something.
“You’re welcome, Elise.” He stood there staring at me like I was supposed to say something else.
I rose to the balls of my feet, trying to come up with something brilliant to prove I was more than a crazed fan. To somehow verbalize how his magnificent stories ripped me from the blackness of my accident and poured me onto the pages of the worlds he created. He made me realize writing could be an escape and a way to heal. He changed my life.
I flicked my gaze to the clock on the wall. Oooh boy . . . A full minute had now passed and I still hadn’t said anything. Way to bring the awkward, Elise.
“Well . . . see you,” I said, bounding out of the room without looking back.
A strong hand reeled me sideways as I entered the hallway, and I found myself face to chest with the cowboy. I peered up at him in surprise.
“Sorry if I startled you, darlin’.” He held a pen up. “I just wanted to give you your pen back.”
“Oh.” I took a slow breath, willing my heart to return to a somewhat normal rhythm. “Thanks.”
I shoved the pen and Professor Creed’s book back into my bag and started down the hall, only to find Clint matching pace beside me.
“Uh, can I help you?”
He rubbed his neck, his eyes scanning the hallway before settling on me. “I overheard you talkin’ to the professor back there. Are you really deaf?”
“Yes, I am. Why?”
“Wow.” He pushed his hat back off his forehead. “I had no idea. I’m sorry. Why didn’t you say anything earlier?”
“It’s not exactly something I want to tell everyone the first time I meet them. I’m pretty good at lip-reading, so I can get along without that awkward conversation.”
Pushing open the door, I squinted when the sunlight infiltrated the dark hallway. A flurry of activity dominated the quad as students rushed from building to building. I took a deep breath and stepped into the light. I wasn’t sure I’d ever get used to walking directly into a crowd instead of away from it.
I pulled the crinkled map out of my pocket and shaded my eyes with my free hand, trying to differentiate one building from another among the badly drawn boxes.
A hand waved in front of my face and I sighed as I looked up at Clint.
“Where you tryin’ to get to?” he asked.
The sun beat down on us with fiery fists, making my head feel as though my hair might go up in flames at any moment. I ogled his giant hat, a jealous twinge in my belly.
“Victoria A Building,” I said. “I have history next.”
The light caught the blue of his eyes and he squinted before pulling his hat farther down. “I have a bunch of classes near there. I can show you the way, if you like. It ain’t far.”
“Thanks.” I folded the map and shoved it into the back pocket of my jeans “So, where are you from, Clint? You don’t seem like you’re from here. Not a lot of Southern drawls in Fernbrooke.”
“How do you know I have a drawl?”
“I guess I just assumed. The hat. The boots. The way you shape your words when you speak.”
He turned right and I followed him past a beige building. Students sprawled across the front steps, laptops open. Some had cigarettes dangling out of their mouths. A boy in a hoodie who must’ve been positively sweltering pulled a silver flask out of his bag and took a nip. As he slipped the contraband back into his bag, he saw me and winked. I returned my focus to Clint.
“. . . not actually a cowboy,” he said.
“What?” I stopped in the middle of the path and someone slammed into my back. I muttered an apology, but that didn’t stop the boy from tossing a profanity at me over his shoulder. Clint started after him, but I grabbed his wrist to pull him back.
“Totally my fault,” I said. “It usually is. I’m not exactly the most graceful person ever. So, what’s this about you not being a cowboy?”
Clint eyed the boy who’d cursed at me as he disappeared around a corner. Then the cowboy turned back to me and shrugged. “I like cowboys. I always wanted to be one. But I’m actually from Chicago. About as un-country as you get.”
I laughed and we started walking again, rounding another building and heading toward a cluster of trees. “Why would you come to Fernbrooke U, then? You have great schools out that way.”
“None of ’em have Duncan Creed,” he said.
“I thought you didn’t like books without cowboys.”
“I make an exception for him.” He made a sharp turn and we left the blessed shade behind. He stopped at the entrance to one of the brown buildings and waved toward the sign on the lawn. “This is Victoria A Buildin’.”
“Thanks,” I said, making my way up the steps, Clint right on my heels. “I appreciate it. I’ll see you next week in American Lit?”
His eyes smoldered beneath the shadow of his hat. “That seems like a mighty long way away. Would you wanna get together sometime before that? You can explain why I’m wrong about your Viking books.”
I opened my mouth and closed it again, scanning his face. Did he just ask me out? How in the world did that happen? I could imagine Jin insisting I jump the hot cowboy. But I hadn’t been on a date since before I’d attempted regular high school, and that had been a disaster, due to my inability to behave like a sane person when it came to boys.
Taking a backward step, I grimaced as the doorknob pressed into my spine. “I . . . um . . . I . . . maybe?”
Way to win at life, Elise. This gorgeous—albeit strange—man actually asks you out, and you come up with “maybe.” Jin threw a freaking fit inside my head.
“Maybe.” Clint’s chest expanded as he took a breath. “Well, that’s good enough for now. I’ll find a way to turn it into a yes.”
He winked at me and started down the stairs.
I opened the door and slipped into the refuge of the building. I leaned against the wall and closed my eyes, wondering if the real me really was out cold in a hospital somewhere. Life had just gotten seriously weird.
I spent the rest of the week learning how to weave seamlessly through campus, without making friends with any more cowboys or garnering the attention of another teacher. When I wasn’t in class and Reggie was out, I banged out some of the first draft of the new Viking Moon. I gritted my teeth against each phrase, and stumbled around characters I was pretty sure I knew better.
The other books had come so easily, as though my fingers wrote them with barely any input from me. But this one seemed harder somehow. I chalked it up to an unwillingness to say good-bye to characters who had become such an integral part of my life. It was like knowing I was going to bury my best friend soon. A dull ache accompanied every single word.
Hunched over my laptop on Saturday night, I bit my lip as I tried to determine what exactly was wrong with the scene. Dag was fighting, as usual, against Thora’s brothers. In the previous book—the book everyone had lined up for—he’d pushed Thora’s older brother Elof off a cliff, resulting in Thora running away heartbroken and her remaining brothers out for blood. It was a perfect setup for the finale, and should have made it easy to write. But nothing came easy, it seemed.
I jumped as a hand waved in front of my face and I slammed my laptop closed. Reggie peered down at me, her face scrunched as she eyed the closed computer.
“What are you doing?” she ask
ed.
“Nothing,” I said. “Just a report for American Lit. What’s up?”
“A couple people in my English class mentioned there’s an open mic poetry night at the café on campus. I thought you might want to come.”
Bad poetry. Crowds. Small talk. I’d rather walk barefoot on the sun.
“Um, it’s not really my thing, but thanks.”
Reggie pulled my computer off my lap and dropped it on the bed. She took my hand and started to pry me from the mattress.
“No,” she said. “You’ve spent enough time in here on your computer. This is college, Elise. It’s supposed to be the time of our lives when we go out and have fun and do stupid things we regret the next day, but tell as stories to our grandkids to prove we were once cool. What are you doing here if you aren’t willing to try new things?”
I bit back a sigh and let Reggie pull me up. She had a point. I could picture my parents and Jin telling me it was time to leave my room and become a member of the actual human race. Besides, how many people went to poetry readings on a Saturday night anyway? We’d probably be the only ones there.
“Fine, fine,” I said. “I give.” I eyed her ensemble of green peasant skirt and white blouse. “Should I change? What does a person wear to one of these things anyway?”
Reggie stood back and studied my outfit of black turtleneck over black jeans as though I were a painting in a gallery. “Actually, I think that is kinda perfect. You’ll fit right in. Come on.”
While summer still laid claim to the days of September, the night belonged to the fall. I closed my eyes and inhaled the cool air before following Reggie down the path from our dorm. The musty smell of leaves wafted around us.
“Do you know where this place is?” I asked.
She surveyed our surroundings. “I think so. A girl from English said it’s near the Lit buildings.”
She released my fingers and combed her hand through her hair. We walked without speaking for a while, both of us focusing on the buildings and seeking out recognizable objects around us.
“So,” I said, realizing I hadn’t taken much time to learn about my roommate since school started, “where are you from, Reggie?”