Fiona openly evaluates me and then joins the men at the table, resting an arm on James’s shoulder. Graham shakes his head and then proceeds toward the refrigerator, placing my beer inside.
“Foster!” Peter shouts, rising from his seat to greet him. “Good to see you.”
“You, too,” Foster says in return. “How was your Christmas?”
“Boring as hell. I couldn’t wait to get back.”
“Understood.” He points an index finger in my direction. “You remember EJ, right?”
“Of course. Her views on Newton’s laws are unforgettable.” He pauses, staring at me in deep thought. “Speaking of, do you think you could do me a favor?”
“Possibly?” I say, unsure.
He leans in closer and points a thumb over his shoulder. “Do you see the guy over there with the red shirt and dark hair?”
I peek at the gathering of men seated at the circular table, identifying the person in question. “Yeah. What about him?”
“I would give my left nut if you could show him your scientific knowledge. That Newton’s law bit is epic.”
“Lance?” Foster questions.
“Yes, the asshole,” Peter answers. “He just took fifty bucks from me, and I’d like to bring his ego down a bit.”
“Consider it done,” I say, amused. “What kind of wager are you thinking?”
“Shit, I don’t know. Just make it good.”
“How about I get your money back?”
“I was kind of hoping for a little more than that.”
“Like what? Should I have him try to lick his own dick?” I ask, totally kidding.
Foster chuckles.
“That could work.” Peter nods his head while rubbing his chin, seriously contemplating the wager.
I laugh. “I’ll think about it.”
Graham joins us with a plastic cup in hand. “You two help yourself to whatever you like. Beer’s in the fridge, and liquor is on the counter next to whatever food Lilliana and her friends brought.”
“Thanks.” Foster turns to me. “Do you want anything?”
“A beer would be great.”
We all disperse. Graham joins the group of girls and hooks an arm around the average-height strawberry-blonde with curly hair, Peter takes a seat at the table next to James, and Foster and I step toward the fridge to get a beer. Once we both have our drinks, I follow his lead and gather around the ongoing card game.
It’s a little after ten in the evening, less than two hours until the New Year, and it’s easy to ascertain that this will likely be a low-key evening of friends, libations, and fun.
“Thanks again,” I utter at Foster’s shoulder.
James deals the cards to everyone at the table.
“For what?” Foster asks.
“The invite.”
“Don’t thank me yet. There’s no guarantee it will be anything memorable.”
I scan the tame playing of cards, observing the content faces of all the guests. “The night is young.”
Over the next hour and a half, I become acquainted with mostly everyone, learning that Graham, Lance, and Peter live in the house together. All of the men, including Foster and James, are chemical engineering majors and have known each other since freshman year. Apparently, it’s a tight-knit class since they spend so much time in labs and doing group projects.
As promised to Peter, I attempt to finagle the fifty dollars back from Lance. I add a bet for him to dip his balls in his own beer and drink it. The latter is not my idea. It’s Peter’s, but I go with it. Thankfully, James, Foster, and Graham silently play their part well, knowing all along that I have the upper hand. The table goes wild when I reveal my knowledge of Newton’s law once again, and it instantly befriends me to everyone. This also helps to open conversation with the group of girls—Lilliana, Graham’s girlfriend of the past three years, and her two friends, who are pleasant, sweet, and getting drunker by the hour.
At fifteen minutes until midnight, Lilliana suggests we all go outside to ring in the New Year. We arm ourselves in our coats, and with drinks in hand, we huddle onto the back porch overshadowed by the faint stars and moon above.
“So, how long have you and Foster been an item?” Lilliana questions me.
Foster is chatting with his friends on the other side of the wooden deck.
“Oh, we aren’t a couple.” I take a sip of my drink. “Just friends. He and I work together.”
“Really? Sorry, I just assumed. He hasn’t brought a girl around in a while. I just figured…”
“Well, there’s nothing to figure.” I gaze up at the stars, dull and almost unnoticeable. This is clearly not the night Van Gogh envisioned when he looked at the sky. I lean in closer to Lilliana and say, “But if you are worried that he might be gay, I assure you that he isn’t.”
“No, I knew he wasn’t gay.” Her focus shifts away from me and toward James and Fiona, who is obviously his girlfriend based on the way they haven’t left one another’s side all evening. “We all know that.” She checks the time on her watch. “Less than five minutes left until we get to start again. I’m going to go and find Graham. It was nice taking with you, EJ.”
“You, too.”
She leaves me, so I’m alone on one side of the porch while everyone congregates at the other end. I take the moment of solitude to gaze above, imagining the painted sky of The Starry Night with myself swimming among its brushstrokes.
Every year at this time, people across the world make resolutions and promises of grandeur to themselves for their betterment. A New Year is literally minutes away, and my wishes remain the same—to live in a world outside of my reality, in a dream of my own making. As graduation draws near, hope for such a dream gradually plunders. Determination can take a person only so far when the visceral truth of reality keeps rearing its ugly head.
Escaping into a dream is just that—a dream.
“Hey, there,” Foster says as he approaches. “It’s almost midnight.”
“So I’ve heard.”
“Do you think you’re ready for the New Year?”
“Probably not, but this one is basically over, so onto the next.”
“Thirty more seconds!” Lilliana shouts with Graham’s arms around her waist.
“C’mon,” Foster says, tugging me toward the group. “Let’s go and join them.”
Surrounded by Foster’s inebriated friends, we count down the remaining seconds until midnight.
When the moment comes where everyone shouts, “One,” in unison, cheers erupt, and people scream, “Happy New Year!” throughout the neighborhood.
We all clink our cups and beer bottles before embracing one another. Whirling around in the crowd, I take in the excitement as couples kiss to celebrate the start of another three hundred sixty-five days.
Time has been reset for everyone.
“Happy New Year, Evelyn,” Foster says close to my ear. Then, he chastely kisses me on my cheekbone.
I tilt my head, connecting my lips with his, and I forget the noise, if only for a second. “Happy New Year, Fozzie.”
Foster’s friends make the rounds, wishing each other well for the impending year. I stay by his side, welcoming hugs from each of them, some even kissing me on the cheek.
James is one of the last of his friends to pull Foster into a hug, laughing about the previous year and some of their many mishaps. When they release each other from their embrace, Foster reaches toward Fiona, James’s girlfriend, with his arms open wide, but he pauses the moment she steps back.
“Happy New Year, Foster,” she says, stiff and cold.
Nodding, Foster lowers his arms. “You, too, Fiona.”
“I’ve decided I’m not going to be angry with you anymore,” she says, James resting an arm over her shoulder. “That’s my resolution—to forgive you.”
“I appreciate that. I hope you know I never meant to hurt you.”
She harrumphs. “Yeah, well, I should have known better. It’s obvio
us you were using me.”
“We should get a drink,” James interjects, tightening his hold on her.
“Did you even care about me at all?” she asks Foster, ignoring James’s suggestion.
Foster’s jaw goes tight.
“That’s what I thought,” she says. “I really was an idiot.” She spares a look at me as I stand at Foster’s side. “Good luck with him. Just don’t expect much. He’s not exactly emotionally available. Corpses have more feelings.”
Fiona turns within James’s arm to leave, but then she pauses in her tracks, glancing over her shoulder at Foster. “By the way, tell Sasha I said hi. I’m sure she’s happier without you.” Fiona lowers her voice as she says, “I certainly am.”
She then leaves our company with James at her side. Foster remains still, his gaze following after them.
“Ignore her,” Graham says to Foster, coming forth once James and Fiona are out of sight. “She’s had way too much to drink, and we all know her motives for…well, what happened between you two, weren’t really the right ones.”
“She’s a vulture,” Lilliana adds. “An opportunist. She’s nothing but a—”
Bitch? That’s the first word that comes to my mind, but what do I know?
“No,” Foster says, giving Lilliana a stern look, shaking his head. “It’s fine.”
“Forget about it,” Graham continues as convincingly as possible. “Let’s get a drink.”
Foster removes the glasses from his face, mindlessly wiping the lenses clean with the bottom of his shirt. “Maybe it’s best that I go.”
“Because of Fiona? No, dude. Stay. The night is still young.”
“Nah.” He returns the frames to his face. “It’s for the best.” Foster peers at me. “Are you ready to go?”
“Sure.” I nod my head, understanding that his need to leave is not to be questioned. Pivoting toward Graham, I say, “Thank you so much for having me. It was great.”
“Anytime, EJ,” Graham replies. “Come by anytime. And you two drive safe.”
“We will,” Foster answers for both of us. “I’ll see you in class in a few days.”
The men nod to one another, and then Foster turns on his heel, creating a path among the remaining guests with me following close behind. We wordlessly make our way through the house and out the front door to where Foster’s car is parked at the curb. I let myself into the passenger side as he rounds the hood and then takes a seat behind the wheel before starting the ignition.
It’s a silent drive along the vacant streets on the early morning of this New Year’s Day. Foster, completely in his own mind and understandably so, keeps his head forward and on the road ahead, never even sparing me a sideways glance.
I don’t ask any questions. I don’t say a word. There’s a time to be quiet, and this is one of them because all sound is just white noise when inner thoughts are the only language one can comprehend.
When he pulls up to the front of my apartment building with the car running, not finding a place to park, it’s clear that we will not be spending the rest of the evening together.
I unfasten my seat belt, gather my purse, and grab the handle to exit.
“EJ?” Foster says as I’m about to open the door. “I’m sorry about tonight.”
“Don’t worry about it. I had a nice time, and your friends are great.” I release my hold on the lever and settle back into my seat. “Are you okay though? I kind of got the hint that something was going on between you and Fiona.”
“It was that obvious?” he asks rhetorically.
“That you two used to go out? Yeah, it’s pretty clear. She wasn’t too thrilled about the way things ended, was she?”
“It was just bad timing.” He stares ahead, out the windshield. “Me and relationships don’t mix. She’s proof of that. I was very…unavailable for her.”
“Well, you’re really busy,” I remind him, thinking of all his extracurricular activities and studies. “I still don’t know how you manage to do it all.”
He laughs softly to himself. “My busyness is a more recent thing. I took up all those activities, including the library job, so I wouldn’t have time to think about her anymore.”
“Fiona?”
Foster shuts his lids. “No. Sasha, my ex.”
I wait for him to say something more. The hum of the running car is the only sound filling the silence. Leaning my head against the warm fabric seat, I observe his features while the stillness echoes. They aren’t tortured or even overly hurt but muted, like the name Sasha somehow resonates a form of emotions vetted so deep into his being that a scar remains.
“How long ago did you two break up?” I finally ask, realizing he might need a little nudging.
Men aren’t known for spilling their guts. It’s like their penises block some forms of speech.
“A little more than a year.” He smiles to himself, contemplating. “You don’t want to hear about this.”
“I don’t mind.” I adjust my positioning so that I’m facing him a little better. “You listen to my crap all the time. You can certainly tell me some of yours. And if you’d like, we could slam our exes together, calling them nasty names while eating ice cream.”
He chuckles. “And paint each other’s toenails?”
“Yes, and watch really crappy romance movies.”
“Sounds like one hell of an evening.”
“Or we could just get hammered and blame it on the New Year.”
“True. There’s always that.”
I palm his forearm. “So, tell me about Sasha, the bitch. I need to know more before I hunt her down and peel back her fingernails, one by one.”
He gives me a you-are-crazy-and-I-really-hope-you’re-kidding look. “That’s really sweet of you.”
“And completely out of character. So, you’d better start talking before my sugary goodness wears off.”
A smile, a genuine one that actually shows some semblance of humor, spreads across his face. “Okay. We were high school sweethearts, and…it sounds pathetic even to say it.”
“Go on,” I encourage, hoping he gathers some momentum.
“I was supposed to go to Duke, but she didn’t get in. So, I came here with her.”
“Wait, hold the phone.” I sit up straighter, intrigued. “You gave up Duke to come here with her? Duke for this place?”
“Yeah. It wasn’t the best decision, but back then, I would have done anything for her.”
“Wow, Foster, you had it bad.”
“No kidding.” He shakes his head. “It was really kind of pathetic.”
“So, what happened?”
“About a year and a half ago, she went to England to study abroad and never came back. She met someone else, and that was that. I came to find out that she had been cheating on me for six months before she decided to tell me about him.”
I blink—a lot. “That’s awful. She really is a bitch.”
“You’re not the first one to tell me that.”
“That’s probably because it’s the truth. What she did was not cool at all.”
“I guess it happens.” He taps the steering wheel a few times with his fingertips. “I didn’t take it very well either. I even flew to England to try to convince her to come back, but she still stayed.”
“Geez,” I mutter. “I don’t even know what to say.”
“There isn’t much to say.”
“Do you still talk to her?”
“No. I talk to her brother often though. Our families are close. Parker was my roommate, but he moved out last year when he graduated.”
“Oh.” I bite my lip, registering and connecting the dots between his ex and his old roommate. “How does Fiona play into all of this?”
“Fiona was a mistake.” He shakes his head, shutting his lids. “After all of that went down with Sasha, I was a mess, but everyone encouraged me to try to get back out there.
“Fiona’s part of the science department, and we’ve all known each other
for some time. She showed interest, and one thing led to another. Before I knew it, we were a couple. But I wasn’t ready. She wanted more in the relationship, and when I couldn’t give it to her, she tried even harder. Eventually, it got ugly, and I said a lot of not-so-nice things, so she would get the hint. It didn’t end well. Between what I went through with Sasha and then with Fiona in the mix, our group all had a rough time. People took sides, and there was a lot of yelling. We’re all friends again now, but it wasn’t like that until recently. I was happy when Fiona moved on with James. It’s a better fit anyhow, but apparently, she still harbors some resentment.”
“Yeah, I caught on to that.”
He positions his torso toward me. “So, there you have it. That’s me. I’m that guy—the one who had his heart broken and now sucks when it comes to relationships. What do you girls call it? Walls? Emotionally broken? Oh, wait, Fiona called it emotionally unavailable.”
I giggle. “Something like that. And you don’t suck when it comes to girls or relationships, Fozzie. You just had a bad string of luck with them.” I cover his hand resting on his thigh with my own. “When you’re ready, the right person will come along.”
“Now, you sound like you’re reciting a line from a movie.”
“Maybe it is a line, but it’s one I truly believe in.”
The first week back to school has gone as expected—full of syllabi, reading lists, assignments, meetings, and picking up various supplies. Not to mention, it’s been filled with boring speeches and lectures from professors with a side of homework. I’ve already gone through the chore of checking in with my advisor in regard to my thesis and confirming that I’m on track to graduate come spring. Everything is set and in motion.
Walking into my art theory class, I’m overcome with a sense of pride. This is an upper-level class, usually only taken by fine art majors, and I worked my way here by following an aggressive track since my freshman year. It’s not typical for an art minor and not unheard of either, but it’s something I aspired to accomplish.
I spy Wolfgang seated at the back table, going through his phone while waiting for the professor to arrive. Meandering through the maze of workspaces and students, I take a seat next to him, setting my bag at my feet.
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