“Nothing really. The whole world is at our feet.” I made the mistake of looking down. “Or at least a lot of gum and cigarette butts.”
“Is this where I quote the puckish optimism of the opening credits of St. Elmo’s Fire?” Quinn asked.
“Ugh, no. Too depressing,” Selah said.
“Even the soundtrack is sad.” Lizzy frowned.
“That’ll never be us. Please swear none of us will become those people.” I stared pleadingly at my friends.
“The eighties are over. Thank God. No more shoulder-pads.” Lizzy adjusted her jean jacket and patted her shoulders.
“It would seem the eighties aren’t over for everyone.” Quinn pointed at a couple of women ahead of us, their hair in full spiral perm and spiked bangs mode.
Or at least I assumed they were women. One turned and I caught a five o’clock shadow. And guyliner.
My eyes bugged out. Selah whistled.
Our laughter burst out of us, simultaneous and in sync.
“Hot,” she mouthed at me. “Hot pirates.”
Gil sat at the end of our row, on the other side of Quinn. Lizzy screamed her declaration of love for Mr. Ferry in my ear for the first two songs. Selah bummed a hit off of the guys next to her, and got invited to another party. One of them looked like he probably dressed up like Robert Smith and went to dance clubs. His friend tried to pass me the joint, but I waved him off. “I’m trying to quit.”
He gave me a raised eyebrow and a shoulder shrug.
Quinn leaned closer. “Have you ever smoked pot before?”
I shook my head no.
“Didn’t think so.” He slung his arm over my shoulder. “We’ll add it to your list of things to do at college.”
“I have a list?”
“You should. This is your chance to explore. Kiss boys. Kiss girls. Have lots of wild sex before your boobies droop.”
I instinctively covered my chest.
“Ha, ha. You have nothing to worry about. My dear roommate seems fascinated with them.” His arm tightened, pulling me into a one armed hug.
I wasn’t sure if I should apologize for my breasts or beam over them having an admirer.
When the opening notes of “More than This” started, I thought Lizzy would pass out from too much joy. We all knew the words and belted them out like old crooners, but mostly off key and pitchy. The exception was Gil. His deep, smooth voice did something funny to my skin, making it all tingly and warm.
Off limits, I reluctantly reminded myself.
Quinn was right.
Friendship before hormones.
Selah Elmore, 19
I’m majoring in men.
That’s not a major?
Fine.
Art history and aesthetics.
First year.
If you could change one thing about college so far, what would it be?
I’d skip to senior year. I’m tired of being too young. Sure, I can vote now, but I still can’t drink . . . legally. I can join the military, but most places won’t rent me a car. I can get birth control, get married, have kids, but I’m still a teenager. I’m bored of people reminding me how young I am. I know who I am and what I want.
“You Got It (The Right Stuff)” ~ New Kids on the Block
We returned from winter break and fell back into the same habits we’d established in the fall quarter. Maggie’s roommate, Jennifer, continued to pine over both Gil and her boyfriend at home. As a result, Maggie spent a lot of time in our room with Lizzy and me.
Thankfully, Gil hadn’t succumbed to the weekly brownie bribes left at his door. Instead, he saved them for movie night after having his friend in the chem lab test them for drugs and scan them for shards of metal. A guy couldn’t be too careful.
I liked Lizzy. She was the light to my dark, which didn’t even really make sense because we both had dark hair. Her optimism and enthusiasm could’ve been extremely annoying. She always hoped for the best and saw the good in people. At times, it was like living with Jeannie in her bottle. So much optimism. So much sunshine. I doubted she had a weird side.
At least until I discovered her secret.
I’d ditched lunch and found her in our room singing that right stuff song by New Kids on the Block at the top of her lungs. Not my taste, but I couldn’t turn on the radio without hearing one of their songs.
It wouldn’t have been that bad. Annoying, but not even a big deal . . . if she weren’t holding a Donnie Wahlberg doll as a microphone.
I screamed, “Busted!”
A hard plastic man body hurt when flung at someone’s head. The someone being me.
“I’m blind,” I screamed, covering my temple where Donnie had beaned me.
She turned off the music, then clutched her chest as her eyes filled with tears that clung to her ridiculously long lashes. “Are you okay? Are you really blind? Did Donnie take out your eye? I’ll never forgive myself if I blinded you.”
I moved my hand and slowly blinked. It stung, but I could see a blurry her. Closing my good eye, I focused on clearing my vision. “I don’t think I’ll need an eye patch.”
“Oh, thank God!” She wrapped her thin arms around me in a claustrophobic hug.
“I’m fine, really. If I lost an eye and had to get an eye patch, I could rock it like a pirate.”
Her exhale brushed against my cheek. “I’m so sorry, but you would make an awesome pirate.”
Our laughter moved the moment past the pain and awkwardness to a place where I could ask the question I really needed to know the answer for.
“Why Donnie?”
“Why Donnie what?”
“Isn’t he the lesser cute guy of the New Kids? I mean, why not have the Jordan Knight doll or the other cute one?”
“Joe? They’re all cute. That’s the point of a boy band.”
“Like Menudo? I couldn’t tell you a single one of those guys’ names except Ricky Martin. In fact, I couldn’t pick them out if there were six guys in our room and five of them were the other guys from Menudo.”
“Charlie, Ray, Robi, Roy, Raymand, and Ricky.”
I stared at her, stunned. I had no words.
“I also like Milli Vanilli.”
Still stunned. She had appalling taste in music, but I couldn’t say anything because it would make me a bitch. Then again . . .”You have terrible taste in music.”
Her bottom lip pouted out and she nervously tucked her hair behind both ears, making herself resemble a little brown mouse. Or a baby hedgehog. “I do not. Just because I don’t like all the dark, never see daylight, brood in an unlit corner music like you.”
I laughed. “Yeah, pretty much describes me in high school. I like other kinds of music now, too.”
“Name one pop singer or song you like.” I swore her foot tapped as she waited.
“George Michael.”
“Let me guess. ‘I Want Your Sex?’”
Obviously. “I like some of his other songs, too. Like the one about the daddy issues. Very hot.”
“We’ll have to agree we like different music. Like we like different . . .” She paused and looked up, thinking. “We like pretty much different everything, but we still get along.”
Of course she was right. I shouldn’t have judged her. “You can listen to New Kids. Maybe I’m missing out.” Leaning over, I picked up the Donnie doll. “I mean, look at his abs. Does he always go around shirtless?” I tucked his faux leather flag jacket back on his shoulders.
Her voice lowered to a whisper. “Uh . . . no, he came with a shirt.”
“You pervert! Where’s his shirt?” I ran my nail down the sculpted ridges of his little six squares of plastic ab muscles.
“I thought he looked better without it.” She grabbed the doll out of my hand and tossed him in her bottom drawer.
“You know most of us keep our porn in that drawer.”
Her hair whipped around her shoulder as she spun to gape at me. “You have porn in our room?”
I
shrugged. “I’m calling it research for my biology of human sexuality section this spring.”
“Your professor assigned porn? I know this is a liberal arts school, but honestly? Couldn’t he get in trouble?”
“Lizzy, our mascot looks like a penis.”
“It’s a regional shellfish!” A blush climbed up her cheeks.
“Plus, they have huts in the thousand acre woods where students go to have sex or do drugs. Sometimes at the same time.”
“That’s not the point of the tree houses.”
“It might not be the intended use, but the administration looks the other way. Plus, pot is illegal. Porn isn’t. We’re all adults here.”
“What kind of porn are we talking about? Magazines, right? Or do you have a stack of VHS tapes in there?”
“You sound curious. Want to see?” She would be disappointed if she were hoping for videos. Opening my bottom drawer, I pulled out the one magazine I had.
“You have Playgirl?” She delicately plucked it from my hands like it might be dirty or germy.
“You’re about to be sadly disappointed.” I sat on my bed and patted the bedspread. “It’s not as sexy as I’d hoped.”
She flipped to a random page of a naked guy on a horse. Bareback. His mostly limp penis peeked out behind his thigh like a scared turtle. Another flip of the page revealed the centerfold. More life existed in that penis, but it was a weird purple color.
“This is supposed to turn us on?” Her voice held nothing but confusion.
“I think so.”
“Do you, uh, get turned on by this?” She flipped more pages.
I reclined against the wall. “Are you excited?”
“Not really. I haven’t really seen more than penises in art.”
“Not in person?”
She shook her head. “Not really.”
“Have you touched one?”
“Oh sure, but it was dark. I didn’t really get a good look.” She held the magazine up to her nose. “I don’t think I realized they’d be different colors, like mauve and purple.”
“Or puce,” I added, helpfully.
“Green?” She shrieked.
“No, puce is a shade of purple.”
“Sounds like puke.” Another dimly lit and softly focused picture of a naked man in front of a fire caught her attention. “What’s the point of Playgirl?”
“I think it’s a man’s idea of what women want.”
“Maybe they should have asked us.”
“If you want real porn for inspiration, you should read erotica.” I pulled the bottom drawer open again. “Erica Jong. Or Anaïs Nin. She’s the queen of sexy lit.”
Lizzy picked up my worn copy of Delta of Venus. Turning the pages, she opened her eyes wide. “Oh, wow.”
“Much better than the Purple Trouser Snake.”
“Knock, knock.” Quinn spoke the words, rather than actually knocked. He stood on the threshold. “What are you two up to? Want to grab some food in the . . .” His words trailed off.
I followed his gaze to the Playgirl sitting on my bed.
“You two were looking at boy porn without me?”
I quirked my eyebrow at him. “I believe the title clearly states it’s for girls.”
“Shh, semantics.” He picked up the magazine and sprawled on my bed. “I found my mother’s stash in high school.”
“You can take it. Keep it, please,” Lizzy pleaded. “Honestly, those things kind of freak me out.”
“Why do you have it then?” Quinn asked.
“It’s not mine!” She waved her hands as if trying to shoo it farther away from herself. “It’s Selah’s. For biology of human sexuality.”
“Uh, huh. With Professor Driscoll?”
I nodded.
“He assigned you porn?”
“I asked the same thing!” Lizzy grinned at me.
“Not really, but the class is super boring. I decided I’d do my own research.”
“The man is a hundred and two. He probably invited women back to look at naughty etchings when he was younger.” Quinn rolled up the magazine and tucked it under his arm.
“I’m worried he’ll keel over when we get to the part of the class where we discuss actual fucking.” I shooed them out of the room ahead of me. “That might make things interesting.”
“This Charming Man” ~ The Smiths
PROFESSOR DRISCOLL DIDN’T keel over. More like fell. He slipped on some ice and tumbled down his driveway, breaking his leg the last week of January. He would be out of the classroom for the rest of the winter quarter. Instead of canceling our section, the department brought in a doctoral grad student from University of Washington to finish out the term.
The day Jason Vincent, soon to be Dr. Vincent, walked into class was a blessing and a curse.
Blessing: no biology grad student should have ever been that hot.
Curse: no biology grad student, who was also my professor, should have ever been that hot.
He had curly . . . no, wavy brown hair hanging over his glasses. Pale skin, probably from spending all his time in biology labs. Broad shoulders and long legs. His torso made the perfect V shape, obvious even under his boring professor garb. He appeared to have perfect proportions according to Da Vinci’s calculations. Jason Vincent was a perfect specimen of a man.
Making everything worse—for me at least—he continued Professor Driscoll’s routine of starting off each class with a dirty limerick correlating with the day’s subject.
About sex.
Most of them were goofy and embarrassing like someone’s uncle telling off-colored jokes at the family table during Christmas dinner after too much spiked eggnog. We could tell Driscoll wrote them ahead of time.
A week into his tenure, the poems changed. Shorter, and dirtier, I knew without a doubt they came from Jason Vincent, who had a very dirty mind.
There once was a girl named Simone
Who spent most of her time alone . . .
Pretending to take notes, I wrote down “seduce Dr. Vincent” in my calendar. Then drew a row of stars next to it, prioritizing it.
When he finished his lecture about the anatomy of testicles, I waited until everyone left to approach his lectern where he stuffed his notes into a well-worn leather satchel.
Noticing me, he gave me a small smile. “Can I help you, Miss Elmore?” He wiped off the drawing of a side view of balls from the white board behind him, leaving a faint pink ghost outline of scrotum for the next class.
“I was wondering if you offer private tutoring?”
“Are you having trouble keeping up with the material?” He opened his grade book. “You seem to be right in the middle of the curve on the quizzes.”
Of course Driscoll graded on a curve.
“I want to do better than average.”
“Are you thinking of majoring in biology?”
Anatomy maybe, particularly his. “No, I’m more of a visual person.”
“Aesthetics?”
“Something like that. Maybe art history? We don’t really have majors here, more like concentrations.”
“Sorry. I’m not really used to how things work around here.”
“I could show you.” Mine. Then he would show me his. If I remembered kindergarten, that was how things progressed.
He studied me, his blue eyes calculating behind his glasses. Astute was the word for his expression. Shrewd.
“You could show me where I can get coffee on campus. Someone said something about a red square.”
I smiled at his confusion. “That’s the center of campus. The big red plaza near the clock tower? It’s not a communist nod to Mother Russia in case you were worried. The pavers are red.”
“I wasn’t worried, but thanks for the clarification.” He slung his bag over his shoulder. “Lead the way, and we’ll talk as we walk.”
During our five-minute trip across campus from LAB II to the quad, I dissuaded him from the idea of a group study session twice. “I thi
nk meeting in your office, one on one, would work better. At least before the research project outlines are due.”
He choked and coughed. “Research projects?”
“No research? I figured there would be because this is a science section. Won’t there be a lab, or experiments, or some sort of team project?”
His eyes focused on something above my head. “Experiments?”
“With a lab partner, I assumed.”
He let his gaze settle on my face, but still didn’t quite meet my eyes. “Experiments and lab partners? In a class about sex?”
“Am I totally wrong?” I knew this was preposterous. I’d read the syllabus. There wasn’t a lab associated with this class. Or a research paper. In fact, the whole class was pass or fail. Come on, biology of human sexuality in college? Clearly, most of the experimenting would be done as independent study. I batted my lashes at him.
His eyes drifted down to my chest for a brief instant. He fought it, but I’d piqued his curiosity. Maybe his libido, too.
“You’re kidding, right? I know this is a liberal school, but Professor Driscoll said nothing about any of this. Hell, the limericks are even crossing the line for most colleges.”
“The limericks are my favorite part.”
“Of course they are,” he mumbled.
“Are you okay, Dr. Vincent?”
“I’m not a doctor. Yet. I have to finish my research and dissertation.”
“Then what should I call you?”
“Mr. Vincent sounds like my dad, but Jason feels too informal inside the classroom.”
“We’re not in class now.” I stepped closer to him. Close enough I could smell his cologne. He wore Polo. How preppy of him. “A lot of faculty go by their first names around here. Something about breaking down the hierarchy of learning and knowledge.”
“Okay.”
“Okay what?”
“You can call me Jason.”
“And you can call me Selah.” Before I lost my nerve, I handed him the folded paper with my phone number. I pointed at the doors in front of us. “Coffee’s in there. It’s not great, but it’s hot.”
We Were Here: A New Adult Romance Prequel to Geoducks Are for Lovers (Modern Love Stories Book 1) Page 5