“Oh, just answer the damn thing,” she huffed.
“But Lydia,” I said. “If we need to talk—the 21st century has also provided us with a little thing called ‘voice mail.’”
“I’m not ready to talk to you,” she replied. So I answered the phone.
“Hello?” A woman’s voice, a crisp English accent. “May I speak to Amy Haskel?”
“This is she.” I furrowed my brow.
“My name is Maya Butler, and I’m with the Rothemere American Institute—”
“The what?”
She chuckled indulgently at the Yankee. “At Oxford.”
“Oh.” Oh. Oxford. On the phone with frickin’ Oxford and I’d already managed to make myself sound like an idiot.
“I’m organizing a colloquium this summer on behalf of St. Catherine’s College about Women and the Classics. Your thesis advisor, Dr. Yousef Burak, submitted to us an abstract of your paper on—er—” she fumbled over the words “—‘Chicks with Styx.’”
He had? He hadn’t told me that. “I, um, really need a new title.” Great, Amy. Continue to impress. I’d been so punchy the evening I’d decided that was hilarious.
“Well, yes, we shall have to work on that,” she said, her tone indulgent. “We were curious when the paper will be complete.”
She was calling me from Great Britain to ask me that? “It’s due on the fifth.”
“Marvelous! In that case, we’d be delighted to extend an offer for you to present it at our conference.”
You what? I caught myself from shouting that into the phone. Lydia was growing silently frantic at my side.
“Hello, Amy? Are you still there?”
“Yes. Sorry. I was just—present my paper? In England?” I gaped at Lydia! So much for her letter theory.
My roommate, to her credit, squealed and bounced to her feet.
“Yes,” said Maya Butler. “Now, the conference is at the end of June. As a presenter, your entrance fee and housing at St. Catherine’s will be gratis, but unfortunately, we cannot provide airfare, so …”
I listened as she laid out the rest of the offer, but my mind had already started to race way ahead. England. Oxford. An hour from London. The Thames. The Tower. The West End. And England! I could travel around afterward. Stonehenge. Jane Austen’s house. Stratford-upon-Avon. Bath!
Amy. Focus. A conference. A weeklong conference. And me … presenting? On classics? But I didn’t even speak Latin!
No, I could do this. This was amazing. I was totally going to kill my professor for not giving me a heads-up, but still …
“… I can e-mail you all the other information you’ll need.”
“And I can e-mail you my thesis,” I replied. “Thank you so much!”
When I hung up, Lydia squealed again and hugged me. “Tell me everything. I only got to hear your end and … well, no offense, hon, but you need some speaking practice before you go to England. What are they teaching you in this secret society of yours?”
I squeezed her back. “Shut up, I was never on the debate team.” I pulled away. “So does this mean you’re done being mad at me?”
“Not even a little,” Lydia said with a laugh. “But there’s a moratorium. We have to celebrate!”
Jamie was in class until six, so I left a message with him to meet us at the Diggers’ favorite bar and took off with Lydia, who’d left a similar message with Josh (sans the “Diggers’ favorite” part). As it was Monday night, the large, split-level, wood-lined bar was relatively empty. Clarissa and Odile had already commandeered our usual spot, a vast, circular booth of dark leather, and were blowing off post-interview steam by splitting a pitcher of Rose & Grave’s signature drink, the 312. They beckoned us over right away, and we’d hardly gotten settled in our seats when Jenny and Harun arrived, together as always. I still didn’t know what was going on with those two—they swore up and down that there was nothing between them but no one believed that. However, no one had ever caught even a whiff of un-platonic behavior either, and given my track record, I couldn’t start pressing them to define whatever their relationship happened to be.
Not that it deterred others.
“You know what you remind me of,” Odile said to them as they scooted into the booth. “Those sneaky co-stars having an on-set affair who are always so careful not to let anyone photograph them together because they don’t want the paparazzi to have any material by which to draw inferences.”
“You know what you remind me of?” Jenny replied coolly. “The paparazzi.”
Odile: “Touché.”
Clarissa made a sizzling sound through her teeth and motioned for the bartender in a subtle, fluid motion I could practice in the mirror a hundred times and never get right, that I could use in a hundred bars and never draw the staff with the efficacy she managed.
Then again, Clarissa’s tipping was legendary. That might also have something to do with it.
As we gave the man our orders, Lydia turned to Odile and said, “Actually, whatever you’re having looks good. What’s it called?”
“Um …” Odile demonstrated her weakness as an improv player.
“Oh, let her have one,” I said. “Who the hell cares? There’s nothing proprietary about the ingredients.”
“Whatever you say, Demetria,” Clarissa mocked, taking a sip of her 312.
Demetria herself showed up halfway through our first round, along with Ben and Greg.
“You people again?” Ben said, as we scooted over to make room. “Man, it’s like I can’t get away.”
“Not at this bar,” Harun agreed.
Demetria checked out his pint glass. “Is that Guinness?”
“Root beer. On tap.”
“Really?” She waved at the bartender and called, “Same as him. But with SoCo.”
“Ew,” said Odile. “Sweet much?”
“Yes, I am.” Demetria gave a saccharine smile. “As far away as I can get from that stuff.” She pointed at the pitcher of 312s.
“Why?” Lydia asked, all innocence, though her mouth was stained with pomegranate.
“I—” She looked at Lydia. “I didn’t know this was a barbarian thing. I would have brought Shannon.”
“Ooh,” said Odile. “Who’s Shannon?”
Jenny glared at her. “Would you, for once, leave someone’s personal life to themselves?” She took a sip of her soda, and her face softened. “Okay, you’re right. I want to know who Shannon is, too.”
“And how you’ve managed to keep her secret from us,” Clarissa added.
“That’s not allowed, is it?” said Lydia, and I kicked her under the table.
“Oh, look,” said Demetria, pointing away. “Amy’s boyfriend is here.” She still avoided saying his name whenever she could.
The distraction achieved its intended result, and I slid from the booth to meet Jamie at the stair landing. His book bag was slung across his chest, tugging his black T-shirt and twill jacket tight across his shoulders. He also wore a pair of khakis with a tiny tear on the right thigh. Strange how his well-worn wardrobe had somehow become one of his more charming attributes.
“Hey, you,” I said, grinning as he took the stairs two at a time to reach me.
He slipped his arms around my waist and pulled me in close. “I got your message. I’m so proud of you,” he whispered against my neck.
“Thanks,” I said. “So, that’s two weeks down, and only seventy more years I have to create a plan for.”
“One step at a time.” He looked down at me, and a lock of his dark hair fell into his face. “And the next step is to alert all the places you’ve still got applications out. This is a huge update—”
“Party pooper,” I said. “First things first. We drink.”
“I stand corrected.” He pulled his bag off his shoulder. “I came here straight from class, so I’m going to run to the restroom for a moment. Order me something?”
“312?”
He looked over my shoulder at the table
. “You’re drinking those in front of barbarians?”
I smirked at him. “Wanna make something of it?”
He laughed. “What else from D177? By the time you’re done with us, I don’t think there’ll be any secrets left in this society.”
“And that’s a bad thing?”
He didn’t answer. “It may shock you to discover this, but I never actually liked 312s. Get me a gimlet instead?”
“Wow, call the secret society police! What’s a gimlet?”
“You’ve only been to keggers your whole Eli career, haven’t you?”
“So not true.”
“Don’t worry, the waiter will know.” Jamie stopped and searched my face. “Everything okay? You don’t seem as happy as you should be.”
I shrugged. “Michelle skipped her interview, so I’m disappointed.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. I know you had high hopes for her.”
“And you didn’t, I know.…”
“What I thought has no bearing on this, Amy.”
“Oh, please.” I looked away, across the bar.
Then I felt his fingers on my cheek and looked back at him. “It doesn’t. You know what I think, what I’ve thought all along. But I don’t expect us to make the same decisions. Have never once expected it, in fact. And honestly, if I’d been making predictions, I should have guessed you’d do something so …” He paused. “Iconoclastic?”
“Heretical, you mean?”
“Yes. Heretical. My little heretic.” He kissed me. “Forget Michelle. If she couldn’t recognize an offer when she saw it, she doesn’t deserve to become one of the elect. You can accept that much Rose & Grave doctrine, can’t you?”
“But what if the problem is she didn’t know what we were offering? We never say ‘Come be a Digger’ when we call for an interview.”
“If they’re smart, they know.”
“I didn’t,” I said.
“You …” Busted. “… understood you were auditioning for a society, though.”
“Nice save.” I pushed his hair back off his brow.
“It was, wasn’t it?” His hands went back to my waist. “I can be very, very good under pressure.”
“I see that.”
Someone cleared his throat behind us. “You’re blocking the stairs.” Josh. We pulled away from each other and he squeezed by. “I think the phrase I’m looking for is ‘Get a room.’”
“With all the PDA going on in my suite?” I asked. “That’s a mighty glassy house you’re standing in.”
Jamie headed toward the men’s room and Josh took my place next to Lydia in the booth, scooting in so there would be room for me and Jamie. Odile and Clarissa had wandered off somewhere. The waiter returned and we all ordered another round, including Jamie’s gimlet, which turned out to be a subtly green-tinged vodka drink. I took a discreet sip before he got back. Lime. Interesting.
“So what’s this news Lydia’s been hinting at?” Josh asked, and I launched into my full report.
“… And the best thing about it is that it’s this summer. It doesn’t cut into anything I might want to do next year,” I finished.
“Which is?” Jenny asked.
“Not sure yet,” I admitted. Jamie put his arm around my shoulders.
“You really need to get on that,” said Ben.
“Sure,” I said. “I’ll do it in all that spare time I’ve got.”
He held his hands up. “Fine. I’m just saying, what happened to the girl who had her summer internship all lined up the January beforehand last year?”
“I’ve been a bit busy with other stuff.”
“We’ve all been busy, Amy,” said Josh, clearly feeling he owed me no charity after I’d caused a rift between him and Lydia.
And it wasn’t fair, either. Those of us who knew what they were doing next year had been more prepared to actually achieve their goals. My grad school applications had been more of a last-minute effort. No wonder they hadn’t performed as well. And if I hadn’t put as much effort into follow-ups or additional applications since returning from Spring Break, well …
“I’ve been really busy,” I said, slightly more forcefully than necessary. “On top of all your stuff, I had that fun extracurricular activity. Remember? The one where I was stalked, harassed, drugged, and kidnapped?”
Everyone got very quiet. Jamie’s arm tightened around me.
“Uh, Amy …” Jenny began. “You okay?”
Lydia got a cunning look in her eye. “Wait, don’t you all know?”
“Lydia, not tonight,” I said, but she was not to be deterred. After all, I’d screwed her over in front of her boyfriend.
“Darren Gehry called last week. He’s totally out on the streets.”
I gave my roommate the evil eye, but she ignored me and went on. “What was it he said when he called, Josh? Something about ‘boys will be boys’? Sounds like the whole family is taking this ‘rehabilitation’ thing very seriously indeed.”
Jamie dropped his arm and turned to me. “When did this happen?”
“Last Thursday,” Lydia informed him. “You must have just left the suite when he called.”
I was going to kill her.
“Amy!” Demetria said, on cue. “Why didn’t you tell us?”
“Because, like I said, I’ve been busy.” I kept glaring at Lydia, who was about to gold medal in ignoring. “We all have, with—stuff.” Society stuff. Now I understood why knights didn’t bring barbarians to their events.
“We could have made time to talk about this,” Jenny said.
“This is not what we agreed upon, back in Florida.” Demetria was seething. “You need to—”
I cut her off. “I know what I need to do. I need to graduate. I need to fulfill my commitments to my … activities on campus. I do not need to dwell on what happened in Florida right now. I do not need to go down there and what—what? Start giving statements? Get in a protracted fight with the extensive Gehry legal team? Just forget it. I don’t have the time or energy for it. It’s over. I’m never going to see that kid again. I just want to move on and concentrate on the stuff that’s really important.” I cast a glance around the suddenly dead-sober table. “Come on, guys. This is supposed to be my night to celebrate.”
Jamie hadn’t spoken again. I tried to put my hand over his but he snatched it away and threw back the rest of his drink. “You know,” he said after swallowing, “I have some reading I have to do for tomorrow. Sorry to cut this short but I have to run.” He grabbed his bag, gave me a quick peck on the cheek, and scrammed.
If anyone else at the table spoke, I didn’t hear it. I was too busy chasing after my boyfriend.
“Hey.” At the top of the stairs.
“Hey!” By the downstairs bar.
“Hey!” As he slipped through the front door into the New Haven twilight.
He took a few steps down the sidewalk then stopped and turned around. “What do you want me to do, Amy? I have two choices. I could sit there with your friends and explode, thereby justifying their negative opinion of me, or I could leave.”
“And what do you think their opinion is when you split in the middle of that particular conversation?”
He hissed a breath of air through his teeth. “Okay, you got me. But what do you want me to do? Darren called you again, and again your friends knew before me.”
“They were standing in the room with me!” I argued. “Josh practically ripped the phone out of my hands.”
He stared at me for a long moment. “None of this signifies. Your friends and me—it’s not the point at all. The real question is, what are you going to do about this?”
“How about nothing?”
“How about that doesn’t sound remotely like you?”
How about I don’t have time! If I get obsessed with punishing Darren, then everything else will slide. What was I going to do about him? Screw that! What was I going to do about Jamie after graduation? What was I going to do about my future? What in the w
orld was I going to do about tap now that I’d lost Michelle? Why couldn’t I just have one evening to rest and relax and be happy about the colloquium?
“The Amy I know would never let him get away with this. You made a deal—a stupid deal, but a deal. You’d let the Gehrys handle their son privately, and you wouldn’t press charges. But they aren’t holding up their end. You don’t owe them anything. Again, Kurt Gehry is breaking trust with us, just like he did last year.”
“And should we expect any different?” I asked. “A scorpion is a scorpion. And even if he weren’t, don’t you think your own son comes before anything you might owe your old college secret society?”
“This isn’t about the society,” Jamie said. “This is about his son hurting you. Really hurting you, beyond any comparison to a society prank or whatever idiotic justification you’ve created for what Darren did. I don’t believe we are to blame for this in any way, no matter what you think Darren learned by spying on us. But now I wonder: Is that what is holding you back from pressing charges? Do you think that going after a patriarch’s son would be against your vows to the society?”
“No. I just—I can’t deal with anything else right now With tap, and graduation, and everything else, my plate is way too full.” It was true. And it would be true even if I hadn’t made sure there was no free time left to spend contemplating what had happened to me.
He folded me into his arms. “But don’t you know, there’s a dozen people in that bar who will help you? I’ll help you. That’s what we’ve been trying to do all along. That’s where the society vows come in. You made a decision, we submitted to it, no matter how bad of an idea we thought it was. But if you choose to take action, we’ll find giving you that kind of help far easier to stomach.”
“I just want to put it behind me,” I said.
“But you’re not,” he replied. “You’re having nightmares. You know who has put it behind him? Darren.”
Darren, who went to Disney World while my life filled up with stress and responsibilities. I buried my face in Jamie’s chest.
“I don’t know,” I mumbled into his shirt. “I have to … think about it.”
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