“Well, sure, when I’m actively seeing them I do. But Matt is something else. He’s fun. All the time. He’s, ugh… I can’t explain it.”
“Sounds serious.”
“I don’t think I can do serious.” Kat flicked her wrist, and the silver charm bracelet wrapping around her pale skin tinkled, the small stones catching the light, reflecting hints of blue. I’d given that to her for her sixteenth birthday, and she’d worn it most days since.
“Well, if he’s fun and nice and not a tool bag, then when can I meet him?”
“Oh! He’s having a party next weekend. You should come. It’ll be perfect.”
“So I can be your third wheel?” I laughed, but when it came to guys and Kat, he always ended up as the third wheel.
“You’ll have an entire crowd of cute guys to choose from. Or you could ask Jake to come.”
I stared out at the students walking through the quad, pretending I didn’t hear her.
“Damn, Audra.”
“Huh?”
“You’ll be happier if you admit it.”
“Admit what?”
I kept my eyes on a tree, waiting for Kat to speak. As I thought maybe—just once—she’d let it go, she said, “You have a crush on Piano Boy.”
That’s all I could think about all day—about how I had a crush on the Piano Boy. And I’d even started referring to him by that nickname in my head.
It had to stop.
Since our camping escapade, I’d tried texting him funny videos or jokes throughout the weeks, or sometimes a hey, what’s up, but it didn’t get me far. Sure, he’d respond, but it always felt one-sided.
Until today.
When Jake opened his door, I hovered a few feet away, afraid to move any farther—not sure why, exactly. A part of me didn’t know what to do with myself, and I couldn’t stop thinking about what Kat said. The other part said stop it, because it was just Jake, and it was definitely not a big deal to be here.
“Smells like pepperoni.” I commented on the first thing I noticed other than the way his hair looked soft enough to grab and how his lips curved upward as he stared at me.
“Pizza as promised. Do you want a beer?”
“A beer?”
“Yeah.” He grinned. “You’ve had beer before, right?”
“Of course I have.”
“Are you allowed to have beer?”
“Legally? Uh, no.”
“So?”
My foot went tap-tap on the carpet, and I blinked back up at him. “So what?”
“So do you want a beer?” He said it slowly, to be sure I understood.
My cheeks burned, my stomach flip-flopped, and my heart did things I’d rather it not. “Oh. Yeah. Okay.” Maybe a beer would help the situation. “I don’t want to watch a movie.”
Jake halted his retreat to the kitchen and pulled his brows together—and God, why did I say that? “That’s…fine. I don’t remember offering to watch a movie, but okay.”
Man, I was an idiot. “I’m good with pizza, though.”
An hour later, I’d had one beer and three slices of pizza, and I sat cross-legged on his couch while he sat on the opposite end.
“What’ve you been doing this past week?” An awkwardness split our silence in two. It wasn’t unusual, the weirdness, but asking him about his week felt lame and pitiful. I wanted to ask the questions that meant something, like what kinds of things kept him up at night, and what was keeping him from sharing the thoughts inside his head?
But I was too damn chickenshit.
He chewed some pizza before answering. “Working. Mostly.”
I knew he worked a lot of hours at his job in the campus bookstore, and that, combined with classes, kept him busy. But text messages didn’t take long. Or a five-minute phone call would’ve been nice.
“Working on my midterm assignment, too,” he added, handing me another beer. “Living the dream, as they say.”
When he pulled out a cigarette a moment later, I swallowed my irritation and looked for a distraction. “How many of those do you smoke a day?”
He shrugged. “A couple. Sometimes none. Depends on the day.”
“I don’t understand how anyone could get past the first hit.” I’d tried it one time—with Kat back in eighth grade. It burned my lungs and tasted worse than dirt.
“Once you get past the shitty qualities, cigarettes are a pretty clever little drug.”
I eyed the smoke he blew out, trailed the white puffs floating into the air until they dissipated. “It doesn’t make sense to me. Why would you go past that first initial crap taste and keep smoking the thing?”
“Guess I thought there was something great waiting for me on the other side of all that shit.”
“And was there?”
Jake bowed his head. “Not even close.”
I examined his apartment again while he disappeared into the small kitchen. So dark—everything was so black on black on white, I felt like I’d lost all my ability to see colors. And he likes it this way.
He thought black was a color—and I still thought he was wrong.
Jake rounded the corner again. “What about whiskey?”
I blinked. “What about it?”
He laughed and sat back down on the couch, this time closer to me. “Do you like it?”
“I only drank it once.” About the same time I tried that cigarette with Kat. “It tasted worse than the cigarette, and I think it made me stupid.”
Jake shook his head, more laughter echoing in the room. “You probably just felt stupid.”
“Isn’t that the same thing?”
“I don’t think so.” He grinned. “We could play a game.”
“A drinking game? What, like Never Have I Ever?”
“I was thinking Go Fish.”
I snickered, curling my legs beneath me. “You’ll never want to talk to me again if we get drunk on your cheap whiskey.”
“You’re wrong.”
My gaze moved away from his hands, took in his eyes and dimpled cheeks. “You promise?”
He tipped his head, laughed again, and said, “Sure. I promise.”
For the record, I’d warned him.
Chapter Ten
Jake’s whiskey version of Go Fish totally sucked.
But after a couple shots, the game was funny, and as Kat would say, I was wasty-face. This was no good. Somewhere in the back of my head, I knew that. My doctor said a drink every once in a while was okay, and sure, I’d only had two shots of whiskey total—because I was a lightweight—but this was still far past my standard limit.
“Oh my God, is there more pizza?” I said out of nowhere, throwing the cards down. Actually, I think Jake may have been talking.
He raised a brow. “There’s a little more, yeah.”
“Oh! Do you have cookies?” I stood, planning to head for the kitchen, but didn’t move more than a foot. “Or Twizzlers? Dear God, I would marry you right now if you had Twizzlers.”
A couple moments passed, and then all I heard was the sound of his deep laughter.
“Why are you laughing at me?” I turned around and stormed toward him, like I was about to beat him up. “You’re laughing at me. See, I told you this was a stupid, stupid idea.”
Laughing and shaking his head, Jake stood. “Yes, I’m laughing at you. But bad idea? No way.”
I laughed—it was contagious. “Whatever. I want pizza. I’m over this stupid game.” I made a beeline for the kitchen, and he said something while I stuck my head in the fridge, but I’d stopped listening. The game was stupid. He had to know that. “Hey, so…” My hunger forgotten, I shut the fridge door and turned around. “Is this what you do when you’re alone? Hang out and get drunk and eat pizza?”
Jake leaned forward on the couch, setting his elbows on his knees. “Sometimes.”
I took a step farther into the room. It felt smaller now. “Alone? That sounds dumb. Super stupid. Why would you hang out alone when you have me?”
> And oh God, I really said that. I laughed so I could focus on something else.
When you have me.
Oh fuck.
But I swore I heard him say, “Good question.”
About an hour passed and no matter what I did, I couldn’t keep my mouth shut. Also, everything tingled and buzzed from the alcohol burning through my blood—and I was okay with it.
“Can we do something fun, puuh—lease?” I said. “Like, oh! Can we go get Twizzlers?”
He laughed. “Uh. If you really want.”
“No. How about skinny-dipping?”
Jake stood and walked toward me. “You want to go skinny-dipping?”
I looked at the ceiling. “No.”
When he didn’t immediately respond, my heart beat a faster, unpleasant rhythm. Oh man, he totally thinks I want to get naked with him.
Wait. Did I?
No. Well, maybe.
I glanced down and saw his smirk—the one he was trying to hide from two feet away.
He’s just a guy. You’re just a little drunk.
“If you’re looking for an excuse to take your clothes off—”
“No!”
Jake pressed his lips firmly together, but if his eyes crinkling were any indication, he was trying hard not to laugh.
“Sometimes I think…” My words were barely audible. “I think I might like it if you kissed me.”
No matter what, I couldn’t take those words back. They were out there in the world, and it might’ve been a mistake, but fuck, I hoped not.
We stared at each other silently, and I tried to understand what he was thinking.
I’d almost asked him for what I wanted. And if I’d been brave enough, I would’ve just kissed him.
“I’m not going to kiss you,” he said. “Don’t—” Head dipped lower. Deep inhale. “Don’t get me wrong.”
My face fell, my eyes found the ground, and it was all I could do to swallow the giant lump in my throat.
“Hey.” He reached for my chin, gently tilting it up so our eyes met again. “I do want to kiss you, Audra. But if I do, it may become a habit…and I can’t seem to get rid of habits.”
I inhaled the familiar smell of him—lemon mingled with mint—and my blood warmed. He half smiled at me until I felt my lips pull upward despite my disappointment. He wasn’t going to kiss me, but he wanted to.
“You still haven’t held up your end of the bargain,” he said.
“What?”
“You were supposed to be my model.”
Not now. Was he crazy? “But…that doesn’t sound like fun.”
“We had a deal.” He tipped his head and edged closer to me on the couch, his thigh pressing against mine.
I fought through the fog in my brain. “I can’t be your model. Come on. There’s no way.”
“How about this. I’ve got a better deal.” He leaned in until the faint hint of whiskey reached my nose, his grin back in place.
“I don’t know. I may have gotten myself in over my head with the last one.”
Jake laughed. “I think you’ll like this. Listen.”
I motioned with my hands for him to continue, unconvinced I would like any of it.
“I have an idea. You can fulfill your modeling duties. Then that Cheez-It with the pie in the face you have to replicate? Well, I’ll let you obliterate my face with a pie.”
We stared at each other like we were deciding whether or not to agree to a cease-fire.
“But see, smashing a pie in your face sounds kind of fun and all, but I don’t think it will suffice as a reward,” I said, my gaze locked onto his full lips.
“Trust me. It’ll be a cakewalk. And besides, you technically already owe me. The pie-smashing is simply a bonus.”
I scanned the color wheel in his eyes and considered his offer, considered whether trusting him would end in the most embarrassing night of my life.
Okay, maybe that was a little dramatic.
“Fine. It’s a deal.”
He grabbed my outstretched hand and leaned forward, placing a featherlight kiss on my forehead. “Deal.” His fingers were warm and rough around my cold ones, but his lips were soft, jolting me with their energy, and it made me feel more alive—even if only for that moment. But then his fingers and lips were gone, and I remembered to smile. “All right. Let’s do this.”
The grass was a lot colder than I thought it’d be—and prickly.
“I think I’m getting wet,” I said, shoving a blade of greenish-brown grass away from my cheek.
Jake laughed—a low, guttural sound that sent a tickle down deep in my chest. “You’ll be fine.”
But it was weird, our being outside a few hundred yards behind his apartment building. Me on the ground, sprawled out like I’d decided to nap with the bugs and dirt. Him with his camera, standing nearby, laughing at my complaints.
Weird.
“Shut your eyes. Lie however you want. Just keep your eyes closed the whole time, okay?”
I did as he ordered. “Alrighty. You’re going to take pictures of me lying here? Isn’t that going to look odd? I’ll look…” Dead.
“Wait.”
My eyes popped open—against the rules. Jake pulled his wallet out of his back pocket and opened it up and pulled something out.
“Here,” he said, bringing his hand to my face. A pale blue flash of color caught my attention before I saw what it was: a silk flower the size of a quarter. Bold and delicate, fake and stunning.
Jake tucked it behind my ear as I stared at his face, his eyes focusing on where his fingers moved.
“Oh wow,” I whispered. “You carry around a flower in your wallet? That’s so…”
Adorable.
He grinned, and maybe it was the alcohol, but I swore I saw him blushing in the dark. But that couldn’t be right, because the thought of me making him blush seemed ludicrous. “It was from Emily,” he said. “A gift on my twelfth birthday. Which, by the way, is a terrible birthday gift when you’re twelve.”
The back of my skull hurt from laughing too hard all night. “Have you always carried it around, then? It didn’t get thrown away when she wasn’t looking?”
“Don’t move,” he said when I lifted my head. “Close your eyes again, okay?”
I bit off my response and shut my eyes. “Why do my eyes need to be shut?”
“Just go with it.”
“But you didn’t answer my—”
“Calm down. You can ask me questions later.”
I held my breath for a moment, fought against the urge to open my eyes, peer up at him, and see the look on his face.
“Tell me a story,” he said, his voice soft. It reminded me of library story time.
But I totally dug it.
“I caught a frog today and decided to let it go instead of eat it.”
The sound of Jake’s laughter echoed louder because I couldn’t see him. “Not the kind of story I was looking for. But uh, thanks for the best-worst story ever told.”
“Well, what kind of story do you want?”
“Tell me a story about when you were happy. Anything. Any day or event you want. Describe it to me.”
I stayed quiet as I thought, breathing in the cool night air—still trying to avoid being pricked by blades of grass.
“My birthday,” I finally said. “I was, I don’t know, maybe nine, maybe younger. But I remember wearing my purple Care Bears shirt—oh man, it was my favorite—and it was a super sunny day, and I was so excited it was my birthday. You know, my day.” Birthdays were always so much bigger when I was younger. “And my dad was cutting the grass on his riding mower. He let me sit on his lap the entire time—even let me drive for a few seconds here and there.”
“Care Bears, eh?”
“They were the best thing in the entire world back then.”
“Says you.”
“Exactly.”
“Interesting story choice,” he said.
“I think it’s because this g
rass is itching my face.” I squirmed, trying to flatten the blades down with my head.
“I was hoping for something juicier, to be honest.”
“Uh-huh. Nice try. Can I get up now? Or is it still story time?”
“I got what I need.”
With the flower securely between my fingers, I stood, brushing my hair and shirt, attempting to remove all the dirt and grass. “Wait, this flower. It’s…the flower Emily got a tattoo of.”
“Yeah. They’re called forget-me-nots. My mom used to grow them back when she used to garden. Emily was obsessed with them.” He looked down at the fake flower. “You should keep it.”
“What? No. I can’t keep this.”
Inclining his head, Jake got a familiar look on his face. “Keep the flower. You have her heart.”
A wrenching pain seized my throat. “Exactly why I shouldn’t keep it. It’s yours. I can’t take that from you.”
“I’m giving it to you. That’s not the same thing.”
I frowned, twisted my lips, and looked away, searching for the meaning behind his offer. “All right. I’ll keep it.”
When I looked back, he smiled. “Good.”
We headed for his apartment, and I was still pulling pieces of grass from my skin when we stepped inside. I stared at the flower after setting it down, mesmerized by the bright color and the silkiness of the fake petals.
“So where’s my story?” I asked, kicking off my shoes and turning toward him.
“Who said you get a story?” He smirked.
“It’s only fair, right?”
“Not a chance. Your story was about Care Bears, cutting grass, and turning nine. I don’t think I have an equivalent story to give you—if I were going to give you one.” Jake leaned in a little closer—and if I moved my hand a fraction of an inch, we’d be touching. “But you get to smash a pie in my face, remember? That’s your reward.”
“Can I exchange my reward?” I should’ve picked a better one—one I truly wanted, needed. Smashing a pie in his face would be all well and good, but I could’ve paid someone else to be the pie-smashee.
“Nope. Sorry. A deal’s a deal.”
I glared at him, but it only earned me a wink and a half-assed smile.
“Please?”
He shook his head, faux regret in his eyes.
The Heartbeat Hypothesis Page 9