by Dahlia Adler
I’m just clasping my bra with shaky hands when a knock pounds at the door, followed by “Who the fuck is in my room?”
Oh, perfect—Trevor has arrived.
“I know there were just people fucking in here! People heard you!” More banging. I officially want to die.
“Dude,” another voice says through the door, “don’t you have a key?”
“Why the fuck would I carry around a key to my own room, you dumbass?”
I have to clap my hand over my mouth so I don’t laugh out loud, and though I can’t even look at him right now, I suspect Mase is restraining his laughter, too. I finally secure my bra then throw on my top, all the while eyeing the window.
“That’s a bad idea.” Mase’s voice is low, bossy.
“And coming up here wasn’t?” I shoot back, keeping my voice equally quiet. “Come on.” I rush over to the window and swing it open, letting in a rush of cool night air. We’re on the second floor, and there’s no way I can see to get safely to the ground. Even just getting to the next window seems like a bigger stretch than we can pull off.
“We don’t need to climb out a fucking window, Cait. I’m not afraid of some stupid frat bro fuckboy.”
“Well you should be afraid of getting on the shit list of someone who probably has the power to get you fired. I assume your being here is contingent on keeping your job.”
Mase tenses his jaw in lieu of a verbal response, which tells me everything I need to know. I make toward the window again, but he says, “You should probably be a little more afraid of sustaining an injury exiting a second-story window. I know you being here is contingent on keeping your job.”
He makes an infuriatingly good point, which leaves me with only one thing to do. “You’re being an asshole!” I yell.
“What the—”
I hold up my hand to shut him up as I dash to straighten out Trevor’s sheets. I hate myself for where I have to take this now, but it’s our only option. “You really hurt her. How dare—”
“I hear you in there!” Trevor calls through the door. “Don’t make me—”
I swing his door open mid-yell. “What?” I demand, giving him my iciest glare.
His eyes bulge out of their sockets as he takes in me and Mase. Clearly not who he expected to contend with. “No fucking in my room,” he snarls, but he sounds a little less sure of himself now.
Finally, Mase catches on to my plan. “Bro, no one’s fucking anyone,” he says in disgust. “Trust me, you’re doing me a favor busting up this shit.”
“People heard—”
“Me tearing him a new one for dickishly dumping my roommate?” I fill in, and Mase winces. It plays well, and I’m pretty sure he’s not acting. “Yeah, well, he deserves it. She’s a sweet girl, and she’s been crying her eyes out all day.”
“For the millionth time,” says Mase, “this is none of your business. She doesn’t need you to defend her, and—”
“Ooookay, everyone, take the bullshit out of my room.” Trevor ushers us toward the door, and Mase and I continue bickering until we’ve left Trevor behind. By the time we descend the staircase, we’re stone silent.
And then I hear, “Cait?”
I jerk my head up, and see Jake giving me a quizzical look as he watches me and Mase descend the stairs. Of course, after not answering my texts all day, I’d run into him here and now. Mase and I may be able to hide what we’ve just done from everyone else, but Jake knows there’s reason to be suspicious. And suspicious is exactly how he looks.
“Not now, Jake,” I say with a sigh, because I have apologies to make to him, and questions to ask, but this isn’t the time. All I want to do right now is go back to—
Fuck. Of course I can’t go back to my dorm. Hell, Andi would probably smell Mase on me the second I walk through our door. Not to mention that the very idea just feels cruel. I can’t see her right now. Fuck fuck fuck.
“Baby, don’t be like that,” he says, and now I look at him for real. However upset he might’ve been at me all day, right now he’s asking for a favor, and it’s in both our best interests that I grant it.
“You were late,” I improvise, wondering when I became so good at public fauxmantic bullshit. “I had to walk here all by myself.” I slap on a pout and walk over to Jake as if he’s been the only guy in my life all night, as if Mase isn’t towering behind me like an icy monolith. I assume he’s drifting away too, both of us projecting that if you thought you saw something between us when we walked down the stairs together, it was all in your imagination. Two minutes from now, no one would think twice about seeing us together.
Thank you, Jake.
“I told you, I had shit to do.” Jake opens his arms, and I allow him to wrap them around me and kiss my cheek. “But I’m here now. Come on. Dance with me.”
I can’t stay here and dance. I can’t stay here at all. I don’t wanna be around Mase or Trevor, and I don’t want to stand here under the room in which I just got fucked within an inch of my sanity. “I’m tired,” I say, realizing how true it is when I say the words. “Let’s just go back to your room.”
There are a couple of guys around us, and they all seem to hear that line and make those annoying congratulatory noises. But that’s in our best interest too, and Jake gladly accepts the teasing while I make the necessary “Shut the fuck up” protests and then we sweep out of the party without a backward glance.
Neither of us says a word until we’re safely inside his room—a single, same as all the other varsity basketball and football players in Shamblin. Then we both erupt at the same time.
“I’m sorry last night was such a shit show,” I say, at the same time he says, “You fucked Mason, didn’t you.”
Clearly we’re in different headspaces, but we both laugh. It feels good.
“I know last night wasn’t your fault,” he says. “You were doing me—us—a favor, and it got out of control. It was a stupid thing for me to attempt. There’ll be a time for me to be in a normal relationship, someday, maybe, but this isn’t it.”
“That’s so fucking bleak.”
“Life is fucking bleak,” he says shortly, hanging up his jacket and then holding a hand out for mine. “I’m lucky to have whatever privilege I have. I’ve got a scholarship, I like my teammates, I’ve got a single and will for the next two years—if all I’m giving up for that is having a boyfriend for a couple of years, I’m way luckier than plenty of other guys.”
I just nod. What can I say to that? We’re lucky, as athletes. I know that. NCAA rules may bar us from getting paid, and our schedules may be absolute murder, but we get to play. We do what we love, and we get free rides to a good school to do so. I know what it’s like now to feel like I’m constantly on the verge of having that taken away from me, and it’s hell. So I can’t exactly tell him giving it up for a guy would be no big deal.
Would I give it up for a guy? For Mase?
“You didn’t answer my question.” He drops onto his bed and grins up at me.
“I’m not dignifying it with a response,” I say, slipping off my shoes.
“I’ll take that as a yes.”
“You can shove that yes up your ass,” I grumble, and he laughs.
I settle into his desk chair, examining the few photos that fill the space. His family. The team. None of Troy, not that I’m surprised. He may have his own room, but Shamblin’s basically one big open-door policy, unless you’ve got a sweatband hanging from the knob. “So what happened last night?”
“Exactly what you think,” Jake says with a sigh. “Troy completely bailed to leave me with the crowd at Q, and has been ignoring every single one of my calls and texts since. I’ve spent the last twenty-four hours feeling like shit and eating so many chips it’d probably give Coach a heart attack. I haven’t even left my room to go farther than the vending machine until I went out tonight. And that was just to find you.”
“To find me?”
He holds up his phone. “A couple of
guys on the team texted me that my girlfriend was running around by her lonesome.”
“How nice of them to babysit me in your absence.”
He laughs. “Hey, at least I know they’re loyal, right?” Then his face grows serious and he pats the bed next to him, and I get up and walk over, sitting down next to him on his hunter-green sheets. “I need them to believe this,” he says softly, “at least until I’m sure word about me and Troy being at XO last night won’t get around. Just another week. And since I imagine you don’t really want your roommate so much as suspecting you hooked up with her boyfriend—”
“Ex-boyfriend,” I cut in.
“Is that so?”
“You’re not the only one who had a breakup last night,” I tell him, falling back on the bed. “I don’t know details. I only know that it’s over.”
He lies back next to me. “That’s good news, isn’t it?”
“It’s no news. You don’t fuck your roommate’s ex-boyfriend of a day. What the hell is wrong with me?”
“What the hell is wrong with any of us?” he says, hooking a finger around mine. “Love and rules and all this shit is just so fucked up. Why can’t we just actually like each other? Is it so much to ask for the easiest thing to be the truth?”
I turn to look at him, and see he’s looking at me too. Without a word, we lean in and our lips brush, lightly at first, then not so lightly. A little clingy. Desperate. Not for each other, but for this—for something that makes sense—to work.
It doesn’t.
He pulls away first, and laughs. “Shit. That was dumb. I’m sorry.”
I shrug. “Worth a shot, right?”
“Honestly? You’d never be satisfied with my dick after his.”
I burst out laughing and whack him on the chest. “Jesus, Jake.”
“Hey, I’ve seen him in the locker room. I’m just being honest!”
“Be less honest,” I say wryly, because now I can’t stop picturing it, remembering its hot thickness pressed against my ass, pushing inside me, fucking me mercilessly. It’s hard to imagine being satisfied by anyone else’s cock after that, and considering that was my very last time with it, I really don’t need or want that reminder.
He grins, and we both lie there for a minute, laughing quietly, before he says, “So I’m guessing you don’t want to go back to your room tonight.”
“Not so much. I’m gonna ask Frankie and Lizzie if I can stay with them.” I slide my phone out of the butt pocket of my jeans, but Jake covers it with his hand before I can turn it on.
“You’re welcome to stay here,” he says. “You can borrow a pair of shorts a and T-shirt.”
“And do a classy Walk of Shame tomorrow?”
“Hey, it’s not shameful if you hold your head high.”
I shake my head, but the idea of just crashing holds a whole lot of appeal right now. I don’t feel like answering Lizzie and Frankie’s inevitable questions, anyway. “Okay, fine, I’ll stay. But don’t you dare give me a Yankees T-shirt.”
“Please, I would never do that to you.” He reaches into his drawer and tosses me a navy-blue tee and a pair of gray shorts, then turns around to give me my privacy so I can change.
Only once I’m done do I see the tee is emblazoned with "New York Giants."
Asshole.
• • •
Jake’s still passed out when I wake up in the morning and gingerly slide out of his bed. I creep over to the pile of my clothing on his desk chair, trying to figure out if it’s only in my imagination that it reeks of sex and Mase’s aftershave. Probably not, but it’s between putting it back on and walking out of here in what are obviously Jake’s clothes, so I suck it up and get dressed. Then I leave Jake a quick note and I’m gone.
It’s still early on a Sunday morning, so the jeers and whistles are at a minimum, but they don’t bother me; at least they think Jake is the guy I hooked up with last night. Considering Mase and I didn’t exactly leave things on a hopeful, romantic note, and now I’m stuck having to return to the room I share with his ex-girlfriend, I almost wish everyone else was right.
The thought of seeing Andi makes me sick to my stomach, and I pull out my phone to see if I can delay the inevitable a little longer. But of course, because life is one hilarious conspiracy, my phone is showing four things:
One: an e-vite to a bridal-slash-baby shower for Abigail.
Two: a text from Frankie saying, HI we’re doing breakfast this morning.
Three: a text from Lizzie, sent twenty minutes later, saying, YOU ARE SO BUSTED, SHAMEWALKER.
Four: a second text from Lizzie, explaining, We’re in the suite. Get your ass back here. And DON’T EVEN THINK YOU’RE NOT TELLING US WHERE YOU SPENT THE NIGHT.
And then my phone dies. Fucking fantastic.
I have no choice now but to trudge back to my dorm, and the second I do, Lizzie and Frankie are on me like hyenas. “You did get laid!” Frankie declares.
“I slept at Jake’s,” I say, loading my words with as much emphasis as possible. The last thing I need is for Andi—who’s sitting on the couch with Samara, staring glumly at the TV, exactly as I left her—to take note of any clues that I had sex last night, and with whom. “Just slept.”
I expect the conversation to stop there, but Frankie shakes her head. “Then you hooked up with someone else. I can tell. I can always tell.”
“You couldn’t tell when I fucked Connor,” Lizzie points out.
“That’s different—you were in a perpetual state of having just been fucked for a year before that. Cait, on the other hand, wears her getting laid like the weed I smell on my mom once every six months.”
“Did you just compare Cait’s sexual activity to something having to do with your mother?” Andi asks, in her first sign she isn’t catatonic since I walked in.
“Please stop talking about my sexual activity, period, both of you.” I try to load my glare with extra meaning—usually at least Lizzie is more perceptive than this—but…nothing.
“Why must we constantly play these guessing games?” Frankie asks dramatically. “It’s always pulling teeth with you two. You don’t see me having any shame in telling you I made out with Doug last week at the pool hall.”
“No, can’t say we ever do see you having any shame,” Lizzie concedes, stealing the words right out of my mouth. “But good for you. Well, good for Doug. I like Doug.”
I swear I see Samara stiffen on the couch.
We need a change of subject, stat. “We should get breakfast,” I declare. “I’m starving.” Actually, I’ve completely lost my appetite, but whatever—I’ll choke down an entire buffet if it means ending this conversation right now. I don’t wait for them to answer before I sail into my room, grab an armful of new clothing, and call, “Five minutes!” on my way into the shower.
By the time I emerge, Lizzie and Frankie have somehow talked Andi and Samara into getting their asses off the couch and joining us, proving once and for all that if we ever did have some sort of BFF ESP, it was severed when they moved out on me. But I realize as we walk to the dining hall to chow down on waffles, Lizzie and Frankie are the only ones speaking in more than two-word sentences. Those of us who still reside in Barrow room 302 aren’t quite as joyful. Certainly none of us are sneaking in dirty texts every few minutes, as I suspect Lizzie is under the table, or having to silence our phones because they keep ringing with different tones, the way Frankie’s does.
No, the residents of 302 Barrow have become an unwitting Lonely Hearts Club, and it appears I’m the only one who knows why.
I stuff a huge bite of egg-white omelet into my mouth, just to faster clear my plate and get back to the dorm, where I plan on taking a nice, long, dreamless nap.
Ignorance is bliss.
• • •
The nap doesn’t materialize; what does is a voicemail from my dad, imploring me to RSVP to Abigail’s bridal shower. Which is quickly followed by a text from Cammie saying, Plz tell me you are not going
to that shit. Part of me is envious of Cammie, knowing she doesn’t give a damn if she’s destroying her relationship with our father; it’s not like she really has one anyway. But I have too many years of good memories with him for it to be this easy, and as angry as I am, I can’t stop entertaining the possibility of going, knowing how happy it’ll make him.
I don’t know yet, I admit to Cammie, bracing myself for an angry response. But all she writes back is, Whatever.
I sigh heavily and toss my phone next to me on my bed, picking up my laptop instead. Andi’s on her bed, too, but she’s wearing headphones and listening to something loudly enough for the bass of the beat to travel all the way over to my side of the room. Part of me is so self-loathing that I actually wish she’d speak up, demand I confess—something. I feel so shitty sitting here, watching her stare at the wall while we both think about the same guy.
No. I am not thinking about Mase. That is stupid and pointless and will not lead to anything good. What I should be thinking about are my midterms, my game on Wednesday, my—
Andi’s cell rings, making me jump up off the bed. When she doesn’t pick up instantly, I glance over and see her staring at the screen, as if deciding whether or not to answer. I know immediately that it’s Mase calling, and that I should give her privacy, but I can’t seem to make myself move.
I’m sure she’s about to let it go to voice mail when she takes a deep breath and picks it up, her “Hey” tinged with relief. My stomach tightens as she hops off her bed and leaves me alone in the room to go talk elsewhere. I try to refocus on my computer screen, but all the words on the assignment in front of me just look like a blur.
A gentle knock at the door is a welcome intrusion, and I look up to see Samara standing in the doorway, cradling a steaming mug. “Just wanted to check and see if you’re okay,” she says, quiet but knowing.
I don’t know how to answer that. So I don’t.