Rites of Spring (Break) il-3

by Diana Peterfreund

  ***

  The missive from Dragon’s Head dampened the mood of the evening, and no one felt much like hanging out once the meeting dismissed. After taking a rain check on a planned game of Kaboodle Ball (despite protests from George) the members of the club headed our separate ways. Josh accompanied me back to Prescott College, on a pretense of seeing his girlfriend and my roommate.

  “Feeling okay?” he asked.

  I shrugged inside my winter coat. Once again, I’d shown how very appropriate my society name was. I’d screwed up the raid for everyone. Poe had cracked his head open for nothing. “Do you think Greg was right, that they’ll come after me unless we give them what they want?”

  “Probably,” Josh said in a hushed tone, as we passed the Dragon’s Head tomb.

  “I hate the idea of capitulation.” I kicked the snow, caught sight of my sneakers, and grimaced.

  “Really? Wait, you wouldn’t be Amy Haskel, by any chance, would you?” He grinned. “I’m inclined to say it’s up to you what we do. I don’t want to give in either, but then again, I’m not the one with the target on my back.”

  “But what could they actually do to me?” I asked, swiping my proximity card at the Prescott College gate. “What would we do, if the situation were reversed?”

  “The usual: murder, mayhem, total annihilation of our victim and anyone she’s ever loved.”

  “That’s it? Piece of cake.”

  We walked up the steps to the suite I shared with Lydia. Josh paused at the door. “Seriously, though, they’ll probably start by publicizing your Digger status.”

  I twirled my finger in the air. “Whoop-de-doo. Worse things could happen. Heck, it might even help me get into grad school.”

  “Or…” He hesitated at the door. “They might press charges against you for breaking and entering.”

  That one stopped me in my tracks.

  “And the related theft,” Josh added. “They have a picture with identifying features, you probably left fingerprints somewhere in the building, and I don’t want to know how valuable that dragon is.”

  “That probably wouldn’t help with my grad school apps.” I could feel a headache coming on. “But wouldn’t they have to let the police into their tomb, let all sort of stuff become public?”

  Josh sighed. “I really don’t know how the rules work at Dragon’s Head. I know the policy of the Diggers is to keep as many of our activities below the radar as possible—not to involve the barbarian world in whatever happens on the inside of our organization. We wouldn’t risk opening the tomb up to scrutiny to get a statue back. We’d find another way to deal with it. But Dragon’s Head? Who knows?”

  “Okay, okay,” I said, grasping at straws. Orange jumpsuits weren’t really my thing. “But I thought the cops tended to look the other way when it came to society pranks.”

  “Yes. Tend.”

  “Josh, I must say, you aren’t exactly the embodiment of comfort at this moment.”

  The door flew open and Lydia stood on the other side. “I beg to differ,” she said. “He’s my favorite bodily comfort. Now, exactly how long have you guys been standing here, hatching secret plots?”

  Josh kissed her on the forehead. “The real question is how long you’ve been standing here listening to us hatch our secret plots.”

  “Not long enough, unfortunately.” She pulled his head down for a real kiss.

  I trailed the sickeningly sweet couple into the wood-paneled common room, dropped my coat on the couch, and followed after it. Josh took the recliner on the other side of the coffee table, and Lydia perched on its arm, resting her hand on the back so as to be in easy finger-twirling distance of her boyfriend’s hair.

  Do I sound bitter? I don’t mean to. But here are the things you need to know about Lydia:

  1) She’s been my best friend and roommate for years, and we’ve seen each other through everything—I mean everything—from highly inappropriate relationships with T.A.s (not mine!) to regrettable anonymous one-night stands (guilty as charged).

  2) Up until this past fall, her love life was every bit as disastrous and strewn with little pieces of ventricle and aorta as mine. Then she met Josh, a man whose own romantic history left much to be desired, and they both fell hard.

  3) Ever since, she’s been engaging in the type of coupley behavior we used to scoff at: hair-twirling, lap-sitting, “honey-bunny-ing,” and other nonsense.

  4) Once, during exam period in December, I even caught her laundering his boxer shorts.

  I love the girl, but she needs to remember that this is New Haven, not Stepford. As they cuddled, I put my feet up on the coffee table and toed off my sneakers. Josh cast them a pointed glance.

  “Perhaps a change of footwear for the time being?” he said. “No point making it worse.”

  I sighed and looked at Lydia with imploring eyes. “Josh says I can’t wear my sneakers.”

  Lydia traced her fingertip around his ear. “Since when do you get fashion advice from Josh?”

  “Since now. Can I borrow your fabulous brown boots?”

  “No, because they are fabulous and I want them to stay that way at least until Easter. The slush outside will ruin the finish in a day and a half.” She looked from me to Josh and back again. “Is this one of your new rules? No metal, no sulfur, and now…no sneakers?”

  “Could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you,” Josh replied with a smug smile.

  This was par for the course in our suite since the big reveal in November. Lydia teased Josh and me mercilessly because she knew we were in Rose & Grave, and we, for her amusement, played the parts of obnoxious, secretive society types. At times, Josh even affected an accent he said was James Spader–esque but I insisted was a lot closer to adenoidal.

  On the whole, however, I considered myself pretty lucky that Lydia had picked Josh as my roommate-in-law. I had friends whose inter-suite romantic trauma had been so intense, they’d actually made their bunkmate choose: either the suite, or the significant other.

  “Speaking of Easter,” Lydia said, tiring of the game a little early tonight. “We need to finalize those plane flights before the prices go through the roof.”

  “Flights?” I asked.

  Lydia looked a little guilty. “Yeah. Josh and I are going to Barcelona for Spring Break.”

  Some might be surprised to learn that the look of betrayal on my face was not directed at my roommate and best friend, with whom I had spent my last three Spring Breaks. I’d told her back in the fall semester that I’d be occupied.

  But Josh was supposed to be occupied right along with me.

  “But…” I began, then broke off. What could I say? Oh, Lydia, don’t be silly. Of course Josh isn’t going with you, his loving girlfriend, on a romantic getaway to Europe to consume gazpacho and rioja and dance to guitars on streets covered in bougainvillea and orange blossoms. He’s got to go hang out in an undisclosed and possibly underground location with the Diggers, none of whom is giving him sex or rioja, and discuss those secret world domination plots of ours. Sounds fun, huh?

  “Wow,” I said at last. “How exciting.”

  Apparently, Lydia wasn’t entirely convinced by my ecstatic tone. “Well, you said you couldn’t—”

  Yeah, but I didn’t realize how much the idea of my best friend jaunting off to Spain with her lovah was going to hurt. All of a sudden, I felt very hot inside my turtleneck sweater. I wanted bougainvillea and orange blossoms. I wanted rioja and gazpacho. I wanted to know why the hell Josh was ditching the Diggers. Wasn’t he supposed to place us above all others?

  “What, I’m not enough for you, Lydia?” Josh cut in before I could grill him. “I thought this was supposed to be a romantic getaway you were dragging me on.”

  “With all the museum trips you have planned?” Lydia rolled her eyes. “Guernico is not romantic.”

  “It’s Guernica, and that’s in Madrid, so don’t worry about it.” Josh pulled her onto his lap. “You’re thinking of
Gaudi, whose art we will be seeing a lot of, and whom you shall learn to love, my sweet. La Sagrada Familia. Colegio Teresiano. Palau Güell…” He began to nuzzle her neck.

  Hint taken. Plus, if possible, I was even less interested than Lydia in a lecture about Spanish art, so I chose that moment to adjourn to my room. No sooner had the door shut behind me than I heard Lydia hiss in a whisper to Josh, “Don’t do that in front of Amy.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because…” She hesitated. “I feel bad. She hasn’t had a boyfriend in a while…”

  Oh, no. I sank into my desk chair. They weren’t going to be one of those couples who liked to gossip about a single friend’s lack of love life behind her back, were they? Of course, Josh knew exactly how long it had been since I had a date—he’d even warned me against my short-lived affair with George last semester. But still, it rankled. Especially if they were going to talk behind my back within earshot.

  “She’s got bad luck with men,” Lydia continued.

  “I beg to differ,” said Josh. True. A lot of women I knew would think I’d been very lucky indeed to snag George, even for a little while. I rolled closer to the door to listen in.

  “Don’t you know any nice guys for her?” Lydia was asking. “We could double date.”

  “Look,” Josh said, a note of annoyance creeping into his voice, “it’s not my responsibility to play Cupid for my—er—girlfriend’s roommate.”

  “She’s not just your girlfriend’s roommate, though, is she?” Lydia cajoled.

  “This conversation is officially over.”

  Hey! No! It was just getting good! Why didn’t Josh want to set me up with anyone? Didn’t he think I was cute enough for any of his friends? Or did he have another problem with me? Was it my, um, experience with George? I was ready to burst back out and ask him what he meant, when Lydia spoke again.

  “No need to get bent out of shape. I can understand your concern. She does have a tendency to self-sabotage all of her relationships. Like last year, she was seeing this great guy—”

  “Brandon.”

  “Right, of course you know.”

  And he had made several vows to the effect that he wasn’t supposed to let anyone know that he knew! Josh! Man, I had him so bad. The fines I’d level on him at the next meeting—he’d better hope flights to Barcelona weren’t pricey!

  “Anyway, you should have seen them together. They were so perfect. But of course she botched it up,” Lydia added. “Oh, that reminds me.” She shouted, “Amy!”

  I waited a few seconds before opening the door, so they wouldn’t realize I had been right behind it. “Yes?”

  “Brandon called.”

  I blinked. I hadn’t known what Lydia wanted with me, but a phone message from my ex-boyfriend and ex-friend-with-benefits (if not ex-friend, full stop) was not at all what I’d expected. Brandon never called. In fact, the last time I’d spoken to him at any length, he had said the ball was in my court as far as future contact went.

  It was a ball I’d dropped, as Brandon’s Amy-free life seemed to make him perfectly happy, and Brandon’s very non-Amy girlfriend was beautiful, accomplished, crazy about him, and singularly unimpressed with me.

  “What did he want?” I asked, or rather, croaked. My mouth had gone inexplicably dry in the last two seconds.

  “Um…to talk to you?” She pointed at the phone. “You still have his number, right?”

  Yes, I still had his number. And I still had a lot of baggage to lug around regarding our broken relationship. After sleeping together for several months last spring, Brandon had finally talked me into becoming his girlfriend for real, only to discover that I was no more committed to him than I’d been when I hadn’t called him my boyfriend, and he broke it off.

  I’d been more hurt by the loss of his companionship than by anything else. He’d mostly kept his distance ever since, but every time we did see each other, the air was charged with unfinished business.

  My hand hovered indecisively over the phone, as if each of my fingers had taken a vote, decided that calling Brandon would be a poor plan, and mutinied. “It’s probably too late.”

  “It’s barely eleven,” Lydia replied. “Early evening in college time.”

  I willed my fingers to retrieve the phone then beat a hasty retreat into my bedroom.

  “See what I mean?” I heard Lydia say as I shut the door.

  I’d show her. I dialed his cell phone from memory, and Brandon picked up on the first ring.

  “Hi, Amy.”

  I was so unprepared, I couldn’t think of a response. “You rang?” Ugh. Well, that was rude of me. Not even a Hi, Brandon, how was your Winter Break? No wonder his girlfriend thinks I’m a bitch.

  “Yes, I did, though I should have known you wouldn’t be home. It’s Sunday, after all.” He chuckled. Everyone on campus knew that Sunday nights were secret society meeting nights.

  Time to get back on subject. “So, what’s up?” I kept my tone light. “Have a good break?” There. I could be polite.

  “Wonderful. Felicity and I went to Tahoe.”

  “Oh,” I said, and dropped onto my bed. “Nice.”

  “Her family has a house out there. I was worried that I’d embarrass myself on the slopes, since she’s been skiing since birth, but…you’d never believe it. Did you know I’m a naturally talented skier?” I could hear the smile in his voice.

  “I had no idea.” But it didn’t surprise me. Brandon was a natural at whatever he put his mind to. It was one of the things that made him so attractive. That and his complete lack of pretense. He was brilliant, but didn’t brag, popular, but not cliquish, comfortable in his skin, and utterly forthright about his needs and desires.

  I know what you’re thinking: You idiot, Amy. It’s okay. I think that often enough myself.

  “What were you up to?” he asked.

  “The usual: family, carols, tree, stockings, too much fruitcake.”

  “Any fruitcake is too much.”

  “Agreed…I went to a party with some friends in Manhattan for New Year’s.”

  “Nice. Anyone I know?”

  “Maybe,” I said coyly. It was indeed possible he knew some of the Diggers in a barbarian capacity, but I wasn’t about to name names.

  All in all, I was starting to feel okay about the conversation. Maybe we could move beyond our shared past and be friends, the way we used to be before we’d made the mistake of sleeping with each other. Once upon a time, he’d been among my closest college chums. But that was before Rose & Grave. Now I wasn’t sure anyone could take the place of my society brothers in my heart.

  “So…” He hesitated. “I was wondering if you wanted to have lunch sometime soon. We have a lot to talk about.”

  “We do.”

  He was silent for a moment. “I mean, I heard through the grapevine you’re going out for some fellowships this semester. I am, too. I thought maybe we could help each other with our applications.”

  Oh. “That would be great,” I choked out. But it would also be an exercise in humility. Last time Brandon and I had been in competition for something (the editorship of the Eli Literary Magazine), he’d almost beat me out while finishing a huge project for his Applied Math major. Seriously, the guy had brains in his toe joints. “You think you want to keep studying literature?”

  “No, these are math fellowships. I just thought—”

  “Yes. Sounds great,” I said, before he could change his mind. Whatever it took. The opportunity to hang out with Brandon was not easy to come by these days.

  But why did he want to work with me instead of with Felicity?

  “Good.” He sighed into the phone, as if he’d been holding his breath. “How about lunch tomorrow? I’m free at noon. Want to meet at Calvin College?”

  His college’s dining hall. Interesting choice. There was a decided connotation associated with the location and timing of a dining hall date, and modern Eli students recognized the distinctions as easily as their
forebears once understood the difference between events that called for them to dress in morning coats, dinner jackets, or white tie:

  DINING HALL DATE RULES

  Mutually Neutral Dining Hall

  One Party’s “Home” Dining Hall

  Dinner

  Closest thing to a real date, except cheaper for everyone involved. Possibility of seeing/sitting with an acquaintance: negligible.

  Almost as bad as brunch in a Home Dining Hall (see below). Possibility of playing off as “just friends,” if necessary: high. Possibility of sitting with a group of Home Party’s friends: very high.

  Brunch

  Either a business meeting or the aftermath of a one-night stand. You don’t want anyone to see you.

  Official announcement of coupledom to the Home Party’s entire acquaintance. (This goes double if either Party has wet hair.)

  Lunch

  What the asker angles for if he or she can’t get the other Party to agree to to a real date, or even a Dining Hall Dinner.

  So aboveboard, it’s sickening. Might as well have a sign saying, “Nothing see here, just grabbing a bite before our next class.” Possibility of sitting with friends: medium.

  “Sounds good,” I said. “Remember to bring your apps.”

  After we’d said our good-byes, I unearthed my applications from my pile of start-of-term paperwork and attempted to make it look as if I’d been doing serious work on them for the last few weeks. I made little headway, however, as my brain’s computing power was focused on Josh and Lydia and what they’d been saying about me. Naturally, it’s far worse to hear unpleasant things about yourself from people you know love you, because they aren’t saying it to be mean, nor are they prejudiced against your shimmering personality. No, your friends are telling the truth that you know deep down anyway—and my friends were saying I sucked at romance. To the point that they wouldn’t even try to set me up on a date. Wouldn’t risk subjecting their other friends to the horror that is me.

  Cheer up, Amy. It’s not like this is anything new. I am well aware of my limitations when it comes to forming healthy relationships with the opposite sex. It’s why I’d tried to keep Brandon at arm’s length to start with. I knew getting involved with him would wreck our friendship, and it had. Last year at this time, he’d been buying me dinners at Thai restaurants. This year, I was braving my way through a cafeteria lunch where he had home-court advantage.