by Ashley Love
"Fuck," I can't help but say to myself.
25
Honestly, I'm not eavesdropping. Really, I'm not. I was just coming back to the room for a moment to grab a book I needed before I returned to the library, where I'd even left things on the table with the intention of returning. Only I go to push open the door without knocking (I refuse to knock on the door to my own room, under any circumstance), and I hear the raised voices inside, and...
They're fighting. They're loud. I don't have to lean my head against the door to hear the distinct words they're saying. Which is why I don't feel that bad about it. If it was a conversation they were trying to keep private, they wouldn't be arguing so loud. (I still do feel guilty about it, though, but I can't seem to stop myself.)
"—it is!" The voice is female; it has to be Blake's girlfriend, even if I've never heard her talk in a voice that was anything but sweet and soft. "Just tell me who the hell it is!"
"It won't make a difference," Blake reasons. "Telling you who it was—"
"Was," she repeats, cutting him off. "You're using past tense, Blake, but we both know it isn't. God, I can see it right now on your face. Who the hell is she? An ex-girlfriend? Is that it? You still have feelings for her, don't you?"
"It's not an ex-girlfriend," Blake says lowly, and I do have to lean in to hear it. But I pull back immediately, wincing at my own actions. "I promise you, Sarah—"
"Don't lie to me, Blake," she snaps. "Just be honest with me for five seconds, that's all I'm asking of you!"
"It's complicated."
"Complicated," she repeats, and I know Blake's fucked up now. "People always say that, but it's not! Cheating isn't complicated! It's not something that just happens. It's not an accident, Blake! It's a bad choice. A mistake. A huge mistake, but it's not a fucking accident. It's not something uncontrollable. It's not that complicated to keep your body parts to yourself!"
"I know that," Blake insists. "That's why I told you. You deserved to know."
"What I deserve is a boyfriend that doesn't cheat on me, actually," she spits.
I hear footsteps heading for the door, and I jump back, eyes wide. Shit. I pull the hood of my sweater over my head and start walking in the opposite direction, head ducked just in case.
"And stay away from me!" I hear behind me, just before a door slams.
I slowly walk down the hall. I can hear her going in the opposite direction, but when the footsteps are distant and no longer within hearing distance, I stop. Should I give Blake his space? Or should I go get my stuff? I really need that book, I think, and maybe a part of me wants to make sure Blake's okay. Even if I'm still pissed at him about yesterday. Even if I've done my best to avoid looking him in the eyes since all of that went down.
I turn on the spot and head back to the room. I push inside, only to find Blake sitting on my bed, head in his hands. He looks up when I shut the door softly behind myself, and his eyes are wet and red-rimmed.
"I, um, came to get my book," I mumble. "I can come back later, or—"
"No, it's fine." Blake gets off his bed. "I'm fine," he adds.
"I didn't ask," is out of my mouth before I can stop it. It's automatic, a reflexive response. I hate myself as soon as the words are out there, and Blake actually flinches at them, as if I had slapped him.
"No, you didn't," he says gruffly, voice thick. "Why would you care, right?"
I lean up to grab my book from the shelf, and then I stand there, just at the end of my bed, book hanging at my side. I want to apologize, but then, at the same time, I don't. What I really want, most of all, is to not care. Because if this had happened three months ago, I wouldn't. I wouldn't give a shit if I walked into the room to find Blake almost crying. I would have just walked back out without giving it a single thought. But now—now I want to wrap my arms around him. I want to rub his back until he no longer look so broken and defeated.
And it's my fault, partially, why he looks like that. It takes two people to cheat on someone, and I had as much a part in it as Blake did. "I'm—"
He shakes his head, and the words die in my throat. Slowly, he picks his way across the room, over the mess on his own side, over to my spotless side. I step back, for some reason, until I hit the edge of my dresser, but Blake keeps coming until he's trapping me against it.
It's rough again, whatever gentleness we'd shared the last two times gone when his lips crash down against my own. And I go with it, for awhile. Just as it's instinctive to snap at Blake, kissing him back is an automatic response to his lips brushing my own.
But Blake's girlfriend just dumped him, and I have no doubt that that is exactly why this is happening. That I'm going to be his rebound, for now. Until he finds someone else again, and then he'll leave me in the cold once more. And I'm sick. I'm sick of never being good enough for anyone. Sick of always being a dirty secret, never someone's first choice. Never the one they want to hold hands with, or curl up and watch movies with, or go to dinner with. I'm always the one they want behind closed doors, but I don't want that anymore.
I push Blake away from me. "No," I say firmly. "You can't just do that anymore."
Blake shuffles back a step, and then another. He wipes at his mouth, eyes on the ground. "Aubrey." It sounds like a plea, but a plea for what?
"I can't do this," I say. "You can't keep kissing me whenever you want. You can't keep...fucking with my head. I'm done. Okay? I'm done."
"But—"
I walk away. Just like I had to with Max. Because if not, this would continue on for God knows how long. Until I was shattered beyond repair, all at the hands of Blake Alexander. And I can't handle that. I can't do that to myself. No matter how much I want to go back and kiss Blake and act like it's okay, it's not. It's not.
On my way out of the dorm, I stop at Cadence and Emma's door. They're not in, so I grab the marker hanging from the whiteboard and write In the library. Need you. — A
I walk straight past the front desk when I get to the library. I don't have it in me to nod a greeting to Nancy, like I normally do. Instead I head for the back, for the table that I've practically claimed as my own. A few tables down, a girl is asleep with her head in a book, but I'm alone aside from her and the books.
Cadence and Emma don't get there for a while, but when they do it's with snacks and... "Lucas?"
"We were hangin' out," Lucas says with a shrug. He sits in the seat right beside me. "I'm really good at cheering people up, so I figured I'd come."
"I don't think you want to cheer me up," I admit. "It's got to do with Blake."
"Course it does." Lucas shrugs again, stealing a chip from the bag that Cadence snuck in (which I will give her shit for later, when I feel better) and popping it in his mouth. "When Blake's crying on my shoulder, it's always over you. And I figure it's the same the other way around."
I frown. "When was Blake crying?"
"Well, not crying," Lucas corrects. "He doesn't cry. He just, like, takes a lot of deep breaths and rubs at his eyes. He's too manly for tears or some shit. I don't know. All I do know is I've never seen such a fucked up relationship in my life, to be honest."
"Same," Cadence puts in. "You two are the biggest mess."
"I hate to agree," Emma says, "but it's kind of the truth."
"It wasn't a relationship," I deny. "And whatever it was I called it off this time. Blake didn't have to. After last night...that was the last time. I'm done with it."
"Last night?" Cadence demands. "What happened last night? Why wasn't I informed immediately?"
"Uh, Aubrey came in when Blake was with his girlfriend, wouldn't leave, and it ended with Blake eating Aubrey out. And then Blake said something, Aubrey stormed out, or...I don't know, I kinda tune out whatever he says when he mentions Aubrey name anymore," Lucas says sheepishly. "Sorry, no offense to you. But there's only so many times I can hear I hate her, Lucas. She's so attractive and smart and down to earth and she looks so hot in her glasses b
ut I really hate her."
I blink in surprise. I snatch the bag of chips away from Lucas when he reaches for it casually, as if what he just said wasn't a big deal.
"He said that?" I demand. "Blake...he said those things?"
"Uh, yeah." Lucas snatches the chips back. "The guy, like, worships you, dude. Not that he'd admit it, but..."
No way. "That's not true."
"Sure it's not," Lucas says. He rolls his eyes. "It's like talking to a brick wall of denial with both of you."
"It really is," Cadence says. "They're so oblivious to their own feelings."
"I'm right here," I remind her.
Cadence throws a chip at me. "I know. Get a clue."
I ignore her. And I think Lucas has it twisted. Blake doesn't think that way of me. I would know.
"So, are you two dating?" Lucas ask Cadence and Emma.
The two of them exchange a look before bursting into laughter. I tune them out, too busy wondering about Blake, and what Lucas said. And thinking that Lucas's so, so wrong, but how much I wish he was right.
26
Just like I did at the beginning of the year, I avoid my room as much as possible. I spend all my free time in Cadence and Emma's room or in the common room, and I put in so much time at the library that I might as well live in there. But that's only because Blake is constantly in the room. Every time I open the door, he sits up in bed, mouth open, words about to come out. So I back out and shut the door and hurry away.
I can't deal with it, is the thing. I don't want to know what Blake has to say. I don't want to listen to Lucas trying to defend him (which he does constantly, now that he's apparently become great friends with Cadence and Emma, always there to put in his two cents about the relationship that isn't really a relationship). I want to spend the next few months focusing on school work and nothing else. Blake does not fit into that schedule.
Nor does the box of chocolates I find on my bed one afternoon. Blake, for once, isn't around. The room is blissfully empty, and I was planning on taking advantage of that by going on my laptop to catch up on a few episodes of TV shows before I went to bed. But my eyes fall to the bed, and I frown.
I slowly move towards it, kicking Blake's messy shit out of the way. It's a small box, completely black except the red bow. I frown, pick it up, and tug the bow until it comes undone. There's no letter, no card. Just a few pieces of chocolate inside. Before I can stop myself, I take one out and place it on my tongue.
Expensive, I think. It's not hard to tell the difference between cheap chocolate and the stuff that costs a little more, and this stuff is good. Rich and creamy, melting and coating my tongue.
Carefully, I put the lid back on, stash the box in the top drawer of the desk, and then I fall onto my bed, pulling out my laptop. An hour, and an episode of Shameless later, the door opens. I pause the show, eyes lifting to Blake.
"Hey," he says pleasantly.
"Did you leave those chocolates on my bed?" I demand.
Blake blinks, a frown tugging at his lips. "Maybe."
"Why?"
Blake shrugs and pulls open his dresser drawer. He riffles through it, pulling out clothes, and then he gathers up his stuff for the shower. Distantly, I notice the sweat covering his skin, and I figure he was at the gym. If I run away to the library, Blake's escape is in the gym. He rarely even works out on our floor anymore.
Just before he's out the door, he hangs back and asks, "Did you like them?"
I press play on my show and ignore the question.
27
"You could have just told him you didn't," Lucas points out. "You didn't have to ignore him."
Something I'm learning quickly about Lucas, in the short time that he's pushed his way into the threesome of me, Cadence and Emma, is that he isn't as naive as I thought. In fact, Lucas seems possibly more aware of anything than any of us, sees straight through all the bullshit. And he hasn't been afraid to call me out on it, unfortunately. Not that I don't like the guy, because I do. A lot. But I like living in my happy little world of denial a lot more.
"What was I supposed to say, though?" I demand. I'm on the floor of Emma and Cadence's room, both of them on Emma's bed playing a word puzzle, Lucas sprawled out on Cadence's bed with a bag of chips. I wonder, distantly, why Lucas isn't with Blake. Blake's probably missing his best friend, right about now, and it almost makes me want to snap at Lucas for abandoning him. But I have a feeling there's a reason Lucas's with us and not Blake, and I'm not about to ask what it is, so I let it go.
"Uh, thank you, maybe?" Lucas suggests. "It's the polite thing to do, man."
"I don't even know why he gave me the damn thing," I grumble.
It's been fucking with my head all week. The (now empty, I couldn't control myself) box still sits in my drawer of the desk, and every day, at some point, I'll open the drawer, see it, and it will confuse me all over again. What's Blake playing at? What kind of game is this? Psychological warfare? Is he pissed at me for pushing him away, so now he's pretending to be all nice just to screw with me for it?
"Because he's in love with you, dumbass."
"Dumbass!" Cadence says loudly. "Three down, two across."
"I'm pretty sure the word dumbass isn't used in crosswords," Emma says patiently. "I think the word is dumping."
I ignore them in favor of blinking confusedly up at Lucas. "Why would you say that?"
"Say what?" he asks.
"That Blake's...that he—" I wave a hand, unable to repeat those words.
"In love with you," Lucas finishes. "Because he is, maybe? I mean, Aubrey, come on. The guy broke up with his girlfriend for you."
"No." I shake my head firmly. "She dumped him because he cheated on her."
"With you," Lucas reminds me. "But that's not why it happened. He told her after he broke up with her, because she asked him why it wasn't working out, and he said he'd been with someone else and he couldn't see himself being able to stay away from them, and he couldn't be with her if he wasn't being faithful."
I rub at my temples. This is all too much. It's just...it's way too much.
"That's not true," I deny.
"Yeah, it is." Because it seems to be Lucas's goal, apparently, to not let me live in peace. "Also, poetry or flowers?"
This whole conversation is making my head hurt. "What?"
"If someone wanted to get you something, would you rather have poetry or flowers?" Lucas elaborates.
"I...I have no idea," I respond. "Poetry? I don't—where did that even come from?"
Lucas shrugs and stuffs his face to keep from answering, and Cadence snickers from the other side of the room. Emma looks between the three of us with an upset look on her face, but she drops her eyes back to the crossword puzzle before I can ask her what that look means.
I push that weird question aside in favor of thinking about what else Lucas said. About Blake possibly…but, like, he can't be. Right? Blake can't be in love with me because...why would he be, really? I've been nothing but an ass to him, ever. And even if I were nice to Blake, I don't really have much to offer anyone. Especially not someone like Blake, attractive and popular. Who could have his pick of much better candidates for his love. But...
Whatever. I'm not thinking about it anymore; if I do, I'll drive myself crazy. So I revert back into my Cave of Denial, where I'll happily live my days until the school year is over. And then, next year, I'll make sure that my roommate is not Blake, and I'll never, ever have to see him again. It'll be wonderful, I think, and if my stomach twists at the thought of doing that, well, I'll happily deny it.
28
Lucas's question makes sense when I go to my room after being in the library all afternoon the next day. The first thing I notice, upon entering the room, is that our wastebasket is full of balled up papers, which is weird enough. But then my eyes fall on my bed, on the neat black envelope, sealed with a single chocolate.
I groan. I pop the choc
olate into my mouth and break the seal on the envelope, pulling out the thick parchment inside. The writing on it is kind of sloppy, admittedly, but it looks like it'd been carefully written down, probably more than once, guessing by the state of our garbage bin.
This is not what I intended. I may have failed but I have loved you from the start, I read, eyes skimming over the slanted words. I know you don't think that I am trying, I know you're wearing thin down to the core. But hold your breath….
I read it over three times, eyebrows drawn together. And then I read it once more, for good measure, before putting the 'poem' back in the envelope and pulling out my laptop. I type the words in, and I shake my head. I knew it. They're song lyrics. It's not even a plagiarised poem, they're fucking song lyrics. Jesus Christ, really?
I snort to myself. And while I still have no idea what Blake's trying to do, I'm not going to just ignore him this time.
It's almost an hour later when he comes into the room, once again sweaty after a workout. He shuts the door behind himself and bites his lip, eyes moving from the envelope on the desk to my face, his cheeks going red.
"What the hell even was that?" I ask him.
Blake licks his lips. "Um..."
"Those were Secondhand Serenade lyrics," I state.
Blake rubs his neck, wincing. "I was hoping you wouldn't notice."
I shut my laptop and stand up. He takes a step back, moving away from me. "What are you trying to do, Blake? Putting cheesy song lyrics in envelopes and giving me chocolates and shit."
"I tried writing poetry myself," he admits, stammering a bit. "Lucas said it'd be better than flowers, but I'm as shitty at writing as I am at drawing, apparently, and...it didn't work. So I thought maybe…but obviously you figured it out."
"But why would you even bother?" I demand. "I don't get it."
"Like...like it said, I'm trying," Blake explains. "I'm trying to—"
"Well cut it out," I snap. "It's creepy."