After the hay ride, I turned to say goodbye to John, but before I could, he asked, “Did you drive here?”
I shook my head, wondering what he was getting at. I wasn’t going to dare get my hopes up and make any assumptions.
“You want a ride?”
“She came with me. I can take her home,” Astoria said.
“It’s out of your way,” I said, fighting the grin off of my face.
“Out of his, too,” Astoria said.
“Not really. I have to go back to the school to pick up my laptop. Denise’s apartment is right around the corner,” John said.
Astoria glared at both of us, but I said goodbye to her and Suse and they got into Astoria’s car. I could only imagine what was being said about me in that car. And I didn’t have to imagine too hard, watching shadows of Astoria’s hands fly while they sat in the car, waiting for it to warm up.
I stumbled into John’s car and lay my head back against the leather headrest, wondering how I would keep myself from grinning like a fool.
John climbed in and started the engine. “Have fun?”
“Yeah. Great time,” I said, concentrating on his hand as he pushed the scan button, flipping through radio stations. I was afraid to look into his eyes any more that night. Even if I didn’t see that confusing thing in them, he might see the guilt and desire I was fighting against in mine.
We sat in the parking lot, watching it clear out and talked about the hayride, school, his brother, and other things I can’t even remember now for a long time. It was the longest talk we’d ever had. And if I had to try to pinpoint a moment now, I’d say it was that night I fell in love with him.
“So you and Erich? A thing? Not a thing?” He put those awkward, conversation-killing questions to me.
I shrugged. “I don’t really know. Dating is a lot of hard work. But he’s a nice guy.”
He laughed. “You’d make a great politician, answering questions like that. Dating’s hard work? I guess you’re right about that. I was wondering why you’re single, though. Maybe that explains it.”
“Huh?”
“You’re beautiful. You’re a genius. I heard you’re eighth in our class. I mean, I couldn’t believe some great guy hadn’t taken you off the market yet. I guess I just assumed . . . I mean, I was surprised when Erich said you’re single.”
There was silence in the car while I tried to get over the shock of John calling me beautiful. Didn’t work. Finally, I pulled enough words together to respond, but my voice was shaky. “Yeah, well, I’m really busy right now. I don’t have time for all that. After graduation, there’ll be plenty of time for that kind of thing.” I didn’t believe that, but I didn’t want to tell John I’d given up on ever finding someone. I looked down at my chipped burgundy nail polish, but I could feel him looking at me.
I didn’t want to talk about it anymore. He was confusing me, and I was making me sad. “So you seem pretty laid back. Every other second year is going crazy over jobs,” I said.
He nodded. “You’re not going crazy, either.”
“Yeah, I already have one.” I told him about my job offer from Dettweiler, a firm downtown. “Congratulations.”
“Thank you. So what about you?”
“Yeah, well, I’ve had my job since before I was born.” “Really?”
“Dad owns me. When people ask when I decided I wanted to go to law school, I tell them when I was conceived,” John said with a grin. We laughed.
I finally felt it was safe to look at him. I was wrong, and so after getting stuck in his eyes again for a moment, I concentrated on his shoulder. “Is it what you want to do?”
John took a while to answer. “I guess. I mean, I’ve never really thought about anything else.”
I wasn’t so sure, but I also wasn’t so sure I wanted to push the issue.
The nearly bare trees bowed in the late October wind gusts. The moon was so bright, I could see clear across the empty parking lot.
“Yeah, I dunno. Everything’s just been kinda force-fed to me up ’til this point,” John said.
I looked up, startled. I hadn’t expected him to say anything else.
He leaned forward in his seat. “You ever feel trapped? Like no matter what you do, it’s gonna be wrong? You’re gonna make the wrong decision either way and disappoint a lot of people?”
“I dunno.” John’s proximity was disorienting. I could have reached out and brushed my fingertips along his cheek by moving only my arm. I could barely concentrate on what he said.
“You’ve never been afraid to go after what you want, I bet.” John sat back in his seat.
“At the end of the day, you have to live with the decisions you make. No one else can live your life for you. So I guess it’s good to try to go for what you really want,” I said, parroting—well, paraphrasing anyway—words to him that my mother had put in my ears for years. I didn’t believe them at the time, but they seemed to fit with the rambling path John had set our conversation on.
“I’m glad I have you to talk to. You’re a good friend.”
John put his arms around me without warning and I froze. I was barely aware he was hugging me and it didn’t fully sink in until he’d already pulled back. I shrugged out of his jacket, no longer needing it to keep warm. Instead, I wished I could shed more layers. I handed it to him and he tossed it in the back.
“I guess we should get going.” John pulled out of the parking lot without waiting for a response from me.
All I could think of on the way home was how I wanted to be back in John’s arms. That and how much trouble that desire could create.
Chapter 6
HOW BIZARRE
After the hay ride, I seemed to have a dirty dream about John every other night. Something strange happened the night of the hay ride. We didn’t mention anything about whatever it was, but neither of us minded when the other would find excuses to break study dates. And the hay ride was the beginning and end of our attempts to be see each other outside of studying.
The SBA, or Student Bar Association, and the Elder Law Society decided to co-sponsor a karaoke competition in November. It was the last big event of the semester before everyone went into hiding to prep for finals. By the Saturday night of the competition, John and I barely saw each other outside of class.
Suse and I had to go. We were signed up to be judges. As SBA officers, I guess there was no real way around it for us. But it wasn’t for lack of trying on my part. I just wanted to work on my student note for law review and sleep—which would have probably turned into just sleeping—but Suse wouldn’t let me back out of it. Astoria was out of town so I didn’t even have her to bail me out. Astoria was at a weekend retreat. That turned out to be a good thing.
I picked up my phone, and ignored the urge to send the call to voice mail. “Suse, I’m getting in the shower right now,” I said, lying on my bed and staring up at the ceiling.
“We’re not going to be late,” Suse said. “If you have to go funky, it’ll be your own fault, but I will be there in thirty minutes and I’ll drag you out if I have to.”
“Yeah, yeah. In the shower. Can’t you hear the water running?”
“Thirty minutes, Denise.”
“Bye, Suse,” I said.
She reminded me that I needed to get moving a third time before telling me she’d see me soon. I tossed my phone onto the nightstand by my bed and rolled to a sitting position. I stared at the large mountain of dirty clothes in the corner that comprised most of my wardrobe. I always put off doing my laundry way longer than I should, and I hoped there was still something clean to wear. Although, by the looks of that pile, there couldn’t be anything left clean I would want to wear.
“Oh, well. It’s not like I have anybody to impress,” I muttered to myself, standing and stretching. “The only person I want to impress has a girlfriend.” Wait, I couldn’t think like that. Those stupid dreams were confusing me. Hm. Those stupid dreams . . . thirty minutes was enough time
for a nap. Did I really need a shower?
“What is wrong with me? There’s no chance. I don’t even want there to be a chance.” And with that, I slid out of my track pants, grabbed a towel, and headed to my bathroom. Without separate bathrooms, I think I would have killed Tia the day after we moved in.
* * *
The karaoke was a fundraising event co-sponsored by SBA and the Elder Law Society. It was held in a smoky bar downtown that we had a good relationship with thanks to many successful bar reviews there. That bar had made a lot of money off of serving our law students watered-down drinks over the years. I walked in, hair pulled back in a loose bun. I wore faded jeans that didn’t fit right; I should have thrown them away, but it was good I hadn’t since they were my only clean ones—you know, that pair. And a wrinkled Central Virginia University long-sleeved T-shirt.
Suse, as always, was the primped Southern belle. Her short, silky blonde hair lay perfectly in place. She wore a blue silk wrap dress with black pumps. And cheating, lying Charles had yet another excuse about why he couldn’t come to Suse. Instead, she was going to him right after the show.
Suse and I sat next to the other three judges—members of the Elder Law Society. We all said hello to each other and they passed us pads of paper and then we started talking about our classmates who were competing.
The girl Astoria, Suse, and I called Volleyball because of her height and her undergrad athletic scholarship said, “I can’t wait to see John. He’s so funny. I bet his act is going to be a riot.”
“Archer?” I said, my voice a few octaves higher than normal.
Everyone turned to look at me.
Then, Volleyball’s blonde friend nodded. “Yeah. He just signed up a few days ago.”
“Should be interesting.” Suse threw me a scrutinizing look when she said the word “interesting”.
“So you guys start writing your papers yet?” I said to Volleyball and the blonde. We were taking a short course together that had ended the day before. Luckily, conversation turned to that.
Some of the acts were boring, some funny, some sad, and one almost good. I felt sorry for the DJ, who looked miserable. He kept glaring at the owner, and I was pretty sure he’d been tricked into manning the karaoke machine that night.
John was the last contestant. He walked out on stage in some eighties-inspired get-up, complete with the awful, plastic Ray-Ban knock-off sunglasses, frames in neon green. So many bright colors. I couldn’t imagine finding those pants, even at a consignment shop, without the aid of a time machine. Suse and I looked at each other and broke the tension between us with a laugh.
He perched the glasses on top of his head, and introduced himself to the crowd in a way that earned him waves of laughter. Then, the DJ started the song “Bizarre Love Triangle” by New Order. During the opening bars, he did this odd shuffling dance that was somehow very eighties reminiscent. Then, he started singing. Wild, loud and purposefully off-key as he bounced from one side of the stage to the other, somehow managing to keep the beat despite his manic moves.
I laughed, caught up in the momentum of watching him. So much so that I didn’t notice everyone watching me. I realized at that moment how much I’d missed seeing him almost every day. Just seeing him in class wasn’t nearly enough. I got lost in the memory of his arms around me.
I sat up straighter in my chair, wondering if I was imagining things. It seemed that every time John reached the chorus, he looked into my eyes, singing directly to me. I sat on the edge of my chair, my pencil clutched in my fist, trying to determine whether or not he was singing to me.
Then, for the last refrain, he came down from the makeshift “stage” area and sat sideways on the judge’s table, facing me. There was no mistaking his eyes holding mine then. I put my hands under the table, afraid I would try to drag him across the table otherwise. He then went to the other judges, singing it to them, turning to a different one for each line, although the song had neared the end and was purely instrumental by that point.
After the winner was announced—John by a landslide—Suse and I headed out with Volleyball and her blonde friend. We stood in the parking lot, talking about the contest. It had been one of those freakishly warm days we sometimes get in early November and so the night wasn’t all that bad. A slight chill hung on the air, but that was it.
I heard John calling my name and I froze to the spot. Looking up, I saw him jogging toward us. I watched him approach and so I couldn’t catch the others’ reactions.
“Some people are coming over to my house. You should come with,” John said.
I was stupefied by the invitation. John had never invited me to his house. He hadn’t invited me anywhere since the awkward hug and the hayride and all that.
Suse put her hand on my arm, breaking me out of the trance. “Denise, can you come with me for a minute?” She looked at John. “We’ll just be gone a second.”
“I’ll be right back,” I said in a voice so faint I wasn’t sure if he heard it or not.
When we were out of earshot of John, she said, “Denise, what do you think you’re doing?”
“Walking to your car.”
“I’m serious, Denise. People are talking. They have been ever since y’all started spending all that time together earlier this semester. And after what just happened? You should have seen the look Volleyball and her friend gave each other back there.”
“I didn’t do anything.”
“Yeah, but it doesn’t look good. Him singing to you. That song? And now you going to his house? You should think seriously about coming home with me.”
“What are you trying to say? I’m not doing anything. Like I could break up their relationship if I wanted to. Haven’t you heard about Sasha?”
“Denise, it just doesn’t look good.”
“Suse, can you pop the trunk so I can get my stuff?” I knew I shouldn’t have been getting angry with Suse, but she was getting too close to something I didn’t even want to admit to myself.
“Think about it, Denise. Be smart. No, he’s not going to leave Sasha. But that doesn’t mean you can’t get hurt.” Suse popped the trunk.
I grabbed my tote and threw it over the shoulder, already holding my purse. “He’s not Charles and I’m not skank of the week.” As soon as I said the words, I felt sorry for saying them. Suse’s eyes dropped to the side and her shoulders sagged. “Suse, that was wrong. I’m sorry.” I reached out toward her and she pulled back.
“No, it’s fine. Go ahead. You might miss your ride,” Suse said. She stomped around to the driver’s side, got in and drove off without letting me say another word.
I walked back over to John, still feeling badly about what I’d said. She’d only been trying to help and my not wanting to hear it, because she was right, was no excuse for saying something so ugly.
John and I started in the direction of his car. “What was that about?” he asked, taking my tote from my shoulder. I started to feel better right away.
“Nothing,” I said.
“You sure? It looked kind of serious.”
“Yeah. Let me see your trophy.” I reached for the cheap plastic object in his hand I had helped pick out and knew well. I turned the conversation back to the contest and successfully avoided talking about the oddness of our relationship. For the moment, anyway.
* * *
When we got to John’s place, a guy threw the door open before John could. He had short blond hair and hazel eyes. His muscled, perfect arms rested against the door frame. He stared at me in a drunkenly quizzical way. Then he held his hand up to John for a high-five. “Bud! Where have you been? Missing out on all the fun, that’s where.”
John turned to me. “Denise, this is my roommate, Shawn. Shawn, Denise.”
“Hey.” Shawn barely glanced at me.
“I thought it was just going to be a few people. Where’s Tyler?” John said as we walked in. Tyler was his other roommate. I’d known them both only by name until that night.
Shawn pointed into the living room. Tyler was on the couch, talking to a brunette with an orange tan. He was tall and lanky and had shaggy brown hair.
John didn’t look too happy about what was going on. He pulled Shawn aside for a minute and they had a conversation involving a lot of gestures, a few of them rude. Then, John came back over to me.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“Nothing.” So it was his turn to be evasive. “It’s too loud down here. Wanna come upstairs with me?”
I hesitated, staring at the hand he held out to me.
“I’ll behave. I promise,” he said. He waved to some girls across the room who kept trying to wave him over.
I put my hand in his and he led me up the stairs. We stopped at his room for a jacket, which he put under his arm and then we continued up the stairs.
“Where are we going?” I asked as he opened the door to the attic.
“The roof.” He said that like it was a normal thing. I stopped by the window he opened, refusing to go through. “What do you mean, the roof?”
“It’s safe. It’s a lot quieter. I like it out here. C’mon. You will, too.” He put his hands around my waist to help me outside and onto the roof. Even though I didn’t need the help, I wasn’t about to push his hands away.
“You were right. It is nice out here.” I looked up at the cloudless sky, admiring the stars I could actually see since we were far enough away from the city.
“Yeah. Beautiful,” he said. When I glanced over at him, he wasn’t looking up at the stars. He was looking at me. I fiddled with the zipper on my jacket, my tongue tied.
I shivered slightly. Even though it was still not that chilly, it was cool enough to be uncomfortable wearing just my light jacket. I was hardly aware that I had shivered until John put the jacket he’d brought from his room around my shoulders. I closed my eyes, relishing the sudden rush of warmth that had come with the jacket wrapped around my shoulders. He hugged me to him and I tried to feel like it was wrong to feel so good being pressed against him, but all I could feel was comfortable and warm.
Love Out of Order (Indigo Love Spectrum) Page 5