And nothing else matters.
• • •
I do check Grier’s pages from my own accounts when I get home, just out of curiosity. Every single photo I posted yesterday has been deleted, and the comments have disappeared with them. Which means she saw them and freaked out.
Which is very, very good.
37
WEDNESDAY IS THE SAME THING, including the caffeine, because even though I feel better, I’m still not sleeping right. Last night it wasn’t dreams, but instead me lying there worrying about what I’d do if I had them again, and then what if I couldn’t fall back asleep. That went on until about one in the morning. And then I had to be up at six thirty.
The sodas work their magic though, and the day itself is unremarkable, except that Kate is still ignoring me, and also that Van seems really distracted at practice. He spends a third of the time pacing around the end of the pool on his phone, and twice he snaps at Dylan for goofing around. Grier’s still gone, and when Phoebe asks about it at pep talk, all Van says in his terse voice is that Grier’s not feeling well and needs to really rest up for Saturday. The way Phoebe bites her lip and looks at Kelly, I can tell she’s thinking what everyone’s thinking, which is that with zero practice this week, Grier probably shouldn’t even show up to the meet.
Whether it’s glee over Grier, or caffeine or what, I’m far better today than the last two days, even though we’re still supposed to go slow. I don’t know what my problem was Monday, but that’s obviously all over. I’m back on my game.
• • •
So when I see Gavin talking to Louis when I come out of the locker room, I’m more amused than anything else.
“You didn’t tell me Louis was a track man,” Gavin says right away, clapping my stepdad on the shoulder like they’re old pals. “Hurdles aren’t for sissies.”
I look at him, then Louis, trying to hide my confusion. Not about the two of them talking, but about the two of them talking about something I’ve never heard of.
“Ah, it was a long time ago,” Louis says, rubbing his knee, the one he wears a brace on sometimes doing yard work, or when he and Mom go ride bikes. The look he gives Gavin makes it clear he doesn’t want him to say anything more, but I already get it. Suddenly the whole supersupportive stepdad routine makes a lot more sense.
“So—what?” I ask, deflecting the topic, and my own minor shock. “You guys just standing around, trading war stories?”
“A little bit like that,” Gavin says jovially. “But really, I was waiting for you. Thought we could maybe go catch a bite. Talk more about . . . Auburn. I could give you some tips for Saturday.”
I glance over at Louis. The week before a major meet, Mom makes sure to have these elaborate dinners at home to help me calorie-load. It’s kind of a big deal. At least for her. Besides, I know Gavin doesn’t really intend to talk about college, and there isn’t anything else to say about the rest. It happened, and it’s done. I don’t give a shit about whatever’s going on with Grier or him. I’m finished with letting him screw with me. I have to stay focused for the rest of the week.
“Karen’s got something planned tonight,” Louis apologizes.
“Oh. Well—a milk shake or something?” Gavin’s apparently determined. “It won’t take long. I just had some pointers I wanted to—”
“Why don’t you join us for dinner?” I say to shut him up, get him to go away.
The panicked look he gives me is priceless. “Oh, I wouldn’t want to impose.”
I hook my elbow in his, realizing this will be a great way to torture him.
“Come on. You’re such a stiff. We can talk while Mom and Louis make dinner. You probably could use a home-cooked meal anyway, right? I mean, your times are still important on Saturday too. College bracket still counts, after all.”
I blink up at him, giddy at my own unexpected brilliance. He wants to “talk” about what happened with Grier? Fine. But we will do it on my terms.
“Sure, yeah,” Louis says, scratching his head and reaching for his phone. “Let me double-check.”
“What the hell are you doing?” Gavin whispers fierce while Louis steps away. “I only wanted to talk.”
“So we’re going to talk.”
“This isn’t what I meant.”
“So what did you mean? That you were going to drag me off on your own and get me half naked again? Hm? Then, since it seems like that’s your pattern, go back to Grier and start all over? That what you had in mind? Not enough of it on Saturday?” My voice is thickly sweet but bitter-bright. I am dizzy with power.
“That isn’t what happened, and you know it. Jesus. You’re as crazy as she is.”
That part makes me curious, but before I can say anything back, Louis tucks his phone back into his pocket. “All set,” he says, coming toward us with a smile. “And Karen’s looking forward.”
38
OF COURSE GAVIN ALREADY KNOWS where my house is, but it’s still delicious watching Louis signal way too early for the turns, constantly checking his rearview, making sure not to lose Gavin following behind us. He pumps me for all the information I have, which, in terms of what I can tell my stepdad, isn’t much, and then tries to act all in the know when he finally introduces Gavin to Mom. They grill him about Auburn, his high school team, his plans for the future, and it’s funny for a while to watch Gavin squirm, but I finally pull him off to the den where he can “help me out as much as possible.” I worry at first that Mom might ask me later if Gavin’s why I’m not hanging out with Charlie anymore—the look on her face when she sees how good-looking he is means it crosses her mind—but after a few minutes in the kitchen, Gavin all stiff and formal, it’s clear she and Louis think he’s some impressive coach for me, which makes the whole thing even funnier. I didn’t even mean to play it this way, and still I’m winning.
“I shouldn’t be here,” he grumbles when we’re finally alone, each tucked into our corner of Louis’s giant L-shaped couch.
“Oh, come on. It’s just dinner. And Louis loves you.”
“Yeah, thanks for that. You girls are nuts.”
I wiggle my eyebrows at him. “I thought you wanted us to be into those.”
“It’s not like that, Jesus. Will you calm down? It’s what I wanted to talk about if you would just listen. I don’t know what Grier’s said to you, but I’m sure you saw what she did.”
I hold my face still, but it’s hard not to smile.
“That shit she posted online? That was all her. I didn’t even want to take those pictures.”
I scoff to hide my delight. “Don’t pretend you’re sorry. Besides, nobody knows for sure it’s you, so why do you care? And why do you think that I would?”
“I don’t know.” He sighs. “Everything was just so fucked up on Saturday, and you won’t answer my texts or even look at me in practice, so I wanted to make sure.”
Victory swirls over me, making me dizzy.
“You wanted to make sure of what, exactly?”
He rakes his hand over the top of his head. “Make sure you knew I was done with her. That girl is a disaster. It isn’t like that with you. I mean, the way it was with me and her. I wasn’t—”
I cross my arms, pretending to be mad. “So, what? I’m not hot enough for you?”
The weak, exasperated look on his face is so satisfying, I almost exclaim aloud.
“That’s not what I mean,” he whispers, glancing at the den’s entryway, though the kitchen’s down the hall, and Mom and Louis have some Internet radio program going on anyway, so it’s not like they could hear.
I scoot closer to him, put my hand up high on his hard thigh. “What exactly do you mean then, hm?”
I can see he thinks he should push me away, but he doesn’t.
“I mean, you’re different. You aren’t like half the girls I know at school. Sure, you’re unbelievably hot, don’t get me wrong, but maybe I want to actually know you.”
I want to hop up, right there, and
do a touchdown dance in the middle of the living room. I wish I had a recorder on so I could play what he just said over and over. Take that, Grier. Take that and that until you die purple.
The sound of Mom’s house shoes in the hallway breaks us apart.
“Well, that’s all very interesting, and I really appreciate it,” I say, leaning back in the couch cushions and away from him.
“I just want you to know, I’m serious,” he says, voice all coachy-enthusiastic, but eyes still making a point.
“Sounds like it’s going well,” Mom says, peering in at us. “And I hope you’re hungry.”
“Oh, yeah,” I say, growl, rubbing my tummy, and flashing a grin. “Totally starved.”
• • •
Mom’s made lemon-roasted chicken and the wild rice salad with dried apricots that I like, plus a spinach salad for extra iron, and there’s dessert, of course. She and Louis sit at their ends of the table, which leaves Gavin and I across from each other. Through most of the meal, because it’s hilarious, I keep snaking my bare foot under the table and up his leg. For almost three whole minutes my foot’s there, heel pressed against the taut fly of his jeans, moving up and down. At one point he reaches under the table and presses my foot even harder against him, which makes me flush. He gives me a glimmering look under those thick eyelashes, and then coughs and half-stands, reaching over to take another chicken leg from Mom and then pushing my foot away with his other hand.
He can push me away, but I know I can still do anything to him.
I can do anything I want.
• • •
When dinner’s over and Gavin’s refused Mom’s second attempt to make him a cup of coffee, I walk him out to his car.
“So when am I going to finally get you on my own?” he wants to know. He’s draped in the driver’s seat but facing me with his knees open. The hungry eyes he had at the dinner table take over. I thought, after his little you’re-actually-interesting bit in the den, that he might be turning all pussy on me but apparently not.
“You have to wait until after Saturday. I’ve got to conserve my energy.” I’m facing him with my back against the open car door, but as I say this, I rock my hips forward a little, just to tease him. Just to keep it going.
“That’ll be a long wait.” He reaches out, grabs the belt loop on my shorts, and pulls me closer. He slips the tips of his fingers down between the waistband and my skin, sending a shiver up my abs. “You aren’t going to give me something to hold me over?”
I lock my knees and squeeze my quads tight.
“What? Hand job out here in my driveway? Much as Louis likes you, I don’t think he’d go for that.”
He makes a low growl and lifts my hand to his lips. I watch as his tongue flicks gently between my fingers and then as he engulfs one of them in his mouth. His eyes stay on mine as the wet tip of his tongue tickles along the bottom of my finger. Against my will, even my elbows swirl with heat.
“Maybe tomorrow,” I find myself murmuring.
“Tomorrow?” he asks, still nibbling.
“You can come over. After Mom and Louis are in bed.”
• • •
I sleep fine that night.
And there aren’t any dreams.
39
MAYBE IN RESPONSE TO DINNER with Gavin, or maybe because of it, but on Thursday morning I’m back to full-on normal. Nothing fazes me, not even that I don’t have my flash cards finished for Spanish. I just make my excuses to Señora Gupta about the meet this Saturday and how important it is, and say that I’ll have everything by Monday. She smiles her tired smile and says okay, as long as I do ten extra.
Not even Kate and her steady silence across the room in Enviro can bother me. Not her tall, solid, uninterested back in Conflicts, either. Today I don’t have to sleep through lunch, and I don’t need any caffeine, either. So bring it, everyone. Just bring it the fuck on.
• • •
Practice, though, is a little weirder. Grier’s still not there, and enough of the team seems worried about her that they break their vows of silence to ask me if I’ve heard anything. Like she and the whole rest of them weren’t totally cold-shouldering me just a couple of days ago.
“She’s fine,” I tell them, cool. “She just needs a break. Hard as Van’s been driving us toward Saturday, we could all use it, right? Let’s make sure we don’t make her even more sorry by fucking up ourselves.”
It’s bullshit, and I could care less about Grier anymore. That it took them only three practices to give up on hating me is the important part. If it were me, I would’ve held out for much, much longer.
What makes things even stranger though is that Gavin isn’t there either. And neither is Linus or Troy. That Van doesn’t say anything about it—that he acts like everything is perfectly normal—makes us all shoot questioning looks at one another through pep talk. Something is going on, but Van’s not telling. Not even when I ask him point-blank, before we get into the pool, where the three guys are.
“Just adjusting their schedules” is all he says, terse. “Worry about yourself, not them.” And then sends me on a 200 free, descending times.
• • •
what happened? I text Gavin after practice.
But I don’t get anything back.
• • •
I don’t get anything back at 9:30, either, when I send: getting ready for bed. you still coming? I lay in bed last night picturing how tonight would go: He’d come over, I’d sneak out, and we’d make out a bit in his car down the road. I haven’t had any action since that catastrophe on Saturday night, and I won’t lie that I miss it, especially now that I can’t have Charlie, either. I know it’s partly why I haven’t been able to sleep. But with Gavin, it’ll be even better, because unlike Charlie, I know I can count on Gavin not to want to talk, no matter what he said last night. I can get what I need and then send him away, easy. Even though I felt basically all right today, I still need at least a decent eight hours tonight and another eight tomorrow for sure. Ten would be better. Getting off a bit will definitely do the trick. Tending to myself is all right, but it’s not the same. Still, I’m also not dumb. I need to maintain the upper hand. So we’ll fool around in his car for a while and then I’ll say something about how tired I am, how I need to get to bed. If he protests, I’ll promise—and I’ll be convincing—to make it up to him after the meet. Fingers crossed behind my back, of course.
But now it’s 10:12, 10:26, and there’s still not a beep from him, not even after I send three more texts. Stupidly, I even try trolling through Grier’s pages for a while just to see if he’s been on any of them. But they’ve both been silent for days. I picture Grier having to go back to those shopping bitches. It makes me wonder for a few seconds how she’s doing without anyone to talk to. But then, of course, I realize Gavin’s also not showing up anywhere because Grier’s disconnected herself from him since Monday, and besides, I don’t care about her anymore, after what she did.
Disconnecting from Gavin doesn’t sound like a bad idea for me, either, except now it seems as if he’s leaving me hanging, and I can’t have that. He laid on that cheese about wanting to get to know me, I offered to sneak out for him on a school night, and now he can’t even text back? I lie in my bed in the dark with my knees up, balancing my phone between them, waiting. If he had late practice, as Van suggested today, maybe it’s taken him this long to finish, eat, get showered, and head over. Maybe, I tell myself lamely, he forgot to charge his phone. But I know that’s beyond pathetic. It makes me wish I could take all those stupid texts back.
It’s 11:09. I shouldn’t be up, but I am. Part because maybe he’s still coming over, part because I’m mad, part because I’m trying to think how I’m going to get him back for standing me up. I get out of bed and pace. Now, instead of being rested and calm tomorrow, that edgy feeling will creep back over me all day, and what if I can’t shake it? Being off at practice only screws me up in the head more. So I really need to get som
e sleep. It’s dumb that I haven’t been able to for the last several nights. I think about my routine tomorrow, how I’m supposed to float through the day to relax myself before the race Saturday. And look at me right now—pacing around like a crazy animal, working myself up too tight.
A car outside on the street makes me stop and go to the window. I watch the headlights approach slow, and then keep watching as a car that’s not Gavin’s goes past our house and down the road. My mind jumps around, wondering was he in some accident, wondering did he get in trouble about Grier, then chastising myself for wasting any thought on him at all, when the only person I need to worry about is me.
“You can’t worry though, is the thing,” I remind myself out loud. Because fixating on a thing—swimming or winning or not crying or some noncommunicative college cockhead—is exactly the way to fuck it all up.
Your mind has to be completely blank. It has to be.
Which makes me pause and turn to the door.
Alcohol is stupid, because it dehydrates you and makes you all groggy. Besides, Mom and Louis don’t keep anything around except her cheap gross wine and his beer, which they’d notice was gone. It’d be better if I could somehow get some pot. The next best thing is Mom’s Ambien or whatever is down there in her medicine cabinet. She started taking it after Dad’s accident and then kept going, thanks to her work and Louis’s snoring problem. It’ll be tricky, and I’ll have to be deadly silent, but I know it will work.
I go to my door and turn the knob slow. Out in the dark hallway, I pause, listening, but I wouldn’t be able to hear anything from their bedroom at the back of the house anyway. I move down the hall, heel to toe like I read somewhere the Indians used to do. At the top of the stairs, I pause again. I don’t have to do this. With the right breathing, I could probably fall asleep. Eventually. But then I picture myself on the couch the other night, eyes unable to close. I picture the dreams I can’t afford to have.
I lower my foot to the first step. I will be silent, and I will master this.
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