I run up to my room, the 72 steps nothing at all right now. I slip his letter into my journal and then take a small stack of blank paper from my bottom drawer. My fingers are cold but not because of the weather. My heart has pulled all my blood to my chest.
It takes me three tries, but I think I do it. I hope. As I fold it up, I press my lips to it and inhale.
Back down the steps. Fortunately, Lucy isn’t back yet. All this coming and going would most definitely not be covered by my Con Law excuses. I almost miss the last step, but cling on to the railing and make it unscathed. I feel like a burglar almost, sneaking around college and making sure nobody’s watching me. I hide the bagged note, back under the stone. Part of me wants to wait here for him, but who knows how long it’ll be, so back up I go.
24
I watched her read my letter in the garden, so I can’t do the same, but God knows I’d like to. From between the stones I take the sandwich bag. The anticipation of reading her words is so intense I can’t even make it the fifty feet back to my house. So I step under a covered archway, dedicated to Samuel Morse of all people, and open the plastic bag and read:
B-
All night I dreamt of the way your hands fit around my hips, the way you feel inside me. I have never felt anything like you before. There’s nothing like you. I woke up smiling and I’m still smiling now. I cannot believe you are real. I cannot believe I have you.
I’m yours too. Always,
N
Again and again, I read it. I’ve never seen her handwriting before now. She’s seen mine, I realize, on the board. Her letters are so lovely, so elegant and orderly. She’s written to me right in the middle of the page, almost centered, with white spaces in between the lines. Her p’s and y’s hang a little lower than any of her other letters. Shit, even her uppercase N is sexy.
I take a blank piece of paper from my jacket pocket, already folded, and a pen. I place it on a piece of smooth dry granite in the archway and write:
N
I’m the one that can’t believe it. You’re making me wish for impossible things. I wish I could slip into your room when nobody’s watching. I want to see you in your space. I want to see how you live in your world
B
I place it in between the stones and head back into my house. I look up at her window, and I see her smiling back down at me. I tilt my head towards the Zen garden. Twenty minutes later I see her come back out and find my letter. She walks back to her stairway, but turns and walks backwards the last few steps, watching me the whole way. She isn’t gone but a few minutes. She’s just as anxious for more as I am. The idea of her standing in that stairwell, not even going back up to her room to write back to me, is driving me wild. But not as wild as her reply. Seven words of pure fucking glory:
The door will be unlocked for you.
I rub my hand over my hat, and the wool scratches my forehead. Fuck me. What if I did it? What if I snuck up there? Jesus Christ. What is she doing to me?
I know I’m supposed to be that guy who just lets go of shit. The guy for whom nothing matters. But this matters. The way I need her matters. She matters.
“Beck,” says a voice.
I spin around. I drop the smile off my face.
Osgood is wearing a hat that’s kind of the same color as his toupee used to be. A camel color.
“Hey there, Dean.”
“What are you doing out here in the snow?” He gnaws on a dry piece of skin on his lip.
“Nice hat.” I fold up the letter, trying not to look like I adore the very creases.
He glowers at me. “What’s that in your hands?”
I play it cool and slip it into my inside pocket. I zip up my jacket to my neck. If he wants it, he’s going to have to fight me for it, and I’ve got a feeling he didn’t grow up throwing punches in Cambridge like I did in Vegas. “Just some mail.”
“How’s Miss Costa?”
The sensation is like getting pushed off a cliff. He can’t know, I’m sure of that. But he’s got a good poker face. I'll give him that.
Fortunately, mine is better. Vegas. It’s got its fucking perks.
“I wouldn’t know,” I smile. “Sorry to cut this short. But I’ve got some work to do.”
3:17 am. I’ve lain in bed for two hours thinking about whether to do this. I can’t stop thinking of her up there alone. Waiting. Finally, I get up and look out my window. Her light is still on, but every other window on her floor is dark. Fuck it. I can’t resist. I can’t stay away. I put on a pair of sweats, sneakers, a gray zip-up hoodie with a T-shirt, and a baseball hat. I look at myself in the mirror. I look like exactly what I am. A 38-year-old guy trying to pretend he’s 22. But what the fuck can I do about that? Not one goddamned thing. I am what I am. Hers.
The endless steps burn my glutes, and my pulse bangs in my temples. At the door to the fourth floor, I put my hand on the knob and listen. No music, nobody laughing. But just before I open the door, I hear the noise of a flushing toilet and wait. I hear someone walk past in slippers, maybe, that soft-footed noise of someone returning to their room. I open the door again and listen. Nothing. I open the door with a brassy squeak from the hinges.
Inside the hallway, I get my bearings. Rooms 409 and 410 are to my left, so I go right and pull down the bill of my hat. Every door that passes makes my blood pressure rise higher and higher. I’m so fucking close to her, so fucking close.
I pass room 417. Two more to go on this side of the hall. The noise of a door creaking open behind me startles me, but I don’t turn around. Can’t turn back now. I slouch a little, making like a college senior heading to his girlfriend’s room, and keep on going. To room 421. Where I pause and catch my breath, alone in the hallway.
On her door is taped a picture of Naomi and a girl I recognize. One of ours, a Durham student. Lucy is her name, I think. I’ve met her. Lucy Burchett, maybe. They’re covered in dye and paint, holding on to one another giggling. They’re at that Indian festival, what’s it called. Holi? I can’t remember. Naomi’s smile sparkles perfect and white. The kind of smile that could stop a sacred holiday in its tracks.
My hand is on the knob. I hold my breath. It’s unlocked and my heart stops beating in my chest for the whole clockwise turn. The light of her room fills the hallway. There she is, in bed, with her hands to her mouth, eyes bright and open in surprised delight. She’s in a nightie with blue flowers, and wearing a thin gray robe over the top. A totally involuntary, sudden, instantaneous smile springs up to my face, without my even thinking to give it to her. Instant happiness as soon as I see her.
Oh my God! she mouths.
I slip inside her room.
Quietly as I can, I close the door and lock it, even being quiet with the lock itself. Rotating it so slowly, I can bolt sliding through the frame. Slow. Fucking forbidden. And then locked tight. Just us apart from the world.
Her eyes are frozen on mine. She scoots to the far edge of her bed and lifts the comforters. To welcome me home.
I turn off the lamp on my way to her. Everything becomes dark and still. My shirt and baseball cap come off in one yank. I sink down on top of her, and she wraps her body around me. I pull her robe off and bring the straps of her nightie down off her shoulders.
“Not a sound,” I whisper into her ear.
She doesn’t answer out loud, but instead shakes her head against my cheek. I pull my face back from her and find I can see her in the dim, strange light of the snowy sky outside.
I pull her to me, my cock rock solid as I press into her. She tenses, and in place of a groan, she gives me a long, beautiful exhale.
I feel the cheap spring of the mattress dig into my knee as I feed her every inch of me. I slide her nightie up her stomach, and my hand finds its way to the narrow of her waist.
Her hips rise. Her hand leaves the back of my neck to grip the metal headboard.
Fuck. Fuck me.
Fuck. Fuck.
Fuck.
25
/> I wake up to a note tucked under my pillow.
Beautiful –
Thank you for last night. You are pure magic.
Yesterday afternoon I had a close call with You Know Who. So I researched a few things. Download an app called Signal. It’s secure. My screen name is The4Loves. I’ll write you there.
I grab my phone from my desk and jump back under the covers. I download Signal. It asks me for a screen name. I’m tempted to type in a;sldfk;ajkadlfkj or 12345 but I decide on ErosEros. And then comes a message:
There she is.
Room spins briefly.
oh my God. are you sure this is safe?
Yeah. As safe as it can be.
I hope you know what you’re doing to me.
you’re doing the same thing to me.
i wish you were here
No shit.
I want you again. Soon.
Grip sheets.
so do i.
i can smell you everywhere.
i wil l never wash these sheets again.
I’m a broken man, Naomi Costa. All your fault.
Toe curl.
are you going to breakfast?
Thought you’d never ask.
Over the somewhat sad serving tray of pre-scrambled eggs, we brush past one another. I linger by the bacon, and he touches my hand by the sliced oranges. I see him sit down next to Osgood, and I pretend to listen to Lucy tell me something about a guy she met. I barely listen. I’m pretty sure I hear the words foot fetish, but it really doesn’t hit my radar. Back in my room, I report back:
lucy says I’m glowing.
Osgood is a piece of work.
btw id din’t tell you.
i had a chance to rescue the hairpiece
i declined.
Oh shit. You did him a favor.
Snort.
did you shower?
No. Did you?
Lewd as it is, I’d savored walking up to feeling his cum on my lips. Slightly sticky, slightly dry. So fleeting and yet so, unbelievably, wonderful.
nope.
Hang tight a few days. I have something special in mind.
I’m not sure what that means, but okay…sure. I’ll hold off on a shower for a few days. I’m all for a little water conservation.
I mean, you can shower. Sorry. Lol.
Hang tight for our next date.
Which means there is definitely going to be a next time, yes, yes, yes.
i can stand a few days I think.
I can’t. But I'll have to.
Hard swallow.
First time we were together, did you like the tie around your wrists…
you know I did.
The spanks…
i begged for more.
And my hand around your throat.
Full body flutter.
that’s when I came.
I remember. I fucking remember.
Do you trust me?
Sweet Jesus.
i do.
Good girl.
I should go. Duty calls. Bastard.
I don’t know how to say goodbye. I don’t want to say goodbye.
thank you for last night. i need to feel you inside me again.
Fuck you for being so perfect.
God, coming from anybody else, that’d be offensive. From him, I get it. We’re at the limit of words. Fuck you for turning my life upside down, fuck you for ruining what I understand. I get that down to the very last letter.
fuck you right back.
The week goes by with more texts. Most often, we run into each other in the dining hall at lunch. Osgood eats near where he teaches, so lunch is ours. We have, by silent mutual consent, abandoned the dessert area because it’s too damned busy. Usually we happen to meet at the cooked vegetable island, which doesn’t get a whole lot of traffic. One particularly quiet lunch hour, I see him standing there considering steamed broccoli like it’s some philosophical quandary. I know he’s waiting for me. I immediately abort my plans to make a salad and feign a pressing interest in steamed baby carrots. Placing my tray next to him, I stay outside that imaginary but definite bubble of appropriate personal space.
I’m pretty sure it’s just the heating lamps, but part of me wants to believe that searing warmth on my arm is him. That he lights me up that way.
He says, “Broccoli, I love it.”
In my head I interpret this as, I want to rip your clothes off.
“Me too,” I say, by which I mean, Right here, Master Beck. Right here.
“I’m pretty passionate about cauliflower too.” Obviously, that translates to, Your nipples need to be in my mouth.
“Especially if it’s raw.” Please, please, please.
And a slow, almost silent groan escapes from his throat.
Once I get my carrots and my mysteriously cod-like baked tilapia, I sit down alone. It’s not unusual for me. I pull out my book for Medieval History. I can just see him over the top of the cover. What he doesn’t know is I have his book hidden in here. I’ve read it over and over. Next to my glass of water, my phone buzzes. I flip it over and open up Signal.
Fellows’ dinner canceled tonight.
whoa! really?
Yeah. Something went really wrong with the dishwasher.
you didn’t…
Plumbing sabotage is surprisingly easy.
holy shit!
So you’re free tonight.
I freeze with my broccoli on my fork.
do I get to see you?
Eat your broccoli.
I put my broccoli in my mouth.
8pm. Be at the Starbucks on Chapel, window table.
Crunch goes an undercooked stem.
that sounds like a date.
Possibly.
I don’t hear from him for the rest of the day and I don’t reply either. Instead, I work furiously, as fast as I can, thrusting myself into a godforsaken paper about a mostly unknown Revolutionary War hero with one eye and who seemed to divide his time between writing semi-belligerent letters to Washington and “getting in small skirmishes” on roadsides. I have no idea what I’m writing. No thesis. No outline. Just words, words, words.
Paragraphs.
Pages.
They might be good? I mean, good enough?
Yeah. Fine. Good enough for today.
With a crick in my neck, I finish the draft and save it to Dropbox, lest my computer spontaneously implode. I bite into an apple—Lucy is always stealing them from the dining hall, and her room is starting to look like a Vermont orchard, so I get the overflow. I look out my window, and the snow and ice have changed back to rain. It pounds down into the mud on the edges of the grassy quad.
There’s another paper to do, this one a two-page reading response. I look at the clock. 3:00 pm. I give myself a limit of two hours and pound it out. Who knew love could make a person so freaking efficient?
Then at five, I jump in the shower. I slather myself with a little extra body wash. I take some time with my hair, actually finger-combing it and using extra conditioner. In the little shower stall, behind the pale blue curtain, I dry off and make sure to get every inch of myself covered in lotion. Back in my room, I lock the door behind me and put on NoMBe’s “California Girls.”
“Oh how I love the smell of West Coast pheromones.”
“No kidding,” I say to my computer.
I need you this way, he’d said, when I showed up at the Guest Suite in my leggings and sweatshirt. So now it just doesn’t feel right to go ask Lucy for something flashy. I need you this way. God.
So I pick out another pair of leggings—these are what you might call my “dress leggings,” no stains, not faded—and a high-necked tunic sweater. It’s dark blue and everybody always compliments my eyes when I wear it. As for shoes? It’s warmed up and the snow has melted because of the pouring rain. So there’s just one option.
My busted old yellow galoshes.
26
The garage attached to the Master’s House is roug
hly the width of a horse and carriage. It also, thanks to the absolute insistence of the Yale Relocation Office, now contains my trusty old Jeep Wagoneer. 1987, wood panels, and leather seats that same oxblood red as that sofa that I’d leaned Naomi over in the guest suite. I feel a ripple of need rush downwards, and my cock hardens.
Focus, Beck. Focus. The Wagoneer. Focus on the Wagoneer. You can’t be getting a hard-on in your garage, for Christ’s sake.
But I am. Yeah, I am.
I get inside the Jeep. The engine turns over immediately with a satisfying roar. Coming from the radio is NPR at full blast—it used to be 90s hits back in LA. I laugh a little to myself, because of course, and turn down the volume.
The last week without her has been agony. Every day I think about how to get to her. I’ve had to seriously fight the urge to sneak back up to her room and fuck her silent and senseless again and again. But I haven’t, because it’s just too damned risky. I haven’t even gone up that stairwell. I know that if I run up it again, I’ll never want to come back down. So instead we met over the vegetables and gave each other secret glances in class. It had been enough to live off of, just barely, because at least I had tonight to look forward to. The plumbing sabotage had been a stroke of genius, if I do say so myself.
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