Strangely enough, for me, it wasn’t even my father’s arrest. It was after. It was begging my mom to drive us to the police station, to go get him, only to be told she knows what she’s doing, to trust her, and that everything will be okay. It was being told we couldn’t go pick him up after he posted bail because no one could see us with him there. He didn’t even come home. He had to go to the apartment he used to keep near his office in Manhattan for two days before he could ditch the news cameras and come home. And still, my mother promised she knew what was best. Even when they would lock themselves in their master bedroom suite for days at a time, talking in hushed voices, heatedly arguing, my mother’s sobs echoing through the walls, I continued to believe her. And why wouldn’t I? They’re my parents; why wouldn’t they have known what was best?
But without a trial it was less than a year before my father was reporting for his voluntary surrender, and even at nine years old I knew that spending the next fifteen years without him wasn’t what was best. Certainly it wasn’t what was best for me.
That was about when I stopped believing that other people—even my parents—could possibly know what’s best for me better than I do. When I realized the danger in letting others call the shots.
The memories weigh me down with resentment, and I curse that damn dream once again.
After a long day of classes I just want to fall down onto my bed and take a nap. I want this feeling to go away. But I can’t, because tonight we have our first group meeting about the campaign project for Zayne’s class, and for the second time today, I will have to see Tucker.
His presence makes the aftereffects of my dream sharpen and linger, makes the shame and guilt wear me down even more. I almost consider e-mailing them all to tell them I’m not feeling well, but I don’t, because I may be a lot of things, but I’m not a coward.
And besides, there’s too much riding on this project, and I’m determined to win the competition so I can land that internship. Ever since Zayne’s announcement, I’ve grown more and more convinced that it’s my opportunity to show the world—and myself—that I can achieve whatever dream I choose, by virtue of nothing more than some talent and good old work ethic. That I possess both, and I can employ them to forge the future I want for myself—one worlds away from the one my father chose.
The sky has spent the entire day overcast in charcoals and slates in a fitting reflection of my mood, but it only begins to weep a light drizzle after I leave my dorm building to go meet the group. The rain waits to grow heavier until I’ve gone too far to go back for an umbrella, so I push my hood over my hair and rush through the throngs of students also hurrying to their destinations.
Tucker is the last to show up at the student center, and we’re all already sitting around the table, tablets out, when he saunters in, brushing the water from his hair with his fingers. He avoids eye contact as he takes the seat opposite me.
“Hi, Tucker.” Julia smiles, tucking her hair—also damp—behind her ear.
Yeah, he has that effect.
I stare at the blank note page on my tablet as Tucker murmurs a general hello. Julia tries to engage him in small talk but he seems in no mood for it and changes the subject back to the project. Our fourth group member, Manny, leads the discussion while Julia makes suggestions. Tucker seems as distracted as I am, both of us contributing minimally and blindly agreeing to almost everything. I catch him watching me with vague disquiet, and I wonder if he can read my distress, my exhaustion.
I excuse myself to go to the bathroom and add some concealer to the circles under my eyes. I don’t have blush on me, so I pinch my cheeks a little to bring some color to the surface. I avoid Tucker’s gaze when I return, something I’ve become rather skilled at.
“So Tuck did some research on a few of the organizations on the list. He made some notes on their recent outreach campaigns and messages and stuff,” Julia fills me in.
Tuck. My eyes skate his way before I can stop myself, but he’s staring at his phone. I guess he participates just fine when I’m not around, and I wonder again why he stopped me from switching groups. His words from last week ricochet in my head, wounding as ever, tearing through my chest like shrapnel. We’re nothing. We never were.
“That’s good,” I murmur without looking up, my voice soft and unfamiliar.
“I’ll e-mail it out,” Tuck mutters to no one in particular.
“Okay, cool,” Manny says. “You do that, and I’ll look some things up, and we can brainstorm more next time.”
We all pack up our things, except Tucker, who only has his phone out.
“So, Tuck, I hear there’s another party at the lax house tomorrow night…” Julia tosses her hair behind her shoulder.
Tucker looks up briefly from his phone and raises his eyebrows. “That’s what they tell me.”
He always used to be such a flirt, even when he didn’t mean anything by it. It was just his way of being friendly to girls, which is why I didn’t take him seriously back when he first started hitting on me. But he’s different now. It’s like my lies have changed him in some palpable way, and he’s erected a wall around a fundamental part of his nature, effectively caging in his playful spirit. It’s as if he’s lost a piece of himself—or I’ve robbed him of it—and it makes me impossibly sadder. God knows I don’t want him flirting with Julia, or any girl really, but I never wanted him to be anything other than the Tucker Green I’ve adored since childhood. That was the guy I fell for, after all.
“You gonna be there?” Julia asks.
“I do live there,” Tucker says with a vague hint of sarcasm, but he tries on a conciliatory smile to soften it up. And it works; Julia blushes the color of a freaking tomato.
I mutter something about needing to study for statistics and head out of the student center.
“Carl.”
I freeze in place, not daring to turn, not sure if the low rumble of my name in his voice was even real, or if I imagined it. I close my eyes instead, trying to steady my racing heart. Tucker’s huge hand comes down onto my shoulder for no more than a microsecond before he thinks better of blessing me with his touch, retracting it like I’m contaminated or something.
Toxic.
I still don’t turn, but I peek back over my shoulder. Tucker comes around to face me, glaring with army green eyes I could once read so well. “What the fuck is wrong with you?” Strangely his question is harsher than his tone, which is flat and low, and as inscrutable as his glare.
Still, his words make me flinch like he’s slapped me. But mostly I’m puzzled, because he knows full well what’s wrong with me, but I don’t know why he suddenly wants to discuss it here. “What do you m-mean?” I stammer the last word. Freaking stammer. I’ve never stammered in my life.
“Do you not give a fuck about our grade?” A slight hint of frustration sneaks into his voice.
“What?” I breathe. “Of course I do.”
I don’t miss the clench of his jaw. “You think you might want to contribute something next time?” he spits.
My back straightens. If there’s any way to get me on the offense, it’s to make me feel attacked. “You’re telling me to contribute? Because you performed a few Google searches? So, what? Now you’re in charge of the team?”
Tucker’s eyes narrow and he grits his teeth, biting back whatever scathing retort is on his tongue. “No, Carleigh,” he says carefully, like I’m obtuse. Carleigh. “But no one is counting on me or my keen observations to pull this project off. In case you forgot, all of our grades are on the line here.”
Keen observations. He’s making fun of Zayne’s praise from one of our first classes. But I don’t even blame him. I just got done psyching myself up to win that internship, and so far I’m not even pulling my weight to get a passing grade. So much for professionalism. But locked in a battle with Tucker, no matter how petty, it simply isn’t in my nature to surrender. At the same time I’m just too exhausted to argue.
“Are you sick?” he asks suddenly, h
is brow furrowing in a parody of concern.
I blink at him. “What?”
“You’re all out of it. You were out of it in class this morning, too.”
And what can I say? That I haven’t slept? That I dreamed about my dad and now I feel like complete shit? That’s the last thing I would ever bring up to him.
“Maybe I’m out of it because I was just out all night partying.” My shrug is so strained that instead of the indifference I was going for, I’m sure it has a decidedly different effect. But still I don’t back down. “And don’t worry about me contributing to the project. If you really doubt I’m going to win that competition and land that internship, then you were right after all. You don’t know me. And you know what? What if I am sick? Why should you care either way? I’m just a stranger, remember?” The hurt his words have caused me drip from my tone in obvious bitterness.
Tucker glares at me, muscles tensed. I wait for him to strike back with some cutting words, but instead all I get is a slow nod. “You’re right,” he says simply, and then he turns and walks away without a single glance back.
* * *
Devin drags me to the party the next night. I don’t put up much of an argument. It’s not worth it. I’ve already tried explaining that there’s someone at the lacrosse house I don’t want to see, but it went right over her head. And I suppose I can’t blame her for wanting to go to the hottest parties. This is the only college experience we’re going to get, after all.
I’m still feeling out of it, as Tucker described it, and I need a distraction anyway. I’ve realized recently that Tucker’s physical presence is irrelevant. He’s here with me regardless, whether he’s in the room or not.
Fortunately the party is crowded and it’s easy to lose myself in the masses. I bury my troubles deep below the surface, and chat with the girls about nothing important. I’m careful not to drink too much, but I do have a nice buzz going, and I have to admit it helps.
“Hey, Carleigh.” Ben Aronin slips from his ever-present crowd of eager girls to say hello.
“Hi.”
“Having a good time?” he asks, the dutiful host.
I smile—it comes easily as I look up at his handsome features, trying hard not to compare them to Tucker’s. “Beer and music, what’s not to like?” I shrug.
Ben’s mouth lifts into a grin of white, perfectly straight teeth. It’s the kind of grin that obviously gets girls exactly where he wants them, but I can’t help but think it’s missing something, and I try to convince myself it’s not the roguish slant of Tucker’s, or that one slightly crooked incisor it reveals. I need to shake myself out of this funk. To stop wallowing in the reminders of the two men I’ve loved in my life—the one who hurt me and the one I hurt as a result.
So I focus on talking to the nice, handsome, innocuous guy in front of me.
He asks me how I’m liking school and tells me about fall training. Lacrosse season doesn’t start until mid-winter, but that doesn’t mean the team isn’t already hard at work, in the weight room almost every morning, on the field practicing drills most afternoons, and scrimmaging on weekends.
“But I try to enjoy the freedom now before our schedule gets rough,” he tells me.
“I can tell.” I gesture to the party.
Ben smiles. “Well, these don’t stop during the season. In fact, they only get bigger.” He sighs, as if the team having these parties is more of an obligation than something he particularly enjoys, and that surprises me. He seems so in his element.
“You don’t like big parties?” I ask.
He shrugs. “They’re fine. They were exciting when I was a freshman. But, you know, it’s hard to get to know people when it’s so crowded, and when you feel responsible for making sure people are having a good time.”
I smile wryly. “Seems like you already know everyone,” I point out. I nod over his shoulder to the girls who surrounded him a just minutes ago, several of whom are shooting glares my way. “In fact, I think your harem over there is already missing your attention.”
Ben follows my gaze and runs his hand through his hair. “They don’t know me,” he says softly. Again, he surprises me with his sincerity.
“Anyway, how are your classes?” he asks, changing the subject. “Regret taking Zayne’s yet?” His smirk is teasing, but his eyes shine with playfulness.
I give him a light punch on his arm, silently noting the firmness of his biceps. Ben is definitely well-built. “You could have warned me about that final project!” I scold, my smile betraying my humor.
Ben throws his palms up in surrender. “Hey, I thought you weren’t afraid of a difficult class?”
His amusement is contagious and I can’t help but laugh. “I’m not. But it would have been nice to have a heads-up.”
“Okay, okay,” he concedes. “My bad. Anyway, I’m sure you’ll do great.”
I sure hope so. “Yeah, well. It would be nice to win and start with that A. The range for the rest of the teams is crazy. Anywhere from a B plus to a D plus? Talk about subjective.”
Ben nods. “No kidding. My team came in second last semester, and Zayne thought our video was funny, so he started us with B’s. But then he heard about some stupid argument we’d gotten into in, like, the second week, and docked three of us a full grade for not being professional enough. I aced all of the quizzes and participated as much as anyone else, and I ended up with a B- in the class because of that damn project,” he grumbles.
“But I shouldn’t even complain. One of our defenders was on the second-place team and he got a bad peer review from a girl on his team he was stupid enough to blow off after sleeping with at a party, and he ended up with a D on the project. He got a D+ in the class, which dragged down his entire GPA, and he ended up benched the entire season.”
“Benched?” What does one have to do with the other?
Ben nods. “Yup. All NCAA athletes have to keep a 2.8 minimum GPA. He’s just lucky he wasn’t here on an athletic scholarship, because that would have been gone as soon as he got benched.”
Ben takes a sip of his beer, oblivious to my stunned expression. Because Tucker’s here on an athletic scholarship. Which means he’s got a hell of a lot more riding on this project than I realized—far more than I do. Sure, I want that internship, but Tucker’s entire college education could depend on it. And he wouldn’t even be stuck in Zayne’s class if it wasn’t for me. If he hadn’t been trying to escape the one we’d planned to take together.
Familiar guilt threatens to crush me, but I force it away.
“Have you been to Bottega?” Ben asks out of nowhere.
I blink at him.
“It’s a great little Italian place. It’d be nice to get off campus. Let me take you.” His confidence is back in full force, and I’m a little taken aback that he’s asking me out.
“I just got out of a pretty serious relationship,” I murmur, and I peek over his shoulder to the crowd in the next room. Like I summoned him, Tucker stands in the corner, flirting with that same redhead from a few weeks ago.
“All the more reason to get out and have a good time,” Ben offers.
My gaze strays back to Tucker, redhead’s pink manicured claws on his arm, and I wish I could say it’s not what makes my decision, but that would be a lie. “Okay,” I tell him. “Sounds like fun.” It doesn’t really, but that’s my problem. Because it should, shouldn’t it?
My eyes find Tucker again, and this time, he finds me in return. I expect his disinterest or his usual disdain, but what I don’t see coming is his anger. His eyes widen and he glares—not just at me, but at Ben, who doesn’t even notice I’m not paying him attention anymore. When Tucker starts marching through the faceless bodies in our direction, I tell Ben I need to use the restroom and get the hell out of there.
I do go to the bathroom. I fix my makeup and reapply my lip gloss, if only to take the time to let Tucker get over whatever suddenly pissed him off, which was most likely simply my presence.
“Hi—uh, Carleigh, right?”
Fortunately he doesn’t seem to be drunk tonight. “Uh, yeah,” I murmur.
He looks sheepish, and I think he might be about to apologize, but then his gaze veers over my shoulder and his brows slip into an anxious frown. “What’s up, Green?” He directs his words behind me, and I tense.
I turn to face Tucker, but he’s staring at Ricky. “Those chicks from SDT were looking for you,” Tucker murmurs, but it feels like he’s saying something else.
“Gotcha,” Ricky replies, and just like that, I’m alone with Tucker.
“Didn’t he call you a bitch or something a few weeks ago? Now you’re flirting with him?” he sneers.
“I wasn’t flirting with him,” I say defensively. And I really, really wasn’t. But it isn’t Tucker’s damn business either way.
“And what about Ben? You weren’t flirting with him either, huh?” Tucker’s tone is hateful and accusatory and my hands clench into fists. I wasn’t flirting with Ben—not really. But I did agree to let him take me out.
“What do you care what this stranger does?” I hiss.
Tucker’s nostrils flare and I watch frustration color his face red. Suddenly he grabs my elbow and leads me farther down the empty hall and around the bend to a row of closed doors. “And Ben’s not a stranger? You don’t know him!” Tucker growls.
“This is my school, too!” I snap. “I’m allowed to have the same college experiences as everyone else!”
Not the right thing to say. Tucker’s eyes widen and he grits his teeth, and then he drags me roughly through one of the doors and slams it shut behind him. He sucks in a deep breath to calm himself, and then he’s stalking toward me until I’m backed up against the wall. “College experiences, huh? Like hooking up with a stranger?” His voice is low and vaguely threatening, and for the first time, I’m frightened. I know he’d never physically hurt me, but the predatory glint in his eye makes me think there’s something to fear other than violence.
In Ruins Page 9