Rikki

by Abigail Strom

  I took off my jeans and pulled on the pajamas, which were way too big but had a drawstring waist. I folded the jeans and put them on the floor beside the bed, next to my shoes and backpack. Then I got under the covers and waited for Sam to come back.

  I was now perfectly comfortable except for my bra, which I had no plans of removing.

  I entertained myself by imagining Sam addressing that particular issue. You should change out of your bra. You won’t be comfortable sleeping in it.

  When Sam came back he said, “What’s so funny?”

  I shook my head. “Nothing. Thanks again for letting me stay here.”

  “No problem.”

  When he crossed in front of my bed on the way to his own, I noticed a speck of white at the corner of his mouth.

  Toothpaste.

  For some reason, I remembered that night at Sharon’s so long ago. When Sam had kissed me his breath had been fresh and minty, like he’d brushed his teeth right before the party.

  I wondered if he tasted that way to Mena.

  He got under his covers and said, “Okay, so… I’m going to turn out the light.”

  “Okay.”

  He suited the action to the word and the room was dark.

  “Good night, Rikki.”

  “Good night, Sam.”

  I could hear him shifting around a little, but I stayed perfectly still. After a few moments the shifting stopped and then there was complete silence.

  When I’d been standing outside my own room knowing I couldn’t go inside, all I’d been able to think about was sleep. I’d felt exhausted and I just wanted to crawl into bed and close my eyes.

  But now that I was actually in a bed, in the dark, with my head resting on a pillow, I’d never felt more wide awake in my life.

  So, so, so awake.

  I had twitches in my legs and I wanted desperately to move them, but Sam was done shifting and I couldn’t start shifting now. He probably thought I was asleep since I hadn’t moved or made a sound, and in case he was still awake himself I didn’t want him to know that I was awake, because then it would be kind of weird that I hadn’t moved at all while he was moving and now all of a sudden here I was moving.

  And of course, the longer I went without moving the weirder it would be if I started moving.

  Sam’s pajamas were really comfortable. Some pajamas look good in the store, but when you put them on at home the material is stiff or itchy or there’s an annoying tag in the back. These ones were soft with no tag anywhere.

  But in spite of the comfy pajamas, I still wanted to move. I needed to move.

  Okay, this was torture. I might actually get more sleep on the common room sofa downstairs.

  Then, in the bed next to me, I distinctly heard Sam’s breathing.

  I hadn’t been able to hear it before. Now I could hear it, deep and regular.

  He was asleep.

  I’d never appreciated the luxury of moving so much. I wriggled around a little, stretched out long, hugged my knees to my chest and stretched out again. Then I curled up on my right side and looked at Sam.

  My eyes had adjusted to the darkness. He was sleeping on his back, and I could see his chest rising and falling as he breathed.

  I watched him for a long time. There’s something soothing about watching another person sleep. I was actually starting to get sleepy, too.

  The only thing keeping me awake now was my bra. It really was uncomfortable.

  After a moment I unhooked it, slipped it off, and stuck it under the pillow.

  The next thing I knew it was morning and the sun was in my eyes.

  Chapter Six

  I blinked, remembered where I was, and sat up.

  Sam was still asleep. He lay on his back with his arms flung out to the sides and his head turned slightly toward me. The covers were down around his waist and his T-shirt had ridden up, leaving his stomach bare above the waistband of his sweatpants.

  A golden rectangle of skin was exposed. Above his belly button the hard ridges of his abs disappeared under the T-shirt; below it, more muscle rippled down toward the quilt, which was bunched up around his hips.

  The tops of his hipbones were visible. I was fascinated by that, and by the slight dip between his hips and his abdomen—twin valleys angled in and downward, pointing toward—

  Now I was just staring at his crotch.

  I made my gaze travel up to his face instead. There was a slight frown on his forehead, but it didn’t make him look angry. It made him look concerned, as though even in sleep he was thinking about his family, his friends… whatever he felt was his responsibility.

  A shaft of sunlight showed the lighter streaks in his brown hair and cast faint shadows under his cheekbones. The stubble on his jaw was golden, and—

  Suddenly I noticed the clock on his bedside table.

  Shit!

  I had less than twenty minutes to get to class. The building was only five minutes away and I could make it if I skipped my morning shower, but I didn’t have any time to waste.

  I swung my legs over the side of the bed, pulled off Sam’s pajamas, and pulled on my jeans. I shoved my feet into my sandals, grabbed my backpack, and was at the door in ten seconds.

  I paused for a moment with my hand on the knob. I could wake Sam up to say thank you, but wouldn’t it be nicer to let him sleep?

  Yes, it would. I could thank him later.

  I closed the door softly behind me, hurried down the hall, and took the stairs to the third floor two at a time.

  The code phrase was still on the whiteboard, but the prospect of being late to class gave me the courage I’d lacked the night before.

  I pounded on the door. “I hope everyone’s decent in there!”

  There was no response, and after a few seconds I went inside.

  Tamsin was sitting up in bed—alone, I was glad to see.

  “Hey,” she said, sounding sleepy and confused. “Was someone just knocking on the door?”

  “That was me,” I said, stripping off my clothes on the way to my dresser.

  “Why were you knocking on the door? You live here.”

  I pulled on fresh underwear and a bra, and then I froze.

  A bra. My bra. The bra I’d left in Sam’s room.

  I put the thought aside, because I didn’t have time to be horrified and embarrassed now. I’d have to pencil it in for later.

  I finished getting dressed. “I knocked because I didn’t know if Oscar was still in here and I didn’t feel like having my innocence ripped away in one fell swoop.”

  “But I erased the—” She stopped. “Oh, crap. I forgot to erase the board, didn’t I?”

  “Yes, you did,” I said, brushing my hair and putting it in a ponytail, which should disguise its unwashed state.

  “I’m so sorry. Where did you sleep last night?”

  “In a friend’s room.”

  “Oh. Did I mention that I’m really, really sorry?”

  I took the books for yesterday’s classes out of my backpack and replaced them with the ones for today. As I was heading for the door I saw Tamsin’s expression, which looked sort of woebegone.

  “It’s okay,” I said. “Don’t worry about it.” I paused to hitch my backpack higher on my shoulder. “So how did things go last night?”

  Her face was transformed by an enormous grin. “Great. Amazing, in fact. Dinner tonight? I want to tell you all about it.”

  “Sure. Seven?”

  “Sounds good.”

  * * *

  Classes went well but I skipped lunch to talk with a professor, and by the time dinner rolled around I was starving. I loaded my tray with twice as much food as I usually took.

  “Wow. Are you really planning to eat all that?”

  The sound of Sam’s voice behind me almost made me drop the tray.

  “God,” I said, sitting down at an empty table. “You shouldn’t sneak up on people.”

  “I have something for you,” Sam said, taking the cha
ir across from me. He reached into his backpack and pulled out a brown paper bag.

  “What’s that?” I asked. “A peanut butter and jelly sandwich?”

  “Nope,” he said as he handed it to me.

  I opened it up and saw my bra.

  I couldn’t look at him, so I stuffed the bag in my backpack and took a bite of my roll.

  “Thanks,” I said, my voice muffled by the bread.

  “You’re welcome.”

  We ate in silence for a minute while I wondered what was taking Tamsin so long. Finally I forced myself to look up from my plate.

  “I also wanted to thank you for last night,” I said.

  Sam looked up, too, and his green eyes met mine. There were gold flecks in the irises like shards of sunlight.

  “Anytime,” he said.

  My skin prickled. Where the hell was my roommate? She hadn’t been that far behind me in line.

  “Hey, guys.”

  Thank God. “Hey, Tamsin.”

  “You look happy,” Sam said, and Tamsin shot me a look as she sat down.

  “I guess Rikki told you about last night.”

  Sam took a sip of his soda and I watched the muscles of his throat move as he swallowed.

  He set the glass down. “It may have come up, but I was actually just making an observation. You really do look happy.”

  “Oh.” Tamsin said. A smile spread across her face. “Well, I am happy. I’m going to tell my roommate all about it, so be warned. If you’re going to sit at this table you’re going to hear a lot of girl talk.”

  “Go ahead,” Sam said, waving a hand magnanimously. “Maybe I’ll learn something.”

  Tamsin pushed her tray to the side and leaned forward. “There aren’t many guys our age who are good with their tongues, which is why I usually date older men. But Oscar—”

  “Okay, stop,” said Sam. “I’m not ready to learn that much.” He picked up his tray, rose to his feet, and bowed. “I hope you ladies have a lovely evening.”

  As he walked over to another table I noticed that the tips of his ears were red.

  “Wow,” I said. “He’s actually embarrassed. I didn’t think guys got embarrassed about sex.”

  “What about you? Are you embarrassed?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, I don’t care. You have to let me tell you the dirty details. Please, please, please? I have to talk to someone and this could be stuff you want to know someday.”

  I finished my roll and started on my salad. “Okay, lay it on me.”

  By the time we finished dinner and I was nibbling on my brownie, I’d heard graphic descriptions of acts I’d only read about in dirty fan fiction.

  “So, to summarize—you had fun.”

  “I really did. Things are definitely looking up for me. I’m sorry about the whiteboard thing, though. Where did you end up last night?”

  “A friend’s room,” I said, looking down at my dessert plate. I’d eaten so much lasagna I couldn’t finish my brownie.

  “I know, you said that this morning. Which friend?”

  There was no reason not to tell her. “Sam.”

  “Sam? You mean… Sam?”

  I nodded. “His roommate never showed up, so he has an extra bed.”

  “Oh.” Tamsin sounded disappointed. “So nothing happened?”

  “Of course not. He was just being nice.”

  “Did you want something to happen?”

  I shook my head firmly. “All I wanted was a place to crash.” I hesitated. “Also, he and Mena are kind of… involved.”

  “Sam and Mena? But I thought—”

  “I know, me too. But she’s bi.”

  “Oh. So you and Sam are just platonic, huh?”

  I smiled at her. “Sorry not to have any salacious details to match yours. I have a feeling I’ll be living vicariously through you for a while. If you don’t mind?”

  “Not at all. I’ll just have to have enough sex for the both of us.” She leaned back in her chair and sighed. “I tell you, the sacrifices a girl will make in the name of friendship.”

  * * *

  Over the next few weeks I got a chance to meet Oscar. Several chances, in fact, since he was spending a lot of time in our room.

  It turned out that he was a smoker, too, although not cigarettes.

  “Do you guys mind?” I asked one afternoon in October, coming back after class. Oscar and Tamsin were sitting on her bed sharing a joint.

  “Sorry,” Tamsin said. “We can’t waste it, though. Give us five minutes?”

  I wouldn’t have believed I could hate anything more than the smell of tobacco, but it turned out that pot was worse. It smelled heavy and kind of sickly sweet, with an undertone like a skunk dipped in lemon juice. Opening the windows afterward didn’t help much, and even though Tamsin had started burning incense to cover up the odor when she saw how much I hated it, that only seemed to make it worse.

  I didn’t want to argue about it while Oscar was there, so I just grabbed a book and left, heading downstairs to the common room.

  It was full of people watching some reality show and shouting at the TV, and I wasn’t in the mood. I’d discovered a couple of weeks ago that there was a small room near the pottery studio that was called a study and was almost never used, so I went there instead.

  I’d just settled into an armchair with a biography of William Tecumseh Sherman when the door opened and Sam and Andre walked in.

  “Oh, hey,” Sam said when he saw me. “We were going to play chess. Will that bother you?”

  I shrugged. “Chess is a pretty quiet game, right? Unless you’re planning to do a lot of trash talking.”

  “We’ll try to keep it to a minimum.”

  He and Andre headed for the chess table in the corner, but Andre stopped to see what I was reading.

  “That name is a curse word where I come from.”

  “I forgot you’re a Southern boy. What’s your opinion of Sherman?”

  Andre shrugged. “It’s complicated. I’m Southern, I’m Black, and I’m also a pacifist. I’m a fan of emancipation but I don’t hang pictures of Union generals on my walls or anything.” He smiled suddenly. “A white friend of mine drove down once from New York. He was an hour outside of Atlanta when he got pulled over for speeding. ‘I’ve never seen anyone blow through Georgia that fast,’ the cop said. ‘Sherman did,’ my friend answered.”

  “Oh, wow. What happened?”

  “He got the biggest speeding ticket I’ve ever seen.”

  “I can imagine.”

  “Ready to play?” Sam called out, sitting down at the chess table.

  “You’re going to lose,” I told Andre as he went over to the table. “Sam was the president of our high school chess club.”

  “I don’t recall you mentioning that,” Andre said as he sat down across from Sam.

  “You didn’t ask.”

  An hour later they were still at it, which was actually quite a testament to Andre’s chess-playing abilities. Back in high school Sam had usually knocked his opponents out in twenty minutes or less.

  When the inevitable finally happened Andre shook hands like a gentleman and handed over twenty bucks.

  “Next time it’s basketball.”

  “You’re on,” Sam said.

  “Bye, Rikki,” Andre said to me as he headed out.

  “Bye.”

  I expected Sam to head out too but he stuck around for a few minutes, placing the chess pieces back on their squares.

  “Do you want to play a game?” he asked.

  “Are you kidding? No.”

  “Can’t take the competition, huh?”

  “It wouldn’t be a fair fight.”

  “I’ll spot you a pawn.”

  “No.”

  “A pawn and a knight.”

  “No.”

  “A pawn, a knight, and a bishop.”

  “No.”

  “A pawn, a knight, a bishop and—”

  The door opened a
nd Tamsin stuck her head in.

  “Andre said you were here,” she said breathlessly. She came inside and saw Sam. “Oh, perfect! You’re here too. I have a huge, huge, huge favor to ask you guys.”

  “Sure,” I said, hoping it wasn’t bail money for Oscar.

  “Okay, so…” She looked at Sam. “Do you still have that empty bed? I mean, did your roommate ever show up?”

  “Yes,” Sam said, looking a little mystified.

  “Yes your roommate showed up, or yes you still have an empty bed?”

  “Yes, I have an empty bed.”

  “Thank God. Okay. Would you mind putting Rikki up tonight? Oh, and Rikki, would you mind spending the night with Sam?”

  I got up from my chair so fast my book landed on the floor. I marched over to Tamsin, grabbed her by the arm, said to Sam over my shoulder, “Excuse us a sec,” and then dragged her out of the room.

  “What the hell is wrong with you?” I asked once we were in the hall.

  Tamsin was staring at me. “What do you mean?”

  “What do I mean? What do I mean? You can’t just put Sam on the spot like that. Or me. Why are you asking this, anyway?”

  “I need to spend the whole night with Oscar. Please, please, please. We’ve been so good, Rikki. We’ve been snatching time together when we know you won’t be there or when his roommates are both out, which is practically never. But I can’t stand it anymore. I want to fall asleep with him and wake up with him. You know?”

  “Not really. But why didn’t you talk to me about this alone? Why would you—”

  The door to the study opened and Sam came out. “Hey,” he said.

  “Hey,” Tamsin and I said.

  He looked at me. “Whatever you guys decide, I just want you to know you’re welcome to use that bed if you want.”

  “See?” Tamsin said triumphantly.

  All of my muscles felt tense. “That’s really nice of you, Sam. But—”

  He held up a hand. “Whatever you decide. I’m going back to my room now.”

  Tamsin and I stood there a moment, watching Sam walk away.

  “I’m sorry if I—” Tamsin started.

  “I’m really pissed at you,” I said at the same time.

  “I said I’m sorry. But please, Rikki, please?”

  I thought about it. The truth was, I hated being in our room after Oscar and Tamsin had been smoking pot. It felt like I couldn’t get away from the stench even with my head under the covers.