The Fall of January Cooper

by Audrey Bell

  I couldn’t face Katelyn. I would have to come up with a lie. I’d have to pretend that I forgave her—or something.

  If she knew…

  I breathed softly and slowly. Well, she would make my life an absolute hell if she knew.

  I’d have to find a way to make her like me again. I’d have to…

  No, that was impossible.

  I’d have to lie.

  I’d tell her that there was some kind of problem here. Maybe a rat infestation. I couldn’t just expect her to be a nice, normal human being. I couldn’t trust her not to sleep with my boyfriend. How could I expect her to keep from sharing a bit of juicy gossip?

  I scrolled through my contacts, watching them populate my screen and wondering how the hell I’d accumulated so many numbers that I couldn’t dial for help.

  I stopped on Tyler’s.

  I pressed call. In the second that I called him, I wasn’t sure why. I hadn’t forgiven him. But if he helped me, could I?

  It terrified me to even be thinking that—that I was in enough trouble to ask for Tyler Snow’s help.

  But I didn’t have long to think about it. He picked up on the second ring.

  “You’ll never guess what city I just landed in, baby.”

  I could feel in the back of my throat that he landed in Boston, and since my throat felt like closing, I knew I had made a terrible mistake.

  “I don’t know,” I said lightly. “Tell me.”

  Christian

  I saw her for the first time on my birthday.

  Darrin saw her first. “Trouble at twelve o'clock.”

  I looked up—expecting to see the beginnings of a bar fight, or a sloshed Harvard alum in an expensive suit about to pass out cold and sure to blame us for it in the morning. But that’s not what I saw.

  I saw her.

  I saw the reincarnation of Grace Kelly in a white t-shirt and black jeans that hugged long, slender legs, and Ferrari-red heels. She wore a black leather jacket that looked expensive, and a scowl that looked serious.

  I chewed my gum a little bit harder. God, she was good-looking.

  “Who…” I turned to ask Darrin who she was, but he’d ducked over to the elbow of the bar where a bunch of Harvard jocks were jostling against one another, each of them trying to put their drink order in first.

  I looked back and she was standing right in front of me.

  I swallowed. “Hey.”

  “Grey Goose and tonic,” she said. She tugged at the lapels of her leather jacket. She looked even more beautiful and furious up close.

  “Sure thing,” I said, lowering my eyes to keep from staring. The last person Darrin had described as trouble had left actual claw marks across his face when he’d broken up with her. He wasn’t prone to hyperbole. Not when it came to girls anyways.

  Usually, I was the one warning him they were crazy and he was the one telling me to relax. He thought Vanessa was ‘just having a hard time’ when she clearly had been out of her mind for two years straight.

  I made her drink strong and set it in front of her. I watched her through my eyelashes while I wiped down an already-dry counter. She lifted the glass to her lips, and in one smooth motion, knocked the whole drink back.

  She stabbed the lime with the tip of the red straw, and spun the glass in a circle.

  “Seven dollars,” I said. We overcharged rich girls for Grey Goose. Well, we overcharged everyone, but rich girls were the only ones who ended up ordering it.

  “Can I get another?”

  “Sure,” I said. I smiled this time. “Rough night?”

  “You have no idea.”

  Our fingers touched when I handed her the drink, and I drew mine away quickly. She went slower on this one, sipping through a straw.

  “Hey,” she said. “I have a question.”

  “Shoot.”

  “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

  Taken aback, I looked down at the glass. “You want me to remake it?”

  “No.” She plucked the red straw from her drink and pointed it at me. “Not the drink. You. There’s something wrong with you.”

  “Okay…” I wondered if I should take her car keys or ask Darrin for help. He had more experience with psychotic girls than I did.

  “So, tell me. What is it? I’m curious. What the fuck is your problem?”

  “You know, I ask myself that question every day, but I think you might have the wrong guy. I don’t know you.”

  She laughed. She had a low, throaty laugh, like she had just gotten over a cold. Husky. I leaned forward a little closer to hear it a little better.

  “No. I meant good looking guys with tattoos. All of you. What’s your problem?”

  I looked at Sam’s initials on my wrist. I’d gotten them done when I was young and furious and still wanted everyone to see it. I wanted them to ask. I wanted to tell them how he died, and I wanted to see a ghost of the devastation I remembered flicker across their faces. I wanted them to regret having asked me.

  It got old so quickly. Even I couldn’t hold onto my anger that long. I didn’t need his initials on my wrist to remember him, they were burned onto my heart. His image was burned on the back of my eyelids. You know how people tell you they start to forget the faces of people who have died? I had never had that problem. Sometimes I remembered him so clearly it was like he was standing in front of me.

  She cleared her throat.

  “Sorry. What were you saying?”

  “Nothing. Something about tattoos. And men who look like that.” She nodded at me.

  I grinned. “Right. I don’t know. I don’t speak for them all.”

  “Huh. Well, maybe y’all need a spokesman."

  “Y’all?”

  She nodded. “Yes. That’s what you need. A spokesman,” she repeated, like she was deciding to go out and hire us one. “Also, maybe a slogan, and you should do some community outreach. Y’all have terrible personalities. Good-looking guys with tattoos.”

  I laughed. “I’m sorry?” I looked at her. She wore a half-grin on her face, but I could tell she mostly meant it. “Or should I be thanking you for saying I’m good-looking?”

  “It’s not a compliment,” she clarified. “You’re not worth the trouble. None of you ever are. You should come with a surgeon’s general warning.”

  “You’re from the South?” I asked. Give me your number, I thought. I didn’t say that though. I drummed my fingers on the bar.

  “Bingo. Can I get another one of these?”

  I reached for the bottle of Gray Goose and made her a third.

  I hesitated, though, before I gave it to her. “You drinking alone?”

  She shrugged. “Maybe. Don’t worry. I’m a smart girl.”

  I nodded once and handed it to her.

  “Thank you.”

  I smiled. “No problem.”

  “I should have told you this sooner, but I don’t exactly have any way to pay you.”

  Jesus. I rubbed my chin. “Yeah?”

  “Yeah,” she said. She took a sip of her drink. “I threw my purse at my ex-boyfriend. He was supposed to chase after me.”

  “He didn’t?”

  “No, he did. But he’s way more out of shape than he looks and he was afraid his car would get stolen or something,” she said. “He’s an idiot.”

  I laughed softly.

  She raised her eyebrows and I met her eyes briefly. They were wide and awfully blue, and for all the husky laughter and I-don’t-give-a-fuck attitude she was throwing around, they looked soft and vulnerable, like she had just been deeply hurt.

  “So,” I said. “You don’t have any money, but I’m the one with the problem?”

  She smiled. “Yeah. You. You are even worse than Tyler.”

  “Tyler’s the one who didn’t run after you?”

  She shook her head. “No, I told you. He ran. Just not fast enough.”

  “Well, those are on the house. You want another and you’re going to have to wash dishes.” I sm
iled, turning towards a paying customer before Kevin got on my case about giving away free drinks.

  "You need a dishwasher?"

  I smiled. "No, actually. We've got one. Just a joke.”

  She looked actually disappointed and sighed.

  "What? Do you want to be a dishwasher?" I asked, incredulously.

  She waved her hand at me, dismissing the question like it was ridiculous. She nodded. “No. What’s your name?”

  “Christian,” I said.

  “Christian,” she repeated. “Interesting.”

  "Is it?”

  “Yes. I’m January.”

  “January? That’s a little bit more interesting.”

  “You think? Most people hate January, which is, I think, why my parents named me after it.”

  I smiled. “I doubt that.”

  “Oh, you haven’t met them,” she said. “My dad has vanity license plates with dollars signs where there should be ‘s’s.”

  “Okay,” I conceded.

  “It’s their taste—things people hate,” she added.

  I glanced down the end of the bar. A lot of people were waiting to order and Kevin was glowering at me. “Well, I got to get to work…January. But it was nice to meet you.”

  She nodded. “Thanks for the drinks.”

  I glanced over my shoulder as I walked away from her. Chances were the ex-boyfriend would catch her and they’d be back together by the end of the night. Chances were he wouldn’t let her go again. I told myself I didn’t care and that she seemed like a real piece of work.

  “Bro, what the fuck?” said some blond guy in a pink polo shirt, waving his Visa over the bar. “I’ve been waving my card at you for ten fucking minutes. Jesus.”

  I took the card from him. “Yeah? What do you want?”

  “Tequila. How much fucking tequila do you pussies want?” Pink Polo Shirt turned and asked his friends behind him. I counted at least three more in pink. “Ah, make it twenty shots.”

  “Twenty?” I repeated, just to be sure I had the number right.

  “Yeah, twenty. Let me know if you need help counting. I go to Harvard. I know how it is for guys like you.”

  I nodded and cracked my neck. Darrin liked to joke that he needed to take half a bottle of Xanax on Friday nights to keep from knocking the lights out of the Harvard undergraduates who came in acting like they already ruled the world. Most of the time I could laugh it off, but I was in a shitty mood and this guy was particularly pretentious.

  While I poured the shots, I stole a glance at January. She stared mutely at a kid in a checked shirt, holding two beers in one hand, and blatantly trying to chat her up. Maybe that was Tyler. Maybe it was a stranger. At any rate, she was doing a good job of appearing completely unimpressed.

  She turned her head, caught me staring, and stared back. It wasn’t the come-hither stare I’d seen from drunk girls on late nights after big hockey games. And it wasn’t the stare of recognition—that poor hockey star with the dead brother and the broken leg—that I saw on campus some days. It was different. It looked haunted, like a plea. I couldn’t hold her gaze.

  I ducked my head and told myself to forget about her. I set the shots up in rows of four. “You want to open a tab?”

  He nodded. “Fuck, yeah.”

  “What’s the name?”

  “It’s on the card,” he snapped. "Don't you know how to read?"

  “Great. Thanks,” I replied, taking his credit card and filing it next to the cash register. Steele Winchester III.

  What a fucking joke.

  Steele Winchester & Co. kept me occupied with their stream of drink orders and insults. By 1 AM, they were still cursing at me to pour their drinks faster and at 1:30 one of them, who had just ordered a Coors Light, threw a fit saying he’d ordered a Heineken and another looked like he was about to throw up.

  I needed to cut them off, but didn’t have the energy for the conversation.

  “You asked for a Coors,” I said, tiredly.

  “I don’t drink Coors. I did not fucking ask for a Coors. Do your job, you fucking loser!”

  I tightened one fist. Half an hour until closing time, I reminded myself.

  “Hey, kid,” Kevin said, wiping his hands on a cloth, and giving me a sympathetic nod. “Get out of here. It’s your birthday.”

  “I’m fine,” I said quietly.

  “Well, you look like shit. Get some sleep,” Kevin said. “I’m serious.”

  I exhaled, nodding.

  “If these douchebags leave a tip, which I doubt, it’s all yours.”

  I smiled.

  “And check your locker before you go.”

  “I hope you didn’t get me—”

  “I know. But we got you a present. Don’t forget it.”

  “You didn’t have to.”

  “Get out of here, kid. Happy birthday.” He pushed me towards the staffroom with a smile.

  “Hey, you firing him? Good,” I heard Steele Winchester asking Kevin as he stepped up to handle the rest of the order.

  It was quiet in the break room and there was a bottle of Johnny Walker Blue Label on the top shelf of my dusty locker, with a haphazardly tied ribbon around its neck. I smiled slightly, taking it down from the shelf, and sliding it into the gym bag I’d carried here.

  I sat down to pull on my sweatshirt and felt the feeling rush back into my numb leg. My physical therapist told me bartending was a bad idea. I locked my legs, she said, and the muscles knotted. And as I started to feel again, as the knife seared my leg, I believed her.

  I took a shaky breath. The pain was usually bearable. In fact, sometimes I liked feeling my leg hurting—it felt like penance. This was different, though, I almost felt sorry for myself. I let out a slow breath and forced my eyes to stay open.

  Don’t feel sorry for yourself. Don’t you dare. Sam died. Your leg hurts. Just get a fucking grip. If your leg hurt for the rest of your life, if they cut your leg off…you would still have nothing to complain about.

  I got to my feet and walked outside into the fall air and across the mostly empty parking lot towards my old, beat-up Jeep.

  McSorley’s lay on a stretch of Cambridge streets that catered more to the academic community during their daytime hours. Aside from the pizza joint across the way, we were the only place in shouting distance open past midnight.

  “You’re drunk and you’re fucking crazy, January!” I heard some guy yelling. “Get in the goddamn car!”

  I turned to see January stalking away from a guy with dark hair and a tattoo on his forearm. He looked oddly familiar. Like that coked out racecar driver who had had a year's worth of nude pictures leaked onto the internet. Tyler Blow or something ridiculous.

  “January!” he yelled. He got out of the car and ran after her.

  “Get away from me.”

  He grabbed her arm. “You’re wasted. You need to get in the car. I’m not going to stay out here all night fighting with you.”

  “I don’t want you to stay out here all night fighting with me!” she yelled right back. “Leave me alone.”

  He grabbed her arm—a little too hard.

  I stepped out of the shadows. “Hey,” I said.

  If he heard me, he didn’t notice.

  “You are so fucking crazy,” he said to her.

  I crossed the distance between us, ignoring the ache in my leg, pretty sure I could lay the guy out quick if I really needed to. He jerked her arm.

  “Hey!” I barked. “You got a problem? Let go of her.”

  “What the fuck?” he demanded. He jerked January’s arm when he turned towards me.

  I pushed him backwards. Not very hard—I didn’t exactly want to fight him in the parking lot—but just enough for him to stumble backwards.

  “She said she wanted space,” I said.

  “Yeah, and who the hell are you?” he demanded. “You know what?” He laughed. “Actually, you go right ahead. She’s all yours.” He laughed and got back in his car. “She’s more
fucking trouble than she’s worth. Good luck with everything, January. You’ve been a real treat.”

  He slammed the door shut, revved the engine, and zoomed across the parking lot and out onto the road.

  January shook briefly and then rolled her eyes. “Ugh,” January said. “I knew you were a problem.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “How am I supposed to get home?” she asked me.

  “Just trying to help,” I replied.

  “Well, now I’m stranded. Next time, mind your own business.”

  “Next time, don’t scream in a parking lot.”

  She glowered.

  I nodded at my car. “C’mon. I’ll give you a ride home.”

  She growled and I bit back a smile as she stormed towards the car. She gave it a skeptical look. “Is this thing even safe?” she demanded.

  “It’s got seatbelts.”

  She opened the passenger seat door distastefully. I rolled my eyes.

  “Look, it beats your shoes.”

  “My shoes are Christian Louboutin,” she snapped back.

  “Yeah, car still wins for method of transport,” I replied.

  She put on her seatbelt and huffed.

  “Well, where to?” I asked.

  She didn’t say anything. “I don’t know. I think I have a dorm room somewhere.”

  “You think?” I asked.

  She glared at me. “I mean, I do, but I had an off-campus apartment until yesterday, so I’m not exactly sure where the dorm is and I never picked up the keys. And now Tyler is gone!"

  I tried to wrap my head around the fact that a college girl would have more than one residence in the same town.

  I rubbed my chin, sneaking a look at her. “What happened to the apartment yesterday?”

  She didn’t say anything. “Can I stay with you?”

  I laughed. She didn’t. “Are you serious?”

  “Look, you’re the one who made him go away. That was my ride. That was my place to stay. You must have, like, a couch."

  “Yeah," I said, imagining explaining the drunk blonde on the couch to my father in the morning. "That's not a good idea. Do you want me to drive you to his place?”

  “No!” she said. “The plan was to make him beg for me to go with him and then it would’ve been okay. Now, it would be like asking him for a favor.”