When Dolch finally ends the boring meeting, the eleven new residents of the basement squeeze into room two to commence the drinking, courtesy of Winston and his fake ID; smoking, courtesy of the room five girls; and listening to music, courtesy of the intense surround-sound stereo system Winston and Rodrigo set up.
I meet the famous duo of Rocco and Frank, the room four guys. It’s impossible to miss them—they’re giants. Frank is adorable, like an oversized kid with red hair, freckles, and green eyes that dart excitedly around the room. In contrast, Rocco is all steamy male hotness, with dark skin and black hair that falls straight to his bulky shoulders. His stare is intense, like he just stepped off the cover of a romance novel. He’s bigger than Frank and, honestly, a little scary. Along with Ben, the three of them take up half of the small room with their size. My eyes wander down their bodies as my hormones come to life making all the right places tingle.
I can’t help staring and soon realize Poppy is standing next to me doing the same. “That’s a lot of testosterone. I can almost smell it,” she says. “You should get some of that.” She pats me on the back and walks away before I can explain I’m with Ben.
I look around at the new people in my life. Winston, Megan, and Maggie look like three little pixies who practically disappear when they turn sideways. Rodrigo shows me a picture of Kiki-mo, who does resemble me, and Chase smokes with Darcy. I do a double take when I see Chase looking my way. I’m used to being looked at, but something about his stare flusters me. Maybe it’s his purple eyes. I shrug it off. He knows I’m all about Ben.
Ben. He catches my eye and smiles. Finally.
My mind wanders to freshman year of high school, the day we met.
I’d moved mid-year to Evander High from a small private school in Philadelphia, and I had no idea where I was or what I was supposed to be doing. As I looked at my class schedule, I panicked. I needed Justine, but she wasn’t there. I shut my brain down and sat on a bench near the principal’s office, holding my schedule in one hand and my bent knees in the other as I rocked myself, lost in my own world.
Suddenly, Ben stood before me, and I returned to Earth. “Are you okay?” he asked.
I stopped rocking, “No.” I showed him my schedule, and he held out his hand, pulling me to my feet. As I looked into his warm eyes, I felt safe for the first time since Justine died.
“We’ll get you where you need to be.” He looked at my schedule. “Nice to meet you, Jules. I’m Ben.”
After that, we hung out all the time, but our first and only official date had been homecoming. That’s when I bared my soul and begged him for more, but he refused. It’s the only time he’s said no to me.
Friends, I think. How boring. As I sink deeper into my thoughts, devising a plan to change his mind about our relationship status, I inhale the combined scent of aftershave and marijuana, and warm at the intense heat of a body behind me.
I swing around to face Chase. I huff and lift my chin. Despite their glassiness, his stoned purple eyes penetrate mine. “Go away, Train Boy. I’m trying to flirt with Ben.”
“Have you ever heard the expression, ‘barking up the wrong tree’? I think that’s what you’re doing with Ben.”
I study him before taking his red plastic cup. “I’m not barking up any trees. But if I were, Ben’s tree would be the right one.” I drink his beer without apology.
“I’m not feeling the vibe between you two. You’re too…” He moves his hands around.
“What’s that swirly thing you’re doing with your hands?”
“I’m thinking of the right word.” He stops moving his hands and points to me. “Charismatic. That’s the word.”
I grunt. “You’ve known me for half a day, Chase. And you’re high.”
“I can tell. Even after half a day. Even high.”
He looks over my shoulder, but I want his eyes back on me. He’s like the anti-Ben, but his attention is like a shot of adrenaline. “You should stop bothering me and start paying attention to your roommate. If I’m Miss Charismatic, he’s Mr. Charismatic.” He’s still looking over my shoulder.
“Looks like room three wants a piece of Mr. Charismatic, too.” I spin, almost falling over. I follow Chase’s gaze and see Ben deep in conversation with Megan. “Now those two, I can see together.”
Megan’s blonde bob swings over her tiny shoulders as she giggles and shakes her head at something Ben’s saying. He’s smiling but not laughing, keeping eye contact but not standing too close. I can’t decide if I’m angrier that Ben is talking up Megan, or that Chase pointed it out. I do know Ben, however, and Chase is right. He’s piling on the charm.
Chase’s breath warms my neck as he leans in to whisper in my ear. “Wrong tree, gorgeous.”
He lingers and I take advantage of his distraction and jab him in the gut with my elbow, but it bounces off rock hard abs. I try again, with more force, but he doesn’t react. He must have some kind of bod under there. “I hate you,” I say, and he laughs.
I shake my head and turn to walk away from Chase but run right into the wall. Except it’s not the wall, it’s Rocco. I let him grab my wrists and pull them into the air, feeling dizzy and tiny with his hands wrapped around mine. As he examines my body with this brooding, intense gaze, I’m at a loss for words.
“You have nice muscle tone,” he says. Funny, coming from Rocco this sounds like an actual compliment, not a pickup line.
“You, not so much, huh? You should work out,” I tease in a shaky voice.
Rocco calls Frank over and they blatantly discuss my body, creating a workout for me. During the course of the conversation, I learn the dynamic duo met the year before when Frank helped train Rocco for the routine that won him the Mr. New Jersey competition. Frank won’t let me pass until I promise to use the elliptical in the lounge three times a week.
In the meantime, I lose track of Ben. I shove past Chase, who’s leaning in the doorway trying to pick up some girl from upstairs. I hear them flirt as I shoot them dirty looks and push by, waving my hand in the air, half brushing them off and half waving goodbye.
First, I check room six. No Ben. I stop in the ladies’ room then walk back toward the party, peeking into one of the two doorways that open to the lounge. An institutional-looking set of couches and chairs sits on one half of the room, and the kitchen area fills the other. In the middle of the lounge, between the two entrances, Rocco and Frank’s elliptical machine and treadmill stand facing a television near a rack of free weights.
At first glance, the dim room appears empty. Then I see Ben at the kitchen table, his head resting on his arms. My poor guy. I shut the doors to the lounge to block out the noise and turn on the light. “Are you okay?” I ask, stroking Ben’s shoulder.
He lifts his head, and his red, glassy eyes answer my question. “Do me a favor, Jules. Please keep me away from the room five weed girls. I’m gonna get myself kicked off the team.”
“I’ll do my best,” I say. He leans back and I point to his lap. “May I?”
He opens his arms, and I sit, simmering from the contact between my backside and his thighs. He rests one hand on my knee and puts the other around my waist. “I’m really glad you’re here with me,” he says. I smile, aware of every inch our bodies are touching. “I never thought you’d be right down the hall.” My head spins. I’m not sure if it’s because of my closeness to Ben or the alcohol. “I’m glad we’re together, too.”
I knew he’d be surprised by me being at Sheridan. When I’d received my acceptance, I’d emailed housing with a letter from my therapist then put on the performance of my life via Skype to the sympathetic housing assistant. I just lost a sister. Ben’s my rock—my best friend. I’ll be away from home for the first time, and I’ll need to be near him to succeed. Is there any way for us to be in the same dorm?
I shift in his lap and touch the scar over his left eyebrow. “I remember when you got this.”
“Hurt like a motherfucker. Remember all the blood?
” He covers my hand with his, rubbing the scar in circles.
“It wasn’t pretty, but the scar makes you look tough.” I trace it with my finger but focus on his hand against my thigh.
Ben smiles, our eyes meet, and I lose myself in him. I’m back in high school, and he’s protecting me from the world. I put my hands on his shoulders and bend my head down near his. When he doesn’t object, I keep moving toward him. My heart races as his lips graze mine.
He doesn’t pull away until I attempt contact with his lips again. He lifts me and stands up. I drape my arms around his waist, but he peels me off and takes a step back. “Jules, I can’t do this.”
“Why not? I thought since we’re here together…maybe we can…you know, be together.” Even though I want all of Ben, I’m willing to settle for a friends-with-benefits scenario. I can work out the details once I have him.
“You’re too special to me.” He’s said this before, and it annoys me every time. It’s as though he’s determined to keep me out, but I can’t figure out why. “Look at you. You can have any guy on this campus.”
“I don’t want any guy on campus except you.” I draw close to him and touch my finger to his chest.
He grabs my hand, and his red eyes pierce mine. “We’ve talked about this.”
For four years I’ve let Ben reject me. Tonight though—whether it’s being at college, or the alcohol, or the Jersey air—it pisses me off.
He tries to walk away but I block his path. “I want a reason,” I say. “Right here, right now, Benjamin Riley.”
“No.” He turns his back and tries to walk away.
I follow. “Yes.”
He paces a few times then stops to face me. “Fine,” he barks. “You want a reason?”
I don’t answer. I glare and wait.
“You scare me, Jules.”
My jaw drops. Huh?
“You’re not simple. You’re complicated. You're difficult, challenging, beautiful, and you exhaust me. I love you, I do. You’re my best friend, but I can’t be with you. Not like that. Are you happy now?”
I’m not sure if I’m shaken more by his words or the tone and volume of his voice. I just stand there, mouth gaping, hearing the words over and over in my head: challenging, difficult, not simple, exhausting, exhausting, exhausting.
Ben’s staring, waiting. I take a deep breath and whisper, “Go away.”
His eyes pop. “Jules, no—”
I cringe at the sound of his voice. “You wanted simple. This is simple. Go. Away.” I sit in the chair he vacated and drop my head into my hands. When I lift it again, he’s gone.
As my anger rises from the tips of my toes to the crown of my head, I stand and kick each cabinet. I lift a coffee mug from the sink and fling it as hard as I can at the opposite wall. It flies over the couch, missing the television by inches, and slams into the wall. Stupid mug doesn't even break, but the act of throwing it and hearing it hit the wall satisfies me.
Until Chase’s face pops up over the back of the couch.
I sigh in defeat and shake my head at the ceiling. Fuck my life. I wait for it because I know it’s coming.
“I warned you about the tree.” He wiggles a finger at me and sinks back into the couch, laughing.
I decide to hate him, for real this time. “Fuck you, Chase.”
I march out of the lounge to room one without a word to anyone, throw myself into bed, plug in my ear buds, and hide under my covers.
Tomorrow. I'll fix it all tomorrow.
Chapter Four
Chase
I wake up with a wicked a hangover and a girl in my twin bed. Blurry details flash through my mind: Tina. Art major. Second Floor. “Hey, I like the purple streak in your hair!” She moves and her leg brushes mine. She’s dressed, thank God. I roll away and rub my head, fighting off the letters N-L-P, which repeat in my mind.
Ben breathes heavily from his side of the room. I need water. And Advil. And an excuse to get rid of Tina. What the hell happened? I remember talking with her in Winston’s room. Juliet let Rocco and Frank grope her for a while before continuing on her never-ending quest for Ben. She may have told me she hated me. I’d excused myself to go to the men’s room and then hid in the lounge.
The lounge. Juliet and Ben. Ben had called her difficult and exhausting and beautiful. For some reason, he’d said those words as if they were negatives. In my opinion, those traits are what make her so fucking awesome.
I sighed. I’d told myself I wasn’t going to fill my college days with alcohol and women, yet here I am with a strange girl wedged between the cold wall and me, and what is bound to be another awkward, hung over morning.
She rolls toward me and yawns. “What time is it?”
The light shining from my phone makes my head pound. “Early. Six. Go back to sleep.”
“I’m gonna go up to my room. Thanks for letting me sleep down here. I really didn’t want to see what my roommate had planned with her new…friend.”
“No problem.” The weight on my shoulders lifts at her amicable tone.
She rubs her eyes and scans the room. “Where are my shoes?” She rolls over me and climbs out of my bed.
After a joint effort, we find her shoes in the dark. When she has everything, I walk her to the door. I squint from the bright lights in the hallway, and shut the door behind us so Ben won’t wake up.
“Thanks again for letting me stay. I hope I didn’t disrupt your sleep too much.”
“No, I slept like a rock.” It’s the truth. Out cold. Drugs and alcohol will do that to a person. Fuzzy bits of a discussion about Caravaggio and her trip to the Louvre scramble in my brain like the pieces of a puzzle. “Did you tell me last night that we have Art History tomorrow morning?”
“Yep. Want to walk over together?”
I stiffen at the sound of a door closing down the hall. Of course it’s Juliet, walking toward us in her pajamas. She looks as miserable as I feel. Her hair’s messy, her face is pale. Ah, the morning after.
“Hey,” Tina says to Juliet as she passes. Juliet scowls as she pushes open the door to the ladies’ room.
When the ladies’ room door shuts, Tina raises her eyebrows. “Friendly.”
“Early,” I say. She deserves a pass after Ben crushed her hopes last night.
“Whatever. I’ll knock on your door tomorrow morning.”
I nod and hurry into my room, shutting the door to avoid seeing Juliet on her way out. Clearly, she has the wrong impression about what happened with Tina and me, and I don’t know why I care. Well, I know why I care, but I don’t know why she seems to care. Maybe she doesn’t. All I know at the moment is that it’s too damn early to figure out what goes on in a woman’s head, especially a woman like Juliet.
I lay in bed, happy to have it to myself, and hear Ben groan. A drawer opens and he rummages through his clothes.
“I didn’t mean to wake you,” I say.
“I’m glad you did. I have practice. I’m hung over as shit. The hippies next door will be the death of me. Today’s gonna suck.” Ben throws a pair of shorts from his drawer to his bed. When he finds the pair he’s looking for, he slams the drawer. We both grab our heads at the sound. “Sorry.”
My brain screams. “Damn, everything’s so loud. Maybe we can make a pact not to let each other do that again for a long time.” Hello? New Life Plan? Chase calling.
“Deal.” Ben grabs his shower stuff and hesitates at the door. “Who’s the girl?”
“Tina. An art major. Lives upstairs.”
“Nice.”
“You were talking to Megan a lot last night.”
“Megan? Oh, right. I almost forgot about that after the Juliet disaster.”
“What Juliet disaster?” Okay, so it’s kind of a lie. There is nothing about not lying in the NLP though.
“I can’t talk about it now. If I don’t get into the shower I’m gonna pass out, and I have to be on the field in, like, a half hour. Listen, could you do me a favor?”
“What’s up?”
“Could you check in on Juliet today? I’m worried about her. I think she was pretty pissed at me last night. If you have time, maybe you can hang with her or something?”
Ben’s concern is evident. My interest in Juliet, apparently, is not so evident. There’s nothing I want more than to hang with her. But me wanting to hang with her is not the problem. Her wanting to hang with me is. “Yeah, sure,” I say with a shrug.
“She flipped out last night.” I remember. “I’ll feel better knowing she’s not alone, festering. When she gets pissed, crazy shit happens.”
“What do you mean?” I can’t help it. I want to know everything about her.
“I have a million examples,” he says.
“How about one?”
Ben scratches his head and squints an eye. “Okay. When we were in high school, during our sophomore year, the school threatened to eliminate the arts program. Nobody really cared except the art people. No offense.”
“None taken.” I’m too hung over for the soapbox, and I’m anxious to hear the story.
“Jules freaked out. She started petitioning and going door-to-door in town. Called the local newspaper and wrote letters to the editor about the importance of the art program. Even showed up at Board of Ed. meetings and literally was like a tornado blowing through the school. In the end, I think they kept the program just to get her to back off. I couldn’t believe it.”
“She’s pretty feisty, huh?”
“Or crazy, depending how you look at it.” Obviously, Ben sees it a little differently than me. I prefer feisty, driven, incredible. “She did ballet on the outside, but that had nothing to do with the art program. Still, she wouldn’t give up on it. The more they resisted, the angrier and more motivated she got.”
“Does she always get her way?”
She Laughs in Pink (Sheridan Hall #1) Page 3