‘What?’ Thank God no customers were at the register and Jacqueline was too far away to hear this cracked conversation.
‘It’s true,’ Eve hissed, appearing next to Gwen. ‘Her friends came in here again the other day – you know the two I mean? The sorority chicks?’ Her words said sorority chicks. Her tone said disease-infested hookers. Good God. I was giving her five seconds to get to an argument I could squash.
I nodded once.
‘Well, I couldn’t hear everything they said over the damned steamer, but I heard your name and her name and the fact that she’s using you to be her … ugh …’ She made air quotes. ‘Bad-boy phase. I’ve never heard anything so f**king lame.’
My brows rose. Bad-boy phase. Right. ‘You are both insane.’
Eve crossed her arms. ‘Um, no. We’re not. They’re plotting the whole thing out and she’s just following along. You’re supposed to be like – a rebound stud to help her get over some other guy. So – for a million dollars and a chance to advance to the next round: do you like her or do you just want to screw her?’
They stood there like shoulder-to-shoulder crazy.
Rebound.
‘This is not your business.’
‘The hell it’s not.’ Eve poked me in the chest with one black-lacquered fingernail. ‘You’re our friend, and we aren’t letting some stuck-up bitch play you.’
My jaw clenched. ‘Do. Not. Talk about her like that.’
They looked at each other.
‘Crap,’ Gwen said, as Eve said, ‘Well, f**k.’
After an hour, Jacqueline and Heller left, minutes apart. Before leaving, he stopped at her table, telling her how pleased he was that she was catching up – which I only knew because that was the topic he’d wanted to discuss with me this morning after class.
Then he stepped to the counter to talk to me about her – while she watched – and I remembered an old saying my grandfather had been fond of quoting: Oh, what a tangled web we weave when first we practise to deceive. I was getting a taste of what tangled meant.
The rest of the afternoon was so dead that our manager asked if anyone wanted to go home, and I volunteered. Eve and Gwen shared yet another pointed look. I’d never requested to be cut before.
Gwen followed me to the back and stopped me as I shrugged into my jacket. ‘Lucas?’
Turning, I sighed. ‘Yeah?’
Lips pursed, she laid her hand on my arm. ‘I know Eve can be a little harsh …’
I smirked. ‘Really? I hadn’t noticed.’
Her eyes crinkled at the corners when she smiled, and the Gwen I knew reappeared. ‘But we both care about you. We don’t want to see you hurt.’
I zipped the jacket to mid-chest – a soft, dark chocolate leather that I wouldn’t have been able to afford on my own. Charles and Cindy gave it to me for my birthday my freshman year. It had been a little oversized then. It fitted perfectly now. ‘I’m a big boy, Gwen. I can take care of myself. I have for a long time.’
‘Yeah, I know. Just … be careful. Some things aren’t worth the pain, whether you can survive it or not.’
She never said much about her baby’s father, but I knew she was speaking from experience. I could hardly compare Jacqueline Wallace to a guy who was too much of a selfish prick to man up to being a father. But what I knew about Jacqueline wasn’t mine to tell.
‘Thanks, Gwen. I’ll be careful,’ I told her.
Total lie.
I made a sandwich when I got home, sharing turkey slices with Francis, as I had the day he’d first shown up three years ago. I’d only been in the apartment for a month when Francis moved in, uninvited. Even with the Hellers living on the other side of the yard, I’d had an unexpected sense of isolation. My father and I hadn’t spoken often when I lived with him, but he was there, in the house. It wasn’t talk I missed as much as the presence of someone else.
‘What do you think?’ I asked him now, tossing one last slice of turkey in his bowl. ‘Should I become her bad boy? I’m certainly qualified for the role.’ I picked up my phone and pulled up her contact info. ‘Speak now, or forever hold your peace.’
He finished his turkey and started on a bath.
‘That’s tacit agreement,’ I said, texting Jacqueline an apology for not saying goodbye this afternoon.
It was awkward with Dr Heller there I guess, she answered.
She had no idea what an understatement that was.
I told her I wanted to sketch her. Waiting for her answer, I watched the screen. You want a bad boy, Jacqueline? I thought. C’mon, then. Try me.
Okay, she said.
I told her I could be over in a couple of hours and got her room number.
She’d emailed Landon – ironically, during the hour she sat in Starbucks – thanking him for insisting she do the worksheet. Ninety-nine per cent sure she’d aced the quiz Heller gave this morning, I wanted to email her back, but I didn’t. She wouldn’t be hearing from Landon tonight.
Her building was all too easy to get into. A simple, ‘Hey, man, hold the door,’ to one of her fellow residents was all it involved. I took the back stairwell to her floor, my whole body burning.
I hadn’t lied. I wanted to sketch her. Possibly, that’s all I would do. Tonight.
I knocked softly, ignoring the other students hanging out in the hallway. She didn’t answer, and I couldn’t hear any movement inside her room. But when I knocked again, she opened the door as if she’d been standing right on the other side of it, debating whether or not to let me in.
Her sweater was a lighter blue than her eyes, accentuating them further. Dipping to a cautious V in the centre and following her curves without adhering to them, the soft knit begged to be stroked. I vowed to answer that entreaty.
Entering her room – the door snapping shut behind me – was like closing a door on my conscience. That didn’t keep it from tapping from inside my skull, though – a muffled but unremitting reminder that this girl was a student in Heller’s class, off-limits. Further, she was getting over a breakup, which left her vulnerable in one way … and me in another.
Worse still, she had no idea of my conflict. I tossed my sketchpad on her bed.
Hands in my pockets, I feigned fascination with the room décor and felt her stare trace over me – from the worn shitkickers on my feet to the nondescript hoodie and the ring in my lip. Part beach bum, part redneck, part perfected don’t f**k with me front – I was nothing like her preppy ex, for all that I could have been him, once upon forever ago. I thought nothing of what I wore then, or what it cost. The labels Kennedy Moore and his upper middle class bros sported wouldn’t have impressed my middle-school comrades, whose parents were influential lobbyists, senators and CEOs of multimillion-dollar associations.