For the hundredth time today, my throat was hot. There had been so many nights last winter when all I wanted was for Graham to show up at my door and say, “You’re important to me.” Now he’d done that. But not in the way that I’d once hoped for.
“You know,” I said, clearing my throat. “You used to hide too, okay? So it’s not like you can really give me a hard time about this.”
I expected him to get irritated that I’d poke his old wound. But he didn’t. Instead, I received an even tighter hug. “Aw, Bella. I know that. And it sucked. I wasted so much time worrying about what other people thought. Years, okay? But you’re smarter than that.”
“I used to be,” I mumbled.
Graham cleared his throat. “Well, I had Rikker to show me how it’s done. Who’s going to do that for you?”
Well, ouch. Because I had no clue. “I need a little more time, Graham. Right now, I’m still everyone’s gossip nugget.”
“You aren’t,” he argued. “And the new manager is a pain in the ass. I heard he ordered shin guard tape instead of hockey tape.”
“What?” I yelped. “Who could mix that up?”
Graham chuckled. “See? The team misses you. Come and show your face.”
“Another time,” I said firmly. I stood, putting myself out of the orbit of Graham’s hugs. Because those were potent.
Sensing defeat, Graham stood too. “All right. If you change your mind, you know where to find me. And aren’t you going to eat dinner?”
“Of course I am. I was waiting for my neighbor,” I lied, pointing in the direction of Lianne’s room.
“Promise?” Graham’s icy blue eyes regarded me seriously.
I held up a hand, like an oath-taker on the witness stand. “Promise.”
He stepped in to kiss me on the cheek. Then he headed for the door. “Good night, Bells.”
“G’night Graham.” I used to say that when we were both naked in his bed.
Then he was gone, and I was — wait for it — alone in my room again. And since he’d mentioned dinner, now I was hungry. I went into the bathroom and tapped on Lianne’s door.
“Yeah?”
I opened it, finding Lianne seated in front of her massive computer cockpit. “Feel like ordering a pizza?”
She blinked at me for a moment, probably because it was not a usual thing for me to make a friendly overture. “Does it have to be pizza?” she asked finally. “That’s too carby for me.”
I sat down on her bed. “What, then? Salads?”
She swiveled around to face me. “Thai? The Orchid Garden has some things I can eat.”
“Okay. Let me get my wallet.” I stood up.
She waved me off. “You get the next one. I already have my credit card in their system.”
I sat down again. “You do?”
“Yup.” She turned to her keyboard, and I saw her pull up the restaurant’s website. “It’s funny. My manager made me live at Beaumont instead of on Fresh Court where I might actually meet First Years. He said it was a security risk. But now every deliveryman in the greater Harkness area knows exactly where I live.”
I laughed, even though that was too sad to be funny. “You don’t like the dining hall food?”
Lianne only shrugged, which made me wonder whether she ever went in there. She was waiting for my order.
“I’ll have the chicken pad Thai, extra peanuts.”
Lianne typed furiously for a moment, fingers flying over the keyboard. “All set. They say it will be twenty-five minutes. But they’re usually slower than they say.” She turned around to face me.
“So,” I said. I wasn’t used to making conversation with Lianne. “Did I interrupt anything important? Now that I know you’re a computer genius, I just assume you’re over here hacking into the Federal Reserve Bank or something.”
“Right,” Lianne scoffed, kicking her tiny feet up onto the bed beside me. “I only break into government networks on the weekend. Just now I was ordering my favorite lip gloss.” She grabbed something off the desk and thrust it out for my inspection. “Have you tried this? It’s tinted in a warm berry color, and I love the packaging.”
“Can’t say that I have. Sorry.” Over the years, I’d heard people whisper about the fact that I never had female friends. People have told me to my face that I can’t stand competition from other girls. Not true. The real reason I lacked female friends was that I don’t speak lip gloss.