Cath couldn’t stop laughing. Levi caught her eyes and laughed, too.
And then he was dancing with her. Not close or anything. Not any closer, actually—just looking at her face and moving with her.
And then she was dancing with him. Better than him, which was nice. She realized she was biting her bottom lip and stopped.
She started rapping instead. Cath could blow these songs backwards. Levi raised his eyebrows and grinned. He knew the chorus and rapped with her.
They danced into the next song and through it and into the next. Levi stepped toward her, maybe not even on purpose, and Cath whirled up onto her bed. He laughed and jumped up onto Reagan’s, practically bumping his head on the ceiling.
They kept on dancing together, imitating each other’s goofiest moves, bouncing at the end of the beds.… It was almost like dancing with Wren. (But not, of course. Really, really not.)
And then the door swung open.
Cath jumped back away from it and fell flat on her mattress, bouncing and rolling onto the floor.
Levi was laughing so hard, he had to lean against the wall with both hands.
Reagan walked in and said something, but Cath didn’t catch it. She reached up to her desk and closed the laptop, stopping the music. Levi’s laughter rang out in the sudden quiet. Cath was completely out of breath, and she’d landed wrong on her knee.
“What. The. Major. Fuck,” Reagan said, more shocked than angry—at least Cath didn’t think she seemed angry.
“Emergency dance party,” Levi said, jumping off the bed and reaching out to help Cath. Cath held on to the desk and stood up.
“Okay?” he asked.
She smiled and nodded her head.
“Have you met Cather?” Levi said to Reagan, his face still shining with amusement. “She spits hot fire.”
“This is exactly the sort of day I’m having,” Reagan said, setting down her bag and kicking off her shoes. “Weird shit around every corner. I’m going out. You coming?”
“Sure.” Levi turned to Cath. “You coming?”
Reagan looked at Cath and frowned. Cath felt something sticky blooming again in her stomach. Maybe the scene with Professor Piper was coming back to her. Or maybe she shouldn’t have been dancing with her roommate’s boyfriend. “You should come,” Reagan said. She seemed sincere.
Cath tugged at the hem of her T-shirt. “Nah. It’s already late. I’m just gonna write.…” She reached for her phone out of habit and checked it. She’d missed a text message—from Wren.
“at muggsy’s. COME NOW. 911.”
Cath checked the time—Wren had texted her twenty minutes ago, while she and Levi were dancing. She set her phone on the desk and started putting her boots on over her pajama pants.
“Is everything okay?” Levi asked.
“I don’t know.…” Cath shook her head. She felt ashamed again. And scared. Her stomach seemed thrilled to have something new to twist about. “What’s Muggsy’s?”
“It’s a bar,” he said. “Near East Campus.”
“What’s East Campus?”
Levi reached around her and picked up her phone. He frowned at the screen. “I’ll take you. I’ve got my car.”
“Take her where?” Reagan asked. Levi tossed her Cath’s phone and put on his coat. “I’m sure she’s fine,” Reagan said, looking at the text. “She probably just had too much to drink. Mandatory freshman behavior.”
“I still have to go get her,” Cath said, taking back the phone.
“Of course you do,” Levi agreed. “Nine-one-one is nine-one-one.” He looked at Reagan. “You coming?”
“Not if you don’t need me. We’re supposed to meet Anna and Matt—”
“I’ll catch up with you later,” he said.
Cath was already standing by the door. “Your sister’s fine, Cath,” Reagan said almost (but not quite) gently. “She’s just being normal.”
* * *
Levi’s car was a truck. A big one. How did he afford the gas?
Cath didn’t want any help getting in, but the running board was missing—it was an especially shitty truck, she noticed now that she was up close—and she would’ve had to climb in on all fours if he hadn’t taken her elbow.
The cab smelled like gasoline and roasted coffee beans. The seat belt was stuck, but she still managed to get it buckled.
Levi swung into his seat smoothly and smiled at her. He was trying to be encouraging, Cath figured.
“What’s East Campus?” she asked.
“Are you serious?”
“Why wouldn’t I be serious right now?”
“It’s the other part of campus,” he said. “Where the Ag School is?”
Cath shrugged impatiently and looked out the window. It had been sleeting since this afternoon. The lights looked like wet smears on the streets. Fortunately, Levi was driving slow.
“And the law school,” he said. “And there are dormitories and a perfectly adequate bowling alley. And a dairy. Seriously, none of this is ringing any bells?”
Cath let her head rest on the glass. The truck’s heater was still blowing cold air. It had been a half hour now since the text. A half hour past 911. “How far is it?”
“A few miles. Ten minutes from here, maybe longer with the weather. East Campus is where most of my classes are.…”
Cath wondered if Wren was alone. Where was Courtney? Weren’t they supposed to be skinny-bitching together?
“There’s a tractor museum,” Levi said. “And an international quilt education center. And the food in the residence halls is outstanding.…”
It wasn’t right. Having a twin sister was supposed to be like having your own watcher. Your own guardian. BUILT-IN BEST FRIEND—their dad had bought them shirts that said that for their thirteenth birthday. They still wore them sometimes (though never at once) just to be funny. Or ironic or whatever.
What’s the point of having a twin sister if you won’t let her look out for you? If you won’t let her fight at your back?
“East Campus is just so much better than City Campus in every way. And you don’t even know that it exists.”
The light ahead turned red, and Cath felt the tires spin beneath them. Levi shifted gears, and the truck rolled to a perfect stop.
* * *
They had to park quite a ways from the bar. This whole street was bars, block after block of them.
“They’re not going to let me in,” Cath said, wishing Levi would walk faster. “I’m underage.”
“Muggsy’s never checks.”
“I’ve never even been in a bar.”
A dozen girls spilled out of the doorway ahead of them. Levi grabbed Cath’s sleeve and pulled her out of the way. “I have,” he said. “It’s going to be fine.”
“It’s not fine,” Cath said, more to herself than to Levi. “If it was fine, she wouldn’t need me.”
Levi pulled on her sleeve again and opened a heavy, black, windowless door. Cath glanced up at the neon sign over their heads. Only the UGGSY and a four-leaf clover lit up. There was a big guy sitting just inside on a stool, reading a Daily Nebraskan with a flashlight. He flipped the light up at Levi and smiled. “Hey, Levi.”
Levi smiled back. “Hey, Yackle.”
Yackle held a second door open with one hand—he didn’t even look at Cath. Levi patted him on the arm as they walked past.
It was dark inside the bar and crowded, people pressed shoulder to shoulder. There was a band playing on a couch-sized stage near the door. Cath looked around, but she couldn’t see past the crush of bodies.
She wondered where Wren was.
Where had Wren been forty-five minutes ago?
Hiding in the bathroom? Crouched against a wall?
Had she been sick, had she passed out? She did that sometimes.… Who had been here to help her? Who had been here to hurt her?
Cath felt Levi’s hand on her elbow. “Come on,” he said.
They squeezed by a high-top table full of people doi
ng shots. One of the guys fell back into Cath, and Levi propped him back up with a smile.
“You hang out here?” Cath asked when they were past the table.
“It’s only douchey like this when there’s a band playing.”
She and Levi moved farther from the stage, closer to the bar. A movement near the wall caught Cath’s eye—the way someone flipped back her hair. “Wren,” Cath said, surging forward. Levi held her arm and pushed in front of her, trying to clear the way.
“Wren!” Cath shouted over the crowd, before she was even close enough for Wren to hear. Cath’s heart was pounding. She was trying to make out the situation around Wren—a big guy was standing in front of her, his arms caging Wren against the carpeted wall.
“Wren!” Cath knocked one of the guy’s arms away, and he pulled back, nonplussed. “Are you okay?”
“Cath?” Wren was holding a bottle of dark beer halfway up to her mouth like her arm was stuck there. “What are you doing here?”
“You told me to come.”
Wren huffed. Her face was flushed, and she had drunk, droopy eyelids. “I didn’t tell you anything.”
“You sent me a text,” Cath said, glowering up at the big guy until he took another step back. “‘Come to Muggsy’s. Nine-one-one.’”
“Shit.” Wren pulled her phone out of her jeans and looked down at it. She had to stare at it for a second before she could focus. “That was for Courtney. Wrong C.”
“Wrong C?” Cath froze, then threw her hands into the air. “Are you kidding me?”
“Hey,” somebody said.
They both turned. A fratty-looking guy was standing a foot away, nodding his head at them. He curled his lip and grinned. “Twins.”
“Fuck off,” Wren said, turning back to her sister. “Look, I’m sorry—”
“Are you in trouble?” Cath asked.
“No,” Wren said. “No, no, no…”
“Pretty hot,” the guy said.
“Then why the nine-one-one?” Cath demanded.
“Because I wanted Courtney to come quick.” Wren waved her beer bottle toward the stage. “The guy she likes is here.”
“Dude, check it out. Hot twins.”
“Nine-one-one is for emergencies!” Cath shouted. It was so loud in here, you had to shout; it made it way too easy to lose your temper.
“Do you really think that’s appropriate?” Cath heard Levi say in his smiling-for-strangers voice.
“Fucking twins, man. That’s the fantasy, right?”
“Take a pill, Cath,” Wren said, rubbing her eyes with the back of her hand. “It’s not like I actually called nine-one-one.”
“You realize that they’re sisters, right?” Levi said, his voice getting tighter. “You’re talking about incest.”
The guy laughed. “No, I’m talking about buying them drinks until they start making out.”
“Is that what happens with you and your sister?” Levi stepped away from Cath, toward the guy and his friend. “Who fucking raised you?”
“Levi, don’t.” Cath pulled on his jacket. “This happens all the time.”
“This happens all the time?” His eyebrows jerked up in the middle, and he turned on the guy.…
“These two girls have parents. They have a father. And he should never have to worry that they’re going to end up in a bar, debasing themselves for some pervert who still jerks off to Girls Gone Wild videos. That’s not something a father should ever have to think about.”
The pervy guy wasn’t paying attention. He leered drunkenly over Levi’s shoulder at Cath and Wren. Wren flipped him off, and he arched his lip again.
Levi stepped closer to the guy’s table. “You don’t get to look at them that way, just because they look alike. You fucking pervert.”
Another fratty guy stepped up, carrying three beers, and glanced over. He grinned when he saw Cath and Wren. “Twins.”
“Fucking fantasy,” the first guy said.
Then, before anyone saw him coming, the guy standing next to Wren—the big one who had been caging her in—stepped past Levi and plowed the drunk pervert right in the chin.
Levi looked up at the big guy and grinned, clapping him on the shoulder. Wren grabbed his arm—“Jandro!”
The pervy guy’s friends were already helping him off the floor.
Levi took Cath’s sleeve and started pushing Jandro into the crowd. Jandro dragged Wren behind him. “Come on,” Levi said, “out, out, out.”
Cath could hear the perv shouting curses behind them.
“Oh, fuck you, Flowers in the Attic!” Levi shouted back.
They practically fell through the front door. The bouncer stood up. “Everything cool, Levi?”
“Drunks,” Levi said, shaking his head. Yackle headed back into the bar.
Wren was already out on the sidewalk, shouting at the big guy. At Jandro. Was he her date, Cath wondered, or was he just somebody who threw a punch for her?
“I can’t believe you did that,” Wren said. “You could get arrested.” She hit his arm, and he let her.
Levi hit Jandro’s other arm in a kind of salute. They were about the same height, but Jandro was broader, a dark-haired guy—probably Mexican, Cath thought—wearing a red Western shirt.
“Who’s going to get arrested?” someone asked. Cath spun around. Courtney. Clomping toward them in five-inch pink heels. “Why are you guys standing outside in this shit?”
“We’re not,” Cath said, “we’re leaving.”
“But I just got here,” Courtney whined. She looked at Wren, “Is Noah in there?”
“We’re leaving,” Cath said to Wren. “You’re drunk.”
“Yes—” Wren held up her beer bottle. “—finally.”
“Whoa, there,” Levi said, snagging the bottle and dropping it into a trash can behind her. “Open container.”
“That was my beer,” Wren objected.
“A little louder there, jailbait. I don’t think every cop on the street heard you.” He was smiling.
Cath wasn’t. “You’re drunk,” she said. “You’re going home.”
“No. Cath. I’m not. I’m drunk, and I’m staying out. That’s the whole fucking point of being out.” She swayed, and Courtney giggled and put her arm around her. Wren looked at her roommate and started giggling, too.
“Everything’s ‘the whole fucking point’ with you,” Cath said quietly. The sleet was hitting her cheeks like gravel. Wren had tiny pieces of ice in her hair. “I’m not leaving you alone like this,” Cath said.
“I’m not alone,” Wren replied.
“It’s okay, Cath.” Courtney’s smile couldn’t be more patronizing. Or more coated in pink lipstick. “I’m here, Han Solo’s here—” She smiled up flirtily at Jandro. “—the night is young.”
“The night is young!” Wren sang, laying her head against Courtney’s arm.
“I can’t just…” Cath shook her head.
“It’s fucking freezing out here.” Courtney hugged Wren again. “Come on.”
“Not Muggsy’s,” Jandro said, starting to walk away. He glanced back at Cath, and for a second she thought he was going to say something, but he kept on walking. Wren and Courtney followed him. Courtney clomped. Wren didn’t look back.
Cath watched them walk up the block and disappear under another broken neon sign. She wiped the ice off her cheeks.
“Hey,” she heard someone say after a cold, wet minute. Levi. Still standing behind her.
“Let’s go,” Cath said, looking down at the sidewalk. On top of everything else that was going wrong right this minute, Levi must think she was an idiot. Cath’s pajama pants were soaked, and the wind was blowing right through them. She shivered.
Levi walked past her, taking her hood and pulling it up over her head on his way. She followed him to his truck. Now that she realized how cold she was, her teeth were starting to chatter.
“I’ve got it,” she said when Levi tried to help her in. She waited for him to walk away bef
ore heaving herself up onto the seat. Levi slid behind the wheel and started the truck, cranking up the heat and the windshield wipers, and holding his hands up to the vents. “Seat belt,” he said after a minute.
“Oh, sorry…” Cath dug for the seat belt.
She buckled up. The truck still didn’t move.
“You did the right thing, you know.”
Levi.
“No,” Cath said. “I don’t know.”
“You had to go check on her. Nine-one-one is nine-one-one.”
“And then I left her—completely wasted—with a stranger and a moron.”
“That guy didn’t seem like a stranger,” Levi said.
Cath almost laughed. Because he hadn’t argued with the moron part. “I’m her sister. I’m supposed to look out for her.”
“Not against her will.”
“What if she passes out?”
“Does that happen a lot?”
Cath looked over at him. His hair was wet, and you could see the tracks where he’d pushed his fingers through it.
“I don’t want to talk about this anymore,” she said.
“Okay … Are you hungry?”
“No.” She looked down at her lap.
The truck still didn’t move.
“Because I’m hungry,” he said.
“Aren’t you supposed to meet up with Reagan?”
“Yep. Later.”
Cath rubbed her face again. The ice in her hair was melting and dripping into her eyes. “I’m wearing pajamas.”
Levi put the truck into reverse. “I know just the place.”
* * *
The pajama pants weren’t a problem.
Levi took her to a twenty-four-hour truck stop near the edge of town. (Nothing in Lincoln was too far from the edge of town.) The place felt like it hadn’t been redecorated ever, like maybe it had been built sixty years ago out of materials that were already worn and cracking. The waitress started pouring them coffee without even asking if they wanted any.
“Perfect,” Levi said, smiling at the waitress and shuffling out of his coat. She set the cream on the table and brushed his shoulder fondly.
“Do you come here a lot?” Cath asked, when the waitress left.
“More than I go other places, I guess. If you order the corned beef hash, you don’t have to eat for days.… Cream?”
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