“Oh, wow! Congratulations!”
“Thank you.” He smiled. “I got into UNC yesterday too.” His rubbed the back of his head. “I sort of want a bigger school…”
“So I’ve gathered.” I laughed and elbowed him. “But tell me where the big kahuna is. What’s your ED?”
He shook his head, a slight smile appearing. “I can’t, Sage. I want to, but…” He shrugged. “If it doesn’t work out, I don’t really want to dwell on it, let alone anyone else.”
“Yeah, okay.” I nodded. “I get that.”
After all, I hadn’t told him about Middlebury.
We hugged, and when Charlie pulled back, he opened his mouth to say something, but then his phone buzzed. “I need to go see Luke,” he said after scanning the message. “I’d like to tell him in person, and Virginia comes out soon, at eight…”
“And then you’ll talk about how much you’re going to miss each other?” I joked, since winter break started tomorrow. Mrs. Carmichael and my mom were driving down in the morning to bring us back to Darien.
Charlie smirked. “Oh, come on, we’re gonna do way more than talk…” He gestured to his tacky red jeans. “Have you seen me in these pants?”
“Okay, beat it.” I pushed him away. “I don’t want to hear any more.”
He didn’t need to be told twice, but then turned back to look at me. “Thank you,” he whispered.
“You’re welcome,” I said, giving his arm another squeeze. “Johns Hopkins and UNC. I’m so proud of you, Charlie.”
“I’m so proud of you too, Sage.” He paused. “But no, not that.” He shifted on his feet. “Thank you for protecting me.”
I tilted my head. “Protecting you?”
“Yeah.” He nodded. “I know that’s why you kept things with Nick a secret from everyone, to protect me. So they wouldn’t suspect…” He trailed off and shook his head. “You should hate me.”
Oh, Charlie, I thought, a lump forming in my throat. Oh, Charlie…
“I let people believe what they want to believe,” he said quietly. “You know they think we’re really in love, and I like it that way. I never deny it.” His voice wavered. “But that’s not fair to you, or Nick. If you wanted to be together again…”
Suddenly hope flared inside me. You’ll tell him? I came close to blurting. If Nick and I wanted to be together again, you’ll tell him the truth? About us? About you?
But when he trailed off, I instead heard my stupid self say, “No, no, stop. Stop right there. I could never hate you.”
“I could never hate you either.” Charlie smiled in relief, not noticing my shoulders sag in disappointment. He had no idea how trapped I was, how he was the only person who could rescue me. I still wasn’t sure if my someday with Nick should be now, but him learning Charlie’s secret? I wished it could be.
Charlie opened his arms for a good-night hug, and I stepped into them.
“You’re the best, Sage,” he whispered in my ear. “The best.”
No, I’m not, I thought as I wiped my runny nose on his coat. But I’m trying.
* * *
The walk from the chapel to Simmons wasn’t that long, but tonight, it seemed to take forever. Accepted! kept flashing through my mind as I dodged patches of black ice, but so did my unspoken: You’ll tell him the truth?
I stopped in my tracks outside my dorm…because two figures were standing out front holding hands, and even though the guy had a hat on, I somehow knew he was Nick. Tears pricked at the corners of my eyes.
His girlfriend spotted me first. “Hey, Sage!” Emma called out. “Did you have fun tonight?”
“Oh hey,” I said, and forced myself to start up the pathway. “Yeah, it was tons of fun. Charlie and I got a standing O for karaoke.”
“Which song?” she asked.
I shrugged. “‘Baby, It’s Cold Outside,’ but Paddy’s ‘All I Want for Christmas’ was definitely better.”
“Oh my gosh.” Emma laughed, but Nick kept a straight face.
Then, right as we found ourselves in awkward territory, the front door thankfully opened. “Em, get in here!” Lucy waved her inside. “We’re watching the Hallmark channel, and your favorite’s on!”
Emma’s face lit up. “The one with the Christmas matchmaker?”
Lucy nodded.
So Emma and Nick’s goodbye followed. “Have a good break, Nick,” she said, moving in for a hug (thank goodness, because I so did not want to see them kiss). Then Emma stretched up and pressed her lips to his. I glanced at the ground, knowing I should’ve gone inside, but also wanting to wait so I could congratulate Nick.
“You too, Emma,” he said after. “Let me know when your flight lands.”
Emma touched my arm before she went inside. “Get the girls and come watch with us,” she told me. “This movie is the cutest.”
I nodded, but at the same time felt my skin crawl. It was ridiculous how nice Emma was. I considered myself a pretty nice person, but I could never even hope to be as nice as her.
“Congratulations!” I blurted after she was gone. “Charlie told me.”
Nick smiled, and my heart twisted when his dimple appeared. I hadn’t seen it in so long, and he looked so thrilled. “Thank you.” He let out a deep breath. “It’s such a relief. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it.”
“You completely deserve it,” I said. “Are your parents happy?”
Nick nodded. “Yeah, Dad’s amped, and Mom was basically sobbing.”
“That’s amazing,” I said, and then it was quiet, except for a few shouts and laughs from inside the house.
“Emma, how is this your favorite?” I heard someone say. “I’m cringing! It’s so cheesy!”
Nick shifted from one foot to the other. “What about you?” he asked softly. “Any word…?”
“Oh, yeah…” I started, feeling my eyes well up again. “I was…”
Accepted!
Accepted!!
Accepted!!!
“Sage?” I eventually registered Nick saying. “Are you okay? You look…”
I snapped out of my trance. “What?”
“I’m sorry,” he said, assuming the worst. “Was it a no?”
“No,” I replied. “It was a yes. I got in.”
Nick broke into a grin. “See!” he said. “I told you!” He laughed. “I told you they would see how epic you are!”
“Yeah, you did,” I said, tears now spilling and singeing my cold cheeks. Nick asked why I was crying. “It’s stupid,” I told him. “But I still can’t imagine going to school without you guys.” My voice cracked. “I would’ve liked us to be together.”
A blink later, before I knew it, Nick had folded me into his arms, and I was hugging him and crying into his chest. His crimson toggle coat was warm, and he smelled like Humpty Dumplings, but he also smelled like Nick—so perfect and familiar and vaguely like a campfire—and I never wanted him to let go.
But with curfew creeping up, he had to, sending me a signal with one last squeeze. No, please don’t, I thought. I want this. I love this. I miss this. Don’t let go.
Of course he couldn’t read my mind, so he didn’t get the message, but before he pulled away he murmured in my ear, “I would’ve liked us to be together too.”
Chapter 24
Charlie
Christmas break dragged by, all three weeks of it. “The more you pay, the less you go,” Dad liked to joke, but I couldn’t cross the days off our family calendar fast enough. It was the usual timeline of events: cutting down our Christmas tree followed by the Hardcastles’ black-tie Christmas Eve party, a chill Christmas dinner at Granddad and Nana’s, and lying around in our pajamas from December 26 to December 30 playing board games. New Year’s was spent skiing up at Sugarbush with Sage and her dad, and then finally it was time to head bac
k to Bexley.
But soon I had to leave again.
“I don’t want to go,” I said as I held Luke close. It was a little before 8:00 a.m., the first Saturday classes of the New Year. He had a free period first thing, and I’d been excused from classes so I could get on a bus to Massachusetts at 9:00 a.m. (we were playing Tabor today and tomorrow). I’d spent the night in his room, my backpack and duffel bag for this weekend packed and ready to go. My hockey stuff was waiting at the rink.
Luke rolled over, buried his face in my neck, and mumbled, “So dramatic.”
I smiled and ran a hand through his hair. Sleepy Luke was one of my favorite Lukes, all cute and rumpled with his bedhead and pajamas. I had physically ached last night, getting under the covers with him, our legs tangling together—heavenly. How can I have this every night? I’d asked myself after Luke fell asleep. Because I need to have this every night.
“Okay, come back,” Luke groaned when I was up and in my team jacket, and trying to chug a cup of Keurig coffee. He lifted the edge of his comforter. “Please.”
“Sorry.” I shook my head. We’d hit snooze a couple of times, and the rink was a trek from Brooks. “I’m already going to need to run there.”
“But you’re a solid runner,” he pointed out, smirking hard.
I was in love with him.
“Ticktock…”
“Okay.” I put down his new orange-and-blue UVA mug. “But just for a second.”
* * *
“Dibs on the window bed,” Paddy said as I swiped us into our room for the night, on the third floor of the Hampton Inn near Tabor’s campus. He and I always bunked together on away trips.
I tossed Luke’s pillow on the closer of the two beds. It was cool and soft and smelled like him, peppermint and soap and whatever else made him smell the way he did. Paddy did the same with his, and then we unzipped our hockey bags to air out our stuff. Skates, shin guards, shoulder pads, elbow pads, gloves—everything came out so it could dry overnight. Nothing was worse than putting on wet equipment in the morning.
After that, the team congregated in Nick’s room for about an hour. Tomorrow was an early start, so Coach Meyer informed us that he was coming around at 10:45 p.m. to check that we were all where we were supposed to be. I played with the remote until I found the Rangers-Bruins game on TV, and Cody broke out Cards Against Humanity before some of us went on a field trip to the vending machines up the hall. Things sort of wound down after we epically failed at prank-calling Emma on the fourth floor. “I’m hanging up now, Paddy,” she said the last time, after two minutes of him breathing heavily into the hotel phone’s mouthpiece. “Sleep tight.”
“Well, I don’t really know how to say this,” Paddy said after our face-to-face with Coach Meyer, “but do you mind if I FaceTime?” His face reddened. “Val, uh, wanted to know how the game went…”
Paddy had invited Val to our Tacky Christmas, and they’d been hanging out ever since (Awkward? A bit). “All right, I’ll split,” I said, digging around in my backpack for my new iPad. “Gotta make a call myself.”
Paddy smirked. “Who?”
My chest tightened, but I pulled off a casual shrug. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”
* * *
I took the elevator down to the lobby. We’d stayed at this hotel before, so I pretty much knew all the attractions. The business center’s door was locked, but with one grand flourish of my room key, I was in. There were four Dell desktops and two printers, and I could hear something humming as I dropped down into one of the swivel chairs. But instead of logging onto a computer, I propped my feet up on the desk and unlocked my iPad, swiping to the FaceTime app.
Luke appeared on-screen after three rings, sitting at his desk, which he referred to as the command center. His cheeks were flushed and his breathing heavy, like he’d been running. “Hey there.”
“You guys turned on the turf lights tonight,” I responded.
And he grinned. “It was absurd.”
Sage and the girls had been monitoring the turf’s snow situation all week. “Still some patches,” Reese had reported on Wednesday, but at dinner yesterday, Nina’s recon was way more promising: “Melting as we speak!”
“A shit-ton of people,” Luke said, taking off his baseball hat so he could smooth down his hair. Douchey lax bro flow the girls had nicknamed it, since he’d avoided getting a haircut over break. I sort of loved it.
“Yeah?” I said. “And?”
“And”—he laughed—“I don’t envy them. It doesn’t compare to our thing.”
“Yeah, we’re untouchable,” I agreed, since we used my master key on weekends. (“Should we leave her a note?” Luke had joked before we left Jennie’s study room one night, and I will admit, it felt different going there for student council meetings now.)
Luke relocated from his chair to his bed, leaning against the wall. “How was the game?” he asked. “The Twitter was blowing up.”
I grinned. The Twitter was our team Twitter account: @BexleyBoysPuck. It was Emma’s creation; she posted our schedule, any injuries or line-up changes, and live-tweeted all our games. I hope you’re hungry, Tabor! was one of today’s tweets. Because it’s another Carmichael Sandwich! 3–1 #BBVIH.
We ended up losing 5–3.
“It got pretty chippy,” I told Luke. “You should’ve seen Nick wreck this one guy. The boards actually shook…”
He nodded along as I recapped the hip-check, then asked, “Was your family there?”
“Yeah,” I said. “All the parents were, I think. They had this big tailgate before the game.”
“That sounds cool…” Luke said, and it looked like he wanted to say something else, but he didn’t. My stomach started to churn a little, so I changed the subject.
“Where’s poker tonight?” I asked. There was a midnight poker game every Saturday night in Brooks—PGs only. I’d bought Luke a legit cash box off Amazon because the jar he had for his “winnings” wasn’t cutting it anymore.
“Dave Taylor’s room,” Luke said, and smirked. “And your guy’s feeling good tonight.”
“Is he?” I arched an eyebrow. “Tell me, what will you do with tonight’s haul?”
“Buy my boyfriend dinner,” he replied right away, no hesitation.
I laughed and rolled my eyes. “Oh, come on, you’ve footed the bill at Pandora’s plenty.”
“No.” Luke shook his head. “I’m not talking Pandora’s. I’m talking a nice dinner. Bistro, or the Bluebird.”
“But we can’t go there,” I said, feeling the back of my neck heat up. “It’ll seem like we’re on a date.”
Luke sighed. “Well, that’s the point. We should go on a date. A real date.”
I didn’t say anything. Instead, I imagined Paddy or someone showing up at our table. Ooh, what do we have here? they’d say, and the rest of Bexley would know within the hour.
“It can’t be like this, Charlie,” Luke said gently. “It can’t be like this forever.”
“I know,” I told him, heart hammering. “I know, I just need a little more—”
But before I could add time, I heard the business center’s door open. Nick and Paddy were both standing there when I spun around in my chair. “Aw, how cute,” Paddy said, grinning and shaking his head. “I knew there was someone.”
Meanwhile, Nick looked like he wanted to punch me.
I glanced down at my iPad—Luke was dead silent. His mouth was in a straight line, and he reached up to adjust his glasses. I didn’t know what to say. There was this buzzing noise in my ears.
“Come on, Charlie,” Paddy came farther into the room, grabbing his own chair. “What’s happening? Passionate reunion with Dove?”
“Seriously?” Nick stayed in the doorway. “We need redemption tomorrow, and instead of getting sleep, you’re talk
ing to Dove?”
“No, it’s Sage,” I said quickly, then winced. Why was I still doing this? “Sorry, I sort of lost track of time…”
Paddy smirked. “Sure you did.”
Now sweating, I ignored him and looked on-screen to see Luke staring at me. “Nick’s right,” I said, heart so clenched I could barely breathe. “I should go.”
* * *
You don’t have to tell everyone at once, he texted later, after I’d brushed my teeth and gotten into bed. But start with Nick, and soon. Please.
Chapter 25
Sage
Is it appropriate, I wondered Sunday afternoon, to invite another girl’s boyfriend to watch a movie?
Luke, unfortunately, didn’t think so.
“So you wouldn’t trust Charlie?” I asked, disappointed. “If someone invited him to get parietals, and he said yes?”
“No, I didn’t say that.” Luke shook his head. “I meant that I wouldn’t trust you and Nick.” He smirked from over on the therapy couch. “He’s been looking at you again.”
My heart skipped. “What?”
“Yup, breakfast, lunch, and dinner—he looks over at our table. The old routine has resumed.”
Because I’ve been looking at him too, I thought. Just the other day I’d watched Nick and his sweet tooth seriously contemplate his options at Addison’s dessert station. Chocolate cake? Vanilla? Or maybe coconut? I’d only looked away when Emma sidled up to him and pointed to the vanilla, the most classic but also the most boring choice.
Nick served himself a slice, but also a coconut one.
But before I could tell Luke, Charlie slipped through my door. “Hey,” I said. “How’d you get in?” I’d had to swipe Luke in with my student ID and then we asked for parietals permission from my housemaster.
In response, he held up an old-fashioned metal key. “Easy.” He smiled. “I have the keys to the kingdom.” He shucked off his coat. “And snuck up the back stairs.”
I rolled my eyes as Luke shifted on the chaise. “Hey there,” he said, smirking and patting the spot next to him. “Mon petit ami.”
If We Were Us Page 19
