by Sarina Bowen
Jesucristo. Someone needed to help Bella get a grip. Since there was nobody else handy, seemed like that someone was going to be me.
I stuck my arm into the shower, turning off the water. Towels hung from hooks on the opposite wall. I grabbed the largest one and draped it over Bella’s dripping back and shoulders. “Come on now. Stand up.”
She didn’t move.
“Get up, princesita.” I spoke to her the way I might address one of my cranky little cousins who needed a nap. “Come on now. Get up or I’m going to pick you up.” I didn’t really want to make good on that threat. Luckily, Bella didn’t want me too, either. She gathered the edges of the towel together and rose, her back to me.
I gave her some space. Bella stepped out of the shower, avoiding my eyes. I followed her into her room, averting my gaze while she wrapped the towel properly across her chest and under her arms.
When she sat down on the bed, I noticed that although the skin on her legs was rubbed raw, I could still see the faded outlines of the words written there. The marks were still quite dark on her shoulders and upper arms, too.
Bella saw me looking and clamped her arms across her chest, hands over her shoulders. “I want you to leave me alone.” She spared me a single glance, and it was full of pain.
Instead of obeying, I sat down beside her on the bed, but not too close. “I’ll go if you call someone else to be here with you.”
She made an irritated noise. “I don’t want company, Rafe.”
“That’s too bad,” I said as gently as possible. “But it’s me or a friend. Because honestly, I feel like I should go get the house dean.”
Bella’s blue eyes widened with horror. “Don’t you fucking dare. I don’t need the dean. I don’t need you. I just need to…” She broke off, rubbing at a spot on her upper arm with her thumb. The ink was particularly dark there. She scraped at it with her thumbnail — the letter “D” in DIRTY BITCH. Still pink from the hot water, Bella’s skin looked tender.
While I watched, Bella made an angry red scratch across her velvet skin.
I wasn’t even thinking when I reached out, but I couldn’t stand to see her hurt herself any more than I could stand the words on her skin. I covered up the scratch with my hand, knocking her clawing finger out of the way.
She froze solid under my touch.
“Don’t hurt yourself. Please,” I begged.
Her face got tight, and her eyes began to redden. When she spoke again, her voice had an edge of hysteria. “But I can’t get it off.”
“I’ll help you get it off,” I promised. “Just don’t do that.”
She inhaled through her nose. I saw her fighting for control, and my throat got tight. I’d been operating on pure adrenaline up until this moment. But now it felt as if all the air had been sucked out of the room and replaced by sadness.
Bella droped her head. Then she let out a sob so raw my gut clenched at the sound. And I wanted to maim whoever caused her to make that awful noise. She hunched forward, her towel slipping. Her back rose and fell with sobs.
I lunged for the blanket at the foot of her bed, which I wrapped around her body. Only then did I reach for her. Grabbing her shoulders, I leaned her against me.
She didn’t fight me, but her shoulders continued to shake. I wrapped my arms around her, pulling her close to me. I just wanted to make the shaking stop. “Shh, cariña. You’re going to be okay.” Dios, what meaningless words. But I didn’t know any better ones.
She didn’t acknowledge me. She turned her face away from mine and I could still feel every silent sob wracking her.
That would not do.
I swept her wet hair off her face and wiped the tears away with my thumb. “Shhh.”
Bella had always struck me as a tough cookie. There was just something so buoyant in the way she held herself. Even now, I watched her slow down her breathing, forcing herself to get calm. She lifted her eyes to the ceiling, blinking back unshed tears. “Sorry,” she whispered.
I gave her shoulder a squeeze. “Do you have any rubbing alcohol?”
She shook her head.
“Okay. What about nail-polish remover?”
Bella gave me the side eye. Then she shook her head again. “Not my style.”
I tucked the blanket around her and then slid out from under her. “I’m going to go get us some breakfast and coffee. And find something to get that ink off.”
Bella looked up at me, measuring me with her gaze. “You don’t have to.”
“Back in a jif.”
* * *
It took me thirty minutes to visit the pharmacy and the dining hall. Soon enough I was trotting back up the entryway stairs, passing my own door to climb to Bella’s.
“Knock knock,” I said outside. My hands were full.
She opened the door wearing sweatpants and a long-sleeved T-shirt. “You didn’t have to do this.”
I ignored that comment and walked in, setting all the booty down on her desk. “Do you want the bagel with smoked salmon, or the egg burrito? Or we could go halfsies.”
Bella cleared her throat. “The bagel?”
I passed her a cardboard clamshell container and a coffee cup. Then I moved a stack of books off her desk chair and sat in it, opening my own coffee.
There were a couple minutes of silence while we ate. I’d run something like six miles that morning, then carried Bella up the stairs. I was desperately hungry.
Across from me, Bella nibbled at her breakfast and snuck looks at me. “Nice work getting take-out from the dining hall,” she said eventually. The Beaumont House dining room was eat-in only, except for coffee.
“I work there.” I shrugged. “I know where the takeout containers are hiding.”
“That’s handy. And I guess you can’t beat the commute.”
“Sure. But it’s really all about the paycheck. The dining halls are unionized, so I get fifteen bucks an hour.”
“Not bad,” Bella said. “That’s more than I get as the hockey manager.”
I doubted that Bella actually needed the money. “It’s almost twice what an office or library job pays. And the weird thing is that very few students take dining-hall jobs. I guess people don’t want to be the guy in the paper hat, serving their friends.”
“But for twice the pay…” Bella took a sip of her coffee. She was looking more and more like herself now.
“The money is good. I’m not usually on the serving line anyway. I’m a prep cook, which means I chop vegetables, mostly. It’s the same job I’ve been doing in my family’s restaurant since I was ten. But now I get paid.”
“I don’t know how to cook,” Bella admitted. “But it’s on my to-do list.”
“Yeah?” I finished my egg burrito and got up to put the empty carton in her trash bin. Then I plucked the pharmacy bag off the floor and took out a bottle of nail-polish remover and a bag of cotton balls. I punctured the bag and tried to remove a couple of them, but a bunch more came along for the ride, scattering in my lap and onto the floor.
Bella raised an eyebrow. “I appreciate this. But I can take it from here.”
I shook my head. “Let me see your shoulder. You can’t see that spot.”
She stayed put. “There’s this thing called a mirror.”
“Bella.” We had a stare-down. “Just let me see if this stuff works. Then I’ll leave you to it.”
“Fine,” she huffed. Then, in one smooth motion, she whipped off her Harkness Hockey T-shirt.
I practically jumped to stand behind her, so that my eyes wouldn’t drift down to her chest. A few seconds later the room was invaded by the smell of the acetone — the scent I associated with the nail salons that I passed on New York City streets. The dampened cotton ball that I rubbed against her skin began to turn a bluish-purple color as it weakened the marker.
“This is working.” I showed her the cotton ball. Then I worked to get the word SLUTTY off her perfect, creamy shoulder. Seeing the word there made me so angry I had to
take a long breath in through my nose, just to try to calm down.
“Is the scent getting to you?” she asked.
“Yeah,” I muttered, my voice like gravel. Dios. Who would do this? “Bella. Would you tell me what happened?”
“No,” she said quickly.
I considered her answer for a minute. “Would you please tell somebody else, then?”
Silence was her only answer.
Meanwhile, I’d faded the word SLUTTY to the point where it was not quite legible. I tossed the cotton ball into Bella’s garbage can and dunked another one, going to work on the word CUNT next. Getting these words off Bella’s skin wasn’t that difficult. But I was worried something worse than marks on her skin had happened to her. And if it had, I was basically involved in a cover-up job at the moment. Some sicko was going to get away with this shit, and I was helping him.
“Bella,” I whispered. We were so close to one another that my nearly inaudible words were delivered right to her ear. “If something else happened to you last night, would you tell someone? It’s important.”
“There’s nothing to tell.” Her voice was flat.
“What do you remember?” I pressed.
She took a step forward and turned around. “Enough to know that it isn’t what you’re thinking.”
“Okay,” I said, holding a smelly cotton ball in the air like a moron. I could only hope she was telling me the truth.
“I’m sorry I broke your iPod.” Her eyes darted to the remains in the corner.
“Easy come, easy go,” I said. “Never really needed that thing.”
“I’ll get you another one anyway.”
“Don’t bother. Really.” I put the cap on the bottle of remover. It seemed that Bella was herding me toward the exit. And even if I still felt unsure about leaving her, I couldn’t force her to let me help.
“I can take it from here,” she said.
“Okay.” I picked up our empty coffee cups and shoved them in the bag. “I’m right downstairs if you need anything.”
“Thanks,” she said stiffly.
Feeling as though I hadn’t really done much to help, I left Bella alone.
* * *
That evening I spent hours in the library. At Harkness you couldn’t really say “the library” without qualifying your location. There were forty libraries, and everyone had a couple of favorite spots. Some libraries were good for people watching, some were close to the better coffee shops.
I didn’t go to the library to socialize. There weren’t enough hours in the day. So I favored the basement of the Central Campus Library with my business. Down there, a guy could snag a private study carrel. They were nothing but a built-in desk, a chair, three walls and a sliding glass door. We called them weenie bins, and that night I spread out my books and went to it.
Eventually, I fell asleep on a book for Urban Studies. I didn’t wake up until the midnight announcement that the library was closing. Shoving books into my bag, I staggered outside to walk home.
Harkness was breathtaking at this hour, with its old fashioned glass lamps making long shadows on the brick pathways. There was nobody else out on the street, and I could almost imagine that a horse-drawn carriage was about to round the corner from Chapel Street.
The iron gate creaked as I let myself into Beaumont gate. As I approached the entryway door, I tipped my head back to look up at the building. A single light burned on the fourth floor in Bella’s room.
I wondered why she wasn’t sleeping.
Twelve
Bella
Even though I was exhausted, I didn’t want to turn off my light.
I wasn’t a girl who scared easily — not at all. But the last time I’d fallen asleep had been against my will. Many hours later, I’d woken up on a dirty wooden floor. It’s not that I thought it would happen again. But I had a lingering smudge of dread in my gut. I couldn’t relax.
So I sat there in my bed, a book abandoned on my lap, just waiting to feel drowsy. Instead, felt only wired and jumpy.
When I heard footsteps on the landing outside my door, all the hair on my neck stood up.
The tap on my door was so gentle, I found my voice. “Yeah?”
“It’s Rafe.”
When I opened the door, he stood there in a T-shirt and flannel pants, a book in his hand. “Hey.” His big brown eyes studied me, as if performing an assessment.
“Hey,” I echoed. I turned to get away from his stare, heading back to the bed and climbing in.
“Did you eat dinner?”
“Yes, Mom.” As long as granola bars count. I shouldn’t be sassing Rafe. He was just trying to be nice.
“Okay,” he said slowly, as if he didn’t think he should believe me. An uncomfortable beat passed, and I was sure he was about to open his mouth and ask me again what happened last night.
I was never going to tell him.
“I did the Urban Studies reading,” he said instead. He walked right over to sit on the edge of the bed. “Move over,” he demanded.
Seriously? “You want to talk about Urban Studies at one in the morning?” I moved over, though.
“Urban renewal is older than I thought,” he said, as if I cared. “The renovation of Paris was in 1853.” He flipped open the book in his hands and read a paragraph.
I yawned. Then I rolled toward the wall to get away from the facts of nineteenth-century urban renewal.
Rafe stretched out on top of the quilt beside me, trapping me under my covers. He rolled, too, putting the book on my hip. “It says here that the streets were widened for military maneuvers. Have you seen Paris?” He gave me a little nudge when I didn’t answer right away.
“Mm-hmm,” I said, suddenly sleepy. It was easy to finally let my guard down now that my neighbor was trying to bore me to death.
“I haven’t been there,” he said quietly. “But now I want to go. Listen to this…”
Rafe’s voice droned on behind me. The warmth of his body seeped through my covers and heated my back. He was like a big sturdy wall between me and the rest of the world. I began to relax, muscle by muscle. I drifted on the sound of his voice.
Sometime later I heard the click of my lamp shutting off, but the solid heat of Rafe’s body did not disappear. At some point I became aware of his slow breathing, and the faint thud of a book dropping to the floor.
I slept on.
Thirteen
Rafe
For the second time, I woke up in Bella’s bed.
When I opened my eyes, I saw her slanted ceiling. She was lying on her side, her butt tucked against me, the soles of her feet against my calf. Carefully, I turned my head to see her more clearly. Her back rose and fell slowly as she slept. Relaxed in her sleep, she looked sweet and so vulnerable. I had a strong urge to roll onto my side and curl up around her body.
Not going to happen. I’d had that chance once, and I’d handled it very poorly.
Quietly, I got out of bed. She didn’t wake at all, not even when I fumbled into my shoes.
Grabbing my book off the floor, I tiptoed out, leaving her to rest.
I didn’t speak to her on Monday at all, though I did get a glimpse of her when she came through the lunch line. She wore a long-sleeve T-shirt and jeans, and a tight expression on her face. Since she was up and around, I counted it as a win.
Monday night her light was out when I got back from the library. So I left her alone. Tuesday morning we had Urban Studies together.
She didn’t show.
I sat through the lecture, worried about her. The only thing that kept me from ditching class to check on her was the fact that Professor Giulio was lecturing about the affordable housing movement, which Bella and I would need to understand to complete our part of the project. So I did my best to take notes.
The minute class was over, I got up and headed back to Beaumont House. Thankfully I wasn’t on the lunch schedule today. Knocking on Bella’s door got me nowhere. “It’s Rafe,” I called, as if that woul
d make a difference. “Are you in there?”
Silence.
After a moment, Lianne’s door opened behind me, and I spun around. She beckoned, and I followed her into her room, letting the door fall closed behind me.
“I have to show you something,” Lianne whispered. She waved me toward a seriously grand computer setup — the girl had several monitors lit at once.
As I stood behind her, the computer screen in the middle loaded a web page called Brodacious. I’d seen this website once before. It was a catalog of fraternity boasts and pranks. Bickley had forwarded a link last year when some frat managed to hang a fifteen-foot banner off the top of Harkness Chapel illustrating the relative size difference between a Harkness guy’s dick and a Princeton guy’s.
Classy, right?
This time what I saw on the screen was much worse. It was a photo of Bella sprawled on a floor somewhere. Her face was mostly obscured by one arm thrown over her eyes. But anyone who knew her could identify her. She’d been wearing the same clothes as in the picture when I’d carried her up the stairs, but I’d know her distinctive curls anywhere.
“PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT. STEER CLEAR OF THE HOCKEY MASCOT,” the text screamed. “DIRTY PUSSY ALERT.”
Jesucristo.
Fourteen
Bella
I knew the exact moment when Rafe saw that fucking picture, because I heard the strangled sound he let out. The noise he made crept under my bathroom door, stole across the room and curled around me on the bed. It squeezed my soul into a tight little knot in the center of my chest.
I burned with shame.
For almost twenty-four hours I’d been lying here imagining what would happen when my friends saw that photo. Everyone I’d ever been close to was destined to see it, if they hadn’t already. Pepe. Graham. Rikker. Trevi.
The hockey girlfriends who already hated me.
