Bad Idea- The Complete Collection

by Nicole French

  Wait. Hold the phone. Love?

  I hug my arms around myself, trying to collect my emotions back into a place where I can manage them. No. You’re not in love with him. It’s not possible. You’re too young for this, and he’s too old for you.

  I repeat the words silently, willing my body and my heart to believe them. It doesn’t work.

  I think back on the two nights we’ve spent together, the easy hours in each other’s company, where the conversation had come more naturally with him than with anyone else. The way he touched me…like he knew my body better than I did…and now the returning shock that I’m the only one who felt that connection.

  I think back to that moment in the kitchen, when Nico came clean about his plans and neatly brushed away any possibility of making things work in other ways. His face drawn in obvious sorrow, with tiny lines I hadn’t noticed before crinkling around his dark eyes. His mouth, chewing ferociously on his lower lip every time he shook his head “no” to one of my suggestions.

  He was genuinely sad; none of it smacked of a play to get rid of me. But what do I know? I’m just a naïve nineteen-year-old who’s fallen for a man seven years her senior. A man who’s explained why he has to leave her. Truthfully, I don’t know what I am to him, and that’s only going to lead to heartbreak. It already has.

  And yet his words keep floating back. I like you naughty, NYU. I shiver, and not because of the cold. Yeah, I like me naughty too. With him. Naked. Mmmm.

  Damn it, Layla, get a hold of yourself. I have to keep repeating the mantra as I turn onto my street and step through the leftover snow drifts. He’s leaving. I just need to keep telling myself that anytime I start getting pulled back into the Nico vortex. He’s leaving. He’s leaving.

  He’s…right in front of me?

  As I approach my dorm, I find Nico leaning against the side of the brick building, about fifty feet from the entrance, intently watching the students as they come and go. His back is to me, but I would know those shoulders, that cap-covered head, that denim-clad ass anywhere.

  He’s hunched over in his leather jacket and a pair of cuffed dark jeans and has replaced his FedEx cap with his favorite, beat-up Yankees hat. His shoulders sag with fatigue, and his head rests lightly against the side of the building. I can tell from the way he keeps rubbing his hands together and shoving them back into his pockets that he’s been standing there a while. Even without seeing his face, I can feel the magnetic attraction between us. He’s here waiting for me, and my body, the traitor, wants to run right to him.

  “Hey, Layla.”

  One of the kids from my dorm greets me as he passes by with a few friends, completely blowing my cover. Nico turns around in surprise, nodding at the kid before resting his dark, searching eyes on me. We stare at each other for a minute, not saying anything.

  “Hey,” he finally says. “I was just—”

  “Stalking me?” I finish for him.

  I walk a few steps closer so that we don’t have to yell over the din of the street. It’s not a busy location, set well off Canal, but this is still New York. There’s no such thing as a quiet street.

  He gives me a sheepish half-smile, baring one dimple that I immediately want to nuzzle. Shit. He’s leaving, Layla. He’s going to break your heart.

  “I wanted to make sure you were okay,” he says. “Quinn said you weren’t home, and she wouldn’t let me up.”

  He reaches a hand out to touch my mitten, but I step back. If I let him touch me, I’m as good as gone. I might as well just throw myself into the abyss right now.

  He shifts back and forth from foot to foot, like he’s nervous about something. “Listen, Layla. I just wanted to say…ah, I’m not good at this…I, uh…”

  Suddenly it’s not hard to keep him at bay. Watching him hem and haw like this is worse than being made into self-imposed star-crossed lovers. At least Romeo actually wanted to be with Juliet. At least he fucking tried to make something happen. Nico wants to have his cake and eat it too. He wants to fuck me, make me fall in love with him, and leave me after. Well, fuck that. I’m not just going to lay my heart on the pavement for him to run over.

  “You know what, don’t worry about it,” I say, stepping widely around him to make my way down the street to the dorm.

  I hear his heavy footsteps on the sidewalk as he follows, so I walk faster, hoping he’ll get the hint.

  “Come on, baby, please don’t do this.”

  “I am not your baby!”

  I whirl around, suddenly furious. He has no right to play games with me like this; to fuck me senseless on Saturday, drop me for a job in California on Sunday, then give me a “maybe I will, maybe I won’t” spiel on Tuesday. I know why he has to go; I get it. But I don’t appreciate being treated like a placeholder for what he really wants. A way to kill time until he leaves. It doesn’t matter if he knows the best delis in the city or he’s the kind of guy who will make romantic gestures like waiting for you for possibly hours in the freezing cold.

  “You’re leaving,” I seethe. Yes, I can do this. Just as long as he doesn’t touch me. “Sure, it’ll be great for the next three months. I know this is great. You think I don’t know that? I do. But you’re leaving, Nico, so what’s the fucking point?”

  “The point is us, Layla!”

  He steps back, unable to keep still as he swings his arms out wide, as if trying to expel excess energy and demonstrate just how big “us” really is. When he finally stops and faces me, his expression is determined and his eyes flash under the streetlamp.

  “It’s us, baby! You know, just like I do, that I’m not going to be able to stay away from you any more than you’re going to be able to stay away from me. We’ll have to see each other every day until May, and it’s not like this is ever going to fade away. One fuckin’ touch, and you melt in my hands. And you know what? It’s the same for me. All you have to do is pout those beautiful goddamn lips of yours, and I’m ready to hop your desk and do you in front of your whole office!”

  “So, you want to fuck me, and I want to fuck you?” I paraphrase cruelly. “Big fucking surprise.”

  “Don’t say that,” he orders curtly. “And don’t play dumb. You and I both know it’s more than that.”

  “We’ve been on one—no, two, I guess—dates,” I snap. “We’ve known each other for about five fucking minutes. It’s just sex.”

  I hate the words as they roll out of my mouth. I hate them because I know them for the lie they are.

  “Fuck that. You know it’s way more than sex.”

  Nico tears his cap off his head and smacks it irritably against the wall before clapping it back on backward. It makes his dark eyes and brows stand out now that the bill doesn’t cast a shadow over his face. His eyelashes are a thick fringe that only intensifies the frustration painted on his strong features.

  “Fine!” I burst out. “So there’s a connection!” My voice falters. I inhale deeply to control myself before continuing. “So what? You’re still leaving.”

  “Yeah, I’m leaving!” He shouts it out like he can’t quite believe it himself. Maybe he can’t. “I have to do this, Layla! I have to get the fuck out of this garbage can of a city, at least try, or else I know I’ll never leave, and I’ll be stuck with this same shitty life forever. I’m not going to get into the FDNY, just like every other fuckin’ time I’ve tried. So, I have to…fuck! I have to do something!”

  He looks at me, those deep-set brown eyes ripped with fury and pain. I want to look away—I don’t want to feel sorry for him. Sorry means I care, and caring is one more step closer to that L-word I’ve been trying to avoid. But I’m already crying. I’m already here with him, stuck in this abyss. I fell in the second he stepped off that elevator.

  “You got your chance, NYU,” Nico says, invoking that nickname that speaks of everything I have, everything he’s trying for. “You’re living it right now. And I wouldn’t take that from you by even letting you consider coming with me. But I gotta take mi
ne, Layla. Don’t you get that?”

  The way his voice cracks on that last word practically breaks my heart. He holds my gaze, not letting me look away, forcing me to feel the earnestness, the pain he feels. We stand together for a moment, our breaths heaving, uncertain of anything but the obvious chemistry crackling between us. This is infuriating, wanting him so badly but at the same time knowing I shouldn’t do anything about it.

  “Of course I get it,” I say, trying and failing not to let my voice, which is still slightly hoarse, split over the words. “I’m not a monster. But I…I don’t want my heart to be broken in the process. And Nico, you will—you will break my heart.”

  There. I’ve finally said it out loud. Now he knows how I feel and how I’m afraid to feel. Maybe now he’ll walk away, because I am steadily losing the strength to do it again.

  “I don’t want to say goodbye to you yet, Layla.”

  “Just…”

  I falter on the words when his eyes glimmer. The way he’s looking at me, I want nothing more than to throw myself into his big arms and tell him we’ll just live in the now, that LA can go to hell, and we’ll deal with his departure when it actually comes.

  But I know I won’t be able to do that.

  “Just go, Nico,” I finally say, my tone defeated.

  I can’t look at him, knowing that with one smile, one flash of his eyes, I’ll be jumping into his arms. I study the texture of the bricks behind him. The way the color of the stone changes when it’s wet with melted snow. I take a deep breath.

  “I’ll deal with seeing you at the office. But I can’t do more than that.”

  I hate that fate is so unkind as to hand me the most intense connection of my life, and two days later steals it back again. I hate that I can’t even take a last glance at him as I walk away.

  “Layla, please.”

  I continue to walk slowly toward the dorm, to where I can be protected by the flurry of students loitering around the entrance. My footsteps drag—whether because I’m still a little sick or because underneath it all, I don’t really want to leave him, I don’t know. But it’s got to be what’s best. It’s just got to be.

  “Layla, please!”

  Just before I reach the street, Nico’s hand catches mine and pulls me back to face him.

  “Please,” he says one last time, his voice catching again.

  It’s then I make the mistake of looking into his eyes, burning bright with a combination of desire, pain, and obvious…love, maybe? Whatever it is, it’s strong, and he searches my face for something of the same, his eyes drawing hungrily over my face, my lips as he cups my cheeks between his leather-encased palms.

  “You’re like a magnet. I can’t just stay away,” he says and bends down to kiss me.

  “Stop,” I whisper just before he touches me. “You’re leaving.”

  “I don’t fuckin’ care,” he growls and kisses me, opening my mouth with his tongue and plundering until every inch of my body practically melts into him.

  I succumb, wrapping my arms around his head and pulling him closer, sucking on his bottom lip so hard I wonder if I’ve drawn blood. His hands reach inside my coat, clasping my ass so he can grind his hips into me. Even as I moan into his mouth, I hear a couple of whistles from students passing us, even a “Get a room,” but it’s hard to do much more than register anything when his lips are on mine.

  Which they won’t be…for long. Eventually my brain catches up with my body, realizing a clear, important truth: nothing about this situation has changed with that kiss. I still want him, and he is still going to leave me cold.

  I am stronger than I thought.

  “Stop!”

  I shove him back, and we gape at each other, our lips swollen and hungry. The air swirls with the heavy mists of our breath and a few errant snowflakes, and I ignore the curious students who walk around us.

  “What?” Nico gasps. “What is it?”

  He reaches for me again, but I step out of his grasp, backing farther down the sidewalk.

  “I do fucking care,” I huff at him, still trying to catch my breath. “And that doesn’t change the fact that you’re still going to break my heart.”

  And with that, before he can whisper another word that will make me stay or surprise me with another kiss that’s sure to paralyze me for good, I turn on the heel of my boot and run the last few steps into the dorm. This time he doesn’t follow, and I force myself not to look back to see if he’s still there.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Nico

  The next day, I switch buildings with Flaco. I must look like an even bigger idiot than I thought, because he doesn’t even put up a fight about missing out on the modeling agency. It should feel like the jackpot. I get to be the hot delivery guy to a floor full of eight-foot-tall Amazons who’d all like to go slumming in between TV executives and the CEOs they’re escorting in between modeling gigs. But even after I get two numbers slipped to me on the first day alone, I couldn’t care less.

  All I see are big blue eyes with a sweep of black lashes. A heart-shaped mouth that’s a puzzle-piece match to mine. Layla.

  The rest of the week and the next drag on, and every day I try something, anything, to make me stop thinking the way I do. I go out to Jersey, but all I can see is her there. I come back to Manhattan, but I only wish she were with me. I spend the entire weekend helping my mom weed through her magazine collection. I take extra shifts at AJ’s and even volunteer to work the door Sunday night at another club uptown.

  I even volunteer to watch my sister’s kid, Alejandra, at night and in the morning, because I’m not sleeping anyway. It’s a good idea at first—Allie’s a great distraction. But then it gives Maggie a minute to patch things up with her boyfriend, and by the next week, they move back to his apartment. So now I’m alone at my place again, with nothing but my thoughts and my sketchbook. And there’s only one thing I’ve been interested in drawing.

  By Friday the next week, I am breaking the fuck down. I take my lunch break in the truck, watching the entrance of the Fox and Lager building like a fucking stalker. It’s been over a week since I last saw her, and like a junkie, I need my fix. I tell myself that it’s because I just want to make sure she’s okay. She didn’t look like she had totally recovered from the flu. I want to make sure she’s taking care of herself.

  Flaco, like the friend he is, keeps me company, eating his sandwich like a horse and shaking his head at how pathetic I am.

  “I told you,” he says through a mouthful of chicken cutlet. “She looks fine. She was out sick a few more days, but she’s been there all week, and she looks fine, mano.”

  I set my sandwich on the dashboard of the truck. The pastrami tastes like cardboard anyway.

  “Nico,” Flaco says. “Why don’t you just tell her?”

  “Tell her what?” I’m absent, keeping my stare glued to the glass double-doors of the building. If I look away, I might miss her when she arrives.

  Flaco smacks me on the shoulder. “What do you think? That you’re fuckin’ in love with her.”

  My head snaps at him like it was on a slingshot. “What?”

  Flaco rolls his bug-eyes. He’s a tall, skinny dude with big eyes and lips like a frog. Flaco, another word for skinny in Spanish, isn’t his real name (which is actually Juan). But he’s been a skinny fuck since grade school and never grew out of it.

  “Don’t play,” he says simply. “I been watchin’ you fall all over yourself for NYU princess. You in love with her, bro. Don’t deny it.”

  I frown. “That’s crazy. I barely know her.”

  “Psssh, whatever,” he says, tossing his gangly hands up in the air. “That don’t mean shit. My parents got married four days after they met. They seen each other across the club, and blammo! That was it. Next stop, Atlantic City.”

  I haven’t met Flaco’s parents, but he’s told the story a lot. We talk a lot of shit about girls, but you don’t grow up listening to mambo kings and bachata ballads
without becoming romantics at heart. His parents are actually still together after they met at an early Hector LaVoe show up in the Bronx. Love at first sight, the way Flaco tells it. It’s easy to imagine––salsa is sexy as fuck. I bet a lot of babies got started at those concerts back in the day.

  “Still,” I say, even though I’m back to staring at the building. “It’s not the same thing.”

  And it isn’t. I met Layla in the middle of my delivery route, not a sexy concert. Flaco’s parents are cut from the same cloth––both Puerto Rican, both new immigrants, both living in the same neighborhood. Layla and me, we’re from totally different worlds.

  “Whatever,” Flaco says as he turns back to his sandwich. “You a fool in love, bro. No doubt.”

  Layla arrives at one-fifty, ten minutes before her shift starts. I see her walking down the street from the subway entrance. She looks...good. Skinny, but good. Better than I want her to look now that we’re split. I really am a selfish bastard.

  She glances nervously toward the FedEx truck, and I’m glad we have tinted windows so she can’t see me watching her like some Fatal Attraction psycho. Fuck, I’m freaking myself out here.

  Still, I take her in, follow her every step. She’s so serious, her big eyes scanning around, already with the watchfulness New Yorkers have so they don’t get taken for a ride. Everyone in this city is suspicious, and Layla, even though she doesn’t have that jaded edge to her yet, has already learned to be cautious around strangers.

  She doesn’t smile. Even from across the street, I can see that the twinkle in her eyes is dulled. I want to tell myself it’s just because she was sick, even though I know better. A couple of construction workers catcall her––the kind who will catcall anything with a skirt––and she ducks her head as she passes, but doesn’t show the fear I know she must have. I clench my fists, fighting the urge to jump out and shield her from their whistles, maybe even teach some of these assholes some respect. I have sisters. I know how scary these streets can be to women, especially young pretty ones like Layla.