Someone bumped into them, and they were knocked apart, Erika tripping backward into the couch. He asked if she was okay, but she didn’t answer, just stood up and hopped onto the middle cushion.
She put her hand out for him and mouthed c’mon.
He let her pull him up, and now they were dancing for everyone, dancing horribly, because it was so hard to stand up there without falling over, but that didn’t matter. People all over the room were screaming, and Tucker looked out at their smiling, laughing faces, and then he spotted Bobby in the corner, with his phone out, standing right next to a whiteboard.
He picked up the pen, then slowly wrote something in very large script before quickly erasing it.
D says 100%
Erika started to fall, and Tucker reached out and grabbed her, pulling her toward him. She sank into his arms, and the happy music was still going, still washing over them.
“I know it wasn’t your real prom,” Tucker said, speaking right into her ear, “but was it okay?”
She burrowed farther into his shoulder.
“Perfect,” she said. “Just perfect.”
30
Erika
Erika, Tucker, and Bobby were the only ones going back to her dorm. It was a chilly walk, but Erika smiled the whole way. She couldn’t stop thinking about how it felt to dance with Tucker on the couch.
A few times, the memory of Jacob flickered back into her mind, what a close call that was, but then she would bat it away.
It was no big deal, right? Everything was fine.
They boarded the elevator, and Erika pushed three for her floor, five for Salma’s. They were silent as they rode up, and then the door opened with a ding.
“Super Smash Brothers?” Erika asked. “My room?”
“Sure,” Tucker said.
He got off the elevator and Erika followed—then they looked back at Bobby.
“I’m good,” he said. “Destiny is begging me to call her right now.”
Bobby clicked the button to close the elevator, stared up at the ceiling, and then was gone.
This is it, this is it, this is it, this is it.
Erika took out her keys, then dropped them. Her lock was finicky, and like always she had to fumble and jiggle for a minute to get it to work.
Tucker was standing very close to her while she did.
“Erika . . . I wanted to say that I’m really glad that we found each other again this year. I feel like I’m happier because we did, you know? Like you helped me figure out some important things.”
She paused, the door handle cold in her palm. She stared straight ahead, not daring to look at him.
In that moment, she knew that she’d screwed up.
Erika wanted something with Tucker tonight, but she wanted it to be real. There was no way to have something like that unless she was more honest.
Impossible. It would be impossible to explain this Tucker.
But even as Erika had that thought, she knew it wasn’t true. She was afraid—afraid that Tucker would be a jerk about it, that he would be judgmental. Worse than that, what if some deep, sad part of her agreed with him? She’d thought she’d moved past all that, and she’d certainly come a long way, just not quite as far as she’d like. The s-word was still waiting for her like it always was, a hibernating snake in the back of her mind . . .
But Tucker wouldn’t be like that. She was sure that he would understand. She just needed a little bit of time, to get her courage up. To find the right words.
“That’s . . . that’s really nice, Tucker. Thank you for saying that. I’m Pikachu, all right?”
The hallway felt stuffy. She still hadn’t opened the door.
“Of course,” he finally said. “Sounds good.”
She changed into a pair of pajamas in the bathroom of her suite, with the door firmly closed. She came back out and turned on their game. They both sat on their own corners of the bed, like at Ryan’s, except this was a twin, so they weren’t quite so far apart this time.
They played one round, and then another, and another. The hour grew late. Tucker took off his shoes to get more comfortable.
When Erika had lost three in a row, she decided that she was done with this little charade.
“So,” she said. “Do you think the air mattress is deflated yet?”
“Oh, it deflated before we even left for the party,” Tucker said. “But I’m, uh, really tired. I’m sure I’ll go right to sleep.”
Erika’s heart careened. She knew she wanted him to stay. One way or another, this was officially happening.
“Just sleep here. It’s fine. You can’t sleep on the floor.”
“No, no, no. Don’t worry about me, seriously . . .”
Erika got up and dug through her drawer, pulled out the biggest T-shirt she had.
“Not your size, I know. But it’s at least as big as the one you wore to the party at the Cave,” she said, tossing it toward him.
He silently took it and disappeared into the bathroom. While he was gone, she turned out the lights and crawled into bed, trying to slow her pounding heart.
The bathroom door opened a crack.
“Um, do you want me to sleep in my jeans? I mean, I can, it’s no problem . . .”
Erika pulled the comforter over her head.
“No, no. Take off your stupid jeans, Tucker. It’s fine.”
A minute later the door squeaked, and then she felt his weight settling in next to her. He was being careful not to touch her, but she crawled toward him, curling up as small as she could and burying her face in his chest.
He wrapped his arms around her, and she felt warm then, and safe. One of her legs slipped between his.
“Uh, good night,” he said. “Hopefully Pikachu worked and we’ll fall right to sleep.”
She was too nervous to laugh, and now they were quiet, pressed against each other. Decision time was here. Either she could tell Tucker how she felt about him and also what was going on with Jacob, or else she could silence all those thoughts and let go. Have fun.
But try as she might, she could not go with option number one. It was just too scary. And option number two still didn’t feel right.
Okay, fine. Maybe this isn’t happening. Fall asleep and then figure it out in the morning. Sleep, sleep, sleep. Sleep, sleep, sleep.
As she was rolling that word over in her mind, a regular game of hers, an idea came into her head, a completely mad idea.
Her pulse started going harder.
Oh my god no. Absolutely not. Who even does that?
But she wanted to. She couldn’t think about anything else, with him so close. She shifted up so her mouth was by his ear, because if she was going to suggest this, it was definitely going to be in a whisper.
You can’t say this. How will you even say this?
But she already knew.
“If Pikachu doesn’t work, we could try the other way.”
There were goose bumps on his legs—she could feel them.
“I could put myself to sleep,” she said. “And you could put yourself to sleep.”
There were three long seconds of pure silence, when neither of them moved.
“Really?” Tucker asked.
She didn’t answer, and he coughed, let his arms go a little looser.
“Okay,” he said.
Now what, now what, now what, now what.
“I’ve never done this with anyone before, so you have to start,” Erika said.
“I’ve never done this with anyone before either, so you definitely have to start,” Tucker said.
Erika let a giggle escape, then recovered. She thought about doing a countdown or something, but then she decided she needed to just go or she would lose her nerve, so she went, and he went, and they were going, going, going . . .
Tucker was in the bathroom, cleaning up, and Erika’s heart hadn’t slowed yet—her breath was still coming short and fast. She realized she was scared out of her mind.
She was
suddenly convinced that he would come back, announce how weird that was, and leave. Or he’d wait until she was asleep and then text Bobby. You won’t believe what she wanted to do.
As he walked back into her room, she shut her eyes. He got into bed, pulling her to his chest and sighing into her hair.
Then he started laughing.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. That was kind of intense,” he said. “That was intense, right?”
Erika laughed, too, the tension inside her uncoiling. She was very ready to fall asleep, and then maybe wake up and do that again in the morning. Except with kissing. She would figure out a way to talk to him, he would totally understand, and then they could do that with kissing, or maybe do other things with kissing . . .
Then Erika’s phone buzzed from across the room with a call.
She sat up quickly and got out from under the covers, immediately on edge, the lateness of the hour making her think of Makenzie, of the stairwell. By the time she’d made her way across the room and dug her phone out of her purse, there was a message from Angela, the RA one floor up. She had some kind of situation with some kids on her floor and was hoping for backup.
Erika started hustling around, grabbing clothes from her drawers.
“So this is terrible timing, but the RA upstairs needs help with something, not really sure exactly what. Who knows how long it will take, so don’t feel like you need to wait up.”
Disappearing into the bathroom, Erika glanced only briefly in the mirror at her flushed face as she got dressed and made a half-assed attempt to smooth her hair and fix her fading makeup. By the time she came out, she was still a little afraid to really look at Tucker and had to take a deep breath before she turned to him to say a quick goodbye.
He was propped up on his elbow, looking at her wide-eyed.
“Are you okay?” he asked. “You seem kind of nervous.”
“Oh, it’s nothing. I mean . . . I was nervous for a second, because middle-of-the-night things still freak me out. But if it was something serious, she would have told me or called security or something. I’m sure it’s fine.”
“But I can at least walk you up there . . .”
“Nope, nope, nope. You’re not wearing any pants, for starters. I’ll see you in a few, okay?”
She put all of her attention on her shoes, and almost fell over as she yanked them on. As she was finally ready to leave, Tucker called to her.
“Erika, can we talk? If not tonight, tomorrow?”
She paused and kept her eyes on the door in front of her.
“Yeah. Yes. Of course. I know. I know we need to talk. We’ll talk soon.”
31
Tucker
There was zero chance, zero, that Tucker could fall asleep right now. He couldn’t even sit still. Kicking his way out of her bed, he grabbed his phone and started mindlessly clicking while he paced the room, trying to make sense of everything that had just happened.
He’d been so close to kissing her, through all of it, but he felt like he wasn’t supposed to, and now he didn’t know what this was, what was going on with them. It was so clearly past time to be open and honest.
She’d said they would talk, and he wanted to be ready. Tucker had started writing a speech in his head, back at the party. Now he put on the finishing touches, saying it to himself a few times.
I know that it doesn’t make sense to have anything right now, when we’re going to be so far away from each other, but I don’t know how to ignore what I’m feeling. Every night we’ve spent together this year is a night that I wished would never end. I want more of them if you want them too.
He needed her to get back quickly, before he lost his nerve. Perched on the edge of her bed, he went to her Instagram page, lingered on the photos she’d posted from tonight. The two of them on the boat, the two of them clinging to each other at the party—seeing their faces together made his heart swell.
Then he started scrolling back further, looking through pictures that were familiar to him, all those images that had given him a glimpse into Erika’s life these past few months. He paused on that picture where she was piled on a sagging futon with a bunch of her friends, because he’d always loved how happy she looked in that one, how much she was laughing . . .
But that’s when he saw him. The guy from the party. The slow-dancing-to-Adele guy.
Tucker had never noticed him before, and the guy wasn’t tagged, so Tucker still had no clue who he was. But looking at the picture anew, it seemed like he was awfully close to Erika, and that might have been his arm around her. Tucker kept scrolling, and there he was again and again, always with that stupid look on his face. Cocky. He looked cocky, right? He had on a St. B’s Swimming T-shirt in one picture, and he looked like a swimmer, he had that build. Was he older maybe? He seemed older. Tucker went back to the photos of himself and Erika on the boat, and suddenly felt like a little kid.
With a very deep breath and conscious effort, Tucker closed out of Instagram. He looked at the time, counting the minutes since Erika had been gone, and now it seemed like a mistake that he was sitting here.
Why had he let her walk out? He should have insisted that he walk her to where she was going. She’d flat-out admitted she was nervous, and he’d let her go—what was wrong with him?
Tucker started fumbling around in the dark for his jeans, trying to decide the best thing to do.
32
Erika
Erika felt like the smell of vomit was going to be following her for the rest of the weekend. Oh god, that had been a mess, an absolute mess; everyone had been written up, although they could go in front of the discipline board and apologize, take one of those classes, and redeem themselves.
There was one more thing she had to take care of.
Erika stood there in the hallway next to Eliot, the only boy who’d been partying in room 405 that night. Or not partying exactly—they’d been watching The Great British Bake Off and playing some kind of drinking game, which had apparently destroyed them.
Now Eliot was crouched on the floor, trying to stop the spins.
He had begged to be let go with just a warning, so that he wouldn’t get kicked off the swim team. Erika had told him that she couldn’t do that, but she promised to at least stick up for him, tell the coach he’d been cooperative. Still, the kid was really upset and completely freaking out, so Erika had called for help.
The elevator dinged, and there was Jacob.
Erika stood up and awkwardly smoothed out her clothes, took a quick second to check on Eliot, and then made her way down the hallway.
“Hey, hi. I am—god. I am so sorry to do this, but he was about to cry, and I asked if he knew you, and I thought maybe you could talk to him, calm him down . . .”
“It’s fine, it’s fine. I’m happy to do it. Eliot’s the best. I mean—maybe not right now. Right now is not his finest moment.”
Jacob had his hands stuck in his back pockets, a tight smile on his face. “This stuff happens a lot. He’ll get in trouble, but I doubt he’ll get kicked off the team. I’ll explain it to him.”
“Jacob . . .”
“Look, it’s late, and I want to get him back to his room and get him some water. So I should probably start moving.”
Erika nodded very quickly.
“Yeah, yeah. For sure. Um, I can go call the elevator?”
From down on the floor, Eliot gave a pitiful groan.
“Elevators make my tummy feel weird. Elevator yuck, yuck.”
Jacob ran a hand down his face, then walked over and offered Eliot a hand. He pulled him up slowly, then did his best to keep him from collapsing as they headed for the stairs.
“I’ll help, I’ll help,” Erika mumbled. “I can open the door for you.”
As she walked alongside them, she noticed that Eliot had indeed calmed down and was now looking adoringly up at Jacob.
“I want to be like you when I grow up.”
“Oh my god,” Jacob muttered.
Eliot gave a little gasp and stopped in his tracks. “I just had the best idea. Let’s be on a reality baking show together. As a team. You can be the handsome one, and I’ll be the funny one.”
Jacob sighed.
“Eliot, you’re plenty handsome. Now, can we please keep moving?”
“WHAT? REALLY? Okay, let’s have our own baking show. We can bake in our Speedos.”
“No.”
“WHY? We’d get so many girls. And make so many cookies.”
As they all started walking again, Erika let a laugh escape, though she tried to cover it up by coughing into her elbow. Jacob wanted to laugh, too, she could tell, but instead he shook his head and pretended to be disappointed.
“You should really be taking this much more seriously.”
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Erika said, grinning. “I’m just really excited about the cookie show.”
Eliot leaned closer to Jacob. “The hot RA is totally not mad at me anymore.”
Jacob stuck a finger in Eliot’s face. “Watch it, okay?”
“Oh my god,” Eliot said in a deranged whisper. “Is she your girlfriend?”
“No, she’s my friend. And you need to chill, regardless.”
Eliot nodded, then sank back down to a crouch, a few feet short of the stairwell. “I can chill. I will chill. Just . . . I need to do it down here. For one more minute.”
As they waited for Eliot to get a hold of himself, Erika and Jacob stood facing each other. He seemed more relaxed than when he’d first arrived. His expression was gentler.
“Thanks again,” Erika said. “You’re, um, you’re a really good friend.”
She was relieved when that made him smile.
“I’m glad you called me, really. You’re a good RA.”
Erika felt her cheeks go pink. “Thanks. I try to be.”
“I’m going to miss you next year, Oscar.”
Jacob put his hand up for a high five. Smiling, Erika gave him one.
Our Year in Love and Parties Page 15
