“Rough night?” Jerry asks, slicing a grapefruit in half and digging in with a spoon.
“Yeah,” I mutter. Not too long ago we were in this same situation, except the roles were reversed. Now I’m the miserable one. The one without Aster.
The one who doesn’t deserve her.
“You want to talk about it?”
I glance up to see if Jerry’s serious, and he is. He’s eating his grapefruit and offering a shoulder to cry on. Except I’m moping about a fight with his ex-girlfriend, the one I paid for him to cheat on, so I can’t exactly go into detail.
“No,” I say, downing the orange juice. “Thanks, though.”
“Want to come with me today?” he offers. “We’re learning how to tie knots.”
I pause as I rinse out my glass. “Is this for the volunteer thing?”
“Yep. It’s a survival skill.”
“Shouldn’t you have learned it before you spent a weekend camping in the woods?”
“Definitely. That trip was a disaster. But we’re supposed to call it a learning experience.”
“What’d you learn?”
He eats his grapefruit. “That I hate camping.”
Ugh. He’s just so...positive. Every mistake is an opportunity in disguise.
“I’ll pass on the knots. But thanks.”
I retreat to my room, throw on a pair of sweats and a T-shirt, grab my mp3 player, and go for a run. Working out is one of the few things I do at Holsom that I did growing up. Most everything else got me in trouble, and despite what happened last night, I’m trying not to get in trouble. Not to mess up. Not to be that guy.
I run for an hour, using each footstep to stomp on another memory of the fight with Aster.
The kiss.
The slap.
The kiss.
But try as I might, I can’t forget anything. Not a single detail. Not the way she smelled. Not the way her tongue felt against mine. Not the way she looked in that dress and that lipstick. Not the way her eyes changed, the tiny cracks that sprung up in her armor. Out of all the things that were said last night, one theme stands out more than the rest: You have no idea, Aidan. You don’t know anything. You don’t know shit.
I know she wasn’t just talking about how I’d hurt her. There was something more. It was the incongruity of those gold heels, the way they sat there, like a prop. The smudged red lipstick. The way she tried to be angry then crumpled and caved. The way she was trying to be something she wasn’t.
I know what that looks like.
I see it in the mirror every day.
I was drawn to Aster because she was beautiful. Light and flawless. But last night the tarnish showed on her perfect finish, and I don’t think I’m the one who put it there. I think I’m the one who bumped against that glossy shine and rubbed off the polish to reveal the secret scratches hidden underneath.
21
Aster
“What do you think? Gold or silver?”
I try to appear appropriately interested in Missy’s question. She’s been trying to find a new pair of earrings for the past three hours, dragging me to every store in the nearby mall in her quest for a new accessory.
“Gold,” I say, when she keeps waiting for an answer. “Definitely.”
“Hmm.” She holds the hoops up to her ear and studies them. “Good call, Aster. Gold it is.”
I try not to react to the elite black credit card she pulls out of her designer purse; the way she casually buys a pair of earrings that cost more than my groceries for a month. I do a good job looking totally happy with everything. I’ve been doing it for three years, after all. And it had almost started to feel normal.
Until Aidan.
Fucking Aidan.
I’d kill him, but I don’t want to go back to prison.
“I’m starving,” Missy says, tucking the earrings in her bag, alongside the new jeans and the dress and the forty-dollar mascara she bought on a whim. “Do you want to get some ice cream?”
“Ah...how about cupcakes?” I say, scrambling to think of anything other than ice cream. If I think about ice cream I’ll think about Aidan, and if I think about Aidan I’ll scream. I’ll think about how incredibly stupid I am. How I’m supposed to know better.
How I do know better.
And yet.
For weeks after I’d learned what he’d done I’d tried to come up with a plan to ruin him. To build up his heart and then stomp on it the way he’d done to mine with his lie. I thought I’d bring him to the pool and let him drown, except he’d been so genuinely terrified that I hadn’t had the heart. The way he’d looked, floating in the water, believing in me...no one has ever looked at me like that.
The ice cream date. Telling him about Sydney, giving him a shot to come clean. He didn’t deserve a second chance, but I tried to give him one, and he hadn’t taken it. It was a wasted effort, and one I won’t make again.
“I could totally eat a cupcake,” Missy says, navigating through the busy mall and completely failing to notice the way her bulging shopping bags bump passerby.
When I first met Missy at Aidan’s Frisbee baseball game, I’d never in a million years have imagined us hanging out, but here we are. And I never would have imagined myself saying I wish I could be more like Missy Freestone, but I kind of do.
We couldn’t be more different. Missy’s from an old money southern family; her mom has a brand of bourbon named after her and her father owns a plastics factory. Missy’s apartment is professionally decorated and paid for by her parents; I have a dorm room in which I live for free in exchange for agreeing to listen to sobbing and STD-riddled students at all hours of the day.
“I hope they have the coconut lemon one,” Missy is saying. “Ooh, or maybe the red velvet. But once they had cookies and cream and there was a whole cookie inside the cupcake—that was amazing.” She stops walking. “Aster? Are you listening?”
I school my expression into its standard happy-go-lucky blandness. “Of course I am! Sorry! I’m just so hungry!”
She beams back at me and resumes walking. “I’m the one who should be apologizing. I dragged you out here on this shopping trip and then totally forgot to eat! We should get two cupcakes.”
My stomach clenches. “Absolutely.”
I don’t want two cupcakes. I don’t even want one cupcake, that’s how bad things are. I didn’t feel this miserable after the break up with Jerry, and that was honestly miserable. When Aidan asked me if I’d really loved Jerry, I wasn’t lying when I said I did. I loved him. I loved everything about him. When we first met I loved the idea of him, this guy from a good family with hope and ambition and a truly huge heart. And then, with time, I loved him, too. And he loved me. He didn’t look deep enough to see all the dents and dings beneath the surface, and he was totally, completely happy with the package I was selling. And I was totally, completely happy to be that package.
Until Aidan ripped it apart.
I shake my head, like that will jar loose all stray thoughts of him.
It doesn’t work, of course. Somehow he’d weaseled himself in there, past all the carefully constructed walls I’d put up, making himself not just my only friend, but my best friend. I wasn’t lying when I told him that, either. Finally a guy who listened to and heard me; liked me and respected me; lied to and betrayed me.
I was furious when I spoke to Sindy and she spilled the details of Aidan’s little plan to have her seduce Jerry. The whole thing made sense...and then it didn’t. He wanted to break us up for a reason, but what? The obvious answer is sex, but he never pushed the issue. Even when I was drunk, pants-less, and sharing a cheap motel bed with him, he didn’t make a move.
“Oh, man.” Missy moans as we approach the shop, their display case filled with a colorful cornucopia of cupcakes. “They have all the flavors! What are we going to do?”
I pretend to contemplate the selection, but I’m really looking at our reflections in the glass. Missy’s wearing a red dress with a boat n
eck collar and heels so high I couldn’t walk in them if my life depended on it. I’m wearing skinny jeans and flats and a tank top beneath my denim jacket. When I first got to Holsom I tried to dress fancier, tried harder to fit into this life, the life I wanted. But it was such a far stretch from the life I’d left that I couldn’t do it. Instead of going from prison beige to Prada bags, I’d steered into the safer middle ground of jeans and T-shirts. At least I can afford them.
“Okay,” Missy says, sighing dramatically when it’s our time to order. “We’re going to get four cupcakes. “Coconut lemon, red velvet, cookies and cream, and vanilla. That’s your favorite, right, Aster?” She reads the surprise on my face. “You mentioned it before. Said you were boring vanilla. Like anybody’s buying that.” She winks at me and turns to pay, waving away my money. “If I’m going to corrupt you, I’m going to pay for it,” she says, steering us over to a table in the nearby food court.
Despite her regal southern belle countenance, Missy is a hardcore athlete and ruthlessly ambitious. The second time I turned up to play with the team she’d invited me to a party at her place. I’d turned her down and instead of pouting she said, “I don’t blame you. Let’s go for drinks instead. Do you like bourbon?”
I’d tried to get out of the invite but Missy wasn’t taking no for an answer, and soon enough I’d found myself sitting across from her in a campus bar, listening to her bawdy stories of the lengths she went to in order to maintain her good girl image. “That’s why I wanted to hang out with you,” she’d explained. “I recognize it in you. That wild side, trying to break free. My wild side needs company. Join us.”
I didn’t have the nerve to tell her my wild side had been tamed after fourteen months in a women’s correctional facility. I don’t tell anyone about that side, keeping my past as vague and bland as my present is supposed to be.
Until Aidan.
Missy slices the cupcakes into quarters and steeples her fingers as she tries to decide where to start. “Red velvet, right?” she mutters, as though there’s a wrong answer. “Or lemon coconut?”
I pick up a piece of vanilla and lick off the frosting. It’s delicious, and instead of revolting, my stomach sings its praises. When I haven’t been in class I’ve been moping around my dorm room, pretending to be a good resident advisor, the one who’d had such a loud fight with a guy the week before that another resident advisor had been sent down to scold her.
There was no end to the moping in sight until I bumped into Missy after class this morning and she insisted I come along on her shopping trip. I couldn’t think of a good excuse to get away, so here I am.
“Oh, hell,” Missy says, picking up the red velvet and the lemon coconut and sandwiching them together. “I’ll just eat both.” Frosting smears on her upper lip as she eats, and then she beams at me, cupcake crumbs clinging to her chin. “What?” she asks, when I laugh. “Is there something in my teeth?”
I laugh harder.
All week I’ve been convinced I’d never feel better, never find another friend, but maybe there’s hope. Maybe Missy will be my friend and I’ll never seen Aidan Shaw again and everything will be just fine.
22
Aidan
“You seem better,” Jerry remarks when I enter the kitchen the following Monday morning, dressed in a white button down and navy pants. “You also look better.” It’s a fair observation, not an insult. I’ve been wearing the same sweatpants and T-shirt all week, and even I had to admit I was starting to smell.
“Thanks.”
“Early shift at the library?”
“Yeah,” I lie. “I’m covering for someone.”
“Cool. Let me know if you need to tie anything up for any reason. I have a lot of knot knowledge now.”
Sure enough, the couch, ottoman, and both side tables are covered in various lengths of ropes tied up in various types of knots.
“You’re really taking this seriously,” I remark, pouring a bowl of cereal and watching him work on another knot as I eat.
“Well,” he says, chewing on his bottom lip. “I was the worst knot-tier in the group, and it was pretty embarrassing. You don’t say you’re pre-med and then admit you can’t tie a slip knot.”
“Oh, God, no.”
If he hears my sarcasm, he doesn’t acknowledge it. “Anyway,” he continues. “Practice makes perfect, so here I am.”
The word perfect makes me think of Aster, and I contemplate Jerry’s knots, an assortment of twisted penance for his crime of cheating. And my crime of paying for it.
I finish the cereal, down half a glass of orange juice, and grab my jacket. “I’ll see you later.”
“Have fun at work.”
It’s a rainy March day as I trudge over to the campus, passing lecture halls and coffee shops, the tempting smells of caffeine and cinnamon buns trying to lure me off my path. But I can’t be late for the morning’s check-in. Today is the requisite Promise & Potential Program once-a-term meeting, where, in addition to classes, jobs, and our extracurricular activity, we’re assigned a task to complete to benefit the seriously under-funded program. I got lucky my first year because they had just moved offices and needed help setting up, so I spent a weekend painting walls and moving furniture and got my cooperation credits without actually having to talk to anybody. Last year I monitored the online program forum and forwarded the queries to Jim and Becca as needed. I’m hoping for something as unchallenging again this time around
The PPP offices are on the second floor of a nondescript gray building, its walls covered with moss and ivy. I pass a handful of people as I enter, mostly older folks dressed in cheap suits and ties.
The building is dim, the floors cheap brown linoleum, the walls a dingy off-white. I take the stairs up one level, weak light spilling in through the occasional window. My boots squeak as I make the short trip to the end of the hall and into the entrance area for the PPP. An elderly lady named Becca sits at the reception desk, and next to it is a swinging gate that leads to a cluster of small offices and meeting rooms.
“Hi, Becca,” I say, signing my name on the clipboard she slides over.
“Hey, Aidan. How’s everything?”
“Never better. Need anything painted today?”
She tsks. “You wish. Go straight on back.”
I slip through the gate and search for the program director, a redheaded guy named Jim who’s not much older than me but who possesses the enthusiasm of a ten-year-old. Not even the drab décor or the constantly dwindling budget can bring Jim down.
I pass a couple of empty offices before coming to the PPP library, a slightly larger office with two half-empty bookshelves, three small desks, and one ancient desktop computer. Today the desks have been pushed to the side, the floor space crammed with cheap metal folding chairs, arranged six across and ten deep, with a small aisle carved out in the middle.
Nearly all the seats are full, so I take one at the very back. Toward the front I spot T.J. and Wes, their heads bent together as they talk. Brix stands off to the side, having a conversation with Jim, but pretty much everyone else is sitting quietly or fiddling with something on their phones.
The room is about seventy percent male, a hundred percent diverse, and extremely confused. We’ve never been gathered before. Never seen this many PPP faces. But before we can worry too much, Jim moves to stand behind the makeshift podium at the front of the room.
“Good morning,” he says, smiling widely. “And thank you all for coming.”
A couple of people mutter some sort of greeting, but everyone else is sitting anxiously, waiting for the ax to fall. A free ride to Holsom in exchange for our promise to try our best was too good to be true, and without exchanging a word, it’s obvious that everyone in here is expecting the worst.
“I know we’ve typically met one-on-one to discuss your cooperation credits, but this year we have a special PPP ten-year anniversary project, and we need everyone here to work together to see it succeed.”
&nb
sp; There’s an expectant pause, like he’s waiting for us to applaud, but no one makes a sound.
“Okay,” Jim says, still smiling. “Great. The project will have a past, present, future theme, and will hopefully help to update and re-brand the program. We’ll be creating new brochure materials for prospective students and donors, conducting interviews with program graduates and current participants, offering in-person campus tours, phone consults...”
“We’re supposed to do tours?” Wes asks, sticking his hand in the air belatedly. “I thought we were anonymous.”
“You’re not anonymous to me, Wes,” Jim says, but no one laughs. “Ahem. No one has to lead a tour if they don’t want to. Your privacy is yours to cherish, and we respect that.”
“Can I just send out donation letters like last year?” a girl in the front row asks. “I like mail.”
“You did a great job with the mailings, Nikki. We’ll see if that spot is still available for you.”
She cracks her gum. “Awesome.”
I sigh and dig out my phone, tuning out the rest of Jim’s presentation. I don’t plan to lead any tours, but the cooperation credit is mandatory, and I get why it’s necessary. A PPP student named Lindo greeted me on my move-in day, helping me bring my bags to my room and get settled in. I’d had an enormous chip on my shoulder, totally prepared to be the black sheep in this sea of imagined trust fund rich kids, but seeing someone who’d had a harder life than me make this place work for him gave me the confidence to believe I could have the same opportunities if I opened myself up to them.
Three years ago I never would have believed I could get a girl like Aster. Never would have had the courage to try. I might have always been destined to fail, but making the effort is its own type of progress.
“So that’s that,” Jim says, some time later. The sharp clap of his hands interrupts my thoughts and I put away my phone and straighten in my seat, preparing to go. “We’ve got the sign up sheets here, so if you have a partner in mind, add your names to the same line. I’ll pair up any singles later. You can select your three preferred tasks, and jobs will be assigned shortly. I’m here if you have any questions.”
My Roommate's Girl Page 9
