Find Me in the Dark

by Ashe, Karina

  I can’t believe how mean they are! “You guys…”

  “Not gonna work,” Cassie says.

  I clamp my mouth shut.

  Dolly glances at Cassie. “Cue the movie. Anna, grab her shirt.”

  The tears! No, they couldn’t be serious. “You guys, this is kind of going overboard…”

  “You need to tell us. We’re friends,” Anna says, gazing into my eyes like I’d just shot Bambi’s mom.

  “Best friends,” Cassie says, flicking on the TV. Static glows before my eyes. All I can see is the outline of her back.

  “Alright, alright, there was a guy,” I stammer.

  “Uh huh.” Dolly grins. “And?”

  “And…” and what? I didn’t know this guy’s name. I didn’t know anything about him. What could I say that would make sense?

  “She’s trying to think up a lie,” Anna notes.

  How did sweet Anna know that?

  “You should just tell us the truth, babe. Get it over with fast. It’s like ripping off a band-aid,” Dolly says.

  “You guys are making this really scary!” I wail.

  “It shouldn’t be scary!” Dolly raises her hands. “I tell you all about the guys I date.”

  “Yeah but…”

  Dolly raises a brow. “But what?” she asks, daring me to say something.

  “Like nothing,” I mumble as she flashes a victorious grin.

  Anna grabs my shirt. “You ready to tell us?”

  “Yeah,” Cassie moans. “I thought you trusted us!”

  It was a low blow. I did trust them. They were my closest friends, and apart from Molly, my family. They meant everything to me. Which was why I couldn’t tell them this.

  This relationship went against everything I knew was right. No one would ever understand it. I mean…God, just thinking it made me feel like a fool. If I heard another girl talk about how she slept with a guy who’d written her letters for years and wore a mask—a guy she knew nothing about—I would think she needed help.

  Maybe I do need help, I think as I ball my fists in my pants.

  “I don’t want you guys to read too much into this,” I say, trying to keep my voice light. It’s hard because I’ve thought so much about him already that it’s difficult to separate my fantasy from reality.

  And, more than that, maybe I don’t want to separate them.

  “Okay, we won’t,” Cassie says as Anna and Dolly nod.

  I open my mouth and start frowning. Can I really do this? “I, uh, I met a guy that I like.”

  The three of them edge closer, unable to keep their excitement from spilling over.

  “How long ago did you meet him?” Anna asks. “Like, three years ago at—”

  “She already said it wasn’t David!” Dolly interrupts.

  What is all this about David? “It isn’t David,” I confirm.

  Cassie’s eyes fall again. “Well, what’s his name? Is he nice?”

  What’s his name? Oh shit! I can’t say I don’t know, can I? And why the hell don’t I know his name? Why hasn’t this bothered me before?

  Dolly’s eyes narrow. “Do you know this guy’s name?”

  Oh fuck. How did she guess so quickly? Maybe because she hooks up with guys without knowing their name. “No. I know it, I just…”

  “Well, what is it then?” Cassie asks.

  “Um…”

  Dolly’s eyes are little slivers. I feel them stabbing into me.

  I say the first name that pops into my head. “Derrick.”

  “Derrick,” Cassie repeats softly, then, “Oh God, Derrick? The bass player Derrick?”

  Bass player Derrick? Who the hell was she talking about—oh no, wait, shit! “No, not that Derrick.”

  But it’s too late. They’ve jumped to their own conclusions. The damage has been done.

  Dolly pats my leg sympathetically. “Oh sweetie.”

  “It’s not that Derrick!” I wail. I sound so pathetic, even to my own ears, and I’m protesting so much that it probably sounds like I’m lying.

  The girls share a look.

  “Did you use…protection?” Dolly asks softly.

  I feel like I’m about to die on the spot.

  Derrick is a walking one night stand. He doesn’t go out with girls, he just fucks them. And yeah, he’s hot. Insanely hot. And everyone on campus wants him. Or at least that’s the official story. I certainly do not want him, and neither does any sane woman. After being with a woman, he drops them and only calls back if he’s interested in round two, and supposedly the girls are always up for round two.

  I shake my head. Sure he’s hot as hell, but he’s also an asshole. A gigantic asshole. No sane girl would get involved with him.

  And my best friends think that he and I had a late night practice session together.

  Oh god.

  I bury my face in my hands. “You guys, it wasn’t Derrick. I swear.”

  Cassie pats my back. “It’s alright. We just wish it had been David…”

  “Shut up Cass,” Dolly interrupts. “Look, it doesn’t matter. Just know that we’re here for you. Hey, let’s watch The Notepad! That’s fun.”

  “It is not fun!” My voice is partially muffled by my hands. “You don’t even like that movie!”

  “Sure I do,” Dolly coos.

  I didn’t even know she was capable of making that kind of sound. This is so bad! My friends pity me and are being nice because they think after all these years of celibacy I decided to give it up to an asshole who’s never going to look at me again. It’s not like that! I want to yell, but they’ve already made up their minds, and this lie, however embarrassing, is still better than the truth. Anna holds onto my arm and gives it reassuring squeezes.

  “Hey, we’re watching The Notepad. You can’t hold onto me like that after I told you everything,” I say even though I hadn’t told them everything.

  Dolly loses interest before the intro credits finish. “So, how was it?” she asks.

  “Come on, what are you doing?” Cassie whispers.

  “She got some. She should tell us how it went,” Dolly replies.

  “We don’t know she got some,” Cassie says.

  “She was with Derrick,” Dolly whispers back.

  “You know I can hear you guys, right?” I remind them. Listening to my friends refer to sleeping with a guy as ‘getting some’ was really creepy.

  They both glance up at me.

  “Well, you didn’t answer my question,” Dolly says. I guess she took my comment as fair game.

  I sink back further into my seat. “Let’s just watch the movie.”

  “Well, at least it was good,” Dolly winks.

  “How can you tell?” Anna asks, breathless.

  Cassie tries to shush them as Dolly pats my leg. “Oh, I can just tell.”

  It was a long movie. I had to look away during the sex scene, which wasn’t lost on anyone.

  Chapter 9

  The next morning, I wake again before anyone else. When I creep downstairs, I find a letter.

  I’m too afraid to open it. After last night, I feel like there is no place secret enough to read his words.

  My fingers tremble even before I’m opening it. It’s hard to get a grip on anything. The dark feelings of the night before—that breathlessness, that desire—pool up in my stomach and drip down to my legs. For a moment I grip the cement bench and just breathe.

  But even my nerves can’t prevent me from reading it for very long.

  My words have always felt trivial. At times I’ve wanted to destroy every letter I’ve ever written to you because all of them are such a pale imitation of how I feel about you. I kept writing only because not doing so would mean losing my only connection to you, at least up until recently.

  I didn’t want to write to you today. I thought doing so would trivialize that moment between us, and I didn’t want to do that. Last night I couldn’t sleep. I lay awake thinking of you. I thought of you next to me. I wanted to go to y
our home and climbing into your room and lay down beside you. To remove my mask and touch your lips with mine. To be as naked before you as you were with me.

  But I couldn’t do those things, and so I knew I had to write. You’d think I’d abandoned you if I didn’t. That it wasn’t important to me. That couldn’t be further from the truth. It doesn’t matter what happens in the future. I will cherish last night always.

  When I finally walk back up to the room, Dolly is making pancakes in the kitchen.

  “What’s going on?” I yawn as I enter. My slippers scuff the floor until I trip over a shirt. “God, Cassie needs to clean her shit up.”

  “Yeah, she does. I don’t know how we put up with her.” Dolly plops a plate of pancakes on the table. “Here.”

  I scowl. “What’s the occasion?”

  Her eyes soften as she watches me wince as I sit. “You’re probably sore, and deserve something sweet. David would have made you pancakes, you know.”

  “What?” Why was she talking about David again?

  “Nothing.” She smiles a little bit to herself. “I’m just saying you deserve to wake up next to a guy who’ll make you pancakes.”

  I feel myself blushing. Can’t help it. The image of masked man making me pancakes is silly and…makes me feel warm for some reason. I’m not comfortable with this feeling.

  I grab the plate and cut off a piece of buttery sugary goodness with my fork.

  “Well, at least it was good, right?” Dolly probs.

  I stuff that piece of buttery sugary goodness into my mouth. I take my time chewing.

  Unfortunately, Dolly is patient.

  “Come on, Laura.”

  “I already told you it wasn’t Derrick,” I whisper.

  She raises a brow. “Who was it, then?”

  I can’t answer that, so I answer her last question. “You’re right. It was good. And so are these pancakes. Yum yum.”

  Dolly sighs. I suppose she realizes if she wants more information she’ll have to beat it out of me, and she’ll probably wait to do that until she has her morning coffee. “Well eat up while I start on the next batch.”

  Chapter 10

  After pancakes, the rest of the morning breezed by without incident.

  Then came lunch.

  “What a fucking pig!” Cassie growls as she slams her basket of burrito and tortilla chips on the table.

  Dolly reaches across and touches her wrist. “Come on, girl.”

  “No, I will not come on,” Cassie hisses as she spins her head back to focus on her target. “I can’t believe him!”

  Dolly sighs. “That’s just the kind of guy he is.”

  “Yeah, a fucking pig!” Cassie repeats.

  “If you know he’s a pig,” Dolly notes, “don’t expect him to do anything more than to stick his nose into any trough that offers food, roll around in the mud, and get you dirty and covered with someone else’s scraps.”

  “Ugh.” I push my tray away. “I can’t eat anymore.”

  “Sorry Laura,” Dolly says.

  I glance at Derrick. He’s peacefully eating and chatting with friends. For a while he had some girl in his lap. Cassie and Dolly, of course, think it’s the pinnacle of rudeness that he passed me in the lunch line without at least saying hello.

  Well, of course he wouldn’t say hello. I didn’t know who the masked man was, but I was pretty sure it wasn’t Derrick. Derrick wouldn’t woo a woman behind a mask. I knew he could read music, but I wasn’t even sure he was literate. And even if he was, he wouldn’t follow a woman around the shadows for years and write her letters. He wasn’t that creepy or desperate.

  My heart twinges. I just called my man creepy and desperate. And I liked him that way. What exactly did that make me?

  “That’s it,” Cassie says, standing. “I am not going to sit here and let that asshole get away with this.”

  “Uh, Cassie, what are you doing? Sit back down,” Dolly warns.

  Cassie’s eyes are gleaming when she turns back to us. “I’ll be right back.” And then she’s off, straight across the cafeteria, for Derrick’s table.

  Shit.

  I jump up and Dolly does the same. Anna looks at us like we just ran over a puppy. “Is she going to do what I think she’s going to do?”

  “Afraid so,” Dolly says before marching off in Derrick and Cassie’s direction.

  “Oh no,” Anna says, stumbling to her feet. “We have to stop her.”

  Dolly and I are already running over. We don’t know how Cassie started the conversation, but it doesn’t look good when we get there.

  “What the hell are you talking about?” Derrick squints. “Who are you?”

  “I’m Cassie,” Cassie says as I stop by her side, panting. Then, she takes my arm and yanks me in front Derrick. “Her friend.”

  Derrick frowns. “Okay…”

  “Okay? Is that really all you got? Okay?” Cassie snaps.

  Derrick leans forward and waves a hand between us. “Uh, who are you guys?”

  “Oh!” Cassie waves her hand around and snaps. Uh oh, the snap. She’s gone. “No. No, you do not do this. You do not hook up with a girl and not even have the fucking courtesy to say hello to her when you pass her in the lunch line. You do not sit some skank down on your lap just a few feet away and make her watch.”

  Derrick is obviously still confused. “Dude.”

  Dude? Who even says that anymore? How could this guy be considered the hottest thing in school? How could my friends think I slept with him?

  Dolly tugs on Cassie’s arm. “Hey babe, I think we should let these guys work it out. He’s not worth it.”

  “I know he’s not worth it,” Cassie shrugs out of Dolly’s grip and stomps towards him like it’s her first night at Fight Club. “But he’s got to own up to his shit.”

  Derrick just frowns. “Look, I don’t know what you think I did babe…”

  “Cassie,” Cassie bits out.

  “Oh sorry, Cassie,” he replies sweetly. “But I’ve never seen that lying skank before—”

  Oh no, did he just say that? Does he have a death wish?

  “My friend is not a liar, and you’re the skank,” Cassie says.

  Dolly rolls her eyes. “Come on Cass.”

  “Listen to your friends, Cass. I’ve never seen you or that chick before, thank fucking God.”

  But Cassie’s not going. She grounds her teeth. “Her. Name. Is. Laura.”

  Dolly looks at me. Anna arrives looking like she’s about to cry. This has to stop.

  And then my prayers are answered. I see a brilliant crown of golden hair from the other end of the dining hall, more luminescent than an angel’s halo.

  I don’t look at anyone. I just start running.

  “David!” I yell, waving my arms like they’re wings.

  David turns and smiles. “Hey…” he frowns when he notes my expression. “Laura, what’s wrong?”

  Everything! “Cassie thinks I slept with Derrick.”

  “Derrick? You mean Derrick Derrick?” David’s eyes widen with concern. “Wait, did you? Did that asshole hurt you?” He grabs my shoulders. I’m not ready for it. It’s strangely…manly. I don’t think of him that way generally. He doesn’t seem like that kind of guy. But right now, it looks like all I have to do is say the word and he’d go to war for me.

  “Of course I didn’t sleep with Derrick! Why does everyone think I slept with Derrick?”

  David’s grip softens a tad. “So you didn’t sleep with Derrick?”

  “No!” I groan. “But Cassie thinks I did. And now she’s chewing out Derrick because he didn’t say hello to me, which isn’t surprising since he’s never even met me before…”

  David nods.

  “And I need you,” I finish lamely.

  David’s eyes widen again. I don’t recognize the emotion that fills them. “You need me?” he repeats softly.

  “Yes, badly! Please tell them I was with you last night.”

  David doe
sn’t move for a moment.

  Oh shit, he’s not going to do it! “Just tell them we went out for coffee, and tell them that I kissed you. No, tell them that I came onto you. And that things just kind of…I don’t know. That I was embarrassed after and ran away.” That actually sounded like something I might do.

  “Where were you last night?” David whispers.

  I open my mouth, but there’s no way I can tell him. “Practice went long, I was just thinking some things over, and they got some ideas in their head and…and I don’t know, it’s a mess.”

  David studies me a moment longer. I feel like he’s seeing right through me. But in the end, he just nods. “Alright. I’ll do it.”

  He takes my hand leads me back to Derrick’s table. I can’t believe how firm his grip is, and for the first time, notice the width of his shoulders…

  What the Hell?

  Luckily it doesn’t take long for us to reach the others. “Hey,” David says.

  Cassie glances over at us and momentarily stops chewing Derrick out.

  David puts his arm around me, slamming me into the side of his muscular stomach. “She was with me last night, not him.”

  Everyone’s mouth opens as they stare. Well, everyone except Derrick. “See? Didn’t even know her. Never seen her before. Would remember if I’d tapped that.” He glances at Cassie with a big smile. “And I’d definitely remember if I tapped you, babe.”

  Cassie’s face curls with disgust. “You’re a pig.”

  “You already said that,” Derrick murmurs as a strange sort of heat lights his eyes. Is this guy a masochist? Seconds later, he tries to press a folded paper into Cassie’s hand. “So Cass, call me if you want to get dirty.”

  “I am not Cass to you,” Cassie growls.

  “You prefer babe?”

  Cassie wads the paper he gave her into her fist and throws it at Derrick’s face.

  Derrick doesn’t even blink. He picks up the paper and tries to hand it back to her.

  Alright, he’s a masochist.

  Cassie’s hand wavers in the air like she’s about to slap him.

  “He’s not worth the assault charge,” Dolly says, catching Cassie’s hand.

  Cassie reluctantly backs up. “Shit!”

  Derrick plays with the paper and leans back with a smile. “Don’t worry, sweetheart. I’ll still give it to you if you ask nicely.”