Crushed

by Dawn Rae Miller

  “Elizabeth? Your name’s Elizabeth?”

  The revelation seems significant, like learning a secret.

  “Yes. Elizabeth Rose.” She hesitates before asking, “Where’d you get your name?”

  “Fletch? It’s my middle name — Fletcher. My mom’s maiden name.”

  “What’s your first name?”

  “Will, William, like my dad. But he’s Will, so I’m Fletch.” I’m grinning like a fool.

  “William Fletcher Colson. I like it.” She pushes on my lips with her finger and wiggles her nose at me. God help me for being just a little turned on.

  Her eyes glint in a way that sends heat rushing to my crotch. “We should study,” she says lightly.

  “We should.” Her hand is still against my lips, and when I speak, it’s like I’m kissing her finger.

  With one more press of her fingertip on my lips, she moves away from me, sits down, and starts to put her headphones back on.

  “Hey, Elle,” I say.

  She raises eyebrows. “Elle? Not Ellie?”

  “Does it bother you?” I ask, thinking maybe I overstepped.

  She considers my question for a long moment. “No. It’s okay.”

  I smile. “So, Elle, how would you like to come with my friends and me to my parents’ place in Napa next weekend? For my birthday.” I hastily add, “Brady’s going to invite Sarah.”

  “It’s your birthday? How did I not know this?”

  Funny, but all those times we’ve hung out with her, Brady and I never asked Ellie about herself, and she’s never asked personal questions about us – other than my favorite ice cream. It’s like our lives away from school aren’t real. Like they don’t matter.

  Suddenly, I want to ask her a million questions. I want to know everything about her.

  “Yeah, Saturday.”

  Ellie pops one of her headphones in. “Sounds fun, but if this is just a ploy for presents, you’re going to be sad.”

  I toss a pencil at her. It strikes her chest. “Smart ass.”

  “Yeah, but you like me this way.” She tucks the pencil behind her ear.

  “Speaking of birthdays, when’s yours?” I ask.

  “March first. I was born during the worst snow storm ever, according to my dad.”

  She grew up somewhere with snow. Interesting. “Where do you live?”

  “Here.” She absentmindedly gnaws on her finger. For being a neat freak, her nails are a mess.

  “You know what I mean. Where do you go during breaks?”

  She looks up at the ceiling and raps her fingers against the table. “Hmmm…I’m trying to decide if I should answer that. It may remove some of my mystique.” Her deep brown eyes rest on me.

  “Tell me.” I’m surprised by the pleading in my voice.

  “Michigan. I’m from the great state of Michigan.”

  Huh. Not my first guess. I was thinking old school East Coast like Brady.

  “So…next Saturday, Sarah, Libby, and I are going to your parent’s home in Napa?” I notice she’s added Libby to the list, but don’t mention it. What’s one more guest? “I thought they lived in San Francisco.”

  “They do. Napa is our country house.”

  She sucks on her cheek, which makes her mouth pucker. “Fancy.”

  Talking to Ellie is easy. Like breathing. I’m not worrying about saying the wrong thing or if she has ulterior motives.

  “How come we never hung out before this year?” I ask

  A slow smile dances across her lips. She keeps her eyes trained on the application she’s resumed working on. “Probably because you never tried to seduce me?”

  16

  It’s still early, maybe three-thirty, when Ellie and I decide we need a break. We leave our bags in the meeting room with the intention of coming back after we secure food.

  Since the dining hall is closed until five, our choices are go to her place or mine. Ellie’s is closer, but she says, “You have better stuff. Sarah only orders health food – like rice cakes and edamame. Plus, it’s gorgeous out and a walk will do us good.”

  We’re talking about nothing — the weather, classes, the likelihood of Brady and Sarah becoming a couple — as we approach The Beach. It’s crowded, at least half the school is out enjoying the sun.

  Ellie’s telling me a story about how she once fell into a toilet, and I’m laughing, really laughing because Ellie can make the most boring story sound hilarious.

  Then I see Calista. With Alex. On The Beach. Sharing a blanket. Their heads touching. Lounging there, in full view of my room, like they want me to see.

  I can’t look away.

  I need to look away.

  We’ve stopped walking.

  “Are you okay?” Ellie steps in front of me and turns so that she’s somewhat blocking the view.

  The way she stares at me, like she can see straight inside my thoughts, unnerves me. “I’m…”

  She finishes for me. “Not okay. You’re not. I can tell.”

  I’m shaking, trying to hold in everything building inside me. The anger, the hurt, all of it.

  Why does this hurt so much?

  Ellie places her hand in mine. Her fingers rub the back of my hand. It’s not sexual or anything. Just nice.

  “Let’s go for a walk,” she says, leading me away from The Beach. My fingers instinctively wrap around hers, and she gives them a little squeeze. “Away from here.”

  “Where are we going?”

  A warm breeze drifts up and over the hill. It plays with Ellie’s dark hair, sending loose strands across her face. With her free hand, Ellie tucks them behind her ear, only to have a gust loosen them again.

  “Just follow me, Fletch.”

  And so I do, away from The Beach and Calista and Alex, toward a dirt path. With each step, my heartbeat slows, and the anger lessens.

  We walk in silence through the redwood forest. The sun doesn’t reach this low, and the undergrowth still drips with water. Even though the fog lingers here, I’m neither cold nor damp. Just numb.

  Halfway to the faculty lot, Ellie veers left, stepping off the path and through the large ferns covering the floor of the forest.

  “Where are we going?” I ask again.

  She drops my hand and holds up her finger, telling me to wait. This isn’t a beaten path, but from the crush of the plants, it isn’t unknown either. Ellie forges on, her thin frame dwarfed by the towering redwood trees.

  Suddenly, she’s running.

  “Hurry, Fletch,” she calls, racing ahead.

  Around us, the forest is alive: the groan of the trees, a crack of a branch, the rustle of the wind.

  I wait, not sure what game she’s playing, and Ellie sprints back toward me. She slaps my arm. “You’re it.”

  Before I can tag her back, she darts away, running between the trees faster than I can keep up. My feet stumble over the hidden obstacles beneath the lush plants.

  Disoriented, I turn in a circle searching for her, but the massive trees obscure all traces of my prey. Which way were we walking? The trees blend into one another.

  “Ellie?”

  Her voice drifts through the underbrush, beckoning me, guiding me toward her. “Chase me, Fletch. You have to catch me.”

  I take off, sprinting toward the sound of her voice. The residual fog clings to me and shrouds the world in gray.

  Ellie reappears, weaving back and forth between the trees. Suddenly, the fog breaks, and she stands in a small clearing, her arms spread wide, the sun streaming over her. The fog lingers at the edges, as if held back by magic.

  She licks her lips, her head tilted toward the sky.

  “I come here when I need to feel better.” She saunters over to a fallen redwood and traces the rough bark with her fingertips. “These trees have seen so much life. We’re just a blip, you know?” She climbs up on the fallen giant. “Sometimes, it’s like I’m just moving through life in a fog, doing the motions. Do you ever feel like that?”

  Ev
ery day. My eyes wander to the trees soaring over us. Seated beneath them, my insignificance is magnified. “Mostly, I’m confused.”

  “About what?” She pats the spot next to her and waits while I climb up. We sit shoulder to shoulder. Ellie’s tall, maybe five eight or nine.

  I hesitate. She doesn’t need to be burdened with my drama. “Nothing.”

  “Fletch.” Her soft, gravelly voice draws out my name. She rubs slow circles across my back, warming the spots she touches. “You can talk to me. I’m trustworthy, I swear.”

  Ellie treats her friends like they are the most important people in her life. They trust her, but I’m not sure I’m ready for that.

  “What do you want, Ellie? What?”

  She snatches her hand away. “Did I do something?”

  “No.” I remain facing forward, even though she’s staring at my profile.

  “Then tell me what’s wrong. I know something upset you on The Beach. What was it?”

  She has no idea about Calista and Alex. Or if she does, she’s good at hiding it.

  Tears – tears! – sit in the corners of my eyes. I wipe them away with the back of my hand before turning toward her. “College. Expectations. Calista. All of it.”

  “Are you worried about making the wrong decision? I get like that sometimes, trying to sort out all the college crap.”

  I notice she didn’t latch onto the mention of Calista.

  “I need to get into Princeton, or my dad will be pissed.”

  She wraps her arm around me and lays her head on my shoulder. “You’re smart, you’ll get in.”

  “Probably.”

  Ellie adjusts herself so that our legs touch at the hip, down the thigh, and to the knee. We touch in more places than we ever have before.

  “There’s something else, isn’t there?”

  My heartbeat thunders in my ears. Is it okay to talk to her about Calista? I don’t know, but I’m about to find out.

  “Over the summer, Calista and I hooked up.”

  Ellie doesn’t say anything, doesn’t act surprised, so I continue. “By hooked up, I mean we slept together. A lot.”

  “Oh.” She shifts a little next to me, and our knees no longer touch. “I kinda guessed as much. Is she mad at you?”

  “Mad? No. I don’t think so.” I pick at the rough bark beneath my leg. “I told her I loved her.”

  Ellie draws a sharp breath. “What did she say?”

  “She said she didn’t want a boyfriend. She doesn’t like me like that.”

  “What does this have to do with what happened on The Beach?”

  I swallow and take a deep breath. “Calista was with Alex. They looked like they were together.”

  There’s no sound from Ellie. She lifts her head from my shoulder and folds her hands in her lap. “You still like her?”

  “Maybe?” I shake my head. “I don’t know.” Even though it’s awkward as hell, talking to Ellie about Calista is calming me down. “She shot me down. Hard. The first girl I said ‘I love you’ to, basically laughed at me.”

  Ellie chews on her ring finger. I’m beginning to suspect it’s a nervous tick. But why would she be nervous? “You said ‘the first girl.’ Do you plan on saying it to more girls?”

  “What? I don’t know. Why?”

  “Maybe she was afraid? Your reputation as a man-whore might have scared her.”

  I gape at Ellie. Is that even possible? My reputation scared Cal off? “It doesn’t matter. She’s obviously not interested. Besides, there are plenty of other girls, you know?”

  Ellie leans away from me and furrows her forehead. “What are you doing?”

  “What do you mean?”

  She jumps off the tree and looks up. The sun lights up Ellie’s face and casts a long shadow behind her. She turns her head to the side and stares into the distance, at some unseen thing just beyond the fog line. Air pulls slowly through her parted lips, her chest rising and falling in steady, even breaths.

  “Don’t live your life in a fog, Fletch. Don’t. You might not see what’s right in front of you.”

  She slaps my leg and starts running, teasing me to chase after her.

  17

  Ten minutes into the drive, I ease my car to the shoulder, hop out, and say, “Dude, I can’t take anymore of your whining. You can drive.”

  I throw the keys at Reid as we pass behind the car to switch sides. He had been riding shotgun and torturing us with weird Japanese pop music – another of his attempts to prove how Japanese he is.

  Reid pulls himself into the driver’s seat, keys clenched in his hand. He got his license over the summer and constantly begs to borrow my car. He’s reminded me about two hundred times that Calista, he and, as of today, me, are the only eighteen-year-olds. Which means we’re the only ones who can legally drive.

  With a huge smile, he guns the engine, eases off the gas, and pulls back onto the road.

  As the passenger, I now have complete control over the music. I unplug Reid’s iPod, hook mine up, and scan my playlists, looking for just the right one. Music blares over the speakers as I mess with the bass, sending tremors rippling through the car.

  The massive SUV seats eight, but it’s a tight fit. Paige, Calista, and Alex are squeezed into the third row while Brady, Sarah, and Ellie occupy the middle. Libby decided she didn’t want to come – something about having too much homework.

  “What?” I shout when Reid mimes wildly to me. He keeps one hand on the wheel while the other hits the dashboard.

  I turn down the music.

  “Are you trying to make us all deaf?” he asks.

  “Sorry.”

  For the most part, no one talks much. Every so often, when I turn around to talk to Brady, I catch a glimpse of Calista. Seeing her next to Alex doesn’t hurt as much it did. I’ve had a few days to get used to it. As long as I don’t have to watch them play tonsil hockey, all should be well.

  When we leave the fog and redwoods behind, the rolling brown hills of dairy farms stretch out as far as I can see. About forty minutes past that, neat rows of grapevines replace cows and we’re almost there.

  Reid maneuvers the SUV down a long, curving, tree-lined road.

  “Take the next right,” I say. “It’s kind of hidden, so start slowing down.”

  He takes the turn slowly, like a beginner, and we drive through the iron gates marking the boundary of my parents’ country home. The house looms at the end of the long, narrow driveway.

  Behind me, someone gasps, and I spin around. Ellie and Sarah stare, their eyes huge. Sometimes I forget this isn’t normal for everyone.

  “Your parents live here?” Sarah asks, craning her head out the window.

  Calista answers, a little condescendingly. “No, this is their country home. Fletch’s parents mostly live in San Francisco.”

  With the music off and the windows down, the crunch of gravel fills the air. Reid parks in front the main house, because, yeah, there are multiple buildings on the property. Before he shuts off the engine, I jump out.

  Brady opens his door and stands next to me, waiting for the Sarah and Paige to climb out of the car. Ellie, Alex, and Calista exit the other side.

  “Crazy house, huh?” Brady asks Sarah. She nods. “Wait till you see the inside.”

  “It’s a mansion,” she whispers.

  Brady shrugs. “Not to his parents. That would be their chateau in the south of France.”

  Ellie and Sarah both gave me incredulous looks.

  “He’s kidding?” Ellie says.

  “Sadly, he is not.” I respond.

  Ellie whistles. “What do your parents do?”

  Reid cracks up, like that’s the funniest thing he’s ever heard. “Are you serious?”

  Her gaze ping pongs between Reid and me. “Yes.”

  “His dad founded GroundFloor.”

  “Holy shit, really?” Ellie exclaims. Sometimes, when people find out who my dad is, I’ll get an earful about how much they love GroundFlo
or or use it to stay in touch with their grandmother or whatever. But mostly, I think, they’re kind of surprised I’m Will Colson’s kid.

  I shrug.

  Calista waits for us on the front stairs. “Can you guys get the bags? I’ll let Leticia know we’re here.”

  Brady grimaces as we each grab two bags from the back of the SUV and follow the girls onto the wrap-around porch.

  “What?”

  “She’s marking her territory.” He means Calista.

  “She’s being helpful,” I counter. “Besides, I think she and Alex are hooking up.”

  Brady raises an eyebrow, like that’s new info to him.

  When we step through the front door, the lofty entryway soars before us. Two staircases flank each side of the enormous room and from here, a sweeping view of the Napa Valley is visible.

  Ellie sighs. “This is rather amazing.”

  “I guess.” After awhile, it becomes normal. I don’t really think about it.

  Calista moves around the house with the familiarity of someone who’s spent her whole life visiting. Which she has. This, in many ways, is her home as much as mine.

  “Leticia!” she calls. “We’re here.”

  From high above us comes an excited “Happy Birthday, Fletch!”

  Leticia, the house manager, leans over the upper floor railing and waves. Years ago, she was my nanny, living with us in San Francisco, but after I left for school, my parents asked if she wanted to oversee the Napa property. I think her job is mostly hanging out here, making sure anyone who rents it – mostly for photo shoots and weddings — has what they need, and keeping the place ready in case we decide to visit. Doesn’t seem like a bad job, if you ask me.

  When she reaches the bottom step, she holds her arms open wide. I know Reid and Alex are going to give me shit, but I walk across the spacious room and let her hug me. I squeeze her back, lifting her feet off the ground.

  “You used to be this big.” She holds her hands slightly apart. “Now look at you. So tall!” She spies Cal. “Do you remember how little he was, Calista? I thought he’d never grow!”