“Yeah, I'm a member of the frat,” he said. “Shocker, I know.”
I blinked over at him, taking in his collegiate appearance. With his square, hipster glasses and the little bit of scruff around his chin… “Honestly, it kind of is,” I said. “You don't really seem like the frat guy...type.”
“Yeah, I get that a lot,” Dan said. “But not all frat guys are dicks, you know. That's just a Hollywood stereotype. We actually do a lot to give back to the community, and our main aim is just to...have fun and build connections between our members. We're not out to rape and pillage and whatever else that you might believe.”
I smiled a little. “I mean, I don't think that all frat guys are the devil incarnate or anything like that,” I said. “Just...” I trailed off, not really sure how to word what I thought.
“No, I get that,” Dan said. He was still smiling, though; he didn't seem to mind. “So you got dragged along to this party by your friend. You want to go home?”
To be honest… “Not really,” I said, looking around the yard. Someone was just starting a fire pit over in one of the back corners, and someone else had got out a guitar. It was peaceful, and I had a feeling almost like I might make some friends there. Which was totally not what frat parties were about, as far as I knew, but I couldn't help thinking that this was nice.
“Good,” Dan said, adjusting the blanket and scooting a little closer to me. I leaned into his warmth, still a bit chilly given the damp autumn air. “So what do you study?”
“History and French,” I told him.
“Oh!” Dan said. “I thought you looked familiar. I'm studying French as well, but I think you're in one of the lower levels…?”
Chapter Ten
I hadn't expected to have nearly as much fun as I ended up having. Granted, part of that was the alcohol. Every time my drink even started to get low, Dan got up to get me a fresh one (and we were well into the jungle juice by now, enough so that I would swear it was one of my favorite drinks). But Dan was also just genuinely interesting to chat with. Our talks probably sounded pretty boring to the casual observer, but this was actually exactly what I had come to college for: intellectual chats in a cozy atmosphere.
By the time the party was breaking up and Alex finally came to check up on me, Dan and I were chatting gaily. We had moved on from French language to French culture to French film to French literature (and it was so rare to find someone who had an interest in literature at all, let alone in obscure foreign classics), and now we were talking about all the places that we wanted to travel to in the Francophone world.
“See, Algeria was never that high on my list,” Dan was saying, “until I saw this one article by a photojournalisst, and oh my god, those pictures were incredible. Hold on, I'm sure I can bring them up on my phone, just give me a moment...” He pulled out his phone and started typing away on the screen. I smiled contentedly and looked around the backyard, noting that it was starting to clear out, the fire long since gone out.
“I knew you'd make friends,” Alex said, suddenly appearing on the porch. She cocked her head to the side as she looked at us. “Or a friend, anyway.”
I straightened up, suddenly feeling embarrassed. At some point as Dan and I had been talking, we'd gotten our legs tangled together, and I was leaning close to him after showing him some pictures that I had taken during a short family trip to France back in high school. To the casual observer, we probably looked pretty cozy. We probably looked like we were planning on tumbling into bed together that night, actually—because that was what frat parties were really all about, right?
But I had a boyfriend.
I wondered if that had been Dan's intention all along—but no, he had to just be a friendly guy. No one could fake that much knowledge about French cinema and culture. Especially because a lot of the literature references he had pulled out were even more obscure than the ones that I had pulled out.
I suddenly thought guiltily of Ben, and I wondered if maybe I should have told him that I was coming out to a frat party that night. Not that I thought he needed to know everything that I did (we might be dating, but he wasn't my keeper), and obviously I wasn't about to sleep with someone else, but…
But part of me, I think, wanted him to be jealous, wanted him to wonder if maybe I might be thinking of sleeping with someone else. In my drunken state—because there had been plenty of jungle juice consumed that night—I almost felt like he would deserve it if I did sleep with someone else. It wasn't fair that this whole relationship with him was so much based off his whims and when he chose to have time to see me. And anyway, it wasn't like he wanted to kiss me or anything like that. Even after mentioning the fact that he hadn't kissed me, he still hadn't gotten the hint and actually kissed me.
Thinking of that, I suddenly turned to Dan and kissed him soundly. I didn't quite manage to land the kiss on his lips since he wasn't looking at me and I was...a bit inebriated. But the intention was there.
When I pulled back, Dan looked a little surprised, but he definitely looked interested. In fact, he leaned forwards to capture my lips again, his head moving slowly towards mine—but before our lips could connect, I was hauled away by a tight grip to my arm. I stood there more-or-less upright, trying to fight my arm out of Alex's grip for a moment. Normally, I would have been stronger than her, but in my current state… Well, it was a wonder that I was even standing in these heels, to be honest.
“I think that's about enough of that,” Alex said, giving me an unimpressed look. “Sorry, Dan, but it's about time I get her home before she does something that she'll regret.”
“Hey!” Dan said, sounding offended. “I hardly think that kissing me is something that she'll regret! Anyway, she started it!”
“You don't know the whole story,” Alex said. “And I'm not going to stand here and tell all of it to you right now, but basically what it boils down to is, she has a boyfriend, and you're not him.”
“Well what the fuck,” Dan said. “If she wants to cheat on her boyfriend, that's her own prerogative, isn't it? You don't get to make those choices for her.”
“Yeah, you're not my mom,” I said, folding my arms petulantly over my chest, even though the rational part of myself, somewhere deep inside of me, knew that it was probably a really, really good idea for her to bring me home. And that I was definitely going to owe her one after this. But still, the drunk part of me said, “I don't have to leave just because you've decided that you're done for the night.”
“Come on, Rachael,” Alex said with surprising patience. “Remember, you wanted to stop on the way home for Mama's Pizza? They're going to be closing in about twenty minutes, so if you still want to do that, we have to get a move on.”
Oh. I couldn't remember having voiced that urge before, but now that she mentioned it… “Yeah, let's go,” I said. “Is everyone else leaving too?”
“A lot of them have already headed back,” Alex said. “It's just the two of us.”
“That's okay,” I said, following her back into the kitchen and through the house, wobbling in my heels. By the front door, where most people were putting on their jackets and straightening out their clothing, I paused to take off my shoes. Then, I put on my jacket. There was no way I was going to make it down the porch steps in those stilettos, and I definitely wasn't going to walk all the way to the pizza joint like that.
I should remember that for next time I got drunk. “No stilettos next time,” I muttered. “Just normal ballet flats. Or maybe my sneakers. I could probably show up in jeans and sneakers, right?”
Alex laughed a little. “Honestly, you probably could. I would never be able to pull it off, and I definitely wouldn't be able to get past paying the cover fee if I tried. But you? I think it's possible; you're hot enough.”
“Aww, thanks Alex,” I said, flinging an arm over her shoulder and almost dragging her down with my weight in the process—not that I really noticed it at the time. “You're really pretty too. But your hair. I think
you have to do something different with your hair.” I squinted at her in the dark. “I'm not sure what exactly, but something. I'll figure it out eventually. And then I'll tell you.”
Fortunately, Alex wasn't offended, whether because she had dealt with enough drunk people before in her ife or just because she didn't care what my drunken self had to say about her hair—probably the latter. She laughe a little. “Man, you're totally tanked,” she said. “How much jungle juice did you have, anyway? You practically reek of the stuff.”
“I dunno,” I confessed. “Dan kept bringing it back for me.”
Alex grimaced. “That ass,” she muttered. “Probably knew that he couldn't sleep with you if you were sober.”
“He couldn't sleep with me drunk either!” I pointed out, feeling inordinately proud of myself.
“Only because I dragged you away,” Alex reminded me.
I frowned. “Do you think I should call Ben?”
“Tonight?” Alex asked. “Absolutely not. In fact, you should probably give me your phone right now if you're even thinking of it.”
I shook my head a little sadly. “No, I'm not seriously thinking of it,” I told her. “He probably doesn't want to hear from me, and I don't want to talk to him like this.”
“That's the smartest thing that you've said all night,” Alex said. She paused for a moment. “Think you're going to remember this tomorrow?” she asked.
I rolled my eyes. “Of course I will. I'm not that drunk.”
As it turned out, I was that drunk, and most of my memories from that night were pretty spotty by the next morning.
Chapter Eleven
The next morning, I definitely wasn't getting out of bed early like I normally did. And I definitely wasn't going for a run, either, I decided. My head was pounding, and even though I didn't really feel like I was going to be sick, I also didn't really feel like I wanted to put more food in me and chance things.
I lazed around in bed for a while, until my phone started ringing. Then, I groggily reached over and answered it.
“'lo?” I asked.
“Rachael?”
I sat up quickly, hearing Ben's voice on the other end of the line. Unfortunately, sitting up quickly made the whole room a bit spinny, and I started reconsidering whether I felt sick. “Hey,” I finally managed weakly.
“Are you all right?” Ben asked. “You sound like shit...”
“Just waking up,” I admitted. “Bit of a...long night.”
There was a long pause. “Oh,” Ben finally said. “Well, sorry I woke you up, then.”
“No, no, it's fine,” I said quickly. “Just...I'm a bit hungover.” I glanced over towards Alex's bed and was surprised to see that she wasn't there. I could have sworn that she'd had more to drink than I had… But most of the night was a bit blurry. The clearest memory was definitely of going out for pizza at the end of the night. I remembered having ordered some strange selection of toppings, too—eggs and jalapeños and olives, maybe? Thankfully, Alex had talked me into just getting plain cheese pizza. Which had also tasted pretty awesome.
“Oh, that kind of a long night,” Ben said, sounding a bit relieved, and I wondered what he'd thought that I meant. “Do you need me to bring you anything?”
I glanced over to my bedside table and frowned at the water bottle and aspirin that was sitting there. I definitely didn't remember putting those there, but maybe Alex had… “I think I'm good,” I said. “I just kind of want to curl up and do nothing all day. Except that, shit, I have to get up because I have this study group meeting at 3.”
That sounded like a horrible idea, but there was no way I was going to blow it off because I'd gone too hard at a frat party the night before. That was irresponsibility at its finest, right there.
“So presuming that you're going to eat lunch before that study group meeting...” Ben said.
I frowned. “Are you seriously asking me to lunch again, after not having talked to me all week?” I asked a bit waspishly.
Ben sighed. “I know, I know,” he said. “Look, I'm doing the best that I can at the moment. Our company's going through a really busy time at the moment, and I've actually been in Europe working on finalizing some deals and things like that. Every time I thought to call you, it was the middle of the night your time or else it was getting late on my end and I needed to get to sleep. I'm sorry, I know that that's no excuse, but-”
“I didn't even know you were in Europe,” I said exasperatedly. “I feel like if you're my boyfriend, I should know those kinds of things.”
“You should,” Ben admitted, sounding a bit sheepish. “I'm just...still trying to figure out how much I can tell you about what I do.”
“Because you're a super secret spy,” I said flatly, although this time, it wasn't as much of a joke.
“No,” Ben said. “But because I don't want you to think of me as that guy. I want you to really have the chance to get to know me.”
“Fine,” I sighed. “But I would like to know where you are, when you're out of the country. Just… I don't know.”
“That's fair,” Ben said. “And I'll make sure to let you know in the future. But lunch today…?”
“I feel like shit,” I said honestly. “I'm not sure I can handle food.”
“You must have some sort of hangover food,” Ben said. “Anyway, you can't just starve yourself for a day. You're skinny enough as it is—I don't say that in a bad way, but that's the truth.”
I shrugged. “If I have a hangover food, I haven't found out what it is yet,” I told him.
“You've just given me a great idea,” he said. “Here, you go back to sleep for an hour or two, okay? I'll be there in a little while.”
I shook my head. “Ben,” I said warningly, but before I could say anything else, he had hung up the phone. I rolled my eyes and rolled over, deciding that I might as well do as he said, then.
I made it through a shower and into some sweats and a teeshirt by the time Ben called and said he was downstairs, so I was feeling pretty good about myself, all things considered. I was treading the thin line between 'still sick to my stomach' and 'hungry', as well, so I was grateful to see that Ben had brought two takeaway bags with him.
I signed him in at the front desk and led him up to my room. “Sorry, it's kind of cluttered,” I told him. “I mean, it's a pretty small space for two of us to be living in, and...”
Ben laughed as I opened the door and revealed our room. “Honestly, if you think this is bad, you'd absolutely die to see the place that I lived in during uni,” he said. “There were six of us in a three-bed flat, all lads, and I swear half of us had never had to do laundry or clean a dish until we were thrust out into the cruel world of uni. You can imagine what it looked like...”
I shook my head and wrinkled my nose, grossed out by the very idea of that. “So what exactly did you bring?” I asked, leading him over to the coffee table that we had pushed into one corner. I glanced around. “Sorry, but this is really the best that we can do, unless we want to eat directly off the floor.
“No, this is fine,” Ben said, smiling at me. “I actually kind of like the whole low-tables thing; that's why I took you to Pretty as Pie.” He set down the two bags and started pulling out all sorts of containers. “So I figured I'd impress you with what I know about world cuisine. You said you didn't know what your hangover food was, so I brought you a selection of hangover foods from around the world.”
“You didn't!” I exclaimed, intrigued by the idea.
“I did,” Ben confirmed, nodding gravely. “So we've got a Korean dried pollack hangover stew, and we've got some spicy instant noodles like they eat in Mongolia. I stopped short of bringing you a full English, but I did get some baked beans and bacon and fried eggs. We've got some pickle juice like they do in Poland—yes, you just drink it straight up, or if you're not keen on that idea, you could also maybe just eat a couple pickles; I imagine it would work about the same. And we've got espresso because that's how they do
it in Italy. And we've got umeboshi, which is a Japanese pickled plum, because apparently those will cure everything. And then last but not least, we've got a Big Mac and fries, plus ice cream. Because those are both super American and that's what Laura suggested.”
I was laughing by this point. “I'm actually really excited about this,” I told him. “Although I'm not sure how I feel about either fish stew or pickle juice.
“Me neither, to be honest,” Ben said. “Although actually, the only time I had the fish stew for breakfast when I was in Korea, I wasn't hungover. Maybe I would have benefited from being in that state.”
I shook my head and suddenly leaned over to kiss him—it was strictly chaste, but it adequately summed up my feelings at the moment.
Ben looked surprised when I pulled away, but he just smiled and handed me one of the containers. “Go on,” he said.
Take Me Away: A College Romance Story Page 5
