by Daniels, Viv
“I know what you meant.” He popped the last bit of his sandwich in his mouth and wiped his hands on his napkin. “I should probably head out. Hannah will be back in town this evening.”
Inwardly, I flinched. “Okay. Have a nice day.”
“And I have some work to do before then,” he finished awkwardly as the ramifications of his words sank in. “Tess, I didn’t mean ‘my girlfriend’s back, so, later…’”
“I know what you meant,” I echoed, clearing away his plate. And boy, did I ever. How many weekends had my father spent in our apartment when his wife was away on a spa trip with her rich friends, or off on a shopping weekend in Manhattan with Hannah? How many Sunday afternoons ended with him saying those exact words to us?
“Thanks for lunch,” he said.
“Don’t thank me,” I said. “You’re paying for it.”
“I meant for you having lunch with me.”
“Oh.” I actually hadn’t known what he meant that time. “Well, like I said, I was taking a break anyway.”
“You didn’t have to take it with me.”
“You didn’t have to come to Verde.”
“I did,” he said, and from the tone of his voice, he sounded like he wanted to say so much more. “If I wanted to see you.”
After Dylan had gone, I opened the leather folder. His bill had come to twelve dollars. Inside was a twenty-dollar bill. I swallowed. Had it been anyone other than Dylan, I wouldn’t have thought twice about that tip. Sure it was big, but it wasn’t outlandish, and it wasn’t that unusual from a single diner who’d gotten some extra conversation from the wait staff. Yet from Dylan it felt like he’d paid me to have lunch with him, like he was saying, “Poor Tess, not rich enough to attend Canton without filling your days with menial labor, not nearly as rich as the girlfriend I should be spending my time with.”
Sometimes, when Mom was between jobs or feeling blue, Dad would write her checks. Big ones. Dad would pay for her to get a new wardrobe or have a Botox treatment or some other lavish indulgence that felt really good until you thought about it and realized that it was nothing compared to what he gave his wife.
Eight dollars from Dylan. Twenty from Todd, which Dylan had also arranged. One hundred and fifty from the rest of the weekend. At this rate, I’d have that Tissue Engineering textbook paid for in no time.
***
The next three weeks passed in much the same manner. Monday through Wednesday, as soon as class was done, Dylan and I would meet in the bioengineering labs to work on our project. We’d decided to resurrect our work from Cornell and do an advanced version, using the skills we’d gained after two years of college and, of course, Transport Process Design. On Thursday and Friday, as soon as I was done with class, I hurried to Verde for my shifts. Either way, I never came home before 11:00 p.m. On lab days, I smelled like the nose-tickling chemicals they used to keep things clean. On waitress days, I smelled like garlic and frat boy sweat. Mom had stopped waiting up for me. I never saw my father, which I think suited both of us pretty well. After that, it was at least two hours of homework before I set my alarm for six and got up to start all over again.
Dylan’s crazy email schedule didn’t let up, and it was soon clear that every hour I spent at the restaurant, he was spending working on the project. I hated the idea that he was doing so much more work than me, but what option did I have? There was literally zero time for anything else. I’d been at Canton for a month and so far, I didn’t even know the names of most of the other students in my classes. I’d often see them leaving together for lunch or playing Frisbee on the quad while I rushed from class to library to class to work to lab. My fellow students would head off to eat in the cafeteria or any of the little shops dotting campus, and I’d bring a bag lunch to save cash.
I tried to tell myself that it was okay. I wasn’t at Canton to make friends. I was here to get my name on a Canton diploma. Besides, it wasn’t as if I’d had so many friends at State, either. I’d had acquaintances in class and people I called friends who I went out with on weekends, but no one I was really close to. And hadn’t it always been that way, anyway? Maybe I just wasn’t the type of person who had close friends. Even Sylvia, whom I’d always thought of as my best friend, didn’t know the truth about me.
It was safer that way. The more people who knew about my father, the more chances there were that the story would become public. These were the rules. I knew the rules.
On the weekends, I worked all Saturday at Verde, then Sunday afternoons, too. Dylan always came in on Sundays, once the brunch crowd had departed. He always seated himself in my section. He always cajoled me into having lunch with him.
On Sunday morning of the third week, after what seemed like an endless weekend of Halloween revelry by the entire Canton student body, I met my mom, bleary-eyed, over the coffee pot.
“You look like hell,” she offered and poured me a cup.
“Thanks, Mom,” I grumbled. I had, in fact, worn a sparkly devil horn headband most of the weekend, to play off Sylvia’s angel wings and silver glitter halo. Quite a pair we’d made behind the bar, but the tips had been worth it.
“You can’t keep this up,” she continued. “Look at you. Something’s got to give, Tess, and the way you’re going, with work and school and this Symposium project, I’m afraid it might be you.”
“What, old before my time?” I snapped. “Guess I’ll never find a man, then.”
She sighed. “I don’t care about you finding a man, sweetie. I do care about you getting sick and flunking out of college, though. How are you ever going to prove your father wrong if that’s what happens?”
I looked at her. A hint of a smile ghosted across her face.
“Mom!” I said, impressed. “What did you put in your coffee this morning?” Prove Dad wrong? I’d never heard her so much as disgree with him over the weather.
“Oh, come on,” she replied. “You never were rebellious as a teenager. It’s nice to see that you do have it in you. Which is why I don’t want you turning into a drudge over this school thing. College is supposed to be fun. You need to be able to go out, make friends, and yes, meet boys…and I do mean boys, Tess.”
“Not married men?” I couldn’t help but ask.
“Not married men.” My mother had been even younger than me when she’d met Dad, a college intern the fifteen-years-older-than-her Steven Swift had found irresistible. When she’d gotten pregnant, she’d dropped out, he’d agreed to support her, and the rest was history. “I don’t regret any of the choices I’ve made, the life I’ve had with you and your father, but I know that’s not for you. So…no married men, Tess.”
What about boys with girlfriends? I almost asked her. I wondered what my mother would do in my situation. Damn the torpedoes, probably. She’d had no compunction muscling in on a marriage, she’d have no trouble trying to break up a simple dating arrangement.
When I was younger, I’d wonder why, if my father loved my mother so much, she hadn’t been able to get him to leave his wife for her. Later I understood. It was Hannah. She was only a few months my junior, and my mother had once let slip that Dad and his wife had struggled for years with infertility. The powerful Steven Swift getting divorced and marrying a younger woman was not an earthshaking revelation. Abandoning his pregnant-at-last wife for the intern he’d knocked up—well, that was a career-ending scandal.
When I was a teenager myself, I’d wondered why my mom had submitted to this arrangement. Why she hadn’t told Dad where to shove it, taken me, and started our lives free and clear. But I saw how hard it was on Annabel. She was twenty-four now and still working on her nursing degree, taking the odd class here and there while working two jobs. Sometimes, she said, it was like she worked just to pay the babysitters.
And it wasn’t just the money, either. Mom loved Dad. Even if she’d been as ambitious as me, she might not have left. She loved him then, she loved him still. You couldn’t help your feelings, no matter what obstacles stood in
the way. She’d always believed that, and I had to admit she was right. Though I was making different decisions than my mother, I knew that it didn’t change how I felt. I’d spent two years wishing away my connection to Dylan Kingsley. But even though I had more reason than ever to deny my attraction to him now, I couldn’t make myself stop wanting him. It was a part of me, and wishing it away would be like trying to banish my left foot by power of will alone.
Mom always claimed I got my brains from my father, but it wasn’t that. She wasn’t stupid, my mother. She was just more willing to let her life be guided by her emotions than Dad was, than I was. I believed he loved my mom, just not enough for him to ruin his life over. I’d cared for Dylan, too, two years ago, but I’d chosen to walk away, to not let my life be guided by my relationship to a man.
And I wouldn’t let it happen now, either. There was far too much to lose.
That afternoon, Dylan came to Verde again and asked to be seated in my section. I hadn’t seen him since class on Thursday. He’d probably spent the weekend partying, in costume, with Hannah. I bet she’d made a beautiful kitty cat, or princess, or nurse.
For the sake of my weariness, my libido, and my sanity, I decided to go on break. Let someone else handle his table for today. I didn’t have any fight left.
TEN
I wasn’t even to campus on Monday morning when I got a text from Dylan.
We need to talk. Meet me in the atrium ASAP.
Fear bubbled in the pit of my belly. Was he breaking off our partnership after I’d blown him off at Verde on Sunday? Or because he realized that working together was just too weird? Or maybe it was because I wasn’t good enough? He couldn’t do that! I needed this project. I needed the money. I needed…Dylan.
I took a deep breath.
What’s wrong?
There was no reply. I sped to campus, parked, and tried to look calm as I approached the glass doors to the bioengineering lab. Dylan was standing by the stairs, and his face was grim. Today, the glasses were absent and his frown left me cold. I’d honestly never seen him so serious.
He saw me, and there was no brightening in his expression. I’d never before realized it, but there was always a hint of a smile when he first caught sight of me. The fear boiled over. Maybe this didn’t have anything to do with our work at all. Maybe he somehow found out about me and Hannah. About my dad.
That was silly, though. It wasn’t possible. Even if he’d noticed our eyes, most people would write that off as a coincidence. Lots of people had similar eyes. I smoothed my hands over my jean skirt, tugging down the folds that always formed over my hips when I sat. What I wouldn’t give sometimes to have tiny little hips like Hannah.
What I wouldn’t give to have a lot of Hannah’s things.
I took a breath, pulled my shoulders back, and walked over.
“Good, you’re here,” he said, his tone flat. “You have to see this.”
He led me over to the lab sign-up sheet posted on the board outside the admin offices. Elaine Sun was signed up for Monday through Wednesday evenings every week for the rest of the semester in the lab we’d been using for our sessions.
“She’s trying to sabotage us,” he growled. “I know it. She’s studied our schedule and she must know you can’t make it at any other time.”
“So this thing really is cutthroat.” And to think one of the things I was looking forward to at Canton was not competing for lab space.
“When it comes to Elaine?” His tone was grim. “Yes.”
I laid a hand on his arm. “We’ll find another lab space.”
“Not with all the equipment we need, and not for as much time as we’ll need it. She arranged this very neatly. And, lest you think I’m being paranoid, look at this.” He pointed at erasure marks on some of the pages, and I could see the ghost of Elaine’s name. “She erased every Thursday or Friday slot she had and every slot she had where we had classes. Now she’s only reserved our lab for the times we need.”
“Maybe her schedule changed?” I suggested. “I can’t imagine someone going through all this trouble just to mess with us.”
“Well, you’re a better person than Elaine.”
No, I was just a busier one. I could barely get my own shit together, let alone figure out how to fuck up someone else’s.
He slammed a fist against the board. “I’m so angry at myself right now. I don’t know why I didn’t sign up for the whole semester right off the bat.” Up until now, Dylan had just been signing us up for the labs when he came in for his early Monday morning class. “But in two years, I’ve never had a hard time reserving a space. I’ve ruined everything.”
“Hey,” I said. “This is going to be okay. I’ll go talk to her—”
“Yeah, you do that,” he said ruefully. “You go talk to her and see what she does. My money’s on gloat.”
“I never gloat,” said a voice behind us. Dylan and I turned to see Elaine standing there, her computer bag slung over her shoulder. “It’s so petty.”
“No, you know what’s petty?” he asked. “You know you can’t compete with us on real terms, so you’re just trying to make sure we can’t do our project as planned.”
She rolled her eyes. “It’s not my fault you didn’t plan ahead, Kingsley. Might be good for you to realize you aren’t the center of the universe for once.”
I stepped between them. There was no need to go nuclear. I’d learned well from my mother how to arrange things so everyone got what they needed. “Elaine, the problem here is that I have shifts at my job on Thursdays and Fridays, so really our only time in the lab is Monday through Wednesday evenings. I’m sure we can work out some sort of schedule so we can all finish our projects on time—”
“Oh, please. You made your bed with this guy, so now you can lie in it. I told you he was bad news. Anyone with half a brain knows that if you need Lab A and all its equipment to finish your project, you’d better reserve your time well in advance. But Kingsley here thinks he’s above all that.”
How did she know what kind of equipment we needed? Dylan’s paranoia was sounding a lot more plausible.
“Elaine, seriously,” Dylan said. “Get over it.”
“Screw you,” she replied sweetly, turned on her heel, and left.
Dylan looked like he wanted to punch the wall again.
“Okay, that girl has issues,” I said to him. “What precisely did you do to her again?”
“I told you. I beat her in the freshman end-of-year competition.”
“She hates you,” I said, skeptical. “It’s not just rivalry. She honestly hates you.”
“Yeah.” He shrugged. “Like you said, issues.”
I shook my head. Something didn’t add up. “Are you sure all you did was beat her that one time? You didn’t, like, strangle her kitten or spill wine on her silk dress or sleep with her and never call her again?”
“No!” He was quiet for a second. “I did sleep with her roommate freshman year.”
I gaped at him. “You what?”
“I slept with her roommate. Two years ago. Fall.” He looked contrite. “She was the first of the three.”
I smacked his arm. “Dylan!”
He flinched away. “What! I was eighteen. I was new at school. And I’d just had my heart broken by…” He gestured. “Well, you know all that.” He hung his head. “I made a mistake, Tess. Haven’t you ever made a mistake?”
“Yes.” I made a mistake not calling him back all those years ago. I made a mistake breaking his heart, letting him go.
But Elaine’s roommate having an ill-advised hook-up with Dylan two years ago was no excuse for Elaine to sabotage our project now. Even if she was mad at Dylan, that was bullshit. And I’d never done a thing to her.
“Yeah,” he grumbled. “Partnering with me, that was your mistake. I can’t believe I’ve screwed this up for you.”
Partnering with Dylan might still end up being a mistake, but not because of any of Elaine’s ham-handed machina
tions. Clearly, she had no idea who she was dealing with. I had a whole lifetime’s worth of experience working around people who didn’t want me to have nice things. If Tess McMann screwed something up, she screwed it up on her own damn terms. If I wasn’t going to let Dad get the better of me, there was no way I was going to let some Canton co-ed do it.
“We’re not going down without a fight, Dylan. Elaine doesn’t own the lab. I’ll switch my shifts at Verde to early in the week. We’ll reserve every Thursday and Friday instead. We’ll come in at 6:00 a.m. if we have to.”
“You need your Friday-night shifts at the restaurant. That’s when you make the most in tips.”
He’d been paying attention. “I’ll be fine. As long as we win, I’ll be fine.”
He shook his head. “And if we don’t win?”
I shrugged. “I’ll figure it out then.”
Dylan looked at me, his blue eyes keen and penetrating. “You’re a marvel, Tess. You know that?”
“Give me your pen,” I said brusquely, trying not to let his words sink in. “I’ll sign us up for every space left on the chart.”
“I mean it. I know why you’ve really been borrowing my textbook. I’m actually a pretty smart guy.”
“Yeah,” I said, concentrating on filling in the slots. “Is that why you’ve been tipping me out the wazoo lately?”
“So you’ll quit borrowing my textbook? Yes,” he joked. “I don’t like your sticky notes.”
I looked at him, my expression dead serious. “I don’t want you giving me money, Dylan. And I don’t want you bullying jerks into giving it to me, either.” I returned to writing our names down.
Tess McMann and Dylan Kingsley. Tess McMann and Dylan Kingsley. Dylan Kinsley and Tess McMann, just to switch it up. Kingsley/McMann. Tess + Dylan.
No, I wasn’t going to write that last one again.
“Jerks don’t deserve their money as much as you do for putting up with them,” he said softly. He’d moved in so he stood right behind me. His voice was nearly a whisper.
My pen stilled on the page. “Stop,” I whispered.
