Auctioned to Him_The Contract

by Charlotte Byrd

  No, I say to myself silently in the mirror. When you’re starting to feel down, that’s exactly when you need to avoid the things that only bring on more clouds. I skim through my phone for some other music.

  Ah!

  “Hips Don’t Lie” by Shakira.

  An oldie, but a goodie. It’s upbeat and fun. Exactly what I need. I turn up the music and climb into the shower.

  When I lather up my hair, I hear a knock at the door.

  “Yeah?” I yell out over the music.

  “Hey, honey? I can’t find my phone anywhere,” my mom says, opening the door. “Have you seen it?”

  “No,” I say. My mom is always losing her phone. Honestly, not a week goes by that she doesn’t call me on my dad’s phone completely frazzled by the fact that this time she had finally done it, lost it for good.

  “Well, I can’t find it anywhere,” she says. “Would you mind if I used yours? I just have to call your dad about something.”

  “Sure.”

  My mom leaves and takes my music with her. But the good mood that the beginning of that song put me in doesn’t wear off. I close my eyes and let the hot water run over my face and body. Light streams in through the window. I love the way its warm rays feel on my eyelids. When I open eyes, I’m greeted by a curious blue jay investigating me from the windowsill. I want to wave to her, but I don’t want to scare her so instead, I just admire the way her feathers dance in the breeze.

  And then, right there and then, as I’m watching the blue jay cock her head from side to side inquisitively, for absolutely no reason, something occurs to me.

  Oh. My. God.

  Noooooooooo!

  I turn off the shower and wrap a towel around myself. I don’t secure it well and it falls down right before I reach the door. I have to scramble to get it up over my breasts. My hair is completely soaked and water from it runs down my shoulders. My feet leave little puddles on the hardwood floors.

  I look into each bedroom that I pass, looking for my mom. Maybe she didn’t see it. Maybe she just called my dad and that was it. Please, please, please let that be it. My heart jumps into my chest and I can’t take a full breath. I try to slow down my breathing, breath through my stomach like I had learned at yoga, but I’m freaking out. And nothing’s working. Where the hell is she?

  Finally, I get to my parents’ bedroom. Unlike all the other doors, the door to this one is closed. I open it quietly, but don’t bother knocking. I walk in and see my mother sitting on the edge of the bed staring at my phone. Her shoulders are slumped. Her hair is dangling lifelessly in her face. She’s completely motionless. She looks like she has seen a ghost. Or found out that her daughter not only got married without telling her but is also now getting divorced.

  Shit.

  I know right away that it’s too late. She has read my text messages. But I think that maybe she hasn’t heard me. So I try to tip toe out of the room. Please, don’t hear me. Please, please, please.

  “Alice,” my mom says quietly. She has a stern tone in her voice, very much unlike her usual tone.

  “Hey,” I whisper. My mouth is completely dry. I cough a little.

  “What is this?” she asks, turning to face me.

  Her back straightens out and her chin flies into the air. She’s no longer sad. Now, she’s angry.

  “What?” I ask. Even though I know exactly what she’s looking at. I don’t know what it is about me, but I have this tendency to deny when I’m put on the spot.

  “These text messages,” she says, shaking my phone in her extended hand, “from Dylan.”

  I shake my head. I don’t know what to say.

  Of course, I can get angry about her going through my phone and reading my private messages. But something holds me back from going that route. I hate to admit it, but a small part of me is happy that my mom found out. This has been a heavy burden to carry around with me and now it’s out.

  “Alice?” my mom asks. “Do you care to explain?”

  I look away and shrug. She throws my phone on the bed. After crossing her arms, she taps her foot a little waiting for me to say something. I glance over at the screen.

  * * *

  You’ve been dragging your feet enough about this. My message is highlighted in green.

  * * *

  Sorry. Dylan’s message appears in grey.

  * * *

  That’s not good enough. When are we finally going to get a divorce?

  * * *

  It’s happening, don’t fret!

  * * *

  How can I not? It has been forever since we got married. At first, you promised me an annulment. And then that was not possible. And now you’ve been playing games with this divorce. I want to know when.

  * * *

  I don’t know.

  * * *

  I can only see part of the exchange on the screen, but I know it word for word.

  “When did you get married?” my mom asks. “Oh my God, I never thought that I would ask my daughter that question!”

  “Mom, it was an accident. I was really drunk. Tristan and I just sort of broke up. I don’t even remember it happening, really.”

  Her blank face tells me that she doesn’t quite get it.

  So I start from the beginning. I fill in all the details about every little thing and, close to an hour later, she seems to finally get it.

  After listening carefully and intently, my mom takes a deep breath. I’m shaking from the cold – I’m still wearing my towel, after all. But so much time has passed that my hair is dry in parts and some of the puddles that I’ve made walking barefoot on the hardwood floor have dried up.

  “I have to go get ready,” I say, turning to walk back toward the bathroom. “I have a flight to catch.”

  My mom nods. She isn’t angry or upset anymore. She’s just looks lost. Despondent. Not quite here.

  “Before you do that,” she says to me, “regardless of all of this, and how hurt and disappointed I am that you didn’t tell me about this, I still want you to remember what I said to you before.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, I’m a little clearer about why you want to transfer to USC. But before you do that, I want you to think about this for a moment. It seems like transferring will make you leave all of your troubles behind in New York. And that by simply getting away from New York, you won’t have any of those problems anymore. And you may very well be right. But the thing about problems is that they tend to haunt us. They tend to follow us around, as if they’re on leash. Because they’re not tied to geographical locations, they’re tied to us.”

  I nod.

  “Do you understand what I’m saying, Alice?” my mom asks.

  “Yes, I do. And I’ll think about it.”

  And I mean it. Truly.

  25

  On the plane back to New York, I’m wedged into the middle seat between an old woman with bright orange nails who looks like she’s about to chat me up for the whole flight and a large man who spills over into my seat and doesn’t even try to contain himself in his. I quickly put in my earbuds and turn up the music on my phone. I want to zone out. This is going to be a really long flight.

  But no matter how hard I try to fall asleep, my mind keeps racing. I try a breathing exercise from yoga – breathe in through my nose and breathe out through my mouth. But after a few minutes, I’m just as awake as before.

  The thing that I keep coming back to is how disappointed my mom looked after I told her what had happened. The flicker and brightness in her eyes seemed to have dimmed. She sighed these big, exasperating breaths and her skin seemed to lose all color in a matter of seconds.

  I wanted her to yell at me, curse me out, anything but this. I felt like I had actually physically hurt her and I’ve never wanted to take something back more than I did that.

  Shit. I really messed up. I kick myself over practically every decision I’ve made this semester. Even getting back with Tristan at the end of last semes
ter now seems like a completely foolish idea. If we had never gotten back together, we’d still be friends. I wouldn’t have cared about his busy schedule so much and I might even start dating someone new. Huh, what an idea.

  I haven’t given that much thought, but I am young. Not even 20 yet. And I’ve only really been in one serious relationship. And a very not-serious marriage! Dylan, Dylan, Dylan. Why is getting a divorce from you so difficult? Why has it been dragging on for this long?

  I shake my head to try to clear it. But thoughts that I have no interest in thinking just continue to wash over me like ocean waves. I turn up the music and put on my eye mask. Maybe this will help.

  * * *

  Juliet gets back to the dorm a little bit after me. Unlike me, she didn’t opt to go home to Staten Island for spring break. No, she had a proper spring break full of drinking and partying in Daytona Beach, Florida. She comes back refreshed, though not very well rested. But her skin has a nice deep glow to it and her hair has streaks of highlights – all evidence of a spring break done right.

  “Why are you not tanner?” Juliet asks, showing me her bikini tan lines. “Didn’t you spend the week in sunny California?”

  “I am a little tan,” I say. But unfortunately, I don’t have any tan lines to show off. “But California is different than Florida. The sun there is very powerful and the air is thin. So it’s hard to get a nice tan as quickly as in Florida.”

  That’s always a surprise to everyone who hears that I’m from California and I’m not the color of an apricot.

  “I can only get that tan,” I say, pointing to her shoulders, “in the summer when I spend all the days at the beach.”

  “Well, I say that you had missed out then,” she says with a quick smile. “Honestly, it was a blast. I won’t lie, I did black out a few times; I’m not completely used to drinking from morning to night, but wow, what a party.”

  “I’m glad you had a good time,” I say.

  She went with a whole group of Columbia spring breakers. She didn’t know a soul before she went, but is now probably best friends with every last one of them.

  “I’ve got to say, it’s nice get out there and meet new people,” Juliet says. It seems to me that all she does is meet new people throughout the semester. “It gets a little boring to hang out with the same people all the time.”

  I stare at her. I’m about to say thanks sarcastically, but she quickly adds, “No offense, of course.”

  “None taken.”

  “You should really get out there more,” Juliet says. That seems to be her solution to every problem. And at this point in my life, I sort of think that she might be right. I do need to meet new people. Try to shake things up in my life, but in a good way.

  “I will,” I say. And then it occurs to me. Maybe this is as good as a time as ever to tell her about my plans for next year. She might even approve.

  “So, speaking of next year,” I start.

  “We weren’t speaking of next year,” she points out.

  “Okay, you know what I mean.”

  “Oh yeah, about being roommates next year, you mean?” Juliet asks, changing into her pajamas. They are purple and have little coffee pots on them. I’m actually quite jealous of how cute they are. “I’d love that,” she says. “When I said that it’s nice to meet new people, I didn’t mean that I didn’t want to be your roommate anymore. You’re an awesome roommate. There are lots of people out there that are way more obnoxious than you and I’d hate to end up with one of them.”

  “Well, thanks,” I say sarcastically. “But no, that’s not really what I was referring to. Actually, I’ve been thinking about…something else.”

  I can’t quite find the words to say what I want to say. Maybe it’s because I’ve already disappointed one person today and I don’t want to disappoint another. Maybe it’s because I don’t want to hurt my friend’s feelings. But sooner or later, I do have to tell her. Be brave.

  “What? What’s wrong?”

  Juliet gets a concerned look on her face. It’s unusual and I feel like I’m actually scaring her. Honestly, I didn’t know that Juliet was capable of being scared.

  “No, nothing’s wrong. I’m just thinking that I might not be here next year.”

  “What? Are you crazy?” Juliet says as her eyes grow wide.

  “I’m just thinking of transferring to USC,” I say.

  “USC?” She repeats the word as if she doesn’t know what it means.

  “University of Southern California?” I clarify.

  “I know what USC is,” she says, spreading her arms out wide. Juliet has a tendency to gesture with her hands and speak with her whole body whenever she’s drunk or angry.

  “It’s just something I’ve been thinking about for awhile. I think I need a change. It’s close to home. And, honestly, this weather is killing me. It’s making me so freakin’ depressed.”

  “Oh, you’re not leaving because of the weather,” Juliet says. “Don’t lie. You’re leaving because of Tristan and Dylan. And your stupid marriage.”

  I sigh. She’s right. But not entirely. I do hate the weather. The fall wasn’t too bad, but this winter is unbearable. The slush and the darkness and the cold. Everyone on the outside seems angry and disturbed by it, too. It’s harder to get a cab. It’s impossible to see one smiling face in the subway. It’s the very opposite of everything that I love and miss about Southern California.

  “It’s not just them. It’s just something I want to do,” I say with a shrug. Another thing I want is for this conversation to be over. Unfortunately, given how much Juliet is pacing around the room, I’m not sure that’s going to be possible anytime soon.

  “Listen, Alice, you’ll get through this. You and Dylan are going to get a divorce soon and everything will go back to normal. And next year, we can live in a completely different dorm, just the two of us, and we never have to see Tristan again. Or Dylan for that matter, if you don’t want to.”

  “You’re right. I know. But I really don’t want to be here anymore.”

  She shakes her head. She tries again. She reminds me of all the fun things we did in the fall and that we can do them again. She says she’ll hang out with me more and won’t go out almost every night. She’s trying her best to convince me to stay. I admire her for that. I listen patiently and say that I’ll think about it. But that’s a lie. I’m done thinking. I’m pretty set about this.

  * * *

  “Alice is doing what?” I hear Dylan say outside our room. Juliet went into the kitchen and she held this thing to herself all of two seconds.

  “Alice!” Dylan knocks on the door, but doesn’t wait for me to answer. Instead, he just barges in.

  “What is this I hear about you wanting to transfer? Are you crazy?”

  “No.”

  Great. Another person to explain this to. I had less explaining to do to my parents!

  “But why?” he asks. I go into all the reasons all over again. I feel myself being less exuberant about it all though. I’m losing patience with all of these people questioning my decision. And then Dylan calls me on it.

  “We’re your friends, you know, right?” Dylan says. “That’s why we don’t want you to leave. We love you.”

  That breaks my heart. Dylan’s not one for expressing his feelings well. If at all. He’s from Connecticut, after all.

  “And I’m sorry I’ve been dragging my feet on this divorce thing. The truth is that the fact that we’re still married makes my dad really angry and I sort of love it. Nothing really fazes him much, and this is really getting under his skin. But I’m going to talk to the family attorney in a few days. And I’ll take care of it.”

  Finally, an explanation for all the delays! I’m thankful for it. But I also feel like it’s too little too late.

  No matter what I say convinces either of them that this is really something I want to do and I’m not just running away from my problems here. I won’t admit it out loud, but they’re basically righ
t. So, we eventually call it a night after agreeing to disagree.

  26

  When I meet Tea for lunch the following day, she has a completely different reaction to the news. I’m ready to go into a big explanation about all this yet again, but she just nods and says that she understands. She really catches me off guard. So much so that I don’t even know what we’re going to talk about for the rest of lunch since I thought we’d talk about this the whole time.

  “So I finished my book,” Tea announces after we order.

  “What?”

  “Remember, the romance one about the girl pretending to be a wealthy guy’s fiancée on the cruise?”

  “Of course! I can’t believe you’re done with it already.” While I’ve been head-deep in my own drama, Tea managed to write a whole book. Imagine that!

  “I’d love for you to read it,” she says.

  “Oh my God. Yes, definitely!”

  “I can send you an ePub version so you can read it on your phone,” she says.

  “Perfect!”

  Tea has been working on the book since January and it’s finally done. I’m awed by her dedication. In addition to her classes and Tanner, she has been working on this project and now it’s completed.

  “Frankly, I’m really jealous,” I say when our food finally arrives. I ordered a tuna salad and she’s having a grilled chicken panini.

  “What? Why?” she says, laughing.

  “Because you went out there and did this awesome thing. While I’ve been burying my head in the sand and dealing with all of my stupid problems.”

  “Well, another way to think about it is that you’ve been out there living life while I’ve just been writing about someone else’s.”