by Minot, Diana
When they arrived at Elise’s apartment, Whitney carefully took off her suit jacket and hung it on a dining room chair, then followed Elise into the bedroom where Elise kicked off her UGGs and started flipping through the ridiculous amount of clothing in her closet. They were probably going to be here a while.
“I thought you told Jamie that UGGs were ugly,” Whitney said as she flopped across Elise’s large bed.
“They are ugly. But for some ungodly reason they are widely accepted as appropriate footwear. I’m jumping on the bandwagon since you can’t deny how comfortable they are. You should get some,” Elise said, her voice coming out in a muffled tone from the back of her large walk-in closet.
Whitney smiled and rolled her eyes. Elise was a wonderful friend, but she was never going to understand Whitney’s lack of disposable income. Some days, Whitney found this unbearably annoying. Today, she was too preoccupied with other worries to care enough to remind Elise that she had no money. Elise walked into the room wearing a black suit skirt and a black lacy bra that Whitney imagined was the type of thing you would find in a Parisian boutique.
Elise held up two blouses, one cream colored and one a soft pink. “Which one?” she asked.
Whitney sat up and pointed to the pink one. “Why are you wearing such a nice bra, anyways? As far as I know you don’t have any big plans for the evening.”
Elise shook her finger at Whitney. “No, no, no. Wrong attitude. First of all, you should always look beautiful for yourself, because you’re worth it. Don’t roll your eyes at me. I know it’s cliché, but it’s true. Second of all, no, I don’t have any plans. But in the event an opportunity comes up, you want to be ready. My mother used to always tell me that you never know when you might meet your husband.”
“Or your next bang buddy,” Whitney said, her voice sarcastic.
Elise shrugged and raised an eyebrow. “It’s true. You never know when you might schedule a hot date for a library study session, after all.”
Whitney threw a pillow at Elise as Elise escaped back into the closet, laughing.
“By the way, what’s the latest on Ben? I noticed he was not in class at all today,” Elise called out from her closet.
Whitney sighed. “I don’t know. I still haven’t heard from him. When he didn’t show up all day I texted him to make sure he was okay. He still hasn’t answered.” Whitney checked her phone again just in case. Nothing.
“Did you ask Alex?”
“Alex said he was still sleeping when he left this morning.”
Elise came out of the closet and frowned. “That’s weird.”
She had switched to a pantsuit instead of a skirt suit. “It’s too damn cold for a skirt,” she said, in answer to Whitney’s questioning look. “Did Kate say anything to you today?”
“No, she seemed pretty subdued. But I was also going out of my way to avoid her.”
Elise nodded as she slipped on some black heels. She looked stunning, even in a conservative black suit. Whitney could never feel truly jealous of her friend, though. Elise was so kind to her, and so bubbly. It was impossible to hate her. Elise glanced at her watch.
“We should probably get going and get this over with,” Elise said. “I hate this kind of networking event. I mean, seriously, information tables? It’s pretty much just a boring job fair. I wish they’d do a cocktail hour instead.”
Whitney did not say much in response. She followed Elise out the door, and they made the short walk back to the law school as quickly as they could. The temperature was rapidly dropping, and the wind whipping at them from across Lake Michigan was bitterly cold. When they got to the law school atrium, informational tables were already set up from several different law firms. Whitney was content to follow Elise around to the different tables, letting her do most of the talking. Whitney should have done more research to know which firms interested her, but she had been too preoccupied over the last week with midterms and Ben to find the motivation to do anything extra.
About thirty minutes later, Elise was ready to leave. Whitney did not feel like staying much longer, either, and was beginning to wish she had just skipped the event and gone home after class. It had not been a productive thirty minutes for her. The only thing she had gained was a huge handful of colorful brochures from each firm on why that firm was different and was the best place to work. Each brochure said essentially the same thing.
As Elise and Whitney left the atrium and rounded the corner to a long hallway, they came face to face with Ben, Alex, and Kate. The three of them were all wearing suits and heading toward the atrium. Kate crossed her arms and gave Whitney a smug look.
“Ben!” Whitney exclaimed. “I was worried about you.”
“Sorry, I meant to text you back. I’m fine. Just taking a breather after midterms.”
Whitney was sure now that something was wrong. Ben was not talking to her the same way he had last week. There was no “Hey, beautiful.” There was no warmth in his voice. He sounded cautious and tense. Whitney looked at Alex, desperate for some understanding. Alex looked uncomfortable and confused. Whitney felt Elise grab her arm and start to pull her down the hallway toward the exit, just as Kate reached for Ben’s arm and pulled him in the opposite direction toward the atrium. Whitney’s back stiffened when she saw Kate touching Ben.
“No!” Whitney said, and tried to pull her arm away from Elise. Elise held on tighter and pulled harder in the direction of the door.
“Whitney,” Elise said, in a low tone of voice so that her words were not clear to Ben and Kate, “Let’s go. Now.”
Whitney allowed Elise to lead her, but her eyes welled up with tears as they reached the exit. She had no idea what had changed since Thursday night, but Ben acted as though nothing romantic had ever taken place between them. There had been so much chemistry last week in their study room. Surely, that had not been a one-sided feeling. Whitney wiped at her eyes and then realized that Alex had followed them.
“Whitney, are you okay?” He asked.
Whitney was irrationally angry at Alex. He must have known Ben was not interested anymore! He must have known Kate was closing in for the kill. “Why didn’t you tell me?” She hissed, and gave Alex a shove. Elise tried to pull her back.
“Whoa, Whitney! I had no idea!” Alex said.
“You were walking over here with both of them together! Don’t tell me you had no idea!”
“I honestly didn’t, Whitney. I thought Kate was just doing her crazy stalker thing again and tagging along uninvited.”
“Was it really ever uninvited?” Elise chimed in.
Whitney looked at her and frowned. “What do you mean?”
“I just think it’s weird that Ben was all of a sudden into you right before midterms and then as soon as they were over he acts like nothing ever happened. I think he was planning on being with Kate all along and only used you temporarily because you’re smart and he wanted your notes.” Elise’s voice dripped with disgust.
“That’s crazy! Ben went to Stanford, Elise! He doesn’t need my measly notes!”
“You’re smart, Whitney. That’s obvious. And I’m sure Ben’s smart enough, too, but he’s also lazy.”
“Jesus,” Alex said. “I think Elise is right. Ben was complaining a few weeks ago that his class notes were sparse and he didn’t know how he was going to make study outlines for exams.”
Whitney shook her head. They were wrong. There was no way Ben was just using her for exam notes. He did not need her for that. He was much smarter than her! And if he just wanted notes why would he have tried to bang her in the library? She was the one who said no, not him. He had genuinely wanted her.
As if she had read her mind, Elise said, “Whitney, just because he wanted to sleep with you doesn’t mean he wasn’t using you. If he’s a total sleazeball like I’m starting to think he is, then he would not say no to a good lay if the opportunity presented itself.”
Whitney was angry. Elise was supposed to be her friend! She had tol
d Elise about all of the sweet things Ben had said, and all of the incredible goodnight kisses he had given her. How could Elise just dismiss all of that now? She should be more supportive, and realize that this was a misunderstanding. Ben just felt awkward because Kate was standing right there.
“Whitney,” Alex began, reaching out for her arm. She swatted his hand away.
“No! You guys are wrong! You don’t know what you’re talking about!”
“Whitney,” Alex tried again. But Whitney did not wait to hear what he had to say. She stormed out the door and into the freezing Chicago night. The wind had picked up even more and the sky was covered with clouds. Whitney heard Alex and Elise following her, but she did not turn around. Instead, she broke into a run, thankful that she had decided to wear flats today instead of heels. Her large, black tote flapped awkwardly against her body as she ran, but she did not stop. Tears bulged at the rims of her eyelids and finally spilled over. The wind felt even more frigid as it blew onto her wet face. She ignored the strange looks she received from the few people she ran by on the street. Whitney was glad the streets were mostly deserted on this cold Monday night.
She pulled the hood of her jacket low as she got on the bus, avoiding eye contact with the other passengers. By the time she got home, she had calmed down enough to realize that Alex and Elise might be right. It was strange how quickly Ben had started paying attention to her and how quickly he had stopped. And if he could get a good lay out of it, then why not? Whitney shuddered. She was glad she had not slept with him. She felt foolish now, thinking of how she had waited around in the library last Friday hoping Ben would invite her over again.
Whitney changed out of her suit and into her warmest workout gear. She needed to channel her angry energy somewhere. She laced up her running shoes and headed outside toward the lakefront running path. She did not care that it was freezing out. She felt trapped, and needed to escape. Her lungs burned as she inhaled the cold air and her feet pounded the pavement in an angry rhythm. She was upset with Ben, but she was even more upset with herself. She should have stuck with her original plan to focus on studying and not get involved with anyone. She never seemed to be able to effectively convince herself to avoid men. She had to face the facts. She was just another sorry, single woman terrified of hitting thirty alone. As much as she tried to rise above that stereotype, it was who she was.
She regretted her decision to come to law school. She was burying herself under even more student loan debt, and she was not sure what she was gaining. She felt out of place and disillusioned with the idea that she was among the “best and the brightest.” If it was true that Ben was using her for study notes, then he was lazy and pathetic. He was not a genius because he attended Stanford. He had just been lucky that all his cosmic cards fell into the right place.
The confusion and anger hit Whitney in waves. Tears spilled down her face again as she ran through the cold and darkness, a feeling of despair overwhelming her. She eventually turned around and started running back toward her apartment, struggling through the sensation of burning lungs and a freezing face. When she was about a quarter mile away from her apartment, she finally gave in and stopped. She leaned over and put her hands on her knees, heaving and gasping for oxygen. Slowly, she regained her breath and started walking the remaining distance home.
And then, it happened. Little white flurries started falling all around her. The first snow of the season had begun. Once, when Whitney was a little girl, her family had taken a road trip to Colorado for one of their few family vacations. That was the first time Whitney remembered seeing snow. She had been wide-eyed, in awe of the beautiful white flakes floating softly toward the ground, so simple and yet so exquisite. Her father had taken her hand, smiled at her childish wonder, and told her that each snowflake was a little miracle falling from the sky.
Now, as Whitney looked around at the falling snowflakes, she clenched her hands to her heart. Little miracles falling all around her. She was not superstitious, but she felt that, somehow, the universe was trying to comfort her. Moving here had been much harder than she anticipated, but she would prove to everyone that she could do it. She knew herself, and she knew that it would be hard for her to ignore Ben, especially when she had to see him every day. But she could do this. She would do this. She had worked too hard to let some lazy asshole bring her down.
Whitney paused outside the door to her apartment building and turned her face upwards for just a few moments, taking in the feeling of hundreds of little miracles whipping against her skin.
Chapter Fifteen
As October gave way to November, the cold intensified. Whitney avoided Ben as best she could, and he seemed happy to keep his distance as well. She asked Alex once how Ben was doing, and he refused to say anything more than, “He’s fine.” Alex did not want to get in the middle of it. After that, Whitney never asked Alex again, but she was annoyed with him that he would be defensive of Ben after the way Ben had treated her.
Whitney spent most of her time huddled at a study table with Elise and Jamie. The urgency of studying grew as finals loomed closer. Whitney gave up on trying to look fashionable and rocked the jeans and hoodie look most days. When she finally pulled her fake UGGs out of her closet and put them on over skinny jeans, Elise eagerly gave her stamp of approval.
“Aren’t you glad you listened to me and bought a pair? I told you they were comfortable!”
Whitney just smiled and agreed that they were comfortable. If Elise was not paying attention to the fact that they were not real UGGs, Whitney was not going to go out of her way to tell her. Elise and Jamie managed to continue dressing like competent adults. Whitney felt a little overwhelmed sometimes by how put together they always looked, no matter how tired they were or how much the group had studied the night before. She shrugged it off, though, reasoning that it must be easy to keep up appearances when you had so many wardrobe options to choose from. The one thing Whitney did keep up with was her nail polish. The more insecure she felt about how her looks measured up against everyone else, the more she was obsessed with changing her nail color. After all, bottles of polish were not that expensive. She repainted her nails at least twice a week, alternating mostly between gunmetal gray, burgundy, and caramel shades.
Another person who always looked perfect was Kate. Whitney avoided contact with Kate at all costs, and now that Whitney seemed to be removed as a threat to Kate’s quest for Ben, Kate left Whitney alone. It was hard for Whitney to see Kate going after Ben, always laughing and talking with him like they were best friends as her blonde hair fell in perfect waves around her shoulders. Whitney took comfort in the fact that at least Ben did not seem to reciprocate Kate’s feelings. He was always cordial to Kate, but Whitney never saw him initiate a conversation or any kind of physical contact. Whitney wanted to ask Alex about the status of Kate’s stalker games, but she was afraid he would accuse her of putting him in the middle again.
Whitney desperately wanted to press Ben for details on why he let her go, but she did not want to be that girl. She wanted to maintain some pride and self-respect. Despite telling herself not to care, however, she often found herself stealing glances at him in class. She sometimes gazed at his profile until Alex poked her in the ribs and gave her a look that said she was pathetic.
By mid-November, Whitney started skipping class, unable to pull herself out of bed in the morning to greet the gray days. Whitney had discovered that dirty little secret about law school—most of the time, it did not matter much whether you went to class or not. If you read the cases and made study outlines of them, you could get by just fine. The week before Thanksgiving, Whitney did not attend a single class. She stayed home in her PJs, drinking copious amounts of steaming green tea and outlining cases while her favorite jazz music played in the background. She was enjoying not living in daily fear of being interrogated by Professor Neals. Besides, not having to see Ben every day helped her obsess about him a little less. She lied and told Elise and Jami
e that she had the flu, so that they would not pressure her to get off her ass and come to class.
The Wednesday before Thanksgiving, Whitney ventured out to Whole Foods. The food in her apartment had dwindled down to almost nothing, and Whitney decided it was time to restock. She enjoyed cooking, but due to her hatred of lugging groceries home on the bus, she had been surviving mostly on cereal for the last few months. Tomorrow was Thanksgiving, and although she would be spending it alone since she did not want to pay for a flight back to Texas, she decided it would still be ridiculous not to cook something on Thanksgiving. She would do a massive grocery run, and treat herself to a cab ride home. Since she had not spent money on groceries in so long, she felt like she deserved a trip to Whole Foods, even though it had a reputation for being pricier than other grocery stores.
Whole Foods was a madhouse. Harried shoppers rushed around with their last minute Thanksgiving shopping lists, cursing themselves for not making it to the store sooner. Whitney was not bothered by the mayhem, though. She had not left her apartment for a solid week, so being around other people, even just frazzled shoppers at a grocery store, felt good. Besides, she was not planning on making a traditional Thanksgiving meal, so it did not bother her that the canned pumpkin was sold out. She took her time browsing through the aisles, loading her cart with many things that were not on her list but looked good. Since she was planning on taking a cab home, she decided not to hold herself back from purchasing whatever she wanted.
