by Lena Fox
I wasn’t sure there’d be much happy about it, but a drink sounded good.
Inside, ‘The Cornerstone’ was decked out like an Irish pub and crowded with students.
I kept my eyes down, kept to myself, but as I moved through to the bar I couldn’t help notice that I was turning heads. Maybe they’d heard the news about the girls in the car crash and were looking at me out of sympathy?
That was the voice of the old Georgina, always discounting any idea that she could be attractive. The looks I was receiving weren’t looks of pity. I knew what those were too well. This was something else, something like the way Blake had eyed me when we flirted.
I bought the easiest and cheapest drink, a glass of house red, and settled into a threadbare vintage armchair in a warm corner.
I’d barely had a sip when a guy came and took the seat next to mine. He had the build of a football player, and pretty brown eyes that reminded me of a Basset Hound’s.
“Mind if I join you?” he asked, after already getting comfortable.
I shrugged a vague acceptance.
“I’m sure I know you. Are you in my environmental design class?”
“No.”
“Architecture and Technology?”
I shook my head. “Sorry.”
“My dreams every night when I imagine the perfect woman?”
I giggled, and choked on my wine. “I’m doing a Visual Communication degree, but they haven’t yet taught us how to astrally project into someone’s sleeping mind.”
He flashed a disarming smile. He was cute, and the way he looked at me warmed me as much as the wine I drank.
He’s not Blake. The whisper came from deep inside me, unwanted.
“I’m Kevin,” he said, as though in answer.
“Georgie,” I replied.
“You like wine?”
“I like the warm, dulling effect of alcohol,” I said, in my best deadpan voice. I must have been channeling Julie.
“I’ll get you another.”
All the well-established alarms about keeping an eye on my drink went off inside me, but Kevin returned with a full, unopened bottle and two clean glasses. He poured for both of us.
The wine was dark, almost purple. It tasted faintly of olives and cured meat, yet with a sweet and mellow aftertaste. It was potent and burned a trail right into my belly, a fire of life, burning memories of my pain away.
“Thanks. I needed this.”
Kevin shuffled his armchair closer to mine.
I managed to keep up a steady stream of flirty conversation. Before my list, I had been awkward and insecure. The List had made me braver after all. And The List still haunted me. It still had two items on it that hadn’t been crossed off. As much as I wanted to leave it behind, that incompletion gnawed at me. Maybe I could try again. Maybe Kevin could help me.
He could also be a nice distraction, to keep my mind off Blake and … other things. Maybe I could have casual relationships without hurting anyone, as long as that was clear at the outset. If things started to feel even remotely serious, I could stop them in their tracks. If I could cut a relationship off with Blake, I could do it with anyone.
Kevin ordered us food and we ate pulled pork burgers and spicy fries. My smile grew genuine and the bottle of wine grew empty. We tumbled out into the cool evening air together and wandered slowly back toward the campus.
Kevin caught my hand in his. “My roommate’s out late tonight.”
He pulled me in close and when he kissed me, his mouth tasted of Shiraz and salt. His tongue was gentle and his lips were soft. He put his hands on my shoulders then dropped them right down to my breasts. It happened so fast that it almost felt accidental, but his firm grasp let me know he had planned it and liked his hands where they were.
I felt nothing at all—no tingles, no rising warmth in my chest, nothing.
I couldn’t enjoy this. I couldn’t enjoy anything. Not now.
I gently pushed him away.
He took the cue, stepping back and giving me space. I was immensely glad he wasn’t the type to fight a refusal.
He said, “Sorry. Maybe I overdid it a little with the wine. Went straight to my head, and, ahh, other places that might be making me a bit frisky.”
“It’s okay. I’m just … It’s not a good time.”
“I swear I don’t normally move this fast.” He held up his hands innocently. “We can go slow if you want, get to know each other more. Maybe we could hang out tomorrow?”
I put my face in my hands, laughing into them and shaking my head at the absurdity of my life. “Slow isn’t what I want. If anything, I want quick and casual. Before anything else happens, I have to make it clear that I don’t want a relationship.”
Kevin looked letdown, and then excited, all within the one breath. “So, friends with benefits?”
“Maybe just the benefits part. Sometimes. I don’t know. I’m not ready to be with anyone right now. Not tonight.”
He nodded. I fumbled in my bag for my car keys.
“You’re not driving, are you?”
I’d thought about leaving my car there overnight but didn’t want to walk home alone. “I live off campus. It’s a decent walk.”
“I’ll walk you.” He seemed to gauge my reaction. “Just walk you. Really.”
“Really?”
“Hell yeah. You’ve offered me future benefits. I’m not going to blow that.”
I let him escort me, grateful to have someone beside me through the darkness. We talked about everything and nothing. When we reached my front door, he moved to kiss me again. A single, soft kiss. “Just let me know when and how and what you want, and I’ll be there.”
I went inside, closed the door then leaned against it, sliding down to the floor. The dam burst. Tears poured from my eyes as though they’d been waiting to escape all night. I cried myself to sleep there at the front door.
I was woken by knocking. I squinted at the morning light, disoriented. Bedraggled, aching, and half asleep, I opened the door to a courier, delivering a dozen bright and fragrant roses. They were sunset toned, a cheerful yellow fading into the richest golds and scarlet reds. I took the blooms from the delivery woman, and buried my face in them, inhaling deeply. They were an old-fashioned variety with a sweet scent as dizzying as their color.
Nobody had ever sent me flowers before—when I wasn’t in hospital.
There was no card. Could they have been from Kevin, or maybe Blake? I loved them regardless. They brightened my day and made me feel special and wanted.
If only I was certain I had a lifetime to spend with someone who wanted me, and that I wasn’t going to wilt and die as quickly as these flowers.
Chapter Three
GEORGINA
I sat and ate my lunch on my own, surrounded by students coming and going in the huge cafeteria. I could hear discussions on plans for parties, games, dates, and everything except classes. The whole place smelled of tuna fish casserole and chai tea, and the noise levels were deafening. It was a beautiful mess, full of life. I let it all seep into me, churning with the guilt in my belly.
I shouldn’t even be here. There was somewhere else I was supposed to be today. I’m sorry Julie. I can’t. It’s too hard.
I poked my fork into the creamy pasta on my plate, as though that would help me hold myself together.
“I’m all clear! The results were negative.” Kaley appeared beside me so suddenly it was as though by magic. She grabbed the empty seat next to mine, bouncing into it. “No cancer, just a fatty lump or something, but nothing to worry about, totally benign. It’s all okay!” Priya followed not long after, taking the seat on the other side of me.
At nearby tables some other students sat alone, hiding behind their phones or laptop screens. How many were hoping someone would come along and sit beside them? I hadn’t realized how much I had been hoping for that, how much I’d needed the company, and the distraction.
I smiled gratefully at the twins on either sid
e of me then settled my gaze on Kaley. “That’s awesome. I’m so happy for you.”
“Right? I couldn’t even imagine. I knew I was too young.”
I blinked. I took a deep breath. “Just make sure you keep getting check-ups, just in case. Sometimes it does happen very young.”
Kaley nodded, or maybe just kept bouncing. “We SO have to celebrate. You have to come! We could hit the Cannon after class, but I feel like we should do something more, you know? Go big or go home, baby!”
Priya put her hand on mine, speaking over her sister. “How about you? Got your results yet?”
I froze. What should I say? I had too many lies and half-truths to deal with. Blake thought the results were in and I was fine. Dad thought I was still waiting but that I’d been tested much earlier. The twins knew when I’d been tested—they’d been there. The results should have been in by now, and the waiting stretched my anxiety inside me like heavy taffy. Why don’t I have my results yet? Is there a problem?
I should tell them the truth. How likely were they to talk to Blake and mess up my lies?
I fumbled my words. The truth was hard.
Then the radio playing through the cafeteria speakers cut off and an eerie silence spread.
A male voice called from somewhere distant, “Georgie!”
“Huh?” My eyes went round. Why was someone yelling my name? Maybe it was meant for another Georgina, but the voice was familiar, and it made my face turn scarlet. I looked around and saw Kevin walking toward me. Was it him? No, he looked around as though searching for the source of the voice too.
Music started up again, louder than before.
Why can’t I go back, take back the times I didn’t say what I needed to?
Can you take me back, to the time my heart wasn’t broken by you?
Baby, take me. I want you, I want you back.
Six guys from a table across the hall stood up in unison.
Moving in time to the song, they kicked back their chairs, stepped onto the table, and ripped off their jackets to reveal matching tight white T-shirts underneath. Half the cafeteria started whooping and applauding.
Maybe I was dreaming, but the rest of the students were gawping and laughing at the sight as well. A random flash mob seemed weird enough, but even weirder was that they were looking directly at me, dancing toward me.
I shot Kevin an accusatory glare, but he looked just as confused as I felt. He stood there staring and cringed away as the dancers moved past him.
The group reached the widest walkway between the tables which ran down the hall toward where I sat. Students scurried away, clearing a path, and trying to grab the best seats to watch the show.
The music slowed to build for the first chorus.
The dancers parted.
Stepping up in the middle of those cut physiques was Blake.
He looked sinfully handsome in blue jeans and a white singlet that showed off his muscled arms. It clung across his wide chest, and teased the smallest strip of midriff.
He also looked embarrassed as hell, but smiled bashfully through it.
Seeing him caused tremors to shoot through my body. I didn’t know whether to run to him or from him. I could only sit and watch, my jaw dropped, as he started to dance.
Blake doesn’t dance, I thought, my brain dumbstruck.
But he was. He was dancing toward me. He was dancing for me.
And oh boy, how he could dance.
His body seemed built for it. The way it rolled and pumped to the beat was like a force of nature. It was a complicated routine, and the dancers around him clearly knew it better than he did. He stumbled over a couple of moves, twirling left when the others went right. It didn’t matter. Blake was dancing. That was all that mattered.
The music picked up with the chorus, and he sang along. It was a song from five years ago, about wanting his baby back. His voice was as dreamy as his dance moves, his British accent making it even sexier.
And the song—I had loved it back in high school, complete teen-obsession loved it. I had fantasized about meeting the band, and being in their music clips, and which band member would ask me to marry him.
That was a teenage fantasy though, and this was very real. Mortifyingly real. Like having dinner at a restaurant on your birthday and all of sudden, in the middle of your meal while you have a mouthful of food, there was a group of people standing around you singing, while everyone in the restaurant stared at you. Once, I heard someone say that there was only one thing more embarrassing than singing in public, and that was being sung to in public. It felt as true as my face was red.
Blake and the dancers started doing the side-to-side bop that was the signature move of the boy band that had sung the song originally, and half the girls in the cafeteria squealed in delight.
The refrain ‘I want you back’ began to sink in. I hunched low into my chair to hide from the stares and cheers of the cafeteria crowd, as Blake and his backup dancers descended upon me. I covered my face in an attempt to ease my uncontrollable, embarrassment-born laughter.
Blake ended the song down on one knee beside my chair. “I want you back. Give me another chance, Georgina?”
Kaley’s jaw was practically on the table as she looked from Blake, to me, to Blake, mouthing, “Oh. My. God.”
Priya had her phone out. She’d been filming the whole thing. “This is amazing.”
Students across the cafeteria were calling out, “Say yes!” A few girls added, “If she says no, take me!”
On the other side of the room, Kevin stood stock-still. His face wore an expression that said he had no idea what to do next. He shook his head as if to clear it, gave me shrug, and walked off. Blake was not an act he could follow. Poor guy.
The music had ended. The shouts to say yes were picked up by the rest of the crowd until the whole room was chanting. I had to say yes, and Blake knew it. How could I say anything else after that, in front of everyone? It was a giant setup, and that made me angry. I wanted to run. All those days I had missed Blake, fighting every desire to see him again, and there he was, in my college cafeteria, ambushing me with my own teenage fantasy.
“Yes,” I squeaked.
Cheers erupted.
Blake got up off his knee and thanked his backup dancers with a quick round of fist bumps and high fives. Priya put her phone down, scribbled her number on a scrap of paper, and stuck it straight in the jeans pocket of one of the dancers, giving him a wink.
Blake turned back to me and took my hand. I could see the apology in his smile. “Let’s get out of here.”
The whole crowd applauded and wolf whistled as we ran out hand in hand.
Chapter Four
GEORGINA
Outside the cafeteria, away from the crowd, I pulled my hand free of Blake’s.
He turned back to look at me and winced. “I’m sorry if that was as embarrassing for you as it was for me.”
“That was a total ambush. It’s not fair to put someone on the spot like that. Me saying yes under pressure—it doesn’t mean we’re back together.” My heart still raced from the public spectacle of it all, as much as from the feel of Blake’s hand holding mine. It had been hard letting go, but it had to be done.
“I know.” His voice was solemn. “I wouldn’t have chosen to do it that way, only it wasn’t really my choice.”
Of course he wouldn’t have chosen that. He didn’t dance. He used to; he used to be one of Seyvia’s dancers. But her death must have also killed that part of him, the part that danced. So why dance now?
“Whose choice was it, then?”
Blake gave me a cheeky smirk. “Give me that one last chance. Go out with me tonight and I’ll tell you.”
I folded my arms. “Now you’re adding curiosity blackmail onto public ambushing?”
“Bugger, okay. Not a good move.” Blake rubbed his chin as though thinking it through. “But you are curious, aren’t you?”
I snorted a tiny chuckle. Damn it, don’t let
him know he’s getting to you.
He swayed his hips gently. “And that was kind of fun, back there, with the dancing?”
I failed to hide my smile.
“Just give me a go. A fresh start, without that list, free from what you were going through then. One night. One proper date. Please, Georgie?”
Looking into his blue eyes, how they gazed down into mine, my heart cracked open.
Say no. Say goodbye. You can’t have this, no matter what you want. He doesn’t deserve another tragedy.
My mouth opened but nothing came out. How could I say no to those eyes?
Maybe a compromise …
“Just one night. One last night. To say goodbye properly.”
Blake frowned, but nodded. He let me know when he’d be round to pick me up, then turned away.
Before he was out of earshot, I called out, “It was fun, back in the cafeteria. Like something out of a music video. It was nice seeing you dance.”
Back home after class, I turned my wardrobe inside out trying to find something to wear. I had no idea where Blake planned to take me, which didn’t help the decision process. I wanted to dress casual, but not too casual, just in case we went somewhere posh. I didn’t want to look unattractive, but didn’t want to dress too sexily. I didn’t want to give Blake any false hopes. I didn’t want to give myself any either.
I checked my reflection. I was fooling myself if I thought I wasn’t trying to look appealing. I’d chosen my tightest jeans, a semi-sheer lace blouse, and ended up with more makeup on than I should have. Maybe the deep red lipstick was too much. I hesitated, knowing my full lips were one of my best features but not really wanting to draw his attention to them, because then he might want to kiss them. And I was supposed to be not wanting him to kiss me.
I really want him to kiss me.
A knock came from the front door, and I rubbed some of the color off my lips with the back of my hand.
I opened the door for Blake, and he came inside while I chased up my phone and purse.
