by Claire Adams
“What if he hates me?”
“I mean, if he hates you it’s because of what you already did—not much you can do about that.” I had to acknowledge that that was true. “You know you’re going to be miserable until you go back to him and at least try to explain things.”
I looked at my history textbook. “You’re right. I’ll do it tomorrow.” Jess giggled, taking her bottle of water with her back into her room.
CHAPTER FIVE
The next night, I made the trek across campus to see Zack. I knew the frat was throwing a party—there were fliers for it all over campus—but I wasn’t there to get drunk. It was just a question of not having the opportunity until evening to actually talk; my schedule was too packed. It was already dark when I left the dorms; Jess had detained me in my room until she was completely satisfied with how I looked to confront Zack and tell him what was on my mind.
“You can’t just go over there looking like you just left the library,” Jess told me when I announced I was going to go find Zack.
“Why not? I did just leave the library.”
Jess groaned and dragged me to my bedroom, sitting me down on the bed as she rummaged through my closet.
“You need to look like you’re on point, girl,” Jess said, picking up and putting back hangers, flipping through the different dresses, skirts, shirts, and everything else in my closet.
“If Zack doesn’t want to listen to what I have to say then wearing something different isn’t going to change that.”
“First of all,” Jess said, turning to face me with her arms crossed over her chest. “You don’t know that for sure. Looking sexy could very well tip the balance. Second of all, you’re going to be seeing a bunch of his frat brothers too—you don’t want them to give you the run-around, do you?”
“They’re not going to treat me any differently based on how I’m dressed, Jess.”
Jess sighed. “Okay. Say Zack has given up on you and told his frat brothers he doesn’t want to talk to you. You show up looking like you’ve been under a pile of books all afternoon, you’re nothing more than a mousey freshman. Easy to run interference on. Roll up looking so hot you might burn them and they won’t have any blood flowing to their brains to think of lying to you.” I tried to come up with an argument against that, but I couldn’t.
So Jess picked out a skintight pencil skirt for me to wear, and as soon as it was on, she inched up the hem a little bit to show more of my legs. “It’s cold outside!” I protested, trying to tug the fabric back down. Jess swatted my hand away.
“It’s not that cold and you’re walking there, right? Besides it’ll be warm enough in the frat house with everyone packed in.” I made a face but once more gave in. Jess went into her own closet and found a blouse that would fit me; it was a deep red, with a plunging neckline that showed off my cleavage, made of a flimsy, soft material. “Wear a jacket over it, but take the jacket off as soon as you get to the frat house,” she suggested.
Jess then went to work on my hair, pulling it back in a sexy loose bun with messy little distracting strands falling around my face.
By the time I was done, my makeup in place and a pair of low-heeled boots on my feet, I had to admit that I looked incredibly hot—but that I didn’t look as if I’d spent an hour on getting ready. I thought to myself that it probably wouldn’t make any difference at all—after all, if Zack had already moved on to someone else, no matter how hot I looked, he wouldn’t be interested. But it certainly helped to bolster my confidence as I walked along the different pathways that led from the dorms across the campus to frat row.
My toes were starting to hurt in the boots by the time I got to the frat house; even a block away I could hear the roar of music turned all the way up, and as I slipped my jacket off and draped it over my arm, following Jess’ advice, I could make out the fact that there were a ton of people scattered over the lawn, packed into the house—and probably still more in the back yard. I shook my head; at least some of the people partying it up had to have classes the next day—but they’d either be too hungover to make it, or they’d be utterly useless when they did get into class. I rolled my eyes at myself. Not everyone had my priorities, and not everyone was depending on scholarships and their own hard work to pay their way. If they wanted a raging hangover the next day, it was on them.
I approached the front door, moving through a throng of people who were milling around, stumbling and talking too loudly. It occurred to me that at the rate the party was raging, it would end up getting dispersed in next to no time. But that wasn’t my problem. I went to the front door and knocked on it—fully expecting to have to knock again. But there was someone who was apparently waiting for new arrivals; one of the pledges, wearing a toga that couldn’t possibly be warm enough for the weather outside, opened the door with a boozy grin.
“Good evening, and welcome to the party!”
He handed me a red Solo cup from a loaded-down table next to the door; I almost refused it—I wasn’t there to get drunk—but I decided I’d be able to move around a lot more freely if I had a cup in hand; I wouldn’t be as conspicuous.
“Maybe you can help me,” I said, trying a polite smile on the freshman in front of me. “I’m looking for Zack—any idea where he is?”
The guy shrugged, nearly losing the shoulder on his bed sheet toga. “No clue, hot stuff,” he said, the grin still on his face. “They have me manning the door—I don’t know where anyone is unless they’re right here.”
“Thanks anyway.” I edged away from the guy, taking a sip of the cup. It was punch; it wasn’t as good as the punch I’d had the previous party, but I figured that the people at the party were so intent on getting plastered that it wouldn’t much matter to them anyway. I wandered through the public rooms of the frat house, looking for any sign of Zack.
I grabbed one of the upperclassmen as he was walking through the living room. “Hey,” I said, keeping my polite smile plastered on my face. “I’m looking for Zack—is he around?”
“I don’t know; I saw him around earlier but I haven’t seen him in a minute. I’ll talk to you, though.”
My smile grew in my nervousness. “That’s okay—I just needed to talk to Zack about something. I think that girl over there is trying to get your attention though.” The guy looked in the direction I pointed out and saw a girl who was looking in our direction; he made a beeline to her.
I sipped my drink, trying not to go too fast. I went to the back yard and saw—to my amazement—a bunch of people cavorting in and around the pool; it was in the fifties outside but they seemed to be mostly comfortable. There was no sign of Zack, and I narrowly avoided getting pulled into the pool by an aggressive partier. I went back inside and into the kitchen. Someone tried to convince me to take another drink, but I waved my mostly-empty cup, smiling brightly and saying I was just pacing myself so I wouldn’t get sick.
I found another member of the frat dispersed amongst the crowd; he was someone I thought I’d seen with Zack at the dining hall at one point or another. “I’m looking for Zack,” I said; the guy looked like he was just this side of plastered, staring down the front of my shirt. I felt skeeved out, but I didn’t make a move to cover myself up—after all, this was what Jess had had in mind with the outfit I was wearing. “Have you seen him?”
The guy’s features screwed up into a caricature of deep thinking, his brow furrowing and his lips twisting in a grimace. “I know he was in the living room a while back—but I don’t know if he’s there anymore. Zack kinda moves around a lot.”
I nodded and thanked the guy, pulling away and heading towards the living room before he could think of who he was talking to—or decide to waylay me.
I wandered through all of the public areas of the frat house, even going upstairs to the den there to see if Zack was hanging out with some of the more elite guests. I watched someone get thrown into the pool for smoking inside the frat house, saw couples canoodling together on couches and any horiz
ontal surface that would hold their weight. I remembered the fact that Zack and I had been making out right in public—just like so many of the couples here—and blushed. I tried my best to find Zack on my own, moving constantly until my feet started to ache. I started to despair of ever finding him; the frat was simply too packed, and there were too many places where Zack could be. It would be impossible to track him down if no one knew where he was.
Part of me even started to wonder if Zack was there at all. After all—those of his frat brothers who could remember seeing him had said that it had been a while. Zack could have gotten the party started, and then wandered off to another party at a sorority or another frat, or he could have even gone off campus. I realized I really didn’t know very much about his life, all things told; I had been shocked to find out that he apparently went to the Library regularly, after all. The music, pounding constantly in my ears, was starting to give me a headache—I couldn’t hear myself think, and if I had to ask many more people where Zack was, I was going to end up hoarse the next day from shouting. It was a stupid idea; I should have just called or texted him and asked him to meet me somewhere. That way, he could have told me outright if he never wanted to speak to me again.
I decided that I would ask one last person—someone at the frat—if they knew where Zack was, and if I couldn’t get an answer that made sense, I would call it a night and maybe go back to the dorms and send him an email. It was a cowardly way out of the situation, but at least it was something. I couldn’t deal with the drunk, lurching, loud mess of the party for much longer. I looked around and found someone who I thought I recognized from either the previous party or one of the times I had seen Zack around; he was wearing a toga, indicating he was a member of the frat, and he looked like an upperclassman—probably he was in the same year as Zack was.
“Hey! Excuse me!” I ducked and darted around the people between me and the frat brother. “Hey!” The guy stopped and I caught my breath, downing the last of the contents of my cup. “Hey, you know Zack, right?”
The guy looked me up and down with an undisguised leer on his face. “Yeah, I know him—he was in the same pledge group as me. You looking for him?” I nodded. “He’s up in his room. Punked out on the party early. Must be off his feed.”
I laughed, the alcohol beginning to fuzz my brain slightly. “Where’s his room? I just need to talk to him about something.”
The guy looked me up and down again. “Yeah, you might be able to get him to talk. He’s been moping these last few days. He’s on the third floor, last door on the right.”
I let the toga-clad brother give me a quick, sweaty hug—holding back my instinctive cringe. He was off in the direction of some other girls in the next instant, fortunately; I didn’t know what I would actually do to distract him if I’d had to.
I climbed the stairs, dodging around people who were heading down to the living room or to the second floor—or who were simply stalled out, too drunk to know where they were going. The last flight of stairs was much less crowded, and I raced up them, my heart pounding in my chest at the thought of seeing Zack. What if he didn’t even want to see me? I bit my lip, telling myself that surely he had enough feeling for me to at least hear me out. He had to.
It struck me as strange that the music was every bit as loud on the third floor as it was downstairs; I looked around as I walked through the hall of bedrooms, and noticed that speakers were mounted at the ends of the hallway—that made sense. I wondered if there were ever issues with sick brothers trying to get sleep in their rooms while a party raged downstairs; probably not, with a group like the one Zack belonged to. I walked the length of the hall, smiling slightly to myself as I spotted a few doors with neckties on them; as innocent as I was, I knew full well that particular sign and its meaning. I hurried to the end of the hall and looked at Zack’s door for a long moment. There was no necktie on his door knob; he wasn’t with anyone.
For a long moment I was just standing there, the music pounding around me, the sound of a couple hundred people partying below. The one drink hadn’t been enough to get me drunk, but it had left my brain fuzzy, and I didn’t quite know if I was ready. What if Zack didn’t want to talk to me? I pressed my lips together. My hands felt like they were weighted down with lead. I swallowed against the tightness I felt in my throat. I just had to get through it, I told myself. If he didn’t want to hear me out, I’d at least know that it was done with us permanently. I lifted my hand to knock on the door; it fell to my side once more as I continued to stand there. If he sent me away without hearing me out—if he didn’t answer or if he did and then just told me not to bother, I’d have to be ready to walk through the frat house without looking like I was going to cry. I took a deep breath and lifted my hand again. I knocked on the door quick and hard, my knuckles stinging from it—I wanted to make sure that Zack could hear me over the music.
“Yo! I’m not feeling it!” he called out from inside. My heart fluttered in my chest and I knocked again. “I said I’m not feeling it, bro!” I knocked a third time.
Instead of calling out again, after a moment, the door opened abruptly, showing Zack standing there, changed out of his toga—if he’d ever been in a toga in the first place. He was standing there with an irritated look on his face, in a pair of worn jeans and a tee shirt. The irritable look dissolved in a moment, as soon as he saw that it was me. I blushed as Zack’s gaze traveled up and down along my whole body, taking me in slowly, a mixture of surprise and consternation on his face. The red Solo cup was still in my hand and I fidgeted with it, smiling nervously.
“Evie,” He said; I could barely hear him over the music.
“Yeah, it’s me,” I said, my throat tight. “Can I talk to you for a minute?”
Zack’s eyes widened and he opened the door wider. “Yeah—yeah, absolutely.”
I stepped into Zack’s room and my knees went weak. It was cleaner than I would have expected; there was a pile of dirty laundry next to the closet, but there was no trash hanging around, only a few empty reusable water bottles. It smelled like him, and I closed my eyes for a moment, breathing it in. I turned in time to see Zack closing the door and I wondered if he had put a necktie on the knob—to signal that we needed privacy. I wasn’t sure whether or not I wanted everyone to think that Zack was having sex.
“I…” I licked my lips, leaning against his bed, unsure of how to actually start saying what I was there to tell him.
“It’s so good to see you. What did I do, Evie?”
I shook my head. “You didn’t do anything, it’s not your fault, it’s my fault.” Words were tumbling out of my lips in an unsteady rush. “There’s…I’ve been an idiot. Just…okay. I’m sorry; I just don’t really know how to explain it.”
“Evie, calm down,” Zack said, smiling faintly. He moved closer to me and kissed me lightly on the cheek. “Just say what you came to say. I swear I’ll listen to you—I won’t interrupt.”
I swallowed again, wishing I hadn’t had the drink that the brother at the door had handed to me.
“Okay.” I took a deep breath and tried to collect my thoughts. “So the other day, after…I guess after practice…there was a guy hanging out at my dorm room door.” Zack raised an eyebrow, but he didn’t say anything to interrupt me. “I recognized him; he was someone from your team. Anyway, he told me he would consider it a personal favor if I would stop hanging out with you, if I would just leave you alone. He didn’t really give me any reasons. At first, I just sort of brushed it off. I told him if he didn’t get the hell away from my room I’d call the RAs.” I smiled slightly.
“That sounds about right,” Zack said, reaching out and taking my hands in his. I hadn’t realized how much they were shaking until I had Zack’s firm, warm grip.
“But then I got to thinking that he must have thought I was a distraction, and that things could really easily get to be really serious between us, and I don’t want to be a distraction to you—I just panicked.” Zack nodded
. “I didn’t know how to tell you why—or what was going on. So I just sort of…” I shrugged.
“You could have told me, you know,” Zack said gently.
I nodded. “Well yeah, I figured that out, but I sort of wasn’t thinking rationally, you know?”
Zack grinned. “So that explains you totally freezing me out at the game the other day.”
“I suppose, yeah. I just…I’m really sorry, Zack. Jess has already explained to me how much of an idiot I am.”
Zack shook his head, smiling still. “Man. I—I shouldn’t admit this to you, but I was a total mess that night because I just couldn’t get you out of my head. I kept wondering if you were watching, and I didn’t know if I wanted you to be watching or not.”
I laughed slightly. “You’re mental, you know.” I leaned in and kissed him lightly on the lips.
Zack wrapped his arms around my waist and deepened the kiss, pressing my body close to his. In spite of the alcohol I’d consumed that night, I didn’t start to really feel drunk until Zack and I began to kiss. I could smell the scent of his cologne and soap, the softer smell of his skin, the undercurrent of his sweat. The music swirled around me, penetrating even into the room—muted, but still present. Through the floor I heard a loud cheer, but I didn’t care what the cause was.
Zack broke away from my lips after a long moment; my heart was pounding in my chest. I had only come to apologize and explain, but in a matter of only a few heartbeats, just being around Zack and feeling his body pressed to mine had awakened the bone-deep hunger I’d been trying to ignore for days.
“Why were you up here, and not at the party?” I asked him breathlessly, that one aspect of the evening sticking in my head. “I’ve been looking for you for like an hour.”
Zack shook his head. “You could’ve just texted and asked what I was up to, you know.”
I rolled my eyes. “And that would have ruined the whole point of coming here. That’s not an answer to my question, you know.”
