by S. Walden
He had to swallow his instant thought: Because of you. My God, did he have no control?
He gave her a safe answer instead, listened as she offended the other students at the table, then watched her stomp off towards the cafeteria doors. Little brat, he thought, though he knew he instigated her anger. He played a mean game, and he wasn’t sorry for it. She stomped off for now, but he’d see her again. And again and again. She was going to be his girlfriend. And he was going to make her love him.
***
“Avery’s spending the night with Marybeth,” Cadence said, trying hard not to laugh.
“Marybeth?” Mark asked.
“I couldn’t resist,” Cadence said. “It’s the most virginal, sweet, Christian-sounding name I’ve ever heard, so I chose it for Avery’s campus friend.”
Mark rolled his eyes. “The Campus Crusade for Christ friend?”
“Mmhmm,” Avery replied. She pulled up “Marybeth’s” contact info on her phone and showed Mark.
He leaned in to take a look at Cadence’s number. “Clever.”
“We know,” Avery replied. She paused for a second. “Nice to see you again, Mr. Connelly.”
“That’s cute. Call me Mark.”
“Hmm. No, I think I’m gonna call you Mr. Connelly for a while.”
The girls giggled.
Mark pushed a hand through his hair. “Do I need to go somewhere else?”
“No,” the girls said in unison.
“Fine. I’m calling Dylan.”
“Who’s Dylan?” Avery asked, watching Mark walk to the bedroom.
“Mark’s friend. The guy who owns the record store.”
“Ohhh. Is he cute?”
“He’s cute. He’s dating a witch, though. So I don’t know what that says about his intelligence.”
“Nothing wrong with a good witch,” Avery said.
“She’s not a good witch. She’s just a witch.”
“Hmm. Well, good witch bad bitch—”
“Witch,” Cadence corrected, then smirked.
“That’s what I said. Bitch. Anyway, I don’t care if he’s a retard,” Avery said. “So long as he’s freaking hot.”
Cadence smiled patiently.
“You think he’ll come over?”
“Don’t get any ideas,” Cadence warned. She flipped the page of her magazine.
“Ideas? What ideas? I don’t have any ideas,” Avery argued.
Cadence stared at her.
“I’m freaking horny, okay! I haven’t been laid in months! Can’t I just have someone cute to look at and fantasize about?”
“But won’t that make it worse?” Cadence asked.
“Yeah, but I don’t care. I need a guy, Cadence. Okay? I need a guy to flirt with me and then ravage me.”
“He’s got a girlfriend.”
“I’ll take care of that.”
“Oh, Lordy.”
“Show me a little bit of kindness, all right? I’m desperate over here. Hello? Song of Solomon, anyone?”
Cadence closed her magazine. “Wanna paint our nails?”
“No, I don’t wanna paint my nails! I wanna fuck! I just wanna get fucked really hard!”
Mark cleared his throat.
Avery whipped her head around. “Oh, fuck.”
“Yeah, so I’m gonna go to the store for beer. That’s the only way I could get Dylan to come over.”
“Will you get us something?” Avery asked.
“No.”
She folded her arms over her chest and screwed up her face.
“He’s not bringing her, is he?” Cadence asked.
“Who? Portia?”
Cadence nodded.
“He broke up with her a week ago or something,” Mark replied.
Avery sat folded up on the couch sporting a sour expression, but inside . . . oh, inside her heart was glowing! Pulsating, actually, with hope. She felt the pulsing move from her chest to her inner thighs and squeezed her legs tight.
“Bye bye, Mr. Connelly,” she said, trying to push him out the door so she could squeal to Cadence.
Mark opened his mouth to reply, but he had nothing to say. He winked at Cadence then left. She knew what the wink signaled. He knew what Avery was up to, and he also knew she wouldn’t have a chance with Dylan.
He had no idea how wrong he was.
All four sat at the dining room table holding cards and placing bids. Avery glanced every now and then over the tops of her cards at Dylan, who sat directly across from her. They were playing Spades, and she was on Mark’s team. Dylan had this weird rule about card playing: couples couldn’t be partners, so Mark was reluctantly paired with Avery while Cadence teamed up with Dylan.
Dylan grinned at Avery, then took a swig of his beer. Cadence watched with amusement. Mark was skeptical of his friend’s intentions. He wouldn’t necessarily call Dylan a player though he went through women like tissues. It was really that no one could meet his ridiculously high standards. Or maybe that was just his excuse to stay uncommitted. He didn’t sleep with all of them. He didn’t sleep with many of them, actually, because they didn’t meet his standards. And he was terrified of STDs.
Mark chuckled.
“What’s funny?” Avery asked. “Please don’t tell me your hand sucks.”
He shook his head. “Nah. We’re winning this round. Just follow my lead.”
“You’re such a cocky asshole when you play cards,” Dylan piped up. “And you’re not even good at it.”
Cadence giggled.
“Mr. Connelly, maybe since I’m spending the night, you can let Cadence and me drink a little.” Avery smiled sweetly.
“Keep calling me ‘Mr. Connelly’ and you can forget about it,” he replied.
“What?” she cried indignantly. “It’s funny. And anyway, you were a teacher at my school. I can’t just call you by your first name. That’s, like, totally disrespectful.”
“I call him by his first name,” Cadence pointed out.
“You’re also fucking him,” Avery said.
“Oh my God, Avery!” Cadence cried.
“What? Just sayin’,” Avery huffed. She winked at Dylan who burst out laughing.
Mark sighed patiently. “Avery, play a card.”
“Oh, it’s my turn?” she asked, reaching for Dylan’s beer. She took a swig and threw down an eight of clubs. “You don’t mind sharing, do you?”
Dylan shook his head. “All yours.”
The double entendre wasn’t lost on Cadence or Mark. They eyed each other, passing the unspoken message, “What do we do now?”
“Do you like your job, Dylan?” Avery asked.
“Of course I do. I own my own business. I’m my own boss,” he said. He breathed in deeply, letting his chest swell, making sure she could see.
Oh, she saw, and she flirted back by biting into her lower lip, pretending that she was concentrating on her next play.
She pouted when Dylan trumped her king of hearts.
“Nothing personal, babe,” he said, pulling the cards towards him.
She finished off his beer. “I’ll get you the next time.”
“Dear God,” Cadence mumbled. “Just get it over with already. But not in our room. Go to the guestroom.”
Avery burst out laughing.
“Cadence!” Mark said.
“Have you not been listening to this conversation?” she asked him.
He opened his mouth to reply when Cadence’s phone rang. Avery’s house phone number showed up.
“Avery! What am I supposed to do?!” Cadence cried.
“Answer it and act like Marybeth.”
“I can’t do that! You know I can’t! I’ll ruin all of it!”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake! Give it to me,” Avery snapped, grabbing Cadence’s cell phone.
“Don’t! Oh my God, just don’t!”
“I’ll take it from here,” Dylan said, calmly plucking the phone from Avery’s hand. He placed his finger over his mouth and pressed the answer
key. “This is Marybeth’s phone. May I ask who’s calling?”
Cadence and Avery held their breath.
“This is her father, actually. She left her cell phone downstairs. The girls are upstairs watching a movie. Uh huh. Oh, yes. Hello, Mrs. Fisher. Marybeth told me about you . . .”
Mark listened, intrigued.
“. . . She’s a lovely girl. Mmhmm . . .”
Dylan chuckled at something Mrs. Fisher said. It was so insincere that Avery had to slap her hand over her mouth to keep from laughing.
“. . . I hear you on that one!” Dylan said. “It’s hard to find good influences these days . . .”
Mark rolled his eyes.
“. . . Well, I’m glad you called to check up on her. Sounds great. Okay. Have a splendid night, Mrs. Fisher.”
Dylan hung up and tossed the phone to Cadence.
“Done,” he said. “Who wants another beer?”
Avery stared at him with newfound respect. “Me,” she breathed. “I’d like another.”
“Cadence?” he asked.
“I haven’t had any,” she replied.
Dylan looked at her confused. “Yeah, I’m asking if you want one.”
“Well, you asked who wanted another.”
Mark smirked.
Dylan thought for a moment. “Look it. Do you want a beer or not?”
Cadence automatically looked at Mark. Avery saw and pounced on it.
“What? You need Mr. Connelly’s permission to drink?”
“No.” Cadence bristled. She didn’t think she was asking permission. She thought it had more to do with Gracie and her vague recollection of the frat party. Gracie said it was her choice, but Cadence didn’t believe her. Everything about that night was wrong, and she never wanted to feel that vulnerable again when she drank. She realized right then that it wasn’t a matter of asking for permission to drink. She was asking Mark, “Will you take care of me?” if she did.
Mark understood and ignored Avery. “I’ll take care of you,” he whispered.
Cadence turned to Dylan and nodded.
Avery sat grinning. “You’re a good man, Mr. Connelly.”
“Thank you, Avery.”
Although he tried to prevent it, the girls got tipsy. Well, Cadence got tipsy. Avery got drunk. Thankfully there was no puking, but he could have gone without some of the giggling. It’s not that he minded their laughter. It really had to do with the fact that they wouldn’t listen to him when he tried to put them to bed. They giggled instead. He ended up yelling at Avery because she tried to strip in front of him. She couldn’t understand why it was a big deal. She was only changing into her pajamas.
“You’ve seen a bra, Mr. Connelly,” Avery huffed.
“Not yours,” he replied. He grabbed her overnight bag and tossed it in the bathroom. “Go in there.”
She stood with her hands on her hips and grinned at him. “You’re a square.”
He laughed despite his irritation. “Where’d you even learn that? Talk about retro.”
“That’s why I said it to you. You’re all hipster and vintage and shit.” She pointed to his Pink Floyd T-shirt Cadence wore. And then she grabbed his fedora off the bureau and plopped it on her head. She searched the room until she spotted his red Converse All Stars, and slipped her socked feet in them. “Hello, everyone. My name is Mr. Connelly, and I enjoy math, instrumental hip hop, and Cadence’s pussy.”
“AVERY!” Cadence squealed.
Avery laughed, then did some kind of turn that resembled a Michael Jackson dance move. She clutched the hat on her head while she did it.
“My name is Mr. Connelly,” she went on. “And I enjoy styling my hair all crazy and flirting with teenage girls.”
Cadence rolled off the bed with laughter.
“One teenage girl,” he corrected. “One.”
“He said ‘one’, folks! And I—” She paused and looked straight at him. “—believe him.”
Mark rolled his eyes. “That makes me very happy. Now are you done?”
She continued, undeterred. “My name is Mr. Connelly, and I wear cool sneakers and drink sodas that were hip and trendy before my time.” She attempted the Moon Walk, but his sneakers were too big, and she fell backwards onto her bottom.
He laughed hard. He wondered how many she had in her.
“I’m Mr. Connelly, and I’m gonna teach you math, music, and how to be a trendy hipster philosopher.”
“I’m a philosopher?” he asked.
“That’s what Cadence told me when she first met you. She said you looked like a guy who sits around in independent coffee shops discussing philosophy.”
Avery struggled to stand back up, and Mark reached out his hand to her. He glanced at Cadence who was curled up on the floor, already snoring.
“A philosopher and a square,” Mark said.
“Almost a square,” Avery replied thoughtfully. “You fucked your student, so you’re not completely square.”
Mark’s face blushed a deep crimson. He thought he heard Cadence giggle in her sleep.
“Avery, go change, and then go to bed,” he said.
“Hey, you never thanked me,” Avery griped. She slid off his shoes. “You have really clean shoes, Mr. Connelly,” she noted.
“Thank you for what?”
She looked up. “Huh?”
“I never thanked you for what?” Mark asked patiently.
“Ohhh. Being Cadence’s friend. Without me you wouldn’t have been able to sneak around with her.”
She was right: Though Avery was driven by her own self-serving motives, she did allow Cadence and Mark to be together. She created the lies, spun the web of deceit. And her motives ultimately benefited him in the end. Sure, he and Cadence eventually got tangled in the web, but there were several blissful months before they were found out. Secret months of secret love that blossomed in this small apartment. Memories. Building a life with Cadence. And it was all because of Avery.
He studied her face. She expected a “thank you,” but she was being silly about it. She couldn’t help it. She was drunk.
“Thank you, Avery,” Mark said softly, and he wasn’t being silly about it at all.
***
Mark strolled through the door and made a beeline for Dylan.
“What do you think you’re doing?” he asked Dylan, who sat in his usual position: feet propped up on the counter.
“What are you talking about?”
“Avery.”
Dylan cracked a smile. “Ah, yes. Avery. What about her?”
“Don’t get any ideas. I know you too well. You date the same girl for about three weeks before moving on to someone new.”
“Relax. I don’t plan to date her.”
Mark sighed relief.
“I plan to marry her.”
“What?!”
Dylan burst out laughing. “That’s my girl, right there. Wanna know why I’ve dated all these years and never settled down? I was waiting for her to come along.”
“Dylan, this is a terrible idea.”
“Why? You’re dating a youngin. I recall little Miss Cadence being seventeen when you two started seeing each other.”
“It’s a completely different thing!” Mark argued.
“How so?” Dylan swung his legs off the counter and stood up.
“It’s weird. What are we? The ‘We Date Way Younger Girls’ club?”
“You can be the president since you started it,” Dylan said.
“Shut up. I’m being serious.”
“I can’t help Cadence has a hot friend. And she’s nineteen. Perfectly legal. And she’s my dream come true.”
“You played cards with her one night. How is she your dream girl? This is purely chemical.”
“Nope. Her brain, man. I figured out how she operates. She’s incredibly intelligent. She’ll keep me on my toes. She’ll challenge me. She’ll entertain me.”
“She’s not a circus animal, Dylan. She’s an actual girl. With feelings.
And you’ll hurt hers. And I won’t let you do it because I cannot deal with that kind of aftermath.”
Mark could see it now: Avery bursting through his door crying her eyes out. An all-night sob session about how awful and stupid and callous men are, and he’d have to sit through the whole thing and agree. All while handing out tissues for tears and spoons for ice cream.
Fuck. That.
“It’s not happening,” Mark decided. “You can forget it.”
“We have a date Friday.”
“Damnit, Dylan!”
“I love when you alliterate.”
“Fuck you.”
“Relax, bro. Everything will work out just fine. It’s only a date. She may end up hating me by the end of it.”
“I hope so,” Mark muttered.
“Is it that you don’t like her?” Dylan asked. He dropped the playful tone.
Mark shook his head. “It’s not that at all. I just foresee a lot of messiness in the future. She’s very connected. Do you understand? If you hurt her, you hurt Cadence. And by default, you hurt me. That’s how it works. I don’t wanna deal with juggling people’s feelings. Managing emotions. I mean for Cadence, yes. But not for you or Avery.”
“I get that. But Avery isn’t your business,” Dylan replied.
“Well, I disagree, but you’re gonna do what you want.”
“Trust me, Mark. I wouldn’t go out of my way to make your life difficult. And it’s just a date.”
“Fine. But can you refrain from sleeping with her?”
“I don’t sleep with anyone on the first date,” Dylan said.
Mark nodded. That was true. The STD fear. “Knowing you, it’ll end up working out.”
Dylan chuckled. “Would that be so wrong?”
Mark shrugged. “Maybe not. Still weird, but who the hell am I to tell anyone who to date?”
“Wiser words were never spoken,” Dylan replied.
Mark thought for a moment. “You really didn’t try to discourage me.”
“Huh?”
“When I told you about Cadence. I mean, you said I was crazy and heartbroken and all that. You did say bad shit could happen, but even then, you said you’d still be my friend and visit me in the slammer.”
Dylan nodded.
“Why?”
“Because people don’t have the right to choose a life for someone else.”
“Sure, but there are still rules,” Mark pointed out.
