by Morgan Kyle
UNSURE
THING
Morgan Kyle
Copyright © 2015 by Morgan Kyle
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without prior written consent of the Author.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons living or dead is entirely coincidental.
Prologue — Cole
I’m in the Athletic Director’s office, a cramped space barely big enough for the four of us. The Athletic Director sitting behind his desk; Coach Malone, sitting to the AD’s left; and someone, a woman, from the University administration perched in a small aluminum chair to Coach’s right. The three of them facing me, as I sit in a chair that feels like a witness chair in a courtroom, the only difference is that I’m not a witness. I’m the accused.
It’s hot in this office, but I’m careful not to take too many sips of water, careful not to show any sign of weakness in front of them, careful not to blink too much, swallow hard, fidget and squirm in my seat.
Who are they to judge, anyway?
There’s Coach Malone, a guy in his forties, single, no kids, and if he had any shot at all at banging a cheerleader, he would. I know he would. Even though I don’t know him that well.
There’s the Athletic Director, an alumnus of the University, a guy in his fifties who played football here. I don’t know if he’s married, don’t know if he has any kids, don’t know anything about him, in fact, other than I’m quite sure when he was my age he wouldn’t have sat across from me looking smug like he is now. No, he’d give me one of those fellow jock nudges, a punch on the shoulder, maybe even a blatant high-five.
And maybe Coach would, too.
But that would be just because I had fucked her. Just because I had achieved another of the proverbial “notch on the bedpost” or whatever that old phrase is that no one uses anymore.
I make eye contact with the woman from the University administration. I wonder why they sent her. Some kind of legal requirement? Must have a woman present during an inquisition into sexual misconduct. Something like that, I guess, but I don’t know for sure.
What I do know, beyond any question, is that she hates me. I’m guilty in her mind, and the questions haven’t even started. I can tell what she’s thinking by the way her body is turned in the chair, both feet on the floor, knees pressed together turned to one side, toward Coach’s desk. But her eyes are focused on me, and that pursed-lip look is a dead giveaway; it’s obvious that her presence here is a simple formality, that she’d nail my balls to the wall no matter what I say.
And the questioning begins with the Athletic Director, who says, “Tell us how and when you met Brooke Wallace.”
This is when I’d like to reach for the water, take a sip, just a small one, enough to wet my lips and tongue because the mention of her name has made my mouth gone dry. I hate the fact that I’m even slightly nervous about this proceeding.
I sit back in the rickety wooden chair, cross my left leg over my right, smooth the thigh of my jeans with one hand. I look out the window over Coach’s shoulder. The window is frosting up, the sky a dark gray, and the flurries will start soon. I see lines of people walking, students making their way to their dorms to pack up for Christmas break, the last of their exams finally completed.
And I sit here with three people who want to judge me for breaking a rule on some piece of paper. A rule that wasn’t designed for people like Brooke and me. It just wasn’t. We were different.
But I can’t tell them that.
I can’t tell them the truth. Can’t tell them what really happened.
And so I answer that first question with a lie, the first of many I’m sure I’ll have to tell in this office today, all while trying not to slip up and tell it like it really was.
Brooke is better at telling the real story, anyway.
Chapter One — Brooke
Four months ago…
Of all the things to dread about going back to school, you’d think a party wouldn’t be one of them. But it was. I guess because it was a frat party, and a frat house is one of the last places I’d ever want to be caught, ranking somewhere on the list just below a solid waste management facility and a Barry Manilow concert. (Sorry, Barry fans, he was just the first one that came to mind.)
In my first three years here at UNC, someone on the swim team organized a sort of back-to-school party, but this year no one did, and so we were left crashing this frat party. I guess I was partly to blame for that. It was the beginning of my senior year, so maybe as a senior I should have taken the initiative to get our own party. But no one else did, either, so we were kind of stuck.
The house was crowded, loud, smoky, and hot, most of all hot. All the windows and doors were open, the party spilling out onto the front and back lawns. I stayed inside only long enough to fill a red Solo cup with some shitty beer. Waiting in line, I tried to ignore the horrible “jam band” music pumping out of the speakers, tried not to look too long at the various clusters of frat guys, arms around each other, smiling, laughing, patting each other on the tops of their heads—all part of the “bro culture” that made me want to vomit.
I know all of that makes me sound bitter, but I wasn’t. I really just didn’t want to be in that place, at that time. If things hadn’t gone so awry, I’d be home and probably talking on the phone with Ryan. That probably sounds like a boring thing to do on a weekend night, but just a few short months ago I was sure he was The Guy, the one I’d marry, the one I’d have kids with, grow old with, make a life with….
But Ryan had other ideas, mainly that it was okay to fuck other girls in his senior year. He also had the mistaken belief that I would be okay with that (if I found out, which I did, of course), and no, I wasn’t okay with it, and so he graduated back in May and by the time I arrived back on campus for my senior year, he was gone, back home to Ohio, and I hoped I’d never see him again.
Outside, I talked with a few other girls from the swim team. We were hanging around a tree, none of us wanting to be there, and I couldn’t help but think of that tree as some kind of escape. Like if something horrible happened—a fight, gunshots, a few frat dudes approaching us—we could all scamper up that tree like squirrels.
Miranda found us. She was my roommate for senior year. My best friend, Isabel, had left UNC to go back home to Miami. I was only back in Chapel Hill for one day and already it felt like a different place because Izzy wasn’t there.
So, I ended up agreeing to get an apartment with Miranda, who I didn’t know very well but who always seemed okay to me, and I guess I seemed okay to her too.
There was some talk of swim practice coming up in the next few days, and then people started gathering around in a large circle to watch somebody do something. Some kind of dare, I had guessed, that involved him jumping off the roof of the frat house.
This wasn’t for me. Izzy and I never would have gone to a party like this. Ryan and I never would have, either. The more I thought about it, the more I wondered not only why I was here, but why I felt like I needed to be at some back-to-school bash at all. I had never engaged too much with the college life, I’d always felt removed from the vast majority of my fellow students. Not that I was better than they were—certainly not, as I have my many flaws and problems, which you will discover shortly. Just different, so different sometimes that I felt like they were from a different country, maybe even a different planet. Or I was. Whatever.
Anyway, this frat scene just wasn’t for me. I’d much rather be over on Franklin Street, with its quaint re
staurants and various music clubs, even if it meant going alone. That’s where I wanted to be, so that’s where I went, not saying goodbye to anyone, not asking anyone to come along with me. I just left.
My teammates from the swim team wouldn’t think much my sudden absence, since I had spent most of my time with Ryan (bastard) and Izzy (the sister I never had but wished I did). Oh, and there was Eric, my best guy friend who I had known since we were little kids. He wasn’t at the party, though. If he had been, I probably wouldn’t have left.
*****
It wasn’t a long walk, just minutes from the frat house, but farther away from my own apartment, so the walk home could have been interesting depending on how much I decided to drink.
It was August, so the air was heavy and damp with humidity, but it wasn’t hot, the sun having gone away hours ago. One thing I had always enjoyed about Chapel Hill was the beauty of the campus, with its old, enormous trees that dropped acorns on the ground that you crunch-walked on all throughout the school year. And, true to the town’s name, the many hills making every walk more like a workout. I loved it all, had loved it for three years, and as I walked toward Franklin Street, I thought about how much I would miss it when I left.
I didn’t have anything specific in mind when I decided to walk downtown. I just wanted to get away from that party, and I didn’t want to go home. There were several clubs, all of them with their doors open, music wafting out onto the sidewalk. I ducked into one and stayed only a few minutes because it was too crowded. Went into another, a few doors down, where it was apparently an open-mic event and some guy was standing at the microphone reciting something—impromptu poetry? drunken stream of consciousness?—about “his girl” did this and did that and why doesn’t anyone understand him and how come there are so many wars and…I left.
I just wanted music. Escapist, fun music. Maybe a few drinks, and maybe flirt a little.
Okay, so that last part wasn’t planned. It just struck me as I walked into the third place. Yes, I was craving the attention of a guy. Pathetic? Trust me, I knew exactly what I was doing and why. Hey, I’m a psychology major and I plan to go to grad school and then get my PhD., so… Yeah, okay, it doesn’t take those credentials to figure out that I was lonely and there was a void there, a big gaping void that Ryan used to fill, and even though I was over him (it’s true) I still wasn’t over the fact that I was twenty-one and, dammit, so what if I wanted a guy to pay attention to me, be attracted to me, maybe hit on me?
Granted, I wasn’t sure what I would do in such a situation, but I was a big girl and I could handle myself just fine, thank you.
So I went into the third place on the block. Cement floor, wood beams, wood ceiling, good acoustics for the trio on stage—guy playing a sax, girl playing a guitar and singing a familiar song, another guy lightly playing bongos. Soft amber lighting allowed me to see my way through the tables and up to the bar, where I ordered a beer, then looked around for a place to sit. No luck, so I stood against the back wall with a row of people who were nice enough to squeeze closer to each other and make room for me.
When the song ended, the girl to my left said, “Thank God that’s over, I want to dance.” She’d had enough of the mellow stuff, and was ready for the next band, which didn’t disappoint in providing dancing music. They played an odd mix of reggae and disco. I listened to the first two songs while having another beer, and then I noticed him.
Him. This would be the guy I would flirt with tonight. He was staring at me, and the longer I looked back at him, it became clear that, like me, he wasn’t with anyone. That fact alone wasn’t enough to catch my attention. It was his looks. That’s all. No deeper than that.
This is the part where someone usually tells you more detail than you really need to know about how someone looks. But those details didn’t even register with me at the time, and I was there, so I’ll just tell you what caught my attention, beyond his constant staring: his deep-set eyes that I could see when the light hit them just right, no color detected just yet; his hair, cropped closely to his head but not shaved, the ends of it just long enough to create a little messy ridge on one side; his mouth, the way one side of it curled upward into an involuntary grin, a grin that could have been the result of his satisfaction from the fact that I was staring right back at him.
And then he walked toward me. The music seemed to fade, the notes disappearing, leaving only the rhythmic drumbeat. Or was that my heartbeat pounding in my ears as he approached.
He stood in front of me and said, “Let me hold your phone for a second.”
I looked down at my phone, which I’d been holding in my non-beer-holding hand, not sure why, maybe thinking I’d get some important text or call.
I’m not sure why, but I handed him my phone. There was no way he could get into it, past the security code, and he sure didn’t look like some kind of thug who would turn on his heel and run out of the place with a stolen phone.
No, he was going to do something like put his name and number in my contacts. But my phone was locked.
He held it up to his eye level, the back of it facing me. The camera app on the lock-screen, I thought. You don’t need to put in the code to access it. That’s what he’s doing. And two seconds later, he confirmed that I was right by turning the screen toward me.
He’d taken a selfie.
“Now,” he said, “you don’t have to stare so much,” and he smiled and started to turn away.
I stopped him by calling out, “Do you want one of me?”
He halted and turned to look over his shoulder. “No. I won’t forget that face.”
So, yeah, maybe it was a cheesy move. Maybe he’d done this exact move dozens, maybe hundreds of times in bars and clubs. But right then, at that moment, I didn’t care because he was doing it to me.
“You aren’t just going to walk away after that,” I said, matter of factly.
The guy turned and stood in front of me again. He was tall enough so that when he stood in front of me—very close, just a few inches—I had to look up into his downward gaze and he said, “If you’re going to keep staring at me, I should at least know your name.”
Bluish-gray. That’s what color his eyes were. There was no mistaking it now, this close up.
“Brooke.”
The corner of his mouth that had been forming that grin moved up a little more, his lips parted, revealing just enough of his teeth for me to imagine them nipping at my earlobe.
I wish I hadn’t had to ask him to repeat his name, but I was so visually distracted that I think my ears might have stopped working for just a few seconds, and so I said, “I’m sorry?”
“Cole.”
I liked it. Strong, short name. Easy to remember. Easy to say out loud in short bursts during sex. And I found myself getting way ahead of the situation here.
“I wasn’t staring,” I said.
“I think you were.”
I shook my head, trying not to smile. “You were staring at me.”
His eyes drifted off mine, to the top of my head, then down to my ear, making a run around my face, as if he were trying to memorize my features.
“Okay,” he said. “I was staring. But you were staring back. Brooke.”
The emphasis he put on my name sent a quake down my neck, my shoulders.
“I’d say I was looking back, not staring…what was your name again?” I had meant to keep a straight face when I pretended not to remember his name, but I couldn’t.
“Nice.” That’s all he said, then, “You should show me how good a dancer you are.”
“Really? Like, a lapdance?”
His expression didn’t change. No eyebrows shooting up his forehead. No gaping-mouth surprise. Nothing. Just his head moving so he could scan the place, then turning back to me and saying, “Damn. Looks like all the chairs are taken. I guess we’ll have to do it standing up.”
Do it standing up… There was more implied in those words than the reference to a lapdance. W
hich, by the way, I wouldn’t have done anyway. The lapdance, I mean.
“You don’t look like the dancing type,” I said.
“I’m not, but I’m willing to try.”
I loved dancing. Always had. Never been very good at it, beyond having good rhythm and being able to shake my booty with my hands above my head, wrists crossed… I know, lame move, but you do what you can, right?
And I did. Right there where we were standing. There was no dance floor in this club. People moved to the music at the bar, at their table, against the wall in the back where we were. Cole’s dance moves sucked more than mine, and within seconds it was obvious we were just goofing around, laughing, two strangers enjoying a few carefree moments on an August night.
When we’d had enough—was it two minutes, or three?—we moved to a table that opened up in the corner of the club and sat in the shadow.
“What brings you here tonight?” he asked.
I’m single and lonely and my boyfriend is now my ex-boyfriend because he cheated on me and earlier I was at a frat party with friends who are really more like “friends” (use air-quotes) and so I left and came here hoping I’d find a guy to flirt with because I’m an adult and I know what I’m doing and I can do anything I want and it’s my senior year in college and if I want to flirt or do more with a guy I damn well can do it with no guilt.
That’s the real answer, but you never let anyone see the crazy this early, especially if you really are just looking for someone who will take your mind off things, occupy a few hours of your Saturday night.
So, keeping the crazy to myself, I only told him the part about the frat party.
He grinned, nodded, sipped the last of his beer.
“Don’t tell me you’re in a frat,” I said.
“Never.”
“Good.” I turned the bottle in my hand, making a wet circle on the table. “What about you?”
