“You, of course.”
Me?
I raised my eyebrows as my notebook slipped out of my hand against my keyboard. Ryan’s pencil trembled before it rolled to the side.
He continued to smile up at me, as if the small earthquake wasn’t any indication of how I was feeling right now. “You see, I heard from somewhere that you have basically taken the entire catalog of classes at Barnett.”
Well, that wasn’t true. At least, not completely, though I did have the habit of overloading on class credits whenever I changed my major.
“Did you now?”
He nodded, assured. “So, I figured, who better to help me out?”
“Excuse me?” I was obviously not following.
He wanted me to help him?
His smile began to falter, as did his clasped hands. Letting them go, he took a deep breath. “Look—”
“No, I mean, you look,” I cut him off.
All I wanted to do was sit here for a few hours. I would get work done or maybe watch a movie on my laptop. Then, I would at least be somewhat prepared to sleep in my own confused misery tonight on a gross common room couch without Vadika.
No one was forcing me to go out to dinner or out to any parties or school events. It was just me. Tonight was mine. I hated to admit it, but I was oddly lost when it came to fun without her well-meaning involvement in my life.
“I didn’t have a good day, and I really don’t need anything else going on right now. I know you probably think that I should be falling over myself to help you with whatever little problem you have, but, well …” I looked down at myself in my jogger-style sweatpants as if that said enough.
With another deep breath, Ryan nodded. “I get it. Sorry. I didn’t realize. Seems like a shit day all the way around.”
“Is that so?”
“My coach met me in the dean’s office. You know, where I saw you earlier.”
I remembered. Reaching up, I touched the crystal pendant I was wearing still. I hadn’t taken it off when I went back to my dorm. A little hope still stuck there—that whatever power Celeste had tried to infuse would kick in eventually.
Ryan took a deep breath before he continued, “My coach and the dean, who’d been my recruiter when I first came to Barnett, said they wanted to break the news about my leg to me together. According to the doctors and everything, there is a lot of damage to my knee. That means a lot of physical therapy before I could ever even consider getting back on the field this season. I let them know that I wouldn’t be going back to playing at all. For the team or any other team.”
“What do you mean?”
He sighed, shutting his eyes for a second. When he opened them again, he scuffed his foot against the blue carpet. The other one was still propped on the chair.
I couldn’t help myself as I glanced down at his braced knee. “It’s that bad?”
“It wasn’t the first time it happened,” Ryan explained. “Either way, I was told I got lucky this time. The ACL tear was minor … ish. Course, now, well, that’s it for football.”
He attempted a small laugh. The short sound came out soft and a little uneasy.
“So, there is no way for you to go back to playing?” I asked calmly, peeking back up to the disappointment clearly written across his face.
“There is. But, y’know, there’s that whole idea of wanting to walk for the rest of my life. I decided more or less to go with that option.”
“Makes sense.”
“Now, as you might imagine, they want me to get back to paying closer attention to my classes. It wasn’t that big of a deal when I was playing. There were practices. Games. A lot of other things were going on every day to contend with, and I got a little leeway. That meant my grades weren’t the greatest last semester … or the one before. I’ve been trying to squeeze in my general classes. I still have a few to get through.”
I sighed. “So, in comes me?”
“In comes you.” He bit his bottom lip. “I could really use the help.”
