“Relax. No pictures are on anybody’s phones.”
“Yeah, but—”
“I didn’t get that close to him, okay?” she said, a bit embarrassed. “I tried to get him to dance with me, but he turned me down. Totally ignored me.”
Syd’s body relaxed, as did my fear. And I knew I wouldn’t need to tell my father about Jane’s night of clubbing.
But I knew I wouldn’t have anyway. I knew I was stepping away from my father’s every command, becoming my own person.
I suppose that’s what college is about…becoming your own self, shedding who you were.
Again I wondered if that was what Lucas was to me—a way to rebel, a way to test myself, a way to move away from the hold my parents had on me.
And yet Lucas didn’t feel like a rebellion. He felt like comfort and safety, even though I knew the life he led, and the world he lived in, were anything but safe and comfortable.
I just knew what I felt for him was beyond the way he made my body tremble when he put his hands on me, or the way his eyes burned into mine just before he kissed me.
After hearing his story last night, all he’d gone through, how he’d turned his life around after the Oxy, and was now taking care of Andy while his mother got clean…I had thought it before, but now I knew I was in deep with Lucas.
I had looked forward to doing the casual hookup thing that was so prevalent here at Bribury. Nobody actuallydated. You “talked,” you “hooked up,” you “hung out,” and it was all good. You were able to meet lots of people that way, with no expectations, and no hurt feelings.
Certainly with no wasted Sundays waiting for someone to call.
And I had wanted that, had embraced the casual culture after coming from a high school that was all about traditional “going out” coupling.
But now…now I just wanted the damn phone to ring.
“Why don’t you just call him?” Jane said, as if she could read my mind.
“It’s not that big of a deal,” I lied. “He’s got to work later tonight, anyway. We kept it casual.”
Jane snorted at that. Syd reached a hand behind herself and patted my hip.
We sat in comfortable silence for a while, until Jane said again, almost to herself, “I was so close to gettin’ with Montrose.”
“Give it a rest,” Syd said in a lazy voice. She was nearing sleep, and I wished I could doze into a nap like that. But no, I lay quietly next to Syd, praying for my phone to buzz.
But it never did.
Chapter12
Syd hada class earlier than our Montrose class on Monday mornings, so Jane and I always just met her there, taking our time in the morning and having a bigger breakfast at the caf.
Or at least we usually did. Jane’s stomach was still shaky after puking up the pizza—and Saturday night’s alcohol—late last night. And my appetite had seemed to vanish.
I couldn’t stand the thought of being one of those girls who couldn’t function because some guy didn’t call when he said he would. But I had a gut-level fear that that was exactly what I’d become.
Jane’s phone buzzed and she swore as she glanced at the caller ID. We kept walking across campus, but she took the call.
“Yes?” she said, not exactly snapping, but certainly not a “hey, s’up” either.
“Mmm-hmm,” she answered to whatever was being said. I had a suspicion that it was either her mother or father, simply by the way her shoulders tensed and her gait sped up, like she was trying to walk away from the caller.
I swim a few times a week and walk everywhere on this campus, and yet I became winded trying to keep up with Jane. And then I thought that maybe she was trying to ditch me, that she wanted to take this call in private. I slowed down, letting her get ahead of me.
But apparently that wasn’t what she’d been trying to do, because she stopped a few yards in front of me, waiting for me to catch up.
“It’s never gonna happen,” she was saying when I reached her. “I know what she said, but I’m saying no. I can do that, you know. I am over eighteen now.” She listened for a moment, not moving, still standing even though I’d caught up to her. People streamed around us on the walking path. Some were kids I knew, and they gave me a nod while looking at Jane, who was becoming more and more agitated.
