“Are Mom and Dad home?” I asked, even though I knew it was going to hurt me even more to know. I could only think of one reason why Clara would shut herself in her room and start talking quietly.
“Yeah.” There was a pause. “I know they’re missing you. They just won’t admit it.”
“How terrible for them,” I said. I had a horrible taste in my mouth – like acid.
“Don’t, Keat,” Clara sighed. “Don’t sink to their level.”
I took a breath. She was right. I was better than this. Better than them, apparently. I never thought I’d say it.
“Sorry,” I said. “I just would find it a lot easier to take the higher ground if I thought you were right.”
“They do,” she insisted. “They love you. With everything that happened, they just don’t know what to do with it. They’ll come around eventually.”
“Eventually,” I repeated. I chuckled, but for the second time that night, there was no joy in it. I was just supposed to keep waiting, was I? Keep living my life like this and waiting for them to eventually find a way to support their only son?
“As for this Olly situation, you’ll have to put up with him for a bit,” Clara said. She was younger than me by a year, but somehow she’d ended up with all the wise genes. She sounded like she was thirty sometimes. “I’m sure it won’t take long for them to sort out a better solution for you both. Until then, just hang on – and don’t let him antagonize you.”
“You think I’m the one who has to be held back?” I asked.
“Good point,” Clara said. “Okay, don’t antagonize him.”
I snorted. “Yes, because I antagonized him so much by the way I kept existing in the past. I’ll just not do that this time around.”
Clara sighed. “There’s no talking to you when you’re like this.”
I groaned. The last thing I needed to do was end up with my sister not talking to me, either. “Sorry.”
“It’s okay,” Clara said immediately. She paused a moment. “I miss you.”
“I miss you, too, Clar,” I said. It wasn’t like it was my first night away from my sister. Somehow, though, the distance made it even worse. I sighed. “I’ll see you soon, okay? I better go back inside. It’s getting late and it’s cold out.”
“Don’t catch a cold on your first week,” Clara scolded me quickly. “I’ll call you on Saturday. But if you need me before then…”
“I know where you are,” I said with a smile. “Bye, Clar.”
We hung up and I walked back towards the dorm building, looking up towards the place where my window was. Our window, really. The blinds were closed, so I couldn’t make out anything about Olly from down here.
I sighed and walked back inside, half-jogging up the stairs and wishing already that we’d managed to get a room on the ground floor.
Our room, for some reason, was empty. I glanced around suspiciously but Olly wasn’t there – not hiding behind the door or crouching inside the closet or anything like that. I had the place to myself. I changed into my pajamas quickly, always with one eye on the door in case it was about to open, and got into bed. At least we weren’t going to have to talk much more tonight if I was asleep.
Asleep… and vulnerable. He could do anything while I was asleep and I wouldn’t know about it. Take my textbooks and ruin them. Throw my clothes out of the window. Draw things on my face. Find some way to tape me down on the bed so I couldn’t get up for class in the morning.
No, I was being paranoid. He said he’d changed, right?
Unless that was just a bluff to make me relax so he could really attack me later.
The door opened and I tensed, my whole body clenching against whatever he was going to do or say next. He walked inside –
And I gawped at him, unable to stop myself.
“Uh,” I said.
Was he… wet?
Olly was drenched, his blond hair slicked back against his skull with water and his bare chest and abs glistening with it. He looked like he’d just stepped out of an aftershave ad. He was wearing his jeans half-buttoned, loosely gathered around his waist and showing a fair chunk of skin – and the fabric appeared to be wet.
Not that I needed to be looking too closely at his buttons.
