“My mom called me.”
“Is she alright? Did something happen?”
“She’s… Fine.” His voice cracked on the last word, just the tiniest bit, the sound wrenching its way into my ear and down to my chest, where it panged. I waited, hoping he would elaborate without further prompting from me. “She’s just… She’s not healthy and I can’t help.”
Was she sick? I was forced to realize that I knew basically nothing about his home life other than the fact that he’d been raised by a single mom and his family was really not well off financially. During our freshman year, I’d overheard a conversation he’d had with Che, who also hadn’t grown up with the easiest home life, where they’d compared their experiences,all of which had sounded completely foreign and unbelievable to me.
But I’d known expressing that sentiment would only highlight our differences and help Aspen justify more distance between us, so I’d thankfully had the foresight to keep my mouth shut. For once. I kind of wished that instinctive foresight would pop up more frequently for me, since it would probably make my life a hell of a lot easier. But nothing had ever really motivated me like the compulsion to get to know Aspen, followed by the immediate craving to get him to like me.
Turns out prickly, moody, tattooed emo know-it-all boys whose emotions were guarded more carefully than fucking Fort Knox could really get under your skin and stay there. Who knew?
I’d wondered if finally convincing him to give me a shred of attention would calm that craving and make my feelings for him a little less intense, but it had only done the opposite. Every time he was vulnerable with me, whether it was with his body or even just relaxing and laughing in my presence, it was making me even more crazy for him.
“What’s wrong with your mom?” I asked. When he didn’t answer for a long stretch of time, I went on. “Do you want to talk about it?”
It was quiet on campus as I maneuvered my way through the residential side and into Aspen’s dorm building, grateful the door had been left propped open. Our house was only a five minute walk away, even at the most leisurely pace, but I’d been rushing toward him.
“No,” he said after another long pause, as I’d expected. The sniffle that followed, so soft I almost didn’t register it, had me speeding up on the staircase that led to his hall. “I don’t know why I called. I feel stupid.”
“You’re not stupid,” I told him. “You just didn’t want to be alone, right?”
“I…”
“Right?” I asked again, wanting him to say it.
“I guess,” he admitted.
I turned the corner into the hall that led to his room, and immediately saw him on the floor, with his back to the wall and his knees pulled up his chest.
“I’m here,” I said. He heard my voice, whipping his head over to face me, his wide eyes shocked and wet. I ended the call as I closed the rest of the distance between us, moving down the hall. He groaned, burying his face in his knees as I reached him.
“Why are you here?” He asked, voice muffled as he refused to look up at me. I sank down next to him, so our sides were flush together.
“You called,” I answered, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. Because it was, to me. “You needed me.”
“You’re psychotic,” he responded into his own thighs.
I snorted, ducking my head down a bit so I could try to meet his eyes.
“Maybe so,” I admitted. “But you didn’t want to be alone, did you?”
It was a long time before he finally looked up at me, shaking his head slightly.
“No, I didn’t.”
Exploiting his now upright position, I slipped my arm around him, nudging his body off the wall a bit to force him to lean into me. It took a bit of wriggling and twisting my body to angle toward him, but he did finally shift into my side, relaxing a bit.
“Do you want to talk about it?” I asked one more time, and felt him shake his head once again.
“I really, really don’t,” he said.
“Okay.” I wouldn’t push him on it anymore. All that mattered was that he wasn’t on the verge of tears anymore and he wasn’t alone.
“I can’t believe you walked here,” he said, after a long stretch of silence where I’d mostly been making tiny micro-movements to get more of his body pressed against mine, somehow eventually succeeding enough to have his head resting against the spot between my chest and shoulder. I had to bite back the urge to pull him all the way into my lap, soaking in the warmth of his body, breathing in the dark forest scent of his hair.
“It’s not a long walk or anything.”
“Still,” he reasoned. “You didn’t have to. I was fine.”
