“Okay, the country of Italy should, like, sue the Subway restaurant chain,” Cammie declares through a mouthful of bread. The loaf was made by the kitchen staff for breakfast this morning, its leftovers placed in a wooden box for us to pick over during their day off tomorrow. Or, as it so happens, tonight, when all the villa’s other residents have left the premises and there’s a first-time-drunk in need of something to soak up the limoncello in her stomach.
“They should?” I ask. I dip my own piece of bread into the plate of olive oil and some spice blend that I got from beside the bread box, then put it in my mouth.
“Mm-hmm,” she hums. “Because they call their plain white bread ‘Italian’ and it tastesnothinglike the bread here. Honestly, it sucks compared to anything I’ve eaten in this country.”
“I’m sure the Italian government will be very glad you’ve brought this to their attention,” I say sincerely.
She nods, just as serious. If I was a meaner person or had any dreams of ruining Cam’s potential future in politics, I would absolutely be filming the off-and-on conversation we’ve been having since I put the rest of her things in my backpack,pulled her up off the library floor, and corralled her into the kitchen for a let’s-try-to-keep-you-from-vomiting snack.
I hope she remembers every absurd thing she said when she wakes up tomorrow. I should at least write some down. Cross-stitch them onto a pillow, maybe.
“West,” she says abruptly a few minutes later, like there is absolutely anything else occupying my attention right now.
“Cammie,” I say back just as urgently.
“Do you think I could have actually, like, scorched my throat drinking that limoncello? Because I swear it still feels like it’s burning.”
I fight the smile that threatens to tip up my lips with everything I have.
“No, I really don’t think you did,” I assure her. “That should go away soon, especially if you keep shoveling in bread to chase it.”
She seems to accept this as truth, even though it’s coming from someone with barely any more drinking experience than she has, from what I can tell. My freshman year experiments with alcohol consisted of forcing myself to drink a majority of one can of beer any time I met up with the guys for studying or gaming and found myself the only one without a drink. I was trying to train myself to like the taste.
So far, it still hasn’t worked. If anything, it’s only made me believe that anyone who claims they like the flavor is straight-up lying, or they’ve never tried, like, ice cream, and don’t know what it means for something to taste good.
“Did I ruin your plans for tonight?” Cammie asks suddenly.
My brows rise at the complete shift in tone from her other delirious musings. “No, I wasn’t doing anything important,” I say, because echoing her earlier “yes and no” feels like it again only opens up the potential to make her sad. Somehow, that’s quickly become the thing I most want to avoid in this life.
“What were you up to?” she asks, her gaze so focused on tearing a hunk of bread into tiny bits that I’d almost think her question was aimed at the bread pieces. I reach up to scratch at the back of my neck, unsure if this is something I should admit, even with the strong chance she won’t remember it by morning.
“I was going to work on some math problems,” I say at last.
Cam startles me by blowing a loud raspberry into the otherwise quiet room, followed by a similarly—and still unnecessarily—loudboooo.
“Okay, I was gonna be sorry if I threw off your night, but actually, you’re welcome. That plan sucked.”
“Damn, okay,” I say with exaggerated offense, though it’s belied by the chuckle in my voice. “Sorry for enjoying the pursuit of knowledge. Sue me along with Subway, I guess.”
Cam throws her head back and laughs, her uninhibited joy making me laugh, too. Her eyes sparkle when she meets my own. “Now that I’m not mad at you anymore, I’m just bullying you for fun. It’s a loving kind of hating on you, you know?”
My laughter dies out, and all at once it feels like there’s not enough air in my lungs, or in this kitchen, or anywhere that I am with her and with those big blue eyes looking at me with nothing even resembling hate in them. They’re filled with something more like the opposite, in fact.
I nod and open my mouth to respond, but before I can assure her that, yeah, I do get it, she keeps going.
“I figured you might have one of those long phone calls lined up with whoever you’re always talking to—”
My eyes widen. “I might…what?”
“Probably a girlfriend, right? I’ve heard you a couple times through the wall, and I can never tell what you’re saying, but your voice just sounds low and rumbly and romantic, so you can just be honest with me, okay?”
I cover my mouth with my fist, pretending to clear my throat into it to disguise the laugh I can’t keep in. Fortunately, Cammie is still too interested in her bread to look at my face. Once I can keep it together, I reply solemnly, “You’re right—it’s time you learned the truth. That low, romantic voice is what comes out when I’m feeling really passionate.” I hear a hitch in her breathing, and it’s a miracle I can go on without breaking, let alone make my voice even deeper, draw the words out slower. “Like on long calls…late into the night…discussing linear algebra or number theory. Maybe even combinatorics, if the mood strikes.”
Her head jerks up, face twisted in something akin to disgust. “Ew! Is that, like, your version of dirty talk?”
A laugh bursts free and turns into more of a wheeze. “What?No, you freak—I don’t have a girlfriend, and I’m always on the phone with my friends, who also do math for fun, and sometimes we talk about it. I’m sorry to report that I’m not carrying on a long-distance love affair. Just a boring nerd doing boring nerd things.”
“Oh. Well, that’s good. But you’re not boring. You’re the coolest nerd I know, Weston. You always have been…” That sentence trails off into a yawn that blurs into more rambled words. “And it’s even more absurd now that you’re this”—she waves a hand to gesture up and down my body as I lean against the counter opposite the one she’s sitting on—“this hot, grown-up man-person.”
