Chapter Seven
T HE CAR PULLS UP TO Christine’s family’s vacation house, a giant mishmash of cobblestones and gray wood. We’re spending the weekend in the Blue Ridge Mountains, and you can feel the elevation gain in the air. It’s cooler up here, clearer. Outside the garage, the gravel of the driveway is dappled with fallen leaves in almost neon red. I packed horribly for this.
Christine parks the car, and Kacey and I jump out. We are the first to arrive, but less than five minutes later, a second car carrying Morris, Will, Hazel, and Wiebke pulls up. A third car is expected within the hour—to no one’s surprise, Houston and Athena got a late start. Everyone was able to make it except Jerry, who was probably too busy contending with his own demons.
“Thank you so much for bringing us up here,” Kacey gushes to Christine as she surveys the house, which looks like it’s on the verge of teetering off the cliff.
Christine unlocks the front door with a key on her keychain. “We come up here for the holidays and summer, but not so much in the fall. My parents are just happy I’m making use of it.”
“Damn, this is nice,” I exclaim as we file through the mudroom into a massive kitchen, all granite and hardwood cabinets. It’s the kind of place you can tell isn’t in use most of the year. There’s a slight musty smell, some cobwebs. A daddy longlegs spider in the ceiling corner. But Christine was right—it is huge and very lovely.
She takes us onto the deck, off the kitchen and living room, outfitted with five gray Adirondack chairs and a glass table. The house overlooks a woods painted in garnet, amber, coral leaves, surrounded by crystal sky.
We continue the house tour, and people start calling dibs on beds. I end up with Hazel in a room downstairs because there’s no good way to object. Will and Morris get the room next door. Everyone else scatters to guest rooms and bunk beds.
We head back upstairs to admire the view and help unload groceries.
“I think it’s time to start drinking,” Christine says, and indeed, the clock is about to strike 4:00 p.m. “The others will come.” She goes back into the kitchen for the heavy shopping bags of beer we stopped for on our way in. Based on the way she and Kacey start popping open bottles, I think the goal is to hit the weekend’s peak tonight.
It’s exactly the kind of reset I need. Back in Boston, I was constantly go-go-go, no time to be outside beyond a once-every-two-month run. Here, now, the goal is to just chill and take advantage of the new environment, which I hope will inspire me to work on new poems.
I walk out to the giant deck and look out into the trees, enjoying the calm.
“Sort of feels like the tenth-grade overnight trip to Tennessee.”
Will is next to me, peering off into the abyss of foliage, steadying himself with his large hands on the railing.
“Oh? Was your year nice? I got stuck with some jocks in my group and was forced into a canoe.” I grimace at the memory. “I was wearing a white T-shirt and they made it their mission to tip us over.”
“Luckily, no jocks in mine. I just remember a really productive impromptu writing workshop I set up with some friends. We spent the free evenings having fruitful discussions of each other’s work. As fruitful as it can be at sixteen, I suppose.”
“Productive workshops? You? Hard to imagine.”
A faint blush appears on his skin, and it’s satisfying to know I put it there.
“Leigh.” His voice drops to something lower, some decibel that’s just for me. “We haven’t really talked yet.”
“Is there something you’d like to say?”
“We’re going to be classmates for two years, and I think this is going to become a little uncomfortable unless we clear the air.”
Something drops in my stomach. I hate how my first instinct is to want to make things more comfortable for him, to not be the root of someone else’s issues. I hate how my second instinct is to want to pull his stupid corduroy shirt by the collar until he slams into my body.
“The air has never been clearer,” I say into the subtle breeze that washes over us. “We’re in the mountains, after all.”
His jaw tightens almost imperceptibly, but I catch it. I go back into the house before he can respond.
The third and final car has arrived, bringing with it Athena, Houston, and their clinking grocery bags of glass bottles.
“We also brought pasta,” Houston announces as they enter the kitchen.
“Put on some music.” Christine shoves her laptop to me with a music app open. Seeing my panicked expression, she adds, “Whatever you like. Just need the vibes.”
What I like is whatever’s currently on the radio—anthemic fluff, girl groups, glittery pop. I have no idea what my cohort wants played. I look around the room for inspiration, racking my mind for obscure indie groups.
Thankfully, Houston walks by, and I tap his shoulder. “Music recs?”
“Oh, word.” He nods, pulls the laptop from me, and types. Rap music I don’t recognize begins playing.
In the kitchen, Christine puts water on to boil, and the atmosphere swirls pleasantly around me. Two beers in, I can feel my facade fade—the one that’s been telling me, all day, You’re not cool enough to be here . I keep my distance from Will, who talks mostly to Morris and Hazel, and instead try to connect with the others, who seem more amenable. It’s no sorority, but maybe it can be something good, too.
Hours later, the fireplace is on, and I’m utterly relaxed. Everyone is loose now, talking over one another, acting like we’ve known one another for years and not just a month and a half.
Kacey announces that we should play charades, but everyone boos. Houston and Wiebke go into the garage to play beer pong that Christine’s set up, Athena helps Morris with his Tinder profile, and the rest of us mingle between the living room and the kitchen and the deck, spilling and sharing drinks.
As the hours pass and everyone gets both sleepier and even less inhibited, we move on to a group game of Fuck, Marry, Kill and start in the most obvious place: the second-years. We’re draped over the various couches, chairs, and rugs of the large living room, the slow pulse of music sneaking in between conversations.
“Okay, okay, hear me out,” Athena says. “Fuck Penelope. I just feel like she could really ruin me.” This earns her nods of agreement. “Marry Willa, who is too pure for this world. And kill August. Obviously.” There are snickers among the group.
“Oh my god, really? What’s wrong with August?” Kacey slurs.
Athena shrugs. She definitely knows Kacey is hooking up with him. “Nothing, nothing. I’m just too gay for his toxic heterosexuality.”
Kacey doesn’t look pleased at all. “This is boring because I barely know the second-years. Let’s do our year instead.”
“Is that not inappropriate?” Wiebke questions. “We’re all sitting right here.”
“Okay, rule: Everyone be nice and mature about it after,” Kacey exclaims, and that solves everything, I guess.
Christine goes first. “Fuck William, marry Kacey, kill Jerry. Sorry, Jerry.” I have a feeling that even had Jerry been in the room, he would have simply nodded in bemused acceptance.
Will goes bright red. Hazel raises her glass. “I would also fuck William, kill Jerry, but maybe I’d marry Wiebke.”
Wiebke crawls across the floor and plants a kiss on Hazel’s cheek. “I accept.”
Of course she likes Will. I force my face to stay neutral.
“Leigh, go, go,” Christine urges.
Shit.
It’s like solving a calculus equation drunk. When playing Fuck, Marry, Kill with people you know, you can’t lie so much that people think you’re intentionally obscuring your answers. It’s a cop-out if I say I want to fuck sweet, quiet, innocent Jerry. So what options do I have? Houston’s gay, Morris is Morris. Will is very obviously the hottest straight guy in the cohort, and all the other girls chose him. If I don’t choose him, it’ll feel intentional. It’ll feel like there’s a reason why I won’t say his name.
And there’s not.
“Marry Christine.” Christine blows me a kiss.
“Um. Kill Houston?”
Houston guffaws. “I would kill me, too, honestly.” We all laugh.
“Fuck Will… iam.” I add the iam late and it comes out more like Will, yum . Which definitely makes all of this worse.
I try not to look at him when I say it, but I find myself gauging his reaction anyway. He blinks slightly more than normal, but otherwise he looks like he always does. Jaw tight, cold hazel eyes, closed-off posture. No laugh, no blush. Nothing to suggest he’s happy about the answer. In fact, he looks decidedly unhappy about it. Even in my tipsy stupor, I know then and there I should’ve played the whole thing as a joke and said I’d fuck Kacey or something.
“William, go next!” Christine yells. My entire body freezes, and I beg my drunk brain to sober up and listen.
Will shakes his head. “I’d kill all of you.”
“Lame!” Kacey cries. “You have to answer.”
Will shakes his head again, then puts his hand on his jaw. He’s clearly buzzed at the very least, because the tension that normally lives in his shoulders is looser.
“Kill Wiebke.”
Wiebke bellows with laughter. “He hated my musical taste in the car,” she says. “William is not into Eurovision.”
“Marry… Christine, because she has such a nice house, and I’d love to stay here more often.”
Christine nods genuinely. “ Some of you are welcome anytime.” She shoots a mock look of disdain at Houston, who spilled beer on the coffee table earlier.
I realize I’m holding my breath as we await Will’s last answer.
“Fuck… Morris. The suspenders really do it for me.”
Morris wraps his arm around Will’s shoulder and whispers something in his ear with a grin, causing Will to roll his eyes and smirk. “I could definitely handle you,” he says darkly. God help me.
This is a nightmare of my own creation. Will played it off as a joke and I didn’t and now he probably thinks I actually do want to fuck him. I make it my goal for the rest of the trip and potentially year to not make eye contact with this man whatsoever.
Eventually the night dies down as the alcoholic buzz of the last six hours starts to wane. Everyone disappears into their bedrooms and scurries around the various bathrooms, fighting for space to wash faces or brush teeth.
Because I’m sleeping in the kids’ room, I’m sharing a large bathroom with the guest room next door—namely, Will and Morris. Hazel is already passed out, courtesy of the final tequila shots we all took, starfished in her twin bed by the window.
I play on my phone until I hear the boys’ door close outside our own. After changing into some low-slung sleep shorts and a ratty Tufts orientation T-shirt (since I left the Delta Gamma swag at home), I grab my makeup bag and go upstairs to use the bathroom. I want to take off my makeup in peace and not worry about someone down here, especially the boys, needing to use the bathroom.
The house at this hour is spookily quiet and dark. There’s a dim light on in the crack of the master bedroom where Kacey and Christine are, and I wonder what they’re talking about, what gossip I’m missing out on. I tiptoe into the hallway, finding the small bathroom off the kitchen, and flick on the light.
I cringe at my reflection. My bangs are plastered to my slick forehead, and my mascara has started to slough onto my cheekbones. I dip my face into the sink and wet my bangs, then proceed with my skin-care routine. The steps are soothing; I like that there’s a formula. Cleanser, serums, moisturizer, oils.
When I’m satisfied, I zip up my makeup bag and grab my small towel. I need water. While I’ve mostly sobered up, I want to ensure I’m at least semi-able to go on the group hike tomorrow.
In the dark kitchen, I flip open cupboards. It’s a real hodgepodge of glasses and plastic cups, the markings of a vacation home rarely in use. It must be nice to have a family that still wants to vacation together.
“Leigh?”
I can feel a body next to me. The creak of a floorboard.
I scream for approximately two seconds. I can’t go longer because a warm hand is pressed firm against my mouth and another hand grips my shoulder.
“It’s me—it’s William—it’s Will.”
I jump backward and the hand releases me. “Holy fuck,” I scream-whisper. “I thought you were a kidnapper.”
“You’re twenty-seven. Wouldn’t I just be an abductor?”
In the ghost of moonlight from the window, I see his outline. He’s a few feet away from me now, and he grabs the water glass I was going for from the cupboard, fills it up at the sink, and hands it to me.
“Why are you up here?” I say, my pulse slowing by the second.
“I’m not a great sleeper.” He flicks the switch next to the cupboard, and a harsh overhead light comes on. He’s wearing sweatpants and a very baggy T-shirt with a tattered collar that makes his shoulders look absolutely enormous. I pry my eyes off his collarbone and back to his face.
“Pity. Have you considered medicating?”
“Oh, I’m medicated. Just not for this.”
I finish my glass of water and set it down on the counter. There’s a sensation that the conversation is over, but I find myself wanting to push it forward.
“Not insomnia, got it. So what are you picking up at Walgreens?” Jesus, what’s wrong with me?
“Wow, personal. I don’t usually tell my abductees my prescription list like this. Prefer to take them to the bunker first.”
“You know, you actually do have serial killer eyes.” I stare at him, past the circular glasses that balance so perfectly on the bridge of his nose, not a millimeter askew.
“You’d be surprised how often I get that.”
“Not surprised at all. I’ve always thought your eyes were very intense.”
You’d think I’d just said Your eyes are very sexy and I want to sleep with you by his stupid smirk. He grabs his own glass from the cupboard and fills it.
“Are you tired?”
I raise my eyebrows. “Well, I was until you scared the shit out of me.”
He eyes me once over and I become acutely aware that I’m not wearing a bra, that my shorts are relatively short, and that my legs are prickly with a day’s worth of stubble.
“Want to go out on the deck?”
I stare at the deck, only illuminated by a few porch lights installed near the gutters.
“Don’t you think it’s cold?”
“Wrap a blanket around yourself then.”
He walks to the well-loved leather armchair in the reading nook of the kitchen and grabs the cable-knit throw blanket from it. He hands it to me. And then we go outside.
The crispness of the air hits me immediately. It has that signature fall smell, earthy damp leaf air with a subtle burnt note. I wrap the blanket around my shoulders and follow Will across the expansive deck. It’s peaceful. I listen for the scamper of an animal over leaves, the gentle swell of wind through the trees.
We don’t speak for a minute, each soaking it up, but I feel like I’m waiting for something. There’s a thickness in the air between us, especially for me, now that he and everyone else in the cohort thinks I want to fuck him. Standing here, quiet and waiting, takes me back to that summer afternoon at Middlebury— that silence was even harder to bear.
Will stands about two feet away, his hands on the railing overlooking the blackness, his posture tense, as if he’s waiting to see who will speak first.
“I don’t want things to be super weird,” I say. “Between us.”
“Right.”
There’s something detached and clipped about his tone, like he’s reciting lines from a script. His discomfort is obvious, but it’s clear that this needs to be said, lest it float over us for the next year. And now that he knows I would sleep with him and I know he’s got a prescription list, well. We might as well lay all our cards on the table.
“You know, six years ago I was really drunk at your apartment, and I hardly remember what I said or what you said,” I continue.
“You don’t.” It’s a statement, not a question.
“I came here to focus on writing. That’s it. I want this to be my career and I want this fellowship. We don’t need to get bogged down by the past. Not that anything really happened in the past… but you know what I mean.”
He studies my face. Really takes his time with it, and as the subject of his full focus, I feel almost immobile. I watch him catalog my wet-dog bangs and my eyebrows and my eyes, my moisturizer-dewy cheeks, my lips. He looks at me like I’ve told him I have a terminal illness. Some soft gaze. Some mourning.
High school Leigh, or even college Leigh, would have spent weeks dissecting every crinkle of his expression. The new me chooses to put it aside because I know no good can come of it. Some call it avoidant. I call it progress .
“You’re right.” He looks away into the darkness. “I was drunk, too. Nothing happened.”
“Great.” I pull the blanket around me more tightly. There’s silence again and I feel the cold wrap around my legs. “I guess we should go back in.”
Will nods, walks to the door, and holds it open for me. I drape the blanket back over the armchair.
“Okay, well. Good night,” I say.
“We both have to go downstairs to our rooms.” His mouth tips up in amusement. My cheeks heat.
“Right.” I laugh.
We march in silence through the kitchen, through the living room, and down the stairs until we’re standing in front of the doors of our respective rooms, as if we’re going home after a long night out. He puts his hand on the knob and, before opening it, turns to me.
“Zoloft, by the way.”
I’m at a total loss for what he’s talking about.
“What?”
“That’s what I’m picking up at CVS, at least. Not a Walgreens family.”
“Ah,” I say, because what else is there to say. He looks down at his feet for a second and then back up at me.
“But it’s fine. I’m fine.”
My chest feels heavy suddenly—the incoming hangover, maybe. I lean against the back of my door; he leans against the back of his, as if we both need the support.
“It would be okay, though. If you weren’t fine,” I murmur.
There’s a small night-light plugged into an outlet at the foot of the stairs, so I can only see the faint outline of his features, the ones I’ve memorized and then tried so hard to forget. But now, everything about him seems softer, more vulnerable.
He makes a low exhale, nods slowly, and tips his head toward my door. “Sleep well.”
“You too.” I turn to open the bedroom door, set one foot into the darkness before I look back over my shoulder out of reflex.
And when my stomach unexpectedly twists to find his eyes still on me, I realize I see him more fully than I have in years. And this time, he’d wanted me to.