35. Calista
THIRTY-FIVE
CALISTA
I t was the first snowfall of the year. I had spent the morning watching squirrels chasing each other in the quad from my dorm room window instead of studying.
Final exams started next week, and I was having a hard time focusing.
My mind had been a whirling mess ever since the other night when I received that unexpected call from Drew.
Part of me wanted to reach out to Lincoln and see how he was doing, but I didn’t want to be overbearing, especially when I didn’t know where we stood.
Before Drew had hauled him into his Jeep, I had given both of them very specific care instructions.
I also told him that if there was any swelling, redness, or heat coming off of it in the next couple of days, that Drew was within his right to knock him out and drag him to a hospital.
No ands, ifs, or buts. I was well aware that the threat went through one ear and out the other.
Lincoln wasn’t going to be doing anything he didn’t want to do.
The only thing that gave me a sliver of comfort was Amelia being an RN.
Even if he didn’t listen to anything I had said, I knew he was in good hands .
What I needed to do was focus on finishing up the semester and passing my courses.
I had invited Harper over to keep me on track. And it worked—for a total of fifteen minutes. I groaned, slamming shut the textbook page on anticholinesterase agents.
Harper had been sitting at my desk, laptop open. When I threw myself back on my bed, she turned her head to regard me with concern. “Are you having to review manual disimpaction again?”
My face scrunched up in disgust. “No, but thank you for that unwanted mental image.” I blinked up at the ceiling. “I think my brain is short-circuiting.”
“Well, not to be the bearer of bad news,” Harper said as she gestured towards a stack of cue cards on my desk. “But you haven’t even touched these yet.”
I glanced at her, unamused. “Yeah, that’s part of the problem. Exams are starting, and I haven’t even scratched the surface of reviewing. It’s stressing me out.”
Don’t get me wrong. Exam periods were the most stressful thing I had to experience in my twenty-one years on this planet. But I had been dreading them even more as the weeks went on because I was putting all this effort into something I wasn’t sure I wanted anymore.
“Harp, when did you start thinking about joining the FBI?”
Harper tapped across her keyboard. “Over the summer, I suppose.”
“What made you change your mind? Ever since I can remember, you talked about joining the military and climbing up the ladder like your father had.”
“It seems like the better fit for me. Relocating time after time due to my father’s employment was difficult.
It was rough being the new kid seven times over.
I wouldn’ t have to concern myself with that as much with the FBI.
And intelligence analytics—whether I decide to go the route of tactical or strategic—is something that I can see myself doing for the rest of my life. ”
“And what if you change your mind?” I said, pushing myself back up into a sitting position. “What if you wake up one day and decide you would rather drive around and sell ice cream?”
Harper blinked. “Then I’d do it… But why would I choose to sell ice cream? The target audience is children. I hate children.”
I shrugged. “It’s the first thing that came to mind.”
“What does any of this have to do with you studying for exams?”
I drew in a heavy breath through my nose. “I’m having a hard time staying motivated. All I can think about is how I froze up at the Pit the other night.”
“It was a high-stress situation that caught you off guard,” Harper tried, turning in her chair so that her body was facing mine. “All things considered, you had a fairly normal response to something traumatic.”
“Maybe for people who aren’t in nursing school,” I muttered. “I was so sure this is what I wanted to do for the rest of my life, you know? The more time goes on, the more I’m debating whether this nursing thing is even for me.”
“You’re not the same person you were when you were twelve, Cal.” Harper lowered herself down onto my single bed, her arm brushing mine. “You’re allowed to change your mind.”
“I’ve already put so much time and money into this degree,” I explained, staring into my lap. “My parents have put so much money into this degree. I feel like it’s a waste if I don’t finish what I started, you know?”
“Education will never be a waste,” Harper stated in a tone that made me believe her.
I fiddled with the bottom of my sweats.
“If I’m being honest,” Harper continued when I didn’t say anything.
“It’s ridiculous that society expects children to decide on what to do for the rest of their lives when they aren’t even given the right to vote or legally consume alcohol.
You shouldn’t feel bad for society’s short-sightedness. Blame capitalism.”
I sputtered a laugh. Now that Harper had said the thought out loud, it did sound ridiculous.
I had been setting myself up for Fenton’s program since I was sixteen, selecting courses that were required to even be considered as a candidate.
What about students who had no idea what path they wanted to head down?
It seemed silly to put so much pressure on the members of society who had the least amount of lived experience.
I glanced at the corkboard beside my bed. Both of my parents smiled down at me from a picture from my eighteenth birthday. A few weeks later, I received my acceptance package from Fenton. They were the happiest I remember them ever being.
“I think I’m more afraid of disappointing my parents,” I admitted.
The lock on the dorm room door jiggling caught our attention. Ella entered the room, snow dusting the top of her head. When her eyes landed on Harper and me, she froze.
“What happened?” she asked, her eyes turning hard. She tossed her keys down on her desk. “Did he fuck up again? I swear, Cali, I will not let you make the mistake of being with a guy who can’t see how absolutely wonderful you are. ”
“It’s nothing Lincoln did,” I rushed out over her tangent. “Well, not intentionally.”
Harper came to the rescue. “She’s having second thoughts about her degree.”
“Like… getting your master’s?” Ella sat down on the edge of her bed, her puffer jacket still on.
“The whole thing,” I clarified. If senior year has taught me anything, it’s that I don’t think I’m cut out for this kind of work. I felt like I was pushing through a childhood dream.
“What made you come to that realization?”
“I think I’ve been feeling it for a while, but I just kept pushing through for the sake of not wanting to feel like a failure. This thing with Lincoln, though… and Hans… it’s really got me second-guessing everything.”
Lincoln’s voice rang through my mind. It takes a special kind of person to be a nurse.
“You liked working in the NICU, didn’t you? And that children’s hospital. Maybe the ICU is what’s throwing you off course,” Ella said.
“I liked it, but I think that’s because I like working with kids.
” Each unit had its pros and cons, but there was something about working with children that made things a bit lighter.
At the same time, caring for a baby that was hooked up to a web of wires wasn’t the easiest thing to stomach either.
“Do you think you’ve lost sight of why you were interested in nursing in the first place?” Harper asked.
“No,” I said, brushing some hair behind my ear. “I think that’s only made things that much harder to let it go.”
Years ago, I had made a promise to myself. Becoming a nurse was part of that. However, the one thing that would hurt more than breaking that vow would be hurting my parents.
“Take some time to think about it,” Ella instructed, getting up to remove her jacket now that the crisis had been averted. “Life’s too short to hate what you do every day.”
The mattress bounced as Harper got up to return to my desk. “Perhaps take a step back from studying today. If you’re not in the head space, cramming information down your throat is the least effective thing you can do.”
“Bottomless mimosas?” Ella suggested with a wiggle of her eyebrows.
The laughter in the room soon came to a halt at the sound of a light knock at the door. I exchanged looks with Ella. “Expecting someone?”
She shook her blonde head as I rose from my stiff mattress to answer it.
The door creaked open, and I found Lincoln standing in the hall. His normally tousled hair appeared even more windswept. The fresh scent of amber and sandalwood wafted under my nose and tickled my senses.
“Hey,” I breathed. “How did you manage to get into the building?” I asked, opening the door a bit wider.
Lincoln’s hands were deep in his pockets, chin low as he tried to avoid eye contact. “Some freshmen let me in.”
“Why are you here?” I asked, my gaze traveling down his side instinctively.
“I want to apologize.”
Those four words had me peering up at him again. This time, his weary gaze was focused past me into the dorm. I looked over my shoulder to find both Ella and Harper sitting there, intent on what was unfolding in front of them.
I bit the inside of my cheek, gesturing for him to back up with my hand. He obliged, moving his large frame so that I could step into the hallway with him. The heavy wood door clicked shut behind us, leaving us alone with one another.
“Let’s try that again,” I said, offering him the tiniest of smiles. “How are you feeling?”
“Fine,” Lincoln replied, the bags under his eyes betraying him. “Look…”
He seemed to struggle with what to say next, but I gave him a moment to collect his thoughts.
“The other day, when you came by the gym, I was trying to be hurtful,” he started, “my mom had heard you leaving that morning and made me feel like a piece of shit for getting involved with you. That’s why I had been avoiding your texts, calls, and not showing up to tutoring…”
“You were trying to push me away,” I concluded.
Lincoln nodded, swallowing. “Deep down, before I realized I caught feelings for you, I knew I was making a mistake. Even associating yourself with me puts you in danger. And that’s the last thing I want to do.”
I crossed my arms over my chest. “I can make my own decisions.”
“I know,” he breathed, and I noticed the twitch in his posture. He was still in pain, yet he ventured all the way out here to see me. “I just wanted to let you know that I’m sorry for the way I handled the situation. You didn’t deserve that.”
I nodded. “You’re right, I didn’t. But I appreciate the apology.”
Lincoln brushed his tongue across his bottom lip. “Want to come over this weekend? I could use some company that doesn’t consist of a three-year-old who wants to dress me up and force-feed me tea.”
I pushed down the smile that tried to fight its way onto my face. The only way I could stop it was by turning my head to look down the empty hall.
“I’ll think about it.”
Regardless of the front I was trying to put up, I knew I’d find myself over at Lincoln’s house sometime this weekend. He might have been dangerous, but I was too far gone.
Doesn’t mean I was going to let him off easy. Ella and Harper would probably kill me. I could picture them standing with their ears pressed against the door behind me.
“Do you plan on going back?” I asked.
I didn’t think he’d need me to clarify, but he asked the question anyway. “To the Pit?”
I nodded, a strand of hair brushing against my forehead.
“Yeah,” he breathed out. It was his turn to look anyway. “As much as I probably shouldn’t, I have to.”
My chest squeezed at the thought. “But why?”
“I know there are risks to what I do…” he started. “But right now, it helps me and my family stay afloat. How else do you think I can afford to go to an Ivy League university like Fenton?”
“I thought you were on a scholarship.”
“I am,” he replied simply. “But it doesn’t cover the full tuition, transportation, not to mention the textbooks I don’t read…”
“I get it,” I said in a breathy tone. “I just worry about you. Sadie needs her big brother, you know?”
“I know,” he whispered, clearing his throat. “That’s the reason why I was trying to keep the whole thing a secret. I don’t want you to have to worry about me.”
Lincoln’s dark eyes locked with mine. I wondered if he was able to see just how desperate I was to know if he was going to be okay .
“What happens once you graduate? Will you stop fighting then?”
That was the million-dollar question. Would he be able to stop fighting? Did he even have that luxury?
Lincoln brushed his tongue across his chapped lips again before responding. “I’m not going to lie to you… I don’t know if that’s a possibility for me.”
My brow pinched together. Harper had mentioned that the Pit was run by a shitty group of people. “Are you under some sort of contract?”
“You could say that,” he uttered. There was a slight pause before he added, “It’s not too late to run away.”
The way he said it came off as a joke, but deep down, I understood how much he didn’t want me to get tangled up in whatever mess he was a part of.
Not caring about who was listening in, I smiled. “I wouldn’t get very far.”