Chapter 24 #2
When I get home, I put my car in Park and switch off the ignition.
I stare into space and don’t move for a while.
I feel odd. Numb, like always, but that’s not all.
There’s a tight bubble in my chest that’s taking up a lot of space.
It’s warm, and it kind of quivers when I think of walking toward the door of the apartment and unlocking it.
Connor’s home. I know that because he messaged me to tell me we were having a stir-fry for dinner. He followed it up with a photograph of all the ingredients laid out on the kitchen counter.
He’s probably in the kitchen or living room, chilling or setting things on fire.
That’s what he’s been up to almost every time I’ve walked into the apartment since I moved in.
He’ll probably smile when he sees me, and it’ll probably be a smile that isn’t too big or too small.
It’ll be relaxed. A laid-back you’re home more than a formal greeting.
I wake my screen and pull up his newest messages.
Are you almost home?
I’m starving.
If you’re not here by six, I’m going to start cooking.
He punctuated the last message with a smiling with horns emoji. It’s fucking dumb. There must be something seriously wrong with me because seeing the emoji makes the bubble in my chest grow bigger and more quivery, until it feels like something papery flapping under my ribs.
I get out of the car and call the elevator. It takes a goddamn age to come down. So long, I give up and opt for the stairs.
Anna’s right. They are faster.
I’m mildly out of breath when I get to the second floor, and I don’t want to walk in huffing and puffing, so I wait on the landing until I catch my breath. I don’t have anything else to do while I wait, so I use the time to fix my hair.
As I make the third or fourth pass through my hair with my fingers, I catch myself and stop, horrified.
Jesus Christ, Bev and Anna better be wrong.
I better not have a fucking crush on Connor Lockwood.
No. No way. It’s not that. It can’t be. I’m just under a lot of pressure, and I feel better when I know my hair looks good. That’s all.
I slide my key into the lock and turn it. It gives with a soft, mechanical sigh. I push the door open and drop my bag at the entrance. I can’t smell smoke, so that’s something.
As expected, Connor is in the living room.
He has one foot on the floor and the other bent at the knee, resting on the sofa.
He must have been curled up on it when he heard me at the door.
He’s midway way through getting up when he sees me.
He stops moving. It leaves him frozen in an awkward position, but he doesn’t seem to mind.
He smiles exactly how I thought he would.
Not too big and not too small. His cheeks bunch and his eyes glitter.
They’re more green than blue this evening.
He smiles like he was expecting me.
Like he knows me.
Like I’m his friend.
A warm bubble bursts and delicate wings flap in my chest.
“Thank God you’re home,” he says, dimple dipping deeply. “Two more minutes and I’d have cremated the chicken.”
He sits on the kitchen counter like he did last night and asks me about my day as I wash my hands and start slicing bell peppers and cabbage. As nothing majorly noteworthy happened today, I tell him about the girl who came in to complain about her roommate yesterday.
“So, wait,” he says, tilting his head as if that allows him to hear me better, “you’re saying that her only complaint about her roommate is that she’s in the room? The room she shares with her?”
I shrug broadly. “That’s what I’m telling you.”
I wait for him to laugh, or at least chuckle. I’m pretty sure what I just said warrants at least a quick spin of whatever it is that lives in his larynx. His lips quirk, but the smile doesn’t make it to his eyes. He looks past me for a beat, and then back at me. All trace of the smile is gone.
“She must really be struggling,” he says quietly.
His words land like a kick in the gut. As soon as I hear them, I know he’s right. Sophie’s not spoiled or entitled. She’s in a new place, far from home, away from her friends and family, and she’s having a hard time figuring it out.
I start dicing an onion and dip my chin to acknowledge what he said.
“College can be a tough transition,” he says.
When he thinks I’m not looking, he lets his hand creep to the corner of the chopping board and sneaks a piece of bell pepper that he quickly pops into his mouth.
“My friend Georgie is like the most together person ever, but she found it really hard to settle in here.”
Georgie is the redhead.
Hearing him talk about her makes my gut clench.
Anxiety quickens and winds itself tightly around my throat.
He hasn’t mentioned her to me before. I shouldn’t know anything about her.
Not her name. Not the color of her hair.
Not the fact that she makes handmade keychains for him, or that she looks at him like he’s the main character in a seven-book fantasy series.
“She okay now?” I think it’s a nice neutral question, and one that’s necessary to keep the conversation going.
“Yeah. It took a while, maybe six months or so, but she settled in. She made friends, and she loves it here now.”
I’ve seen Connor with Georgie a lot. Between her and the jock, it’s hard to say who he’s more likely to have fucked in the past. I’ve trawled through his social media for hours and haven’t gotten any closer to figuring it out.
The urge to ask him about his relationship with Georgie is overwhelming. I want to know. Need to know. I want to ask if he’s fucked her, or if they were ever a thing. I need to know if they have a history together.
I want to know if he’s put his hands on her, or if he’s let her put her hands on him. I need to know if she’s seen him naked or made him cry out in pleasure.
Huh?
Those thoughts and others like them rattle around in my brain so long, and so loudly, I struggle to make sense of them. It takes some effort, but I manage to shake them off.
The problem is, I land on something worse and much more worrisome.
Jesus Christ. Do I have a crush on Connor Lockwood?
Is that what this is?
I focus every ounce of my attention on the onion on my board and the knife in my hand, and thank God, I manage to keep my mouth shut about Connor and the redhead and whether she, or the jock, has ever laid hands on him.
I need to say something, though, so I aim for mild and unaffected, but land closer to clipped and uncomfortable. “That’s good.”
“What about you?” he asks, taking another piece of pepper and crunching it without making any effort to hide what he’s doing. “You’ve never said anything about college. Did you go?”
“Nah, I didn’t.”
“What did you do instead?”
An unpleasant knot forms low in my belly. “Havi and I had a side hustle selling secondhand skateboards and gear in high school. We did pretty well, and we were cocky little shits, so after school we started our own thing—a store. It di-does pretty well. I worked there until the fight.”
Thinking about the store makes the knot tighten and sink. As it moves down my body, it splinters and each splinter knots again. And again.
As always, talking about Havi makes me feel really off. Disoriented and strange. My ears ring and I feel like I did when I was a kid and gamed for too long.
“What happened to the store?” asks Connor. “Did you guys sell it?”
“No. Havi…uh, he just fucked off and left me to handle everything. I couldn’t deal, so I got a manager. It’s still ticking along, but just… I just can’t really be there right now.”
“He just left? What the hell? I can’t believe he bailed on you like that.
” He shakes his head in the closest thing to disgust he can muster.
Not disgust, really, that’s too strong. Displeasure, more than disgust. But I know displeasure is a lot, coming from Connor, because he usually gives everyone the benefit of the doubt, so it pleases me. “Must have been some fight.”
A storm of emotion gathers, rising and expanding so quickly it threatens to spray out of my ears. Guilt, confusion, disbelief, anger, and more guilt. “It was.”
I brace for him to ask me what the fight was about. That’s what everyone does. My mom. My dad. Caroline. All my friends from my previous life.
Connor doesn’t speak. He doesn’t move, and he doesn’t say anything.
At first, I’m relieved, but as the minutes tick by, relief morphs into something that’s crazy, even for me: disappointment.
When I’m able to do so, I meet his eyes. They’re sea green and steady. An ocean becalmed. He holds my gaze, still silent, until I’m left with no doubt about why he’s not asking.
He knows.
He doesn’t have to ask because he already knows.
“It must have been really hard for both of you.” His voice is soft and soothing, smooth with a gentle baritone purr.
A wave of heat rises in me, cresting in my chest and rushing up my neck. I wipe a bead of sweat off my upper lip, suddenly intensely aware that I’m overheating. I tug at my collar and hurriedly unbutton a couple of buttons, flapping the shirt to give myself some air.
“How did you know?” I ask, though I’m not sure when I decided to ask the question.
He smiles easily, but without humor. “You’re beautiful, Lennon, and you’re a good person. It would be hard for anyone who’s into guys to be close to you and not be crazy about you.”
Guilt strikes again, this time stabbing deep between my ribs.
“I’m not a good person,” I say stiffly.
His smile changes. It still lacks humor, but it’s laced with certainty, and something that looks like total honesty. “Yeah, you are.”
I don’t want to talk about this. I don’t want to get drawn into a conversation that opens a can of worms I can’t close.
I’ve done that many, many times with people who know me a lot better than Connor does, and all it does is make me feel like I’m losing my mind.
The problem is, his honesty gets me. The openness in his eyes.
The lack of pressure. The lack of prying.
It all rolls into a ball and loosens my tongue.
“No, I’m not. The thing with Havi… I handled it badly. It was my fault things went down like they did.”