Chapter 3 Boy Has Brains
Three
Boy Has Brains
“Excuse me.” I crawled over legs in the four-hundred-seat lecture auditorium. “Sorry.” I plopped down in a red-cushioned chair next to Jay and pulled out the folding table.
“You’re late.” He raised an eyebrow. Being of Afro–Puerto Rican descent, his skin was golden brown, his hair black and cut short to coil against his scalp.
We’d known of each other since ninth grade, and last fall when I moved into the dorm, I discovered that not only did we live in the same building, but we were both in the College of Science and Engineering and had classes together.
After I’d made him promise not to tell anyone who my family was, we’d become instant buddies.
“I know.” With my hands shaky and my head like mush, I dug in my backpack, retrieved my notebook, and placed it on the tiny table. Maybe the three ibuprofen I’d popped to get rid of a pounding headache and the two Red Bulls I’d drunk to fight exhaustion had been excessive.
“Why weren’t you at breakfast this morning?” Jay asked.
I shrugged and opened to the last page I’d made notes on. “Have I missed anything?”
He peered over my shoulder. “The professor’s reviewing titration.”
The skin on my arms prickled. That was the subject of our last lab, and it hadn’t gone well. Not yet having finished my write-up, I needed to pay attention.
Like some students in this class, I was on the chemical engineering degree path.
Since touring a test kitchen and full-scale plant facility when I was a kid, I’d only ever wanted to be one thing—a chemical engineer in the food industry.
But lately I’d been having serious doubts about whether I’d make it.
Especially after my fall semester grades.
Besides everything else, insomnia was killing my GPA.
“Didn’t you get my texts?” He tapped a finger on his thigh, which stretched so far that his knobby knee bumped against the seat back in front of him.
“I’ve had my phone on silent.”
“So how was Saturday?” Jay had gone home over the weekend for his mom’s birthday. He’d been lucky enough to miss not only the party, but also the plunge.
“Shh,” I said. “Not now. I need to listen.”
He stayed quiet for exactly three minutes, until the professor turned to write on the whiteboard. Then Jay whispered, “Emma said I should ask you for details. Something about a boy.”
I jabbed him with my elbow. “Seriously. I mean it. Stop talking.”
“Come on,” he said. “Tell me what happened.”
I sighed. He wasn’t going to give up. I knew him too well. “I kissed a guy. That’s it. No big deal.”
“What guy?”
“A guy from our dorm.”
“I didn’t see you at dinner last night or at breakfast this morning. You’re avoiding the dining hall, aren’t you?”
For the past thirty-six hours, I’d kept away from the lobby and gone to the dining hall just as it was about to close. I didn’t want to see Texas or anyone else who would remind me of what had happened.
To think I’d fallen for his act in front of everyone.
How embarrassing. But another part of the problem was sleep.
I hadn’t gotten more than a couple of hours the entire weekend.
Since I’d taken Saturday off work for the plunge, I picked up a substitute shift at the bookstore on Sunday, and it had almost broken me. Hence the headache.
I stared him down. “Are you done interrogating me now?”
A glint of evil passed through his eyes. “What’s his name?”
“Omigod,” I muttered under my breath. I could just not answer, but Emma and Priya would eventually tell him anyway. “His name is Dallas. It was a mistake. I’m not talking about it anymore.”
I focused back on the instructor.
“Well.” Jay cleared his throat. “You won’t be able to avoid him for long.”
“Try me.”
“For starters, he’s sitting ten rows in front of us.”
My heart jumped into my throat. “What?”
“Right there.” He pointed.
I sat up and looked over the dozens of heads before me. There, sitting below us, was a blue baseball cap. Nice shoulders.
Oh eff.
Jay’s smile glowed as bright as a cell phone screen. I sat back in my chair and slouched. It couldn’t be. How could Texas be in my chemistry class?
The memory of his mouth moving on mine sent goose bumps down my arms.
“How do you know him?” I mumbled.
Jay shrugged. “He was in my freshman orientation group. A standoffish dude.”
Heaviness filled my stomach, and I flashed Jay a glance. “He’s in engineering?”
He nodded. “Interested in mechanical, I think.”
“Just because someone says they’re going to major in a certain engineering discipline doesn’t mean they’ll have the GPA to get into the program they want.”
“I’m pretty sure he will. I saw his name on the dean’s list last semester.”
I put my face in the palms of my hands. Not only had Texas satisfied my appearance and attraction requirements, but he had just satisfied number five on my list—the most impossible requirement to meet—intelligence.
The lecture was over, and I was hiding under my jacket. “Is he gone?”
“He’s talking to the professor,” Jay said.
Omigod. Seriously? Only extreme nerds spoke with the teacher after class. Who was this guy? How could he be sexy, smarmy, and academic all at the same time?
“Where is he now?”
“Just a minute.” Jay exhaled. “One more second. Okay. He’s gone.”
I peered out. “Did he look up here?”
“Ade, you’re absurd.” All six feet two of Jay’s runner’s body towered over me. “You don’t want him to see you, but you want him to look for you. I don’t get it.”
I zipped up my coat and gathered my things. “Remember last week when I told you I read online that sex can cure insomnia?”
He frowned but nodded.
“Well, that guy, Dallas, he might be the one who could do it for me. Especially now that I know he satisfies some of my requirements for the right candidate.”
“WTF, Ade.” Jay walked out of the row and down the stairs.
I followed. He was wearing his university jacket with the cross-country logo on the back.
At the bottom, he waited. “Did he message you after the party?”
“No.” I stopped a couple steps before the landing, so I was the same height as Jay. “He doesn’t know my number.”
“If he was really into you, he would have figured out a way to get it.”
I remained still. Jay was right. I was losing it. Reliving the encounter moment by moment and trying to process how I felt about it was destroying me. Meanwhile, Texas had shrugged it off.
My heart cinched tight, as if a beanstalk had grown around and around it, cutting off the circulation.
“I’ll see you in calc.” I brushed past Jay. “I need to go to the bathroom.”
“I’ll wait for you,” he called from behind me.
I went straight into the restroom, set my backpack on the sink, and stared at my reflection in the mirror. My brown hair was matted down from my hat. My hazel-green eyes were bloodshot.
Adriana Bianchini. Ugh. I mean Blankin. Adriana Blankin, you look terrible.
My mascara had smudged. Not from crying, even though I wanted to. Probably from my eyes watering during the freezing-cold trek to class. I waved my hand under the paper towel holder and tore off a piece. Using hot water, I tried my best to get the black off.
According to Jay, Texas—the guy rumored to do multiple girls every week—had decided I wasn’t interesting after all. That hurt. That hurt like hell.
“He isn’t worth it,” I said to my reflection.
One of the stall doors creaked open, and a girl walked out. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Did you say something?”
I shook my head and went to use a toilet. Scrawls of graffiti decorated the light-blue door.
Now I was talking to myself. Enough. I needed to focus on what was critical—my classes. I should be on the dean’s list too. And that was exactly what I would do. No matter what happened, no matter how little sleep I got, in May, I would make certain I was on that list.
I finished up and headed back into the hall. Jay was leaning against the radiator in the vestibule. He shouldn’t have waited. I opened the door, stood by him, and bundled myself up.
He looked odd, a blank stare fixed on his face. His posture was all wrong.
“What’s the matter?” I asked.
His eyes narrowed and focused on me. “Guess who I just spoke with?”
“Who?”
“Him.” The side of his mouth scrunched.
A current of heat zapped through me. “You mean…”
He nodded.
“But you said he left.”
“He left the lecture hall but apparently not the building.”
My heart sped up like I’d just taken a five-hour energy shot. “What did he say?”
“I…” He shifted his weight around and gazed at the floor. “Well…”
“Please,” I pleaded. “You have to tell me.”
“He asked me if you were my girlfriend.”
Blood rushed into my head. “Girlfriend?”
Jay nodded.
The skin on my neck tingled. Texas thought I was with Jay.
The idea almost sent me flat on my butt.
It had never occurred to me. But I supposed it made sense.
We were with each other quite a bit. We ate together.
Sometimes it was just the two of us, but most of the time we were with Emma, Priya, and other girls from my floor or guys from his cross-country team.
Suddenly, I felt empowered. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe Texas was interested in me, and he hadn’t talked to me yet because he needed to find out if I was taken.
“What did you say?” I asked.
He rubbed the back of his neck but said nothing.
“You didn’t tell him about my sex cures insomnia theory, did you?” The muscles in my jaw quivered.
“Of course not.” He ran a hand through his hair. “The whole idea of you having sex with someone for that purpose alone is…well…off-putting.”
I flinched. There was nothing appealing or unappealing about casual sex. It just was.
“I told him he wasn’t your type,” Jay said.
My lungs deflated, the air replaced by a burning, scorching pain. I wrapped my scarf around my neck and tightened it. I pushed open the door, only to get hit by a fierce wind blowing against my side. I had criteria, yes, but not a specific type.
“Ade, wait.” Jay grabbed my arm. “I said it because I was doing you a favor. You’re too good for him.”
I snorted. Too good? Ha!
I pulled away and stomped through the accumulating snow.
No, I wasn’t. I’d known that for a long time. I wasn’t too good for anyone. Including Texas. Which meant I had some figuring out to do about him, irrespective of Jay’s assumptions and meddling.