8. Kylie
8
KYLIE
Unfortunately, getting into Parker’s cohort was the last good thing that happened to me that day. After the orientation, I went to a coffee shop and finally read over my schedule. I didn’t get the professor I’d read good things about for my finance class. My Organizational Leadership class met at eight in the morning on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Ouch. Luckily, classes were starting on Wednesday this week, so I’d only have to deal with it once.
Things got worse when I went to the very crowded university bookstore. Some textbooks were available online and some weren’t, but the one thing they had in common was that they all were expensive as hell. Suddenly, the money I’d saved up from working at the bar all summer didn’t seem like much.
Still, this was what I signed on for. This was my dream, to get my Master of Business Administrationdegree and get my career on the right path. At the moment, I didn’t know exactly what that would look like, but it sure wouldn’t be in tiny Norris, Colorado.
My wallet felt metaphorically lighter when I left the bookstore. I’d bought everything I needed except for an enormously expensive text for the Organizational Leadership class. I intended to ask Parker if he had one from last year that I could borrow. Probably I could’ve asked him about more of them, but some were online and password protected and couldn’t be shared. Plus, I liked to highlight and underline in physical textbooks.
In the evening, I poured over the books. None of them were what you’d call easy reading. The next day, Tuesday, was the last day before classes. After breakfast with the guys, I set up shop at the huge table in the living area—facing the mountains, of course. I spent most of the day going through the syllabi for my courses and flipping through the books.
And getting more and more worried. I’d never been what you’d call a natural scholar. I did okay in high school because I worked hard. And also because, truth be told, our small high school wasn’t exactly a top school in the state. College had been a bit of a rude awakening, and at first, I’d struggled. Then I’d learned when and where to ask for help, and I’d put my nose to the grindstone and worked my ass off.
But here? I was beginning to think that I’d bitten off more than I could chew. What if I couldn’t manage the classes? I was tempted to ask Parker about it, but he was gone for most of the day. Once, when I took a break and enjoyed some tea on the balcony, I saw him walking rather aimlessly on the sidewalk near the quad.
Jude seemed like he could lend a sympathetic ear, but he and Mason spent some time mounting the flat screen TV on the wall, and it didn’t go smoothly. Both seemed cranky by the time they were done. Doing my part as a roommate, I told them it was perfect even though the screen was clearly higher on one side than the other.
And then on Wednesday, the classes started. That’s when I knew I was in over my head.
That night, I couldn’t fall asleep, no matter how much I tried. It felt like I’d barely understood half of what was said in my first few classes. After all the work I’d done to get my scholarship and to earn money to come here, it felt like it was all crashing down on my head.
I didn’t know what was going on with the others, but Mason and Jude seemed to be tossing and turning, too. Not Parker, though. I didn’t know where he was. Maybe he’d fallen asleep on the couch?
Panic filled me. It was after two in the morning and I had class at eight. But the harder I tried to fall asleep, the worse it got. And then the whole bed started to tremble. Not like an earthquake, just a little. What the hell was Jude doing up there? Sighing, I rolled over and the shaking stopped. That was strange, but the bigger problem was that I still couldn’t get to sleep. Finally, I crawled out of bed and went into the main room.
Without really thinking about it, I walked over to the floor-to-ceiling windows even though it was too dark to see the mountains well. Somehow, just knowing they were out there helped. Then I nearly jumped through the roof because something moved on the other side of the glass. With my heart still pounding hard, I realized it was Parker sitting at the bistro table out there.
Trying to get my heart rate under control, I slipped out the door to join him. “Can’t sleep?” I asked, which was probably a stupid question.
“No.” His voice was quiet in the night air. I hugged my arms around myself as I looked up. Even with the lights from the campus, it was still possible to see the stars. Not as many as back where I came from, but enough to humble me.
Parker lifted his hand, and I saw that he had a silver can. “Can I have one of those?” Maybe a beer would finally help me sleep.
“There’s more in the fridge,” he said, starting to push himself to his feet.
“I’ll get it. I want to get a sweater, anyway. Do you want another one?”
“I’m good.”
The fridge had a dozen or so cans of rather uninspiring-looking beer. If this was the guys’ choice of alcohol, I seriously needed to expand their horizons. I grabbed my sweater and then pulled it over my head before returning to the balcony. Parker had moved to the chair on the other side of the little table so that I could have the seat he’d been in. He was a polite guy. Yeah, he was a total zombie sometimes, but a polite one.
I popped the top of the beer and took a long swig before setting it on the table between us. Probably Parker wanted to be left alone, but it didn’t seem like solitude was doing him any favors. So maybe this was my chance to finally get to know him a bit better. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you sleep.”
He took so long to answer that I wasn’t sure he was going to. But then he said, “I don’t do much of it these days.”
“That’s got to suck. Rumor has it that sleep’s pretty necessary, although I don’t think that applies to graduate students. Not with the homework the professors assign.”
Again, there was a pause, but it was a shorter one this time. “You’ve only been to one day of classes.”
“Yeah, but they already loaded us up with work.” I took another sip of my beer. “Do first-year students ever just… not make it to the end of the semester?” Somehow, it felt easier to confess my fears to Parker in the dark. I wasn’t even sure if my words would make it past the pain in his mind, anyway.
“It can be daunting at first, but most people do okay.”
Most.
That wasn’t exactly encouraging. When I read passages from some of the textbooks yesterday, it was like trying to decipher a foreign language. There was so much jargon and hugely long sentences with words I could understand on their own, but not when all jumbled together like that. And today in class, I’d felt as lost as I ever had. “I’m not sure I’m going to make it,” I confessed quietly.
“It was just one day, Kylie.” I glanced over, surprised to see that he was actually looking at me instead of staring off into the dark. Plus, that was the first time he’d said my name.
“I know, but… I didn’t expect it to be this hard already.” And if it was this hard the first week, what would the second week be like?
“You’ll get the hang of things. And if you don’t, there are some department programs that can help.”
“That’s good to know,” I said, and then I remembered something. “And the guy who leads my cohort’s a pretty good guy.” I glanced over at him, hoping to see a ghost of a smile in the faint light, but his expression didn’t change. Still, at least he’d finally started talking to me.
But then the silence grew between us. I didn’t want to talk more about my fears in case he started thinking I was a total loser, but I didn’t know what else to say. Instead, I finished my beer in silence.
Just when I was thinking about going back inside, Parker spoke up. “Have you ever been in love?”
“No,” I said honestly. “I wish I had.”
“I don’t.” His voice was suddenly harsh. “That whole ‘it’s better to have loved and lost’ thing is pure crap.”
I nodded, not sure what kind of response would help him the most. “I can’t even imagine how hard it must be.” A cool breeze flowed across the balcony and covered my skin with goosebumps. I readjusted my position, hugging my knees to my chest for maximum warmth.
“It’s like you have everything you ever wanted—and everything you’ll need for the rest of your life—and then it’s just gone. All of it. Your present and your future. And you’re just left wallowing in your past.”
“I’m sorry, Parker.” The words weren’t enough, but I didn’t know what else to say.
He was silent for a few minutes before he continued. “I bought a ring.”
“What?”
“I was going to propose.”
“Oh, shit. God, I’m so sorry.”
“No one knows,” he said, looking out at the sky again. “Mason took classes over the summer, and Jude did some traveling. I spent the summer in my hometown in Illinois. We spent the summer there. I was going to propose. I was just figuring out the best way to do it. Then she was gone.”
Damn that woman. Who would leave a guy like Parker? He was good-looking and kind. Judging from what I’d heard about him at the MBA orientation, he was a lot of fun when he wasn’t broken-hearted.
“A dozen times a day, I think of things I want to tell her. And everything reminds me of her. Songs. Women I see on campus. Even this damn suite. When Mason told me that we’d actually got it, I showed her the pictures we’d found online. She was so excited for me. Said she couldn’t wait to visit me here. But maybe at that point, she already knew she wouldn’t be doing that.”
“Those kinds of what if things are so hard to let go of.” I hadn’t been in love, but I was dumped once by a high school boyfriend, and I remembered how every single song I heard seemed like it was about our break-up. And Parker’s ex, presumably, was the same age as all the women around us. There must’ve been tons of things that reminded him of her. The way a woman wore her hair. Her walk. Her gestures. Her laugh. Her smile. That brought an unpleasant thought to mind. “Do… do I do anything that reminds you of her? Because I wouldn’t want to do that.”
“You’re fine.” It was his quickest answer yet, and it sounded less than sincere.
“I’m serious. If I’m doing something that hurts you, let me know… please.”
He turned toward me. “Could you not…” He trailed off, gesturing at me.
“Sorry,” I said instantly. “I didn’t mean to pry.”
“No,” he said. “I meant… the way you’re sitting. With your feet on the edge of the chair, and your knees up and your sweater pulled over them… she used to sit like that when she was cold, too.”
Oh. Quickly, I put my feet on the ground and smoothed out my stretched-out sweater. “Thank you for telling me.”
“It’s stupid, I know, but?—”
“No, it’s not stupid. If there’s anything else, please let me know, okay? I want you to.”
“Okay.”
I fought the urge to reach over and pat his hand, but I sensed he wasn’t ready for that. “I haven’t been where you are, and I can’t imagine how hard it is, but… everyone always says that the only thing that helps is time.”
“Time’s been moving pretty fucking slowly lately.”
“You’ll get through this,” I said, hoping it was true. And vowing to help however I could. “And hell, maybe I’ll even get through my first semester.”
“Maybe,” he said, his voice quiet again. I didn’t know if he was talking about him, me, or both of us. But maybe was all either of us had to go on.
Thursday was no better in terms of classes. It was worse, in fact, after the early morning seminar with little sleep. All day, I felt lost and anxious. I wasn’t the only one not having a great day, though. Jude was almost as silent as Parker, and Mason was grumpy. Then at night in the bedroom, I heard the guys tossing and turning again. At one point, movement up in Mason’s top bunk caught my eye. Something was shifting back and forth under his covers. Oh my God… was he actually doing what I thought he was? But then the motions stopped, so maybe he’d just been scratching himself or something.
Since I’d had so little sleep the night before, I drifted off pretty soon after that, but the guys were still cranky in the morning. I was beginning to wonder if they were always like that or if their classes were giving them trouble, too.
After the last class on Friday, I went back to the suite and made a beeline for the balcony. As always, the sight of the mountains made me feel better about life in general, but not about my classes.
I called my friend Ronnie and told her about it—both the classes and my unusual living situation. Hearing a friendly, familiar voice was so comforting that I had to blink back the moisture that lined my lower lashes. In general, I wasn’t much of a crier, but at the moment, I felt almost as discouraged as Parker always looked.
After that, I sent a text to my friend Sierra. It was still hard to believe that I had the contact info of a Hollywood actress in my phone, but you meet a lot of interesting people while bartending—even at a small bar out in the middle of nowhere. Besides, Sierra didn’t act like a star. She was pretty much a regular woman except for being drop-dead gorgeous. And a bit girly, in my opinion. But she was very kind and I knew she’d understand how overwhelmed I felt.
I skipped dinner, instead having some popcorn and soda on the balcony. Maybe if I just kept staring at majestic, snow-capped peaks, everything else would fade away.
To my surprise, the guys were around in the evening, too. It was Friday, after all. I thought Mason, at least, would find a campus party to attend. And Jude? Hmm… maybe he was the type to see an arthouse movie? Or go somewhere where there was live music? It wasn’t much of a surprise that Parker was staying in, though.
When I went in to get something else to drink, I saw the guys sitting in front of the TV. It was on, but the volume was low, and they seemed to be talking about something intently. Good. Maybe the older two were finally trying to help Parker with what he was going through.
Leaving them to it, I returned to the balcony, propping my feet up on the railing as I alternated between taking in the view and scrolling through my phone. At least until the door opened and Jude and Mason appeared.
Jude gave me a smile. “Kylie, could you join us inside for a minute?”
“Sure,” I said, returning his smile. But my smile faded when Mason scowled. “We need to talk.”
Uh-oh.
That didn’t sound good.