Chapter 15
Present Day
I follow West out of the bar and chase him down University, annoyed at myself the whole time.
“Wait!” I call, and I’m mad when he does.
He turns dramatically on his heel (how very Fox of him), surprise quickly melting into suspicion. His narrowed eyes match the expression on the actor’s face on his T-shirt. I wish he’d take it off.
I huff an exasperated sigh. “Relax, I’m not going to jump you.
” Why did I say it like that? “ ‘Jump’ as in ‘rob.’ I’m not going to rob you,” I clarify.
“I wasn’t meaning ‘jump’ as in ‘jump your bones.’ Sexually.
” I cross my arms, irritated. What possessed me to use the word sexually? Am I still buzzed?
Even now, with the stench of weed swirling around us and undergrads spilling out of bars, West looks exactly like the kind of guy you write a book about.
Tall. Brooding. Just the right side of dangerous.
My stomach is doing those pleasant swirly loops that lead to bad decisions.
He’s a decade-plus virus that I can’t sweat out.
He crosses his arms over his chest, mistrust dissipating into amusement. “So, to be clear, you are here to jump my bones?” he deadpans.
“Hilarious.”
He drags his fingers through his curls, his shirt riding up again. I try not to watch. “What’s up? You didn’t torture me enough tonight?”
“Is that what it would be?” I put a hand on my waist and cock my hip, all bravado. It’s fine to joke about something that will never happen, right?
He tenses, his expression steely. He chooses his next words carefully. “What are you doing here, Mars?”
I drop my hand. “You still can’t read, talk about, or listen to your own book, huh?”
“Something like that,” he says flatly.
I feel a small, obnoxious urge to apologize. It’s easy enough to ignore. “You forgot your jacket,” I say quickly, relieved to have found an excuse for standing under a streetlight with him.
“Okay.” West nods.
He blinks. Patient. Waiting for…Oh.
Goose bumps streak across my chest as I slide the jacket off. My nipples harden under this ill-advised sundress. I wonder if he notices.
West’s eyes are dark as they dip low for a fraction of a second. “Keep it. You’re cold.”
Question asked and answered. My body flushes hot, desire gathering between my thighs.
I pull his jacket tight over my chest and hold it closed with one hand. “This stupid fucking dress.”
“No,” he says abruptly. When I raise my eyebrows, he clears his throat, looking suddenly uncomfortable. “I meant what I said at the bar. It’s a nice dress. Green is…um…you look…”
“Don’t bother,” I say when it’s clear that he’d rather cut his tongue out than say something nice about me. I motion to his jacket. “When will I give it back to you?”
His expression turns wry. “Do you really think we’ve seen the last of each other, Darling?” My face must give something away, because he asks, “Why do you hate it so much when I call you that?”
“Because it implies that we’re friends, which we haven’t been for a while.” Maybe it’s the alcohol, or maybe it’s just the way he’s looking at me, but my tone has lost all of this afternoon’s bite. I don’t have it in me to open more old wounds tonight.
“Huh,” West murmurs cryptically. “Are you hungry?”
“I would do something illegal to get my hands on a slice of Mount Lemmon pie.”
“The café closed down.”
My shoulders fall. “What? When?”
“A few years ago.”
“Oh.” I feel sadder than the situation warrants.
“I’d bet there’s another establishment in Tucson that sells pie,” he offers.
“It wouldn’t be the same.”
“I guess.”
“What else changed?” I ask, suddenly curious about how many of my memories this town has erased.
“Not much. Casa Video still rents DVDs, but now they have a craft beer bar where they screen films on the upper level.”
“Do they still have the velvet curtain with the adult titles behind it?” West and I were freshmen the first time we stumbled upon that room, and I giggled uncontrollably for twenty minutes straight.
He raises his shoulders in an exaggerated shrug. “I wouldn’t know.”
I gasp. “West Emerson! Tell me you are not renting nineties porn!”
He laughs. “I have no idea if the velvet curtain still exists. I promise.”
“Mm-hmm,” I hum, suddenly giddy.
“Seriously.”
“Okay.”
“Is that a real ‘okay,’ or are you humoring me?”
“Whatever you say.”
He levels me with a pleading stare. “Please tell me you believe me.”
“Fine.” I twist my mouth so he won’t see me grin. “I believe you. Happy?”
“Yeah. Now c’mon, I’ll walk you to your hotel.”
“You don’t have to do that. Seriously. I’m fine. I used to haunt this campus after dark.”
“We used to haunt this campus,” he corrects, “and you’re not as sober as I’d like you to be when you’re walking alone after dark.” His jaw flexes, a stubborn line forming on his lips. It doesn’t seem worth it to argue.
I give him the name of my hotel and fall into step by his side.
There’s a faster route, one that doesn’t involve cutting through campus, but the ghosts of our past can’t leave us alone tonight, and walking next to him feels less complicated than it did this afternoon.
The darkness tends to do that. When I can’t mark the passing years by the faint traces of smile lines around his eyes, it’s easier to chase the shadows of our old selves.
The wind swirls my hair in every direction. There’s no hope for it. If I move my hands from my skirt, West will know the color (light blue) and cut (cheeky) of my underwear.
“Speaking of people who aren’t sober…” I tilt my chin up to look at him. His large jacket slips off my shoulder again, and the chill cuts straight to my bones.
“Is there a question under those ellipses?” he asks dryly. I laugh. West knows as well as anyone about my deep and abiding love for ellipses.
“Not if you don’t want to answer one.”
He glances up at the sky, weighing his words carefully. “The older I get, the more I realize that nothing is as black-and-white as I thought when we were twenty-two.”
We.
My stomach hurts.
“Because of my dad, I saw alcohol as bad, sobriety as good.” He glances sideways, and I can’t bring myself to meet his eyes.
An old, sickening feeling settles heavy on my chest, but he continues, unfazed.
“Eventually I realized that I don’t want to make my decisions based on his mistakes.
I refuse to give him that level of control over my life.
And once I loosened the grip on my own anger, he stopped taking up so much real estate in my head.
” He turns his empty palms to the sky. “I gave myself permission to stop fighting my past.”
His confession shocks me. I inspect his profile under the blue glow of a campus emergency light. Gone is the anguish that used to surround him when he talked about his dad, and in its place is a hard-fought peace. He looks settled. Confident. Steady.
He grew up, I realize with a start. The sensation of guilt quickly makes room for something different but equally as alarming. Pride. I shouldn’t be feeling either in relation to West Emerson.
“I’m happy for you, West,” I say, and the look he gives me in return is so unguarded that it terrifies me.
I need to redirect this conversation away from soul-baring confessions and toward something lighter.
“Friday night and nothing is happening. Other than the café, Tucson hasn’t changed at all, has it? ”
“It’s not so bad.”
“I’ll never believe it. This city has always been sleepy.”
“Because there’s so much to do in New York?” he asks darkly.
We stare at each other in silence, the absurdity of his question hanging between us.
“Don’t say anything. I heard it,” he mutters, before furrowing his brow in thought. “Are you still willing to do something illegal in the name of sugar?”
“I will always, at any time, do something illegal for dessert.”
West nods toward the Student Union food court. The lights are off and the doors are locked. “Prove it, Darling.”
Ugh.
I roll my eyes and follow him into the dark.