Chapter Sixteen Evan
I’m late to class for the second time this semester.
For the past week, I should’ve been preparing for the presentation we’re about to give in front of the whole class, but I’ve done nothing but think about the taste of Scarlett Voss’s mouth.
She is all I’ve dreamed about. All I’ve thought about every time my fingers brush past my lips and I delude myself into thinking I’ll be able to taste her again.
I hate her for kissing me and I hate myself even more for enjoying it.
I don’t know how she’s managed to get into my head like this.
She’s distracted me from the SEI and wanting to prove to my dad that I’m ready to be part of the business.
That is what I should be focusing on. But here I am spending all my time either with Scarlett or thinking about her.
I consume myself by thinking of the different ways I can be around her.
How many times I can brush my hand against hers, how long I can keep it there without her noticing.
I’ve spent all my time thinking that I don’t know what I’m going to do when I’m around her again.
I get to campus just before Scarlett’s and my presentation time slot, and she’s already outside the classroom pacing.
She’s wearing a thick green sweater and black skirt, cue cards in her hands as she mumbles the words to herself while walking back and forth.
Seeing her makes something weird jolt in my chest. It’s been a week, but the softness of her waist against my palm isn’t a feeling I’m going to forget anytime soon.
She felt like silk in my hands, soft and beautiful, and—
No.
Nope.
I’m not going there.
Not now.
Her head shoots up when I stalk closer. She looks furious, dark-brown eyes glare at me and then narrow as she steps toward me. “Where were you? I thought you weren’t going to show.”
I shrug, adjusting the collar of my shirt. “I lost track of time.”
“Really?”
“Yeah.”
She holds my gaze for a long moment, searching for something.
I know I look like a mess. I hardly had time to brush my hair or iron my outfit today, so my shirt isn’t tucked in properly, my tie loose around my neck like always, and I’m pretty sure my face is still flushed from the jog I had to do from the car park to this building.
It probably doesn’t help that seeing her again has completely fried my brain.
When Scarlett can’t find whatever it is she’s looking for in my expression, her shoulders drop, and she rolls her eyes. “Whatever,” she mutters, shoving a piece of paper into my hands. “Read this. I changed the notes slightly, but it’s still similar to what we’ve practiced.”
I nod, scanning over the sheet and trying to memorize the new pieces of information, but I can’t stop watching Scarlett.
Every few seconds I look up to find her taking a deep breath or smoothing out her skirt, avoiding eye contact with me.
I don’t even want her to look at me. I don’t think I could handle it.
But I need to know what she’s thinking after what happened last week.
I need to get inside her head and figure out if she’s freaking out about this just as much as I am.
We enter the classroom when the applause from the first group dies out, and I have to remind myself how hard we’ve worked for this. How much time we’ve spent together trying to make sure this project is the best it can be.
What was once a string of ideas has turned into a comprehensive business plan that details our unique selling proposition, the process of production, and financial projections.
We overcame setbacks with our different opinions on budget allocation and production methods, but if anything, those setbacks are going to be what Lawrence wants to see.
I know he wants to see how we’ve challenged each other, and as always, that’s what made the project even better.
I could practically do this presentation in my sleep by this point, so it doesn’t surprise me when Lawrence looks more than impressed and the class breaks out in applause at the end.
The applause somehow feels that much greater when I turn to Scarlett and see the proud grin on her face.
She should be proud of herself since she did think of most of the starting ideas for EcoElegance and boosted our project even more by sketching potential designs which took the fashion element to a whole other level.
I feel more relaxed when the presentation is over and I can breathe again. When Scarlett asks if I want to go to the library to work on finalizing our applications for the SEI, I just nod, following behind her.
We make our way to our usual study table that’s tucked away in one corner, a soft orange glow coming from the overhead lamp. We sit across from each other, and I pull out my laptop, sliding on my glasses to focus on my application.
“What’s wrong?” Scarlett asks after a round of silence. I don’t look up at her. “We fucking killed that, Branson.”
A smile twitches on my cheek. “We did.”
“Then why the long face?” I shrug and loosen my tie, popping the top few buttons of my shirt. “Evan.”
“What?”
“Can you talk to me? Or argue with me or . . . something. We’ve not spoken all day, it’s freaking me out.”
“I’m talking to you right now, aren’t I?” I fire back, finally looking at her. Her eyebrows are pinched together in concentration, or anger. Or both.
The truth is, I don’t know how to talk to her. What is the socially acceptable way to act around someone you’ve had an intense rivalry with your whole life after you made out with them against a tree? Whatever this is, I’m not good at it. And I don’t know when or if things can go back to normal.
Scarlett scoffs. “Don’t be an ass.” I’m about to retort something about how I’ve always been an asshole, but the words don’t come. Scarlett rests her elbows on the table, leaning closer to me.
“What’s with the ties?” Her question catches me off guard. I pause, meeting her eyes. “You wear them all the time, but you never tie them. Not properly anyway. I thought you’d tighten it to look more presentable, but you never do.”
“It’s just a fashion choice,” I answer, shrugging.
I’m lying, and I know she can tell I’m lying.
My skin itches, but I tell myself that I don’t need to scratch my arm or roll up my sleeves or do anything to combat the compulsion.
But the more I tell myself that, the more I feel like I need to do something to make me relax.
If not, there’s a very real chance I could die.
I tap my finger against my knee three times. Then six. Then nine. Scarlett watches, but she doesn’t say anything for a while.
“A fashion choice?” she echoes softly. There’s a sincerity in her voice that makes me think she’s not trying to make fun of me for once—like she actually wants to know. It’s unsettling.
I take in a deep breath, hating that I’m even admitting this out loud. “It’s a mental game I play with myself.”
“What kind of game?”
I sigh, not wanting to overwhelm her or bore her with a conversation that’s not going to be productive.
Talking about my mental health is usually reserved for therapy or when my dad thinks we need to have another ‘talk.’ It’s definitely not the kind of conversation I want to have with Scarlett.
But I see the way she relaxes, the way her eyes soften, and she lets down her guard just slightly.
There’s no judgment in her eyes, and a part of me craves that connection.
To let her see me the way she’s let me see her.
I give in to the itch on my skin and I scratch the back of my neck, the repeated motion soothing me for a second. “I have OCD. It’s not that serious. Well, I guess it is, but it’s not as bad as it used to be. I’m getting better at dealing with it.”
Her eyes don’t widen like I thought they would, but her gaze flickers to my tie and then back up to me. “Evan—”
I cut her off and continue. “The tie thing is to remind myself that I have some sort of control in my life. That leaving it untied is somehow me proving to myself that I’m not legitimately crazy even when I feel that way.”
“Evan.”
“When I was a kid and I was told something was wrong with me, I was so desperate to feel like I was normal that I’d do anything to not feel that way, and it only made it worse because the more I’d try to fit in, the more anxious I’d get that I wasn’t doing things the right way, and—”
“Evan.”
I drop my eyes to the papers in front of me, and I let out a short laugh. “You don’t have to feel sorry for me. We’ve never felt sorry for each other. It’s just something I have to live with and—”
“Ev, Jesus Christ. Can you breathe for a second?” Scarlett’s tone snaps me out of the spiral I was slipping into, and my eyes meet hers.
Her eyes are like golden pools of sunshine, and I get drawn into them the same way the moon pools in the tide.
They soften, each feature on her face becoming more beautiful as understanding dawns on her.
“You just called me ‘Ev,’ ” is the only thing I can manage.
“And you just almost had a heart attack.” I breathe, and she does too, her shoulders dropping. “Look, you don’t have to explain everything to me,” she continues. “I was being nosy and it’s really not my business. Just forget I said anything.”
I swallow. “I wanted you to know.”
Her eyebrows pinch together. “Why?”
“Because I feel like I’ve spent so long convincing myself that nothing’s wrong with me, and the way you even bothered to ask makes me think you’re one of the only people who would understand.”
Scarlett blinks at me. “If you need to, like, take a break or something, or if you just need a minute away from all of this, you don’t have to explain anything to me. I won’t judge you.”
“You won’t?”
Scarlett grins, tilting her head to the side. “No. Your tidy puzzle brain is what makes you so annoying. It’s something I might never understand.”
I break out into a full-on smile. “My tidy puzzle brain?”
“Yeah. Your noggin, your information-storer.” She leans across the table, her dark hair falling in front of her face for a second, and she taps her pen to my temple. Her lips curve up as she says, “Tidy puzzle brain.”
Something inside me settles, like a fire that’s just been put out.
Before she can retreat, I encircle my fingers around her wrist. She drags her gaze from mine to her wrist, but I don’t move, and neither does she.
I swipe my thumb against her skin, and she lets out a shaky breath.
Her pulse hammers where our bodies meet, and my heart roars in my chest.
“Thank you,” I whisper, “for trying to understand.”
“Yeah, it’s fine,” she says, but her voice is breathless.
Neither of us moves, and we’re caught in one of those moments again, where time seems to both stretch and still. I swipe my thumb against her again, and it’s so subtle, but I watch the way her eyes flutter slightly.
“Scarlett,” I say slowly, “we need to—”
“We really don’t.”
“Yes, we do,” I say, tightening my hold on her just a fraction.
When her eyes try to leave mine, I dip my head slightly, gaining her attention again.
“You kissed me, Scarlett, and we didn’t speak the whole hour it took you to drive us back home.
And then you all but kicked me out of your car when we got to my house. ”
She swallows. “So?”
“So . . . what the fuck does that mean?”
“It doesn’t mean anything,” she seethes, and she pulls her hand out of my grasp. “We were scared and high on adrenaline. It was just a moment of weakness.”
I blink at her, repeating her own words back to her slowly. “A moment of weakness.”
“Yes, we don’t . . . we don’t need to make it into a big deal, or whatever”—she gestures between us—“whatever this is. We’re friends now, right, Branson? I don’t want to complicate that.”
I swallow hard, leaning back in my seat. “Okay, yeah, you’re right. It’s not a big deal.”
“Yes, exactly.” She nods, dropping her gaze back to her own laptop.
I’m lying again. She has to know I am. She has to.
I’ve always played everything at Scarlett’s pace.
Gone along with every game she sets up for us.
If she wants to make this into a big deal, then that’s what we’ll do.
If she doesn’t . . . Well, I guess I’ll just have to suck it up and understand that that might be the only time I get to kiss Scarlett Voss.