22. Gavin
GAVIN
I’ve been pacing the kitchen for thirty minutes, where I have a clear view of everyone coming in through the front door.
“Gavin!” someone yells from outside.
I tear my gaze from the party entrance for only a second to find the source. Tommy and a group of girls stare back at me, grinning. Tommy holds up a bottle of Jager and one of the girls motions for me to join them.
I shake my head, and when I glance back at the front door, she’s finally in it, stepping over the threshold behind Jordan and Daisy.
My heart leaps at the sight of her. Jean shorts and a yellow top with sleeves that fall off her shoulders. As she walks, she gathers her dark hair and pulls it to one side.
Five long strides get me close enough that Jordan sees me.
“Gavin, hey,” my buddy says with a chin jut.
Violet looks up when she hears my name.
Staring at her, I nod to Jordan and Daisy. “Hey, guys.”
Jordan slaps me on the shoulder. “Congrats on the games.”
“Thanks.”
I put myself another step closer to Violet. “You look stunning.”
She lets out a nervous chuckle. “Oh boy, are you already drunk?”
“Sotally tober,” I say, pulling a real smile from her. “Come on, let’s see if we can rectify that.”
The four of us head back to the kitchen as Noah’s coming in from outside.
“Do you want something to drink?” I ask Violet.
“Have any hard seltzer?”
“Do we have any hard seltzer.” Noah cuts in with a sarcastic huff. He opens the fridge. It’s a work of art, really. Truly and White Claw cans fill three shelves and part of the door. If you build it, they will come. If you keep the seltzer cold, the girls will stay.
“Wow,” she says, stepping forward. She grabs one and thanks him.
“Anyone else?” He takes two for himself, stacking them in one hand.
Once everyone has drinks, we go outside. Some of the hockey guys are already here and Jordan and Daisy leave us to go say hello.
Noah cracks his first drink open and takes a long swallow. “Pong, anyone?”
Violet’s gaze darts around the yard. She fidgets with the tab on the can, pushing it side to side.
“Vi?”
“Maybe later.”
Noah leaves with a salute and I’m finally alone with Violet.
I’m still so stunned she’s here, standing by my side. She catches me gawking at her and an uneasy smile tugs at the corner of her lips. “You’re creeping me out, Leonard.”
“Sorry,” I say. “I can’t believe you’re really here.”
“Yeah, me neither. I never thought I would show my face at one of these parties again.”
“We had some good times at these parties.”
“Did we?”
“Yeah. Remember the night we had all those Jell-O shots and then decided to walk to Taco Bell. Only the dining room was closed and we hassled the poor drive-through kid, trying to get him to take our order.”
Her lips part in a smile. “Then he finally caved and neither of us had any money.”
We share a laugh and Violet angles her body, closing us into our own little circle. I like it—being in a circle with just Violet. She glances around the party. “What now?”
“Are you still a shark at washers?”
Her lips twist into a competitive smirk. “Would a shark admit to that?”
“Fair enough.” I chuckle. “Guess we’ll just have to find out.”
On our walk across the yard, where the game is setup, we run into Daisy and Jordan again. We split up into teams, boys against girls.
Violet stands next to me, holding the washer in one hand, and focused solely on the box twenty feet away. Her dark hair hangs forward, blocking part of her face from view.
If I keep staring at her like this, she’s going to yell at me for being creepy again, but I just can’t help it. She’s so fucking gorgeous, and she’s here with me. I don’t want to blink and miss a second of it.
The party is big tonight and has that energy of a special night that only few parties, like the first and last of the year, tend to have.
Violet seems to be having an all-right time, but her guard is up, and I find myself wanting to reach out and touch her but then stop myself.
We’re in this weird limbo, somewhere between friends and more, and as much as I would like to leap over that line straight to MORE, I can tell she is not ready for that.
We’ve kissed twice now since she started hating me, but the way she’s holding herself from me seems like she isn’t so sure she wants to do it again.
“I need another drink,” Daisy says, her cheeks flushed from the alcohol.
Jordan wraps an arm around her waist. “Let’s get you another drink then.”
I nod to Violet. “Ready for another one?”
She lifts her can. “Not yet.”
By unspoken agreement, we walk across the party. It’s slow going, weaving through groups of people. I take Violet’s hand, so we don’t get separated, her slim fingers gripping mine.
Tommy is standing near the pool with a group of our teammates.
“Leonard!” Tommy lifts both arms over his head and stumbles.
Jenkins steadies him. “Easy there, buddy.”
Tommy shrugs out of Jenkin’s hold and says, “Someone was just looking for you, Leonard.”
I pull Violet to my side, and it feels like Coach drew up a play for this very moment as all my teammates’ eyes sweep down to my and Violet’s joined hands and then their brows rise.
“Who was looking for me?” I ask, breaking the silence.
Tommy transforms from a drunk, stumbling mess to someone far too sober. He glances at Violet again and sidesteps to put more distance between us. Slowly, my brain cycles through his odd behavior until I realize, too late, what he’s trying to tell me.
“There you are.” The feminine voice squeals over the music and conversation, and then Sariah tackles me from my right.
I have to pull my left hand free from Violet’s to catch my balance.
“I’ve been looking for you all night.” She pulls back, beaming at me. “You were supposed to call me.”
I step closer to Violet. “Hey, Sariah. Sorry about that. Do you know Violet?”
It goes from mildly uncomfortable to the pit of hell when Bailey falls in beside Sariah. Violet stiffens.
“Oh my gosh.” Bailey’s mouth drops open. “Violet?! Is that you?”
Vi lifts two fingers around her can. I’m honestly surprised it isn’t the middle finger she flashes her.
“I thought you transferred. I haven’t seen you in, in like, forever.”
“Forever wouldn’t be long enough,” I think I hear Vi mutter.
Bailey is oblivious to any weirdness between them as she turns her head to share a laugh with Sariah. “This is my old roommate from freshman year.”
“Oh, right.” Sariah nods and looks Violet over.
Bailey continues to smile. “This is just like old times. You, me, Gavin.”
I can feel Violet’s rage, but she stays quiet.
“We should hang sometime and catch up.” Bailey pulls out her phone. “Air drop me your number.”
I brace myself for the verbal lashing that I’m sure is coming, but Violet just nods. “Yeah, that’d be, like, so awesome.”
Bailey doesn’t catch the sarcasm, but I do.
Part of me wishes she’d yell at her. I don’t blame what happened between us on Bailey.
Whatever went down that night, I made the choices that ultimately had me ending up in her bed, but the fact that she can stand here, acting like everything is just peachy, is unnerving.
Violet lifts her can and fakes a smile. “I think I am ready for another drink.”
Without another word, she disappears into the crowd.
The smallest hint of a smirk pulls at the corner of Bailey’s mouth. I don’t understand chicks. Was that whole thing a show to make Violet uncomfortable? Fuck. A protective rage fills me. I take off after her. She hasn’t gotten far, thanks to the mass of people here tonight.
“Violet,” I call.
When I reach out and grab her arm, she glances back and then tries to tug out of my hold.
“Leave me alone, Gavin.”
“Would you hold up a second.”
A big group blocks her path, giving her nowhere to go. I take advantage of the moment and step in front of her.
“This was a bad idea. I shouldn’t have come.”
“Fuck them.”
“You already did,” she snaps. The fight in her dies a little as the people around us look our way. An embarrassed flush tints her cheeks.
“I’m sorry. I wasn’t prepared to run into them. What can I do? Do you want to go somewhere else?”
“I should have known they’d be here.” She won’t meet my gaze as she speaks. “This is not my scene anymore. I don’t belong here. I’ll see you later.”
She turns sideways in order to fit in the small space between the group of people and the pool.
Only someone steps back as she gets in their path, and the little bump sends Violet teetering on the edge.
She throws her hands up to her sides to catch her balance but can’t quite get it and her eyes widen in panic.
“Vi!” I reach out for her. She grips my wrist, and the next thing I know, we’re both hitting the water.
When I come up, I search for Violet. She’s a few feet away. Her back is to me and her shoulders shake.
“Are you okay?” My T-shirt and jeans stick to my body. We’re in the shallow end, so I easily cut through the water to get to her.
When she looks up, water hangs on her lashes. Her whole body shakes with… laughter?
“You okay?”
“No, I’m not okay.” She laughs harder. “I’m soaked.”
“Don’t worry. It’s not the first time people have jumped, or been thrown in, fully clothed.”
We stare at each other until I take her hand and we walk out of the pool. I pull off my T-shirt and ring it out.
“Must be nice,” she says as she tugs at the wet material sticking to her stomach.
“Come on. I have some towels inside.”
We head into the house and then upstairs. I grab two towels from the bathroom and take her to my room.
“Thanks.” She squeezes the water out of her hair and then dabs her clothes. She pulls her cell phone from her pocket. “Well, that sucks.”
“Oh, shit. Want me to put it in some rice?”
“No. I’ll do it. I’m going to head to my place and change.”
I step in front of her and block the door. “Don’t go. If you go home, you won’t come back.”
“I am not wearing wet clothes all night.”
I lean over to my dresser and snag a pair of shorts. “Problem solved.”
“You’re more than a foot taller than me.” She places the shorts at her hips. They fall all the way down past her knees.
“They have a drawstring. I’m confident you’ll make it work.” I get her a shirt, too. “I can toss your stuff in the dryer if you want.”
“What about the rest of me?” She waves a hand in front of her face. “I should go. This whole thing was a bad idea.”
“You look gorgeous.” I get myself some dry clothes. “I’ll change down the hall. Open the door when you’re done.”
“Okay.” Her gaze drops to my bare chest.
I don’t move because, hello, a hot girl is checking me out. Her eyes slowly lift back up to my face. I can’t help it, I smile.
“You know what?” She flings the shorts and T-shirt over her shoulder and sashays past me. “I’ll go to the bathroom. You can stay in here and keep flexing.”
She disappears out the door. I quickly change, then run downstairs to get a bag of rice for her phone. Violet returns a few minutes later.
The shorts are rolled several times, so they hit her mid-thigh and the T-shirt is tied up in the back. She has her wet clothes in hand.
“Want me to put those in the dryer?”
“No. It’s fine.” She sets them on top of the towel and glances down at her outfit. “Okay. I’m ready. This night can’t possibly get any worse at this point.”
I keep a mini fridge in my room, and I open it and pull out two beers. “Let’s have a drink in here first. It’s so loud out there.”
We sit on the bed. I lean back on an elbow and kick my feet up and Violet sits cross-legged across from me.
“I’m sorry about Bailey and Sariah.”
“I knew I was going to run into her someday. Do you hang out with her a lot?” Her stare drops to the beer in her hands.
“Bailey?”
She nods.
“Definitely not.” In fact, I’ve avoided her. Bailey is an awful reminder of what I’m capable of. “I run into her occasionally at parties, but nothing has ever happened between us.” I lower my voice. “Nothing else.”
“Right.” She brings the can up to her mouth and takes a small drink.
“And I didn’t know she was friends with Sariah.”
“You don’t know the friends of the girl you’ve been hooking up with?”
“It wasn’t anything serious.”
“Neither were we.” She shakes her head. “I can’t figure you out.”
“What do you want to know?”
“I want to know which version of you is the real one. Are you the asshole who slept with my roommate and then continues to hook up with random girls, without getting to know them, or the sweet guy who carried me ten blocks when my sandal broke and stayed up all night, wanting to know every detail of my life? I can’t reconcile the different versions.
Are you the worst mistake I ever made or… ” Her lip quivers.
“I think I’m a little bit of both guys.” I swallow around a lump the size of my many mistakes.
“So where does that leave us?”