13. CHAPTER THIRTEEN
GIANNA
By Tuesday morning, I have learned two things.
The first is that doing sexual things with somebody you already have a crush on does not, in fact, cure the crush.
The second is that Mara should never be allowed access to my phone again.
She is waiting outside Sport Finance when I come out at ten-forty with two coffees with the expression of a woman who believes I will give her my first unborn child.
I stop in front of her. “What’s this?”
She holds one coffee out. “Coffee.”
I take it suspiciously. “You brought me an interrogation beverage.”
She scoffs. “That is so ungrateful.”
Mara falls into step beside me while I head toward the student center. She lasts maybe twelve seconds. “So?”
I shake my head.
“Gianna,” she moans.
“I have Sport Law in two hours, and I would like to preserve what remains of my dignity until then.”
“You called me Sunday morning to tell me you kissed him.”
“That was different.”
“How?”
“I was emotionally vulnerable.”
“You screamed into the phone first thing in the morning.”
“I did not scream.”
“You sounded like a freaking guinea pig.”
I drink my coffee.
Mara looks at my face. Then she stops walking. I make it another three steps before realizing she isn’t beside me anymore. Her eyes narrow.
“You did something.”
“No.”
“You absolutely did.”
I turn around. “I do lots of things.”
“With Rowan.”
I suck in my bottom lip. I feel it happen and immediately know I have lost.
Mara’s jaw drops. “Oh my God.”
“Keep your voice down.”
“You fucked him.”
I look around the walkway. Two girls passing us glance over.
“Mara, be quiet.”
“You did.”
I shake my head. “I did not.”
She grabs my forearm with both hands. “Do not lie to me.”
“I’m not lying.”
Her face changes. Then changes again. “Oh.”
I start walking.
Mara catches up instantly. “Oh.”
“Stop saying oh.”
“You didn’t have sex.”
“No.”
“But something happened.”
I keep walking.
“Gianna.”
“Mara.”
She gets in front of me and starts walking backward, so I have to look at her. “What happened?”
“Nothing you need a diagram of.”
Her mouth falls open. I laugh and try to get around her. She catches my sleeve.
“You gave him head.”
I glance around and warn her, “Mara.”
“You did!”
We are fifteen feet from the student center doors.
I lower my voice. “Can you please stop announcing my sex life to the entire state of Michigan?”
Her eyes are enormous. I grab the front of her coat and pull her closer.
“And before you congratulate yourself, your theory did not work.”
“What theory?”
“The stupid one where I was supposed to hook up with him and magically stop liking him.”
Mara stares at me.
Then her smile starts. “You like him more.”
My face heats. “I hate you.”
“You like him more.”
She wraps both arms around me.
I stand there holding my coffee away from her shoulder so she doesn’t crush it between us.
“This is not a celebration.”
“It is for me.”
“You have contributed nothing useful.”
“I told you to get under somebody to get over them.”
I roll my eyes. “I wasn’t trying to get over Rowan.”
“You were trying to stop being weird about him.”
I point at her and sip my coffee. “That also failed.”
Mara pulls back and looks delighted.
I hate that she’s right. The problem is that nothing about last night gave me distance.
If anything, Rowan feels closer now. Not because of what happened in the kitchen, although my brain has certainly replayed enough of that to be considered medically unhelpful.
It’s everything around it that keeps getting me.
He wanted me there. He gave Blue movie tickets because he wanted the house empty.
He cooked enough for me before I arrived.
He remembered I needed a charger before I remembered I had left my own in my bag, even if he made me fight him for his first. And then after all of it, when I told him he was a problem and he could have made another joke, he looked at me and said he liked me.
Just like that. There was no speech, no buildup, no tortured pause, and no awkwardness. Just I like you.
I have replayed those three words more than anything else that happened on the kitchen counter, which seems like an embarrassing misuse of my priorities.
Mara studies me. Her expression softens slightly.
“What?”
“I was going to ask if you’re happy.”
I adjust my grip on the coffee. “Yes.” I suck in my bottom lip again. “Very.”
She smiles.
There is still uncertainty around Rowan, but it isn’t eating at me the way I thought it would. He told me he likes me. He wants to see me. He wants to kiss me. He apparently wants to do significantly more than kiss me.
I don’t need to take all of that and immediately demand a five-year plan.
For once in my life, I can just enjoy something while it’s good.
Mara bumps her shoulder into mine. “Does Lucy know?”
I scoff. “No.”
“Still?”
“Still.”
She considers that. “And you’re okay with it?”
I nod with no hesitation. “Yes.”
I answer quickly enough that she doesn’t ask again.
The truth is, not telling Lucy still feels strange because I tell Lucy everything.
I told her when I had a UTI freshman year before I told my mom.
She knows which bra I hate, which professor makes me want to commit minor property damage, and exactly how much money is in my checking account because I made her look once when I was too scared.
Keeping Rowan from her feels unnatural, but it still feels right.
For now. Not because I’m ashamed. Not because Benson scares me.
Because the second Lucy knows, this becomes a thing outside of me and Rowan.
And I like having one part of my life that belongs to us before everybody else gets their hands on it.
“I won’t say anything,” Mara says.
I look at her. “That might be the nicest thing you’ve ever done for me.”
“I’m capable of discretion.”
“You texted Rowan from my phone.”
“That was before I understood the gravity of the situation. I wanted to mess with you.”
I laugh. “You are insane.”
“Yes.”
She takes my arm again as we walk into the student center. “But you love me.”
“Unfortunately.”
“See? You and Rowan are basically married already.”
I shove her away.
She laughs all the way to the stairs.
Sport Law spends forty minutes on waivers and assumption of risk, which is possibly the first time this semester that something in class has directly applied to both my professional and personal life.
I take a picture of one of Ottley’s slides.
Negligence: Foreseeability.
I send it to Rowan under the desk.
Me: This is about you.
His answer comes six minutes later.
Rowan: How?
Me: It was foreseeable.
Rowan: What was?
I smile down at the screen.
Me: Everything that happened in your kitchen.
There’s a longer pause.
Rowan: Stop texting me from class.
Me: You’re in class too.
Rowan: Yeah.
I stare at the message.
Then type:
Me: Your thumbs ups and yeahs are emotionally hostile.
Rowan: Sure.
I press my lips together, so I don’t laugh out loud.
Ottley looks toward my side of the room. I put the phone facedown and attempt to behave like a future professional.
By three, I’m at the rink.
Work is quiet enough that I get through the tape inventory, finish two travel jerseys, and help Cole replace a skate holder before Donovan tells me I can use the back desk for my event stuff if I’m caught up.
I am. So I do. The event has reached the point where I can’t call it my little class project anymore. There are forty-eight kids registered.
Forty-eight.
When Derek first told me the youth program thought forty participants was manageable, forty sounded theoretical.
A number on an email. Now I have a spreadsheet with forty-eight actual names, forty-eight emergency contacts, forty-eight skate sizes, and a column noting which kids already have equipment.
The rink is held. The youth program is confirmed.
Athletics approved the use of the space.
I have volunteers. I have a rough schedule.
I have enough questions left that every time I answer one, three more appear, but the event is happening.
That realization hits differently while I’m sitting in the equipment room staring at the registration sheet.
I came up with this. Not alone. Derek helped. Donovan has answered questions. Ives has pushed me every time I showed up to class with a version of the idea that was too vague. But it started in my head. Now forty-eight kids are coming.
I sit back in the chair and grin at the screen.
“What now?” Cole asks from the skate machine.
I look over. “Nothing.”
“You look creepy again.”
“I am creepy. Frick off.” I flip him off.
He smiles and goes back to the skate.
I almost send Rowan a screenshot. My hand actually reaches for my phone. Then I stop. Not because I don’t want to tell him. Because I realize he already knows.
I told him Sunday that registration had passed forty. He asked how many volunteers I had. Yesterday while we were eating, he asked if Derek ever answered me about the second locker room.
Somewhere along the way, Rowan has gotten woven into this project enough that I don’t need to report every single development in real time.
That feels nice too. Annoyingly nice.
I finish the staffing schedule a little after five, send it to myself before I can destroy it with unnecessary revisions, and go home.
Lucy is sitting cross-legged on the couch with her laptop open and one of Benson’s Camden hoodies on, which means she has apparently stopped pretending half of her wardrobe does not belong to my brother.
I drop my bag.
“You know he owns other clothes.”
She looks down at the sweatshirt. “This is mine. He gave it to me.”
I walk into the kitchen. “What do you want for dinner?”
“I already ate.”
I stop. “With who?”
“Benson.”
“At five?”
“He had an early dinner.”
“That is not dinner. That’s an elderly person’s lunch.”
Lucy laughs.
I open the freezer. There is nothing useful inside. I eat cereal.
The entire time, I am aware that Rowan has not texted me since class.
I refuse to care.
At seven, my phone buzzes.
I care immediately.
Rowan: How many kids now?
I smile.
Me: 48.
Rowan: Shit.