Chapter 8
January sucked.
I mean, I know January sucks everywhere, but it particularly sucked for me at Bribury.
And it wasn’t even that we were having a bad winter. Comparatively it’d been pretty mild, hardly any snowfall at all, and when it did come it only stayed on the ground for a day or two before melting.
But Lily and Lucas were in love. And though I was happy for them, it also took my roommate away from the partying I wanted to do.
Oh, Lily tried not to be that girl. The one who dumps her friends for a new boyfriend. And Lucas worked nights, so during the week, Lily was free in the evenings.
But even when we did go to a party or something together, Lily wasn’t interested in any of the guys there.
I wasn’t quite ready yet to confess that I wasn’t either.
I thought about Montrose. Even put myself in his path a few times. He was teaching a few sessions, but they were all of the one class that I’d taken last semester.
The couple of times I would accidentally on purpose run into him, he would be polite, but still call me Ms. Winters like he’d done in class. He never mentioned seeing me at Betsy’s wedding.
The third time I saw him, he actually stopped and talked for a bit. He asked if I remembered what he’d said to me on my last day of his class.
I waved my mittened hand in the air and said, “Yeah, vaguely. Kind of how I should find myself and be true to her.”
That wasn’t exactly it. I, of course, knew every word he’d said.
One: because he’d taken me aside, away from even Syd, who’d been asked to stay behind too, and I thought maybe my constant flirting was about to pay off.
And two: because the words he said were ones I’d thought of nearly every day since.
“You’re so busy not being who you are, perfecting the persona you’ve got going on, that you might not be able to find yourself when you need to. Find her. Be her…and let the rest of the bullshit go.”
Yeah, I hated how he’d nailed me. And yet hadn’t really at all.
He’d nodded that day in the quad and said he remembered every word, and that now he was thinking that maybe his advice to me had not been the best.
When I asked what he meant by that, he just looked off across campus, obviously in his own thoughts, and shook his head.
He said goodbye to me, and something in it felt…final. I didn’t put myself purposely in his path after that.
I thought Syd might step up and fill the void left by Lily being in love. Syd liked to party, and she’d seemed desperate to be accepted by the Bribury boys.
But she’d picked up a second part-time job this semester, so I barely even saw her anymore. Even less than Lily.
Yes, I could have made more—other—friends. But I was kind of content to just hibernate through January myself. I liked the classes I was taking (though there was no hottie like Montrose teaching any of them), and though I’d never really needed to study, I did enjoy reading the textbooks.
One was Intro to Psychology. I’d been playing armchair shrink for years (with my parents, how could I not?) and found that most of my hypotheses actually had merit.
I thought once January passed I’d want to go out more, but coming home from my afternoon classes on a Tuesday in early February felt much the same as it had since coming back from break—stale.
The room was crisp, with a fresh breeze coming from the window that Lily had left open a tiny crack.
Which meant she and Lucas had had crazy monkey sex all afternoon before Lucas would have left to get his little brother from school.
Closing the window, I looked down to the frozen quad below me, watching my fellow Briburians (yes, just made that up…but I kind of like it) scurry to class, bodies huddled into their warm coats, knit beanies firmly placed on their heads.
I walked through our shared bathroom to Syd’s room to see if she was around, but her room was empty.
I was just reaching for my phone to text Lily and see where she was when it beeped with a text tone that wasn’t assigned to anyone, just the generic tone. I didn’t get a lot of those. I liked knowing who was texting or calling, so gave specific tones to everyone.
That way I could ignore my father or mother without even having to reach for my phone to see it was them. Big timesaver.
Are you in your room? read the text.
Umm…yeah…like I was going to answer that.
It’s Stick.
Oh. Okay, so it was at least someone I knew, if not someone I wanted to hear from.
Why? I answered.
Downstairs. Have something for you.
I knew he couldn’t get into the dorm without a student ID, but this was Stick, and I wouldn’t put it past him to worm his way in somehow. He knew what room we lived in because he’d come here the night Lucas was arrested.
And I didn’t want him in the room with me right now. Not because I didn’t trust him. And certainly not because I’d been replaying that kiss over and over in my mind since it had happened.
Because I hadn’t.
Not too much, anyway.
What is it?
Can’t say. You need to see it.
I’ll be right down. I grabbed my jacket, still warm from my body. Phone and keys in hand, I took the stairs down. Made him wait a little.
I walked through the main entrance but didn’t see him waiting against the pillar where Lucas was always waiting for Lily.
“Jane. Over here,” he called, and I turned and walked around the large pillar looking out onto the circular drop-off area.
There were six metered spots in front of the dorm, always taken.
The one-way drive was wide enough for three cars, which was good because there was always at least one car next to every metered one with people being picked up or dropped off, or, like, pizza delivery guys.
That left one lane for people to actually drive through. And sometimes that was taken up too.
Stick was standing in front of a black sports car, with his red car parked behind it. “Hurry up, will ya? I’m freezing my nuts off.”
I walked toward him, surprised to see somebody behind the wheel of Stick’s car. I ducked my head to look, thinking maybe it was Lucas, but it was just some guy about Stick’s age that I didn’t recognize. He nodded at me and I nodded back. The engine was running.
I walked up to Stick and said, “What’s going on? What do you have to give me?”
Okay, I knew I’d watched too many romcoms with my mom when I was younger when the first thing that popped into my head was Stick whispering, “This,” and taking me into his arms and kissing me like he’d done on the dance floor.
Make no mistake, if he’d tried it I would have kneed him in the balls, like I should have done at the wedding.
“This,” he said, and took my hand. His were bare, and my mittens were still in my dorm room. He dropped a set of keys into my palm then curled my fingers over to make a fist over them.
His hands were indeed freezing, and they hesitated for a moment on mine, like he was trying to warm them up on me or something.
“What are these to?” I asked, taking my hand from his and opening my fist. They were car keys, and the key chain was heavy silver with a Corvette insignia.
Stick took a step away from the black car he’d been standing in front of. Which was, of course, a Corvette.
“I don’t get it,” I said.
“It’s yours,” he said, like it made perfect sense.
“You stole me a car? I mean, I figured I was a good kisser, but come on—you didn’t need to steal a car for me as a thank-you.”
He snorted. “Please. You should be thanking me for that kiss. And I didn’t steal the Vette.”
“Oh, ‘the Vette,’ is it?” I took a step around him, to look more fully at the car. My car?
“So if you didn’t steal it—”
“It’s from your dad, okay?” There was definite tone in his voice. He did not appreciate the car thief joke. Which, of course, meant I’d have to save a bunch to use on him.
Though it wasn’t like I was hoping to see him again or anything.
“This is from my dad? Are you sure?”
“Yep. Via Grayson Spaulding.”
Ah, that made more sense. He’d texted me last week that he’d be in touch soon about doing that interview.
My dad had announced his candidacy shortly after the wedding. And, true to his word, Grayson Spaulding had somehow made Bribury a no-fly zone for reporters.
But soon I’d be asked to make an appearance and say how great my daddy was and how I thought he’d make a super governor of Maryland.
Apparently the Corvette was a sweetener.
“But why a Corvette?” I thought aloud. “Why not a cute little Audi, or a Porsche or something?”
“Had to be an American-made car, is what he told me.”
Right. For appearances. I couldn’t be driving a German or Japanese car up to campaign rallies, now could I?
“And you picked it out?”
Stick nodded, a rare flash of…pride? shining on his face.
“And this is what you thought I’d want to drive?” The flash of pleasure disappeared from his face, and for just a second I felt kind of shitty for making that happen. But then I remembered this was Stick—just some low-level car thief.
“Whatever. Trade it for something else. The dealer’s information is in the glove box. It’s registered for Lot H, you know where that is?”
I nodded. It was the freshman parking lot about a quarter of a mile from our dorm.
“Then my work here is done. Keep it. Don’t keep it. Whatever. You can work that out with your father, or Spaulding, or whoever.”
He started to walk to his car, opening the passenger door to get in.
“Wait,” I said as I peeked into the Corvette.
“What?” he said, totally impatient.
I turned to face him. “I can’t drive a stick shift.”
A look of pure exasperation crossed his face. “Are you shitting me?”
“Ah, that would be a no, I’m not shitting you. I can’t drive a stick. So why don’t you go park it in Lot H for me and then bring me back the keys and I’ll get Grayson on the phone to take care of it?”
He walked back to me, snatched the keys out of my hand. “That’s how it’s always been for you, hasn’t it? Make a call and have someone else take care of it.”
He wasn’t really saying this to me, it was mumbled under his breath, and I suspected it was directed at everyone whom Stick perceived as a “have” to his “have not,” but it still pissed me off.
“That’s not at all how it’s been for me.
You may think you know all about me—and you might know more than most from your new BFF Grayson Spaulding—but you don’t know shit about me.
” I took the keys back from him. “Go on, get out of here. I’ll figure it out and get the damn thing to the parking lot myself. ”
“You can’t just figure it out. You’ll strip the gears, or kill—”
“I said I’d figure something out. I’m sure some guy on my floor can drive it there for me.”
“And I just know how you’ll repay him, too.” He stepped closer to me, staring me down.
My eyes narrowed on his, but I managed a tiny, sexy smile. “Yes, I’ll make sure it’s worth his time…and effort,” I said in a breathy voice that I wasn’t even aware I had in my repertoire.
He placed a hand on my shoulder and slowly slid it down my arm, brushing the back of my hand, then tightened his hold on my wrist and turned it upward.
He took the keys back. “Do you have any more classes today?” he asked softly, still staring at me.
I shook my head. “Anywhere you’re supposed to be in the next few hours? ” he asked. Another shake from me.
He sighed, then looked to the sky, raking a hand through his messy hair. No warm beanie for Mr. Hardass. “Christ,” he whispered under his breath as he turned away from me.
He walked to his car and opened the passenger door.
“I’ll call you if I need you. Be available,” he said to the guy behind the wheel, who nodded his understanding.
He then reached into the front seat and grabbed a small white paper sack, which he shoved into his jacket pocket.
Stick shut the door, and the red muscle car drove away.
Leaving me with Stick and my own muscle car.
“Let’s go,” he said as he opened the passenger door of the Corvette and waved me in.
“Where are we going?” I asked, but made my way to the car, lowering myself onto the smooth leather seat, which was warm under my butt.
“Driving lesson,” Stick said, then closed my door and walked across to the driver’s side.