Chapter 10
Ten
HANNAH
My contacts arrived today. Finally.
It’s Saturday night and we have no plans.
Lila treats this like a campus event. I’m out of my favorite almond shampoo so I borrow Noor’s off brand Keratin one that smells like coconuts and vanilla mated.
“You have eyes,” she says when I come out of the bathroom.
“I had them yesterday.”
“Not like this.”
Noor looks up from the sweater she’s borrowing without permission. “Your glasses make your eyes look huge. Without them, you look…”
“Finish that sentence carefully.”
“Less likely to poison someone with a rare plant.”
“Disappointing.”
I lean toward the mirror and blink twice.
No burning.
No scratching.
No sensation that a grain of sand has lodged beneath my eyelid and is trying to reach my brain.
A successful medical procedure.
Lila appears behind me with a curling iron.
“No.”
“I haven’t said anything.”
“You’re holding a weapon near my head.”
“We’re going out.”
“I thought we were getting burgers.”
“We are getting burgers. Somewhere with music, drinks, and men who own shirts without archaeological excavation logos.”
I look down at the faded sweatshirt I’m wearing.
“This is from an important dig site.”
“It has a dirt stain shaped like Florida.”
“That’s authentic.”
Noor tosses a bundle of black fabric onto my bed.
“Wear this.”
I unfold it.
It’s a fitted top with a square neckline and sleeves made of something sheer enough to suggest the designer ran out of material.
“No.”
“You say no before looking.”
“I looked.”
“Try it.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re eighteen, your contacts finally arrived, and you’ve spent the last three weekends teaching thirteen-year-old boys how to stop dribbling off their feet.”
“They’re improving.”
“Great. Tonight, improve your social life.”
I should stay in.
I have reading to finish, practice plans to revise, and an annotated bibliography due Monday.
Then Lila points at my desk.
“You are looking at your planner like you want it to ask you to prom.”
I close it.
“Fine.”
Forty minutes later, I barely recognize myself.
My hair is down, straightened just enough to control the frizz but not enough to flatten it. Noor lends me dark jeans that fit better than anything I own. The black top stays, though I add a leather jacket because the night has turned colder.
Mascara.
Lip gloss.
Small silver hoops.
No tortoiseshell glasses.
Lila studies me from the doorway.
“You look hot.”
“I look like I lost an argument.”
“That too.”
Noor hands me a tiny purse.
“My phone won’t fit in that.”
“It will if you stop carrying three pens and an emergency notebook.”
“The notebook is necessary.”
“For what?”
“Observations.”
“You are not documenting us.”
“That depends on your behavior.”
Lila links her arm through mine.
“Come on, Professor.”
The restaurant sits a few blocks off campus between a coffee shop and a store selling running shoes that cost more than my winter coat.
Inside, it’s dim, loud, and packed with students pretending Monday doesn’t exist.
A long bar runs along one wall. Red booths line the other. The air smells like fries, grilled onions, and spilled beer.
We squeeze into a booth near the back.
Noor orders cocktails with ridiculous names. Lila gets something pink with mint floating in it. I stick with a hard cider after checking the price twice.
“Live dangerously,” Lila says.
“I am. This costs twelve dollars.”
Our burgers arrive fast.
For twenty minutes, everything is easy.
Noor tells us about the professor who pronounced her last name three different ways in one lecture. Lila reenacts a disastrous coffee date with a graduate student who explained cryptocurrency until she pretended to receive an emergency text.
I laugh so hard I nearly choke on a fry.
Then Noor’s expression changes.
She looks past my shoulder.
“Don’t turn around.”
I turn around.
Kane Haverhill sits at the bar.
Krista is between his knees.
I know her now. Everyone does.
Sprinter from Georgia. Sleek dark hair. Legs that seem to begin somewhere near her shoulders. She’s wearing a red dress and one of Kane’s hands rests loosely against her hip.
They look good together.
Annoyingly good.
Krista says something near his ear, then kisses the side of his mouth. Kane smiles without looking at her.
His attention is on the television above the bar.
Basketball.
I recognize the game before I see the score.
Arizona State is running a horns set. Two bigs at the elbows, guards spaced deep in the corners.
Kane leans forward as the point guard rejects the screen.
His mouth moves.
Probably correcting him.
Krista catches his chin and turns his face back toward her. She kisses him harder this time, one hand sliding into his hair.
Kane responds.
For several seconds, they look less like two people in a restaurant and more like an advertisement for bad decisions.
I face my burger.
Lila watches me.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“You made a face.”
“I have a face.”
“You’re using his line now.”
“I am not.”
Noor sips her drink. “You know him?”
“Briefly.”
“How briefly?”
“He spilled beer on me. I spilled lunch on him.”
Lila’s mouth opens.
“The Kane Haverhill?”
“Yes.”
“You never said.”
“He thinks my name is Sandy.”
Noor lowers her glass.
“Why?”
“Because I told him it was.”
They stare.
I pick up another fry.
“It was funny at the time.”
“It’s funny now,” Lila says. “Potentially funnier.”
Across the room, Krista pulls away from Kane. Her mouth moves quickly. He answers without taking his eyes from the screen.
She slides off the stool.
Kane catches her wrist.
She yanks it free.
They argue for another thirty seconds before Krista grabs her purse and heads toward the front door.
Kane follows.
Noor looks at me.
“We should leave.”
“We just got food.”
“We can take it with us.”
“Why do we need to leave because two attractive people are having a public breakdown?”
Lila signals the server.
“Because the parking lot is about to become theater.”
“I am not watching strangers fight.”
“You watch six hours of ancient-burial documentaries.”
“The dead have consented through historical distance.”
Noor slides out of the booth.
“Bring your fries.”
The parking lot is wet from an earlier rain.
Streetlights shine against the pavement. Cars line the curb, and music pulses through the restaurant walls behind us.
Krista stands beside a silver SUV with her arms folded.
Kane faces her.
We stop near Lila’s car, far enough away to pretend we aren’t listening.
Not far enough to miss anything.
“You’ll sleep with me,” Krista says, “but you won’t post one picture.”
Kane drags a hand over the back of his neck.
“Why does it need to be posted?”
“Because people already think I’m some girl you call after midnight.”
“You come over after midnight.”
“That isn’t the point.”
“What is?”
Krista laughs once, sharp and humorless.
“You know exactly what it is.”
“No. I don’t.”
“You’ll let me sit on your lap in public, but the second a phone comes out, you move.”
“I don’t want my private life online.”
“Your private life?” She gestures toward the restaurant. “Half the school has seen us together.”
“Then why do you need proof?”
“Maybe I don’t like feeling hidden.”
“You aren’t hidden.”
“I’m not claimed either.”
The word lands hard enough that even Noor stops smiling.
Kane’s face changes.
“Claimed?”
“You know what I mean.”
“I know what it sounds like.”
Krista steps closer.
“Not every woman who wants you is trying to steal your imaginary contract.”
“No. Some want the followers before the contract exists.”
Her lips part.
Kane realizes what he said a second too late.
Krista steps back.
“That’s what you think of me?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You did.”
“I said some women.”
“You were looking at me.”
Kane’s jaw tightens.
Krista grabs the car door handle, then stops.
“You’re still searching every room for Stella.”
His shoulders go rigid.
“And when she isn’t there,” Krista continues, “you start looking for that weird girl in the giant glasses.”
My fry stops halfway to my mouth.
Lila slowly turns her head toward me.
I lower the fry.
Kane glances toward the restaurant.
“What girl?”
Krista lets out a disbelieving laugh.
“The one you’ve been asking everybody about.”
“I asked Eli.”
“You asked three teammates and some freshman manager who lives near the old quad.”
“That doesn’t mean anything.”
“It means you talk more about her than you ever talked about me.”
“She knows something about my game.”
“Then hire a private coach.”
“I’m trying to find out who she is.”
“No, Kane. You’re trying to find out why she didn’t want you.”
He says nothing.
Krista opens the door.
“Find your own ride.”
She climbs in, starts the engine, and backs out before he can respond.
Kane stands alone beneath the streetlight.
Lila whispers, “We should move.”
“Yes,” I say.
None of us does.
Kane looks toward the sound.
His gaze passes over Noor.
Then Lila.
Then stops on me.
I expect recognition.
It doesn’t come.
His eyes narrow slightly instead.
He starts walking toward us.
“No,” I mutter.
Lila’s grin spreads. “This is excellent.”
“Get in the car.”
“You’re between me and the driver’s door.”
Kane stops a few feet away.
He has been drinking. Not falling-over drunk. Loose enough that his usual control has softened around the edges.
His hair is slightly disordered from Krista’s hands.
The top button of his black shirt is open.
He looks irritated, tired, and unfairly good beneath parking-lot lighting that should flatter no one.
“Do I know you?” he asks.
“No.”
The answer comes too fast.
His gaze traces my face.
“I’ve seen you somewhere.”
“I attend Stanford. That narrows it down to several thousand possibilities.”
His eyes sharpen at my tone.
Something registers.
Not enough.
“You sound familiar.”
“Maybe you hear women reject you often.”
Noor makes a choking noise behind me.
Kane looks at her, then back at me.
“What’s your name?”
“Hannah.”
It feels strange giving him the truth.
“Hannah what?”
“Banana.”
He cocks his head. “Yeah, don’t think that’s it.”
The way he says it sends a faint ripple along my arms.
I blame the cold.
He moves closer.
Not enough to touch me.
Enough that I catch the clean scent of his soap beneath beer and rain.