Chapter 6
Steph
Then
“Excuse me. I’m looking for Riley Walker’s room?”
The man at the security desk for the Bransome Hall dorms glances up at me distractedly. He has a receding hairline and a decidedly pronounced paunch.
“Whatdya say, hon?” he asks.
“Riley Walker. Can you please direct me to his dorm room?” I repeat.
He lets out an inconvenienced sigh, putting his cell phone down and reaching for his keyboard.
“Walker …” he murmurs, and then his eyes light up with recognition.
“Right. Walker. I think…” he trails off as he proceeds to type the name into his computer.
His mouth moves silently as he reads the information on the screen.
After a short pause and another sigh, he meets my gaze with tired eyes.
“Thought so. Walker doesn’t live here anymore, honey. ”
“He doesn’t?” I rear back in surprise. “Did he—” I stumble on the words as my mind spins with the reasons why that might be. “Is it— is it because it’s summer? Did he … get assigned to another dorm for sophomore year?”
The man presses his lips together, studying me for a long moment. I watch as his expression morphs from mildly annoyed to sympathetic.
“I’m sorry, hon,” he says to me gently. “Far as I know, he got kicked out.”
Kicked … out? That can’t be right.
I know he hasn’t been acting like himself lately, or … all year, really. But … kicked out?
“A-are you sure?”
He nods.
“Do you know why?”
He shrugs. “Above my pay grade.”
“Well … do you know where he might have gone?”
“Nope,” the man says, turning back to his phone, his capacity for empathy clearly having reached its limit.
“Oh,” I murmur, unsure what to do now or where to go. “Uhh … okay. Thanks anyway,” I mutter, but he just nods, already having effectively dismissed me.
I move through the lobby, keeping my eyes trained on the floor, and have almost reached the exit when a thought occurs to me. Spinning back on my heel, I make my way towards the security guard once again.
“Um, excuse me,” I say, swallowing thickly. Then add, “Again.”
I’m met with another world-weary sigh followed by a grunt, which I take as an indication that I should continue.
“His roommate … uh, former roommate. Jeff. I don’t know his last name, but … his name is Jeff. Could I— can I please have his room number?”
“Three fourteen,” the man answers, glancing back at his computer screen. “But a lot of the guys aren’t back yet from summer vacation.”
“I understand. I just … can I just check if he’s in, please?” I ask, to which the man gestures vaguely in the direction of the stairwell. “Elevator’s on service,” he says, attention already back to his phone.
The door to three fourteen swings open on the third knock, and I freeze with my hand still raised for a fourth.
A tall shirtless man with pillow creases on the side of his face stares down at me through bleary eyes.
His mouth opens in a deep yawn, and he scratches at the small patch of pale hair between his nicely defined pecks.
And yeah, I may be heartbroken, angry, and slightly distressed by the news that Riley got kicked out of his dorm, but I still noticed.
I’m an eighteen-year-old girl after all.
“Do you know what time it is?” The man—Jeff, I assume—asks, rubbing a hand down his face. He’s wearing faded navy blue cotton pajama bottoms that leave little to the imagination, showcasing a decidedly pronounced bulge, and his blonde hair is sticking up in every direction.
“Um … it’s four-thirty,” I respond, and my voice rises at the end, making it sound like a question.
“Oh shit, for real?” he asks, blinking repeatedly. I nod, and I can tell the moment he finally manages to focus on me because a smile spreads across his face, and he leans an arm against the doorframe.
“Is that right? Well, then, thank you for the wake-up call,” he says, eyes roving slowly over my body, and I swear to God he turns up the wattage on his grin.
“Are you Jeff?” I ask.
“The one and only. What can I do for you, sweetness?”
“I’m, uh … I’m looking for Riley Walker,” I say, and the smile drops instantly from his face.
The flirty tone from earlier is gone when he says, “I don’t know why you’d want to. That dude’s fucked.”
“Fucked?” I repeat, eyes widening.
“Mm-hmm.” He raises his hands and begins backing away from the door. From me. “I don’t want anything to do with any of that shit.”
“That shit?” I parrot once more, stupidly.
He nods.
“What … shit are you referring to?” I ask, but he shakes his head vehemently. “Look, I— do you know where I can find him?”
He blows out a harsh breath, running a hand through his messy hair, then shrugs. “Probably hanging with that sketchy dude Lucky.”
“Okaaay,” I say slowly. “Where can I find this Lucky?” I ask.
“You can’t,” he says, giving me another once-over. “I mean, you shouldn’t. He’s not a good guy.”
Well, that’s … alarming.
But after being ignored for months, I’m resolved to finding Riley and having it out with him.
Clearly, he doesn’t want anything more to do with me, but after everything we meant to each other, everything I thought we meant to each other, he owes me at least that.
I’ve come all this way, and I’m going to get an explanation for his behavior.
I’m going to get some closure if nothing else.
Closure.
The word causes my heart to twist painfully in my chest, but, after a summer of devastation, of walking around like a zombie, I need it. I don’t think I can move on without it.
So, here I am. Looking for the man who broke my heart. And at this point, I’m not too proud to beg, either.
“Please,” I say. “I really need to find Riley.”
He sighs, then plops heavily onto the unmade bed, and I take a moment to cast my gaze around the surprisingly spacious room.
There’s a twin bed against each of the east and west walls, both flanked by a dresser on one side and a desk on the other.
Along the north wall, there’s a large center window.
Little light is getting into the room, however, because it’s partially blocked by a large flat-screen TV on a stand directly in front.
Several dark bean bag chairs are strewn before it with multiple video game remotes cast haphazardly on the floor.
Moving my eyes around the room for another pass, I notice, with disappointment, that both the desk and bed across from Jeff’s are indeed bare. I stare at the stripped mattress for a long moment, letting sadness, anger, and concern war inside me.
“Told you before,” Jeff says, “that dude’s fucked. You should stay far, far, away from him,” he advises.
“I can’t!” I snap. “He’s my—” but I cut myself off abruptly, unsure how to finish that sentence. He’s my what, exactly?
My boyfriend?
Jeff leans back on his palms as recognition flares in his eyes. “Oooh, shit,” he breathes, then cringes. “You’re Steph?”
I nod.
“Shit,” he repeats. And … there’s that look again. The one I’ve become so very familiar with as of late.
Pity.
“Alright,” he says quietly, then points a finger at me.
“Alright?”
“I want it on record that I don’t think this is a good idea,” he starts, and I nod again, more eagerly this time.
“Noted.”
He expels a harsh breath then clamps a hand around the back of his neck, watching me, clearly uncertain about whether or not he should share the location with me, and a flicker of real fear ignites in my chest. What the hell has Riley gotten himself into?
Ultimately, Jeff must decide I deserve the information, because he pushes back to his feet and strides over to his dresser, picking up his phone and typing.
“I don’t know the actual address …” he murmurs, moving closer to me as he scrolls.
After a moment, he appears to find what he’s looking for, tilting his phone so I can see he’s pulled up a map.
He works the screen, zooming it in on what appears to be an industrial area.
Train tracks run through a collection of large rectangular buildings that appear to span entire blocks.
“Here,” he says, indicating what I think is an apartment building on the edge of the screen. “That’s Lucky’s place. He’s got a unit on the main floor. I don’t know what the number is, but …” he trails off with a grimace. “You’ll know it when you see it.”
“And Riley will be there?”
He offers me a sad smile. “Chances are pretty good.”
I rattle off my phone number, and Jeff texts me the GPS pin, wishing me luck and warning me to be careful.
And as I move down the hall, my stomach clenching with nausea, I wonder just what I might be walking into.
Istare up at the nondescript building. It’s an ugly tan brick that looks to be about five stories tall.
The surrounding neighborhood is as the map indicated—a small collection of residential buildings at the edge of an industrial area comprised mostly of what appear to be factories and warehouses.
If I had to guess, I’d say quite a few of the businesses down the south side of this street have failed, with many of the buildings looking either run-down or completely deserted.
A chill runs through me that has little to do with the weather, given the warm, late-August evening, and I cross my arms over my chest as I study the peeling brown metal door to what I gather was once a lobby, but through the adjoining window, I can see is now little more than a trash-filled vestibule.
I bite my lip in apprehension as I consider actually entering this place.
If it weren’t for the dull bass beat of music I can feel more than hear originating from somewhere inside, and the sickly-looking woman propped up in a semi-seated position against the dinghy hole-ridden drywall, I would have thought this building to be abandoned as well.