Chapter Five
Dear Grace,
My biggest fear, huh? I don’t think I ever told you about my recruitment experience, did I? So the AF reps show up at high school on career day. Bo had skipped and gone somewhere to drink the day away. Lucky bastard. I would’ve cut class that day, too, but I had too many skips and was warned that if I had any more, they would withhold my diploma and make me go to summer school. Not going to happen.
Anyway, I end up talking with the Army and Marine recruiters. Their spiels are pretty similar. They ask me about my interests, and I tell them getting the hell out of Nowheresville is my priority. The Marine recruiter nods and says he felt the same way. He tells me I can earn money, get my college paid for, and make a lot of friends. The first one sounds interesting, the second intriguing, the third I could care less about. Turns out the last one is actually the biggest benefit of joining.
Later, the recruiter follows up with me. Gives me a huge laundry list of awesome things about joining. I tell him he doesn’t have to sell me anymore, that I’m ready to sign, only I’m debating between the Marines and the Army. Then I make my biggest mistake ever. I admit that I’m not a fan of water. The Marine recruiter laughs and says, “you’ll be infantry, son,” and I sign.
When I get to boot camp they tell me the Marines are a branch of the Navy. The Navy, Grace. The Marine recruiter must have noted that I had an aversion to water, because every punishment I ever received was water-related.
The moral of this story is that I can’t go around telling people my greatest fear, because someone will use it against me. It ain’t water anymore.
~Noah
Grace
A soft knock on my bedroom door woke me up the next morning. I sat up, disoriented. The sun was filtering through the sides of my curtains. I grabbed for my phone, but I had forgotten to plug it in last night. The dark screen stared up at me mockingly. It was dead. Crap. What time was it?
I scrambled out of bed and opened the door to find Lana standing with her hand raised.
“Knock, knock,” She lowered her hand. Her expression was unreadable and that was sufficient to alert me that something was wrong.
“What time is it?” I looked at her bare wrist. “Why don’t we wear watches?”
“Because we have phones?”
“My phone is dead! I’m supposed to meet Noah for breakfast at 9 a.m.”
I heard a cough from behind Lana. Noah was standing in our living room, waving to me. He was dressed in jeans and another dark T-shirt. Sunglasses hung from his collar. He wore a watch, only I couldn’t tell the time from here. I smiled weakly, gave him a half-wave. I grabbed Lana’s arm and dragged her into my room.
“How long has he been here?” I asked, running to the bathroom attached to my bedroom.
“He just got here,” Lana said.
“My God, what should I wear? Do I have time to shower? How could I have overslept?”
“Yes, take a shower, but don’t wash your hair. We’ll put it up. It kind of looks like sexy bedhead.”
I screamed a little when I looked at myself in the mirror. I had a pair of boxers on and one of Josh’s old shirts. My hair was matted on one side and stuck up about four inches from the top of my head. I couldn’t believe Noah saw me like this.
“Go out there and tell him I’m sick,” I instructed Lana as I turned on the shower and waited for the hot water to climb four stories from the basement.
“Sick with what?”
“Sick with bad hair.” I attacked my hair with a brush. Sexy bedhead, my ass. I looked like a drunken housewife. I only lacked the raccoon eyes.
“While you and I may think that’s an illness worth staying in bed for, my guess is Mr. Hard Body out there isn’t going to fall for that.”
“Pick something out for me to wear and go stall him.”
“Are you two dating now?” Lana called as I jumped in the shower. I washed all my parts in the quickest shower known to womankind. I tried to keep my hair from getting wet, but the ends were dampened. After toweling off, I pulled my now-combed hair into a low ponytail.
“No. We’re ‘friends.’” I curled my fingers into air quotes.
“Ugh, the worst.” Lana laid some clothes on the bed and went out to entertain Noah.
I grabbed some lip gloss and mascara and headed for the bedroom to see what Lana had chosen for me. On the bed were the shortest shorts I had ever seen. I swear she hides random outfits in her closet that she trots out right when I can’t refuse to wear them. I pulled on the bright blue shorts and a racerback bra lying next to the shorts. A white floral racerback tank completed the outfit. It was dressier than I would ordinarily wear, but the loose fit of the tank made up for the brevity of the shorts.
Ten minutes after jumping out of bed, I walked out of the bedroom. Lana was ensconced on the sofa and Noah was in my chair. She was full of smiles, but her eyes signaled to me that we were going to have a long talk about Noah. If only I had answers for whatever questions she’d have.
“Sorry about that, but I’m ready now,” I announced, double-checking to see if I had a credit card, my school ID, and keys in my bag. My phone was charging on my nightstand. It was at 5% when I left the bedroom.
Noah stood up and looked me up and down. He opened his mouth and then closed it. His lips curved up slightly at the ends and this time the smile, albeit small, was real, all the way from his mouth to his eyes, unlike last night. “You have some sandals or something?”
I looked down to see my feet were bare. I turned around and ran back to my room, returning momentarily, properly shod. I fiddled with my bag a little to hide my embarrassment. Could I never catch a break around this guy?
Noah turned to Lana and held out his hand. “Great to meet you finally, Lana.”
“I’ll see you around, I’m sure,” Lana shook his hand and grinned at me. Apparently it had taken Noah no time at all to charm Lana. I was right to be wary. Lana liked to play overprotective mother hen, although the kind that finds hookups for her charges, not the kind that separates the girl chicks from the boy chicks. That he was able to make her so at ease in less than ten minutes told me I had almost no chance at keeping a barrier between us.
I jingled my keys.
Noah walked over. Before I could put my hand on the doorknob, he had swept me aside to open the door and waved me through.
“It’s the 21st century, Noah. Women open their own doors.”
“Not while I’m around,” his previously non-existent southern accent showed up as he drawled the last part. “My momma would be turning over in her grave if I let a woman touch a doorknob.”
I merely grunted in response, pretty sure he dragged that old line out anytime he wanted to get away with something—as only good-looking guys could do.
I stopped when I hit the porch of the Victorian and blinked like a mole seeing sun for the first time. I felt like I had engaged in a twelve-hour bender and had only two hours of sleep before someone pried open my eyes again. The bright sun turned to dark spots in front of my eyes and I started to sway.
“Whoa, there,” Noah said, setting his hand around the base of my neck, his thumb and fingers wrapped around like a reverse collar. “Let’s get some protein in you. The diner okay with you?”
There was a diner on the south end of campus that served breakfast all day long. I nodded again. Noah unhooked his sunglasses and placed them over my eyes, dragging his fingers behind my ears. I suppressed a shiver.
We walked for several minutes without a scrap of conversation. Trying to think of something interesting to bring up reminded me of my early days of writing to Noah, making sure each word was interesting enough to lure him into writing me back.
In retrospect, I probably looked like a fool from the very beginning, a bothersome child who was trying to buy her way into a cool kid’s group with treats and expensive toys. I bit my tongue in an effort to not be the first one to break the silence.
“So, weather’s nice today,” Noah finally said. I nearly stumbled. Was that a reference to my first letter when I told him I wasn’t going to ever refer to the weather because it was such an incredibly boring topic, or was he just really bad at making conversation?
“Yeah, nice.” Our breakfast was going to feel really long if this was the best we could come up with. After the silence became too much for me, I went for the low hanging fruit—his major.
“What do you do with a finance degree?” I had skipped all the business majors in the course catalog. I’d have to go back and review those.
“Build empires,” Noah responded immediately, relief evident in his voice.
I raised my eyebrows behind the sunglasses. “Lofty ambitions.”
“Aim high.”
“Are you allowed to say that, given that you’re a Marine?”
“Probably not. Don’t repeat it or they’ll take away my right to shout Oorah. What’re you studying?”
“Didn’t your recon divulge that? You know my class schedule, where I live, and apparently where I was partying last night.”
“I admit that I hung out over at the Fine Arts Center for a few days and was surprised I didn’t see you or any of your work,” Noah said, unperturbed by my recitation.
“Why would I be at FAC?”
He shrugged. “I just thought you’d be majoring in something over there. Like Art, or whatever majors there are in Art.”
I could rattle off a few. Unlike the business section, I knew this part of the course catalog by heart.
“Because of my photography?”
“Yeah, I mean the stuff you sent was amazing. It should be in a magazine or a museum or something. You aren’t going to do something with that?”
“Um, thank you, but first, my stuff isn’t that good and second, photography is my hobby,” I said. I didn’t want to admit to Noah, who had fought in a war and was likely putting himself through school here at Central, that I was too weenie to submit a portfolio for entrance into the Fine Arts program. Instead, I told him a partial truth. “I don’t want to ruin it by having the stress of having to support myself with it.”
Noah shook his head. “You can tell you’ve never had to worry about money.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“Only people with money ever say money ruins things.”
“That’s …” I trailed off. I hadn’t had to worry about money, but it’s not like money had ever made me happy. It didn’t keep my dad from dying. It didn’t make my mom suddenly stop being addicted to anti-depressants. It didn’t prevent Lana from getting an eating disorder. “I’m undeclared. I haven’t picked a major,” I finished.
I felt his hand on my head as he turned my head to look at him. “Not knowing isn’t so bad. You’re young yet.”
I stuck my tongue out a little. “What are you, my dad?”
“Is that your kink? I haven’t had a girl ever call me Daddy before, but I’m open-minded.”
“‘Eww’ is the only response to that.”
I shook my head. I couldn’t tell if his flirting was just to cheer me up or lighten the mood, or if it was an invitation. I did know I didn’t want to talk about money or majors. “How is empire-building these days?”
“Slow, but I’ve got a plan.”
“Are you empire-building by yourself or with others?”
“Others right now,” Noah added. “Roommates.”
“How many roommates do you have?”
“Four.”
“Wow, and they all go to school here? Have I met any of them?” I was letting curiosity get the better of me.
“No, only Bo and I. Finn flips houses and works at his dad’s construction company, Adam plays in a band—although technically I think he lives off his trust fund—and Mal,” Noah paused, “I’m not sure what Mal does. ”
“That’s a lot of testosterone in one house.”
“Yeah, it can be fun, but also a pain in the ass.”
The mile walk along the campus was over before I realized it, and not once had Noah removed his hand from the back of my neck. He opened the door with one hand and placed a light pressure with his other to propel me forward. A huge clock over the reception desk declared it was nearly ten o’clock.
We sat ourselves in a booth and pulled out the slightly greasy menus that I hoped were tacky-feeling because of a cleaning compound and not something else. A waitress came over and took our orders. Noah ordered an egg white omelet with fresh vegetables and wheat toast, no butter. I ordered the number 2: eggs over easy, toast, and bacon.
“How did you come to live together?” I picked up the thread of our conversation. From across the booth, I felt Noah’s long legs stretch out next to mine, his jean-clad legs rubbing slightly against my bare leg.
“Bo and I went to the Americana bar down on Fifth one night.”
“Never been there,” I admitted. Lana and I stuck pretty close to campus. I wasn’t even sure I knew where Fifth was.
“I’ll take you sometime,” Noah said, nonchalantly presuming that we would be spending more time together. “Adam was in the band. He tried to crowd-surf an unfriendly crowd for some reason, and we ended up defending him. Not sure why, though. His music sucked that night.
“Ouch. What’s the band?”
“No band right now. He couldn’t play all summer, so they found a new guitar player. The band he was in was called Ten Speed.”
I made a face, and Noah laughed. “I know. I kept telling Adam that he couldn’t be in a band called Ten Speed and still hold his head up.”
The waitress brought our breakfast, and I watched Noah surreptitiously. I realized that I didn’t know until now whether he was right or left-handed. I knew a lot of other things about Noah, like that he and Bo had been friends since the seventh grade, when they got into a fight and were sent to detention together. Noah hated his father and loved tart things like Starbursts and Skittles, but he wasn’t much of a chocolate fan.
Four years of letters can make you think you knew someone really well. Sitting across from him for the first time watching him eat bland wheat toast, I wondered if my collection of facts stood for actual parts of the whole or simply random tidbits I could trot out if I was playing Noah Jackson Trivial Pursuit.
“What are you doing after breakfast?” Noah asked.
“I’m taking a picture of the Alpha Phis for a rush invitation.”
“Is that a regular photo or one of your special ones?”
“Well, it’s a miniature one, if that’s what you mean. It’s not like I invented the technique.”
“Are you going to show me how you do one of those?”
I shrugged slightly. “I guess, if you want.”
“I want.” He looked at me as if waiting for something.
“Like today?”
“Such an enthusiastic invitation.” He made a tsking sound. “Why yes, Grace, I’d love to come and be your assistant today.”
“I actually already have one—it’s Lana.”
“Isn’t she a member of that house?”
“Yes, but she’s a bad member who’s using me as an excuse to get out of her rush duties.”
“You know, if you weren’t doing it for them, they’d have to pay someone,” Noah said.
“Yeah but I’m happy to do it as a gift.”
“They think it’s good enough to put on their stuff.”
“I get that I can make money off of it. I just don’t want to.”
“I’m just trying to point out that what you do has value.”
“Got it.” I picked up my toast and bit down hard.
“So, are you seeing anyone?” Noah asked, abruptly changing the subject.
“What?” I choked in surprise on my toast and swallowed an unchewed piece in order to avoid spitting it all out on the table.
“Seeing someone. Dating. Hooking up. Hanging out?”
I wished I could say that I had found someone really wonderful, and that he’d come all the way to Central for nothing. I didn’t think my old line about being a cranky cat spinster was going to work for me here. Instead, I asked him, “Are you?”
“Nope. And I haven’t been for a long time.”
“Since like when?” He was sharing, so I might as well take advantage. I ignored the rest of my breakfast. I was hungry for information. What had he been doing for the last couple of years?
“Since high school.”
I sat back, stunned. He hadn’t dated anyone since high school. That seemed preposterous, and I told him so. “I don’t believe you.”
He wasn’t offended by this, but instead gave me a half smile that hinted at something more. “Truth. Ask Bo.”
He pulled out his phone and shoved it toward me. Handing someone your phone was like giving them the Pulp Fiction briefcase. You couldn’t take it and not look inside. I was pretty sure I wasn’t ready to view the contents of his phone, no matter how tempting. With great effort, I pushed the phone away.
“Like no dates, hookups, hangouts at all?”
“Like no serious girlfriend since high school. It’s not easy to maintain a relationship while deployed, and I didn’t have anyone I cared about enough to make that effort before I left.”
“You wrote to me for four years,” I pointed out.
“I can make an effort when I want to.” He looked at me like this was important, but I couldn’t get past the idea that Noah hadn’t dated anyone seriously since high school.
“But since you’ve been out?” I pressed.
“Not everyone can just get into Central, Grace. I was busy studying, taking practice tests, and trying to make myself into an interesting candidate for admission. Girls were the last things on my mind.” He wiped his mouth with a napkin and pushed his almost spotless plate away. “But you haven’t answered my question.”
I didn’t want to make it seem like I was sitting around waiting for him, even though I had been. In a moment of panic and stupidity, I lied.
“I’m not dating anyone, but…” I paused intentionally, and took a sip of my Diet Coke. “I’m interested in someone.”
Noah’s eyebrows raised.
“Who is this lucky guy?”
“Ah… Mike Walsh.” Mike was actually the two-year crush of a different library co-worker, Sarah. She was always looking at him with puppy dog eyes when she thought no one was watching.
“Is he a frat guy? Jock? What?”
“He’s my student supervisor at the library.”
“So what’s the problem?”
“What do you mean?”
“You like him, but you aren’t dating.”
The thing with making up stories is that people always wanted details. I rubbed my suddenly sweaty palms together and tried channeling Sarah. What would she say? “I like him, but he’s never asked me out.”
“Isn’t this the 21st Century?” Noah threw my own words back in my face.” Why are you waiting?”
“I don’t think he’s interested.” Good lord, what was with the inquisition? I felt my cheeks heat up. Lana would know immediately that I was lying. I didn’t know how intuitive Noah was, but I dropped my gaze to my half-eaten breakfast to avoid looking at him in the eye.
“How do you know? I think you girls assume that guys are mind readers. Or impervious to rejection.”
I thought about this. Why didn’t Sarah just ask Mike out? It was obvious to everyone in the library that she liked him.
“I thought I had made it pretty clear,” I muttered.
“Call him now and ask him to a movie.”
“Now? My cellphone is dead.”
“Use mine.” He gestured toward his phone still lying face up on the table.
“I can’t.”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t know what his phone number is.” I had it programmed into my phone, but I never called him. I never had occasion to.
“Lame, Grace. You like this guy but you don’t know his digits?” That did sound bad. But other than for a few people, I didn’t memorize phone numbers. Your phone did that for you.
“Where is he right now?” Noah pressed.
“Um, I have no idea.” I didn’t know what Mike did on the weekends. Other than our occasional, Thursday night, after-work get-togethers, I didn’t hang out with him. I hung out with Lana and her crew, which usually meant sorority and fraternity people. Mike was GDI—Goddamn Independent.
“You’ve had a crush on a guy you’ve worked with for the past year and you don’t know his phone number or how he spends his R&R time?” Noah looked at me skeptically. I shrank back into my side of the booth. I promised myself that I would never lie again. I wanted to throw up my hands in surrender and confess all.
“He might be at the library,” I said. I didn’t know Mike’s work schedule, but he was often at the library either working or hanging out.
“On a Saturday morning?” Noah looked at his watch. “At eleven o’clock?”
“Why do you care?”
“I’m your friend,” Noah replied and placed his forearms on the table, leaning closer to me. “I want to help you out. Isn’t that what friends do?”
“I’ve never had a male friend before,” I admitted. “I don’t know.”
“Just pretend I’m one of your girlfriends, then.”
“Riiight.” Because that would be so easy to do.
“Let’s go to the library.”
“Right now?”
“Yes.”
“Don’t you have anything to do today?” I tried to think of an excuse to get out of this, but saying you had to study two weeks into the new year wasn’t ever believable. Laundry, though, was a good excuse. Everyone had to do laundry. But before I could trot out my excuse, Noah was standing up ignoring my question.
I dug in my pocket and pulled out my debit card. I placed it on top of the wallet carrier that the waitress had dropped off earlier when she cleared our plates. Noah took out his wallet and threw down a couple of bills to cover the total plus a big tip. He stuck my card in his pocket.
“Hey, that’s my card.”
“Don’t make me hurt you, Grace.” He fended off my attempts to grab my card back. “I’ll return your card when we get to the library.”
“But I wanted to pay,” I said. “That’s what friends do. They pay their share.”
“You can buy next time,” Noah said and pushed me forward and out the door.
The library was on the south end of the campus, near the diner. It was a quick walk over, and I didn’t have time to think up any other plausible reason we should go back to the apartment. Noah’s long legs were eating up the pavement, and I felt like a tiny Chihuahua trying to keep up.
“Are we racing?” I asked.
“Sorry.” Noah slowed down. “Not used to walking with anyone as short as you.”
“I’m not short. I’m above average height for a female.” For some reason, Noah’s lack of experience walking around with shorter people was kind of pleasant. It fit in with his earlier confession that he hadn’t dated any one seriously since high school. Or maybe it just meant he dated really tall women.
We walked into the library, and a girl I didn’t know too well was manning the desk. I thought her name was Molly or Marie or Maria or something.
“Hi, Grace,” she said. I winced inwardly, feeling like a tool for not knowing her name when she knew mine. Faces, I could remember. Names, not so much.
“Hi. Is Mike around today?”
“Actually, yeah, he just came in and was going down toward Periodicals.”
“Great,” I said. I was batting negative one thousand today.
I walked slowly down the stairs but didn’t dawdle at the door. I knew I should’ve introduced Noah, but since I didn’t remember her name, I left one embarrassment to head to another.
“Not going to introduce me?” Noah whispered.
“I don’t remember her name,” I admitted.
“Ouch,” he laughed.
“Next time I pause, introduce yourself,” I instructed.
“Yes ma’am,” he said, trying to sound obedient but failing. I could practically hear his smile through the words.
We walked downstairs, turning left toward Periodicals, and sure enough Mike was there, leaning on the desk, flirting with some girl wearing a sorority T-shirt. Her Greek letters were appliquéd in white on the back of her pink tee.
“That’s Mike,” I pointed out.
Noah stopped and turned toward me. Then looked back at Mike, disbelieving. Mike tossed his hair out of his eyes. Once and then again. “Mike.” It was a disbelieving sound.
“What’s wrong with Mike?” I asked, faking my indignation. Mike was decent-looking, but he had long bangs and was constantly flipping them out of his face. You couldn’t talk with him for more than five minutes without a head toss.
He was on the thin side, which was another negative strike against him. You never date a guy who can wear skinnier jeans than you. I glanced furtively at Noah’s thighs. While Noah wasn’t heavy, he was big enough that I knew he wouldn’t be wearing my pants, ever.
Noah just shook his head at me and walked forward toward the pair. “Hey, Mike Walsh, right? Didn’t you come to my house out at the Woodlands before school started?” Mike turned toward Noah and stuck out his hand.
“Dude, yes, it was awesome. You’re Noah Jackson right? You fight?” Mike made a little move, like he was ducking and avoiding a fake punch.
“Right. I hear you work with my friend, Grace.”
Mike peered around Noah, and I gave him a limp wave and a weak smile.
“So I was thinking about going to the movies tonight. You want to come?” Noah was saying.
“Um, yeah, that would be awesome.” Mike looked suitably surprised, as any normal human being would be when some total stranger came up and asked them to see a movie.
“Great. Grace here is going to come, and I’m bringing a friend,” Noah emphasized the friend with a wink at Mike. He winked back uncertainly, his eyelid lowering slowly as if he wasn’t sure what he was winking about. I wasn’t sure either. Noah was bringing a friend? We were doubling?
Then my heart sank to my feet when I saw that Sarah was working the periodical desk and had heard this entire exchange. Her expression accused me of violating the girlfriend code.
I wanted to jump back there and assure her that I didn’t have designs on her boy, and that despite the fact that she and Mike were not dating, I considered him off-limits. But I couldn’t do that and keep up my stupid fiction with Noah. I’d have to explain myself later, if she let me.
I extricated myself from the situation moments later by saying I had an appointment at noon. I left Noah standing there chatting with Mike about some kind of fighting stance.
Noah
Grace’s abrupt departure, while her man of interest was throwing a head fake, was more encouraging than anything she had said all morning. When Grace brought up Mike during breakfast, her tone made me instantly suspicious. She drew out the name slowly, like she had to make one up. My first thought was that she was faking. When the name was attached to a real person, someone she worked with at the library, I admit that I may have had a moment of doubt.
But seeing him, I couldn’t believe it. While Grace wasn’t super-communicative in her letters about her dating life, this guy didn’t fit her. He wore jeans that were so tight I wondered if they were from the women’s section of the store. I wanted to lop off those stupid-ass bangs of his. I could barely see his eyes. I didn’t trust anyone whose eyes I couldn’t stare straight into. This guy looked like a stiff breeze might snap him in half.
If I pictured Grace with anyone, something I tried not to do, it would be someone like her brother. A jock. Or, because she loved photography, maybe one of those foreign war correspondents. But not this guy, who looked like he spent more time in front of the mirror than an entire sorority house.
Inviting him and Grace to a movie was risky, but if I was there, I could get a better sense of whether she actually liked him—in which case I’d have to kill him—or whether she was just using him to put me off.
It could be that Grace was just setting up a series of tests for me to pass, like the Twelve Labours of Hercules. That was fine. I’d complete each challenge, and then we could be done with it.
Even though my reunion plans were less than stellar, it was all working out. Grace was talking to me. I didn’t have to skulk around campus anymore. I was putting together the final piece of my overall plan. Get out of the Marines, get a degree, get Grace.
It was all going to work out fine. I pulled out my phone to text her, only to realize that I still hadn’t gotten her number.
Item number one. Get Grace’s number.