She needed to get out of there, now.
“Yeah, I’m fine, I just have to go. I left the curling iron on while needing to wash my hair just as my favorite show is starting. See you around, okay?”
Chapter 4
Letty decided the best course of action was just to pretend none of this was happening. But it was hard to, with ten girls a day coming up to her to ask if she was dating her mortal enemy. Most of them were lovely about it, but lovely was not the point. She came to this school to get away from Tate, and now he was everywhere.
He was in their starry eyes and behind almost every whisper she heard. She had to endure a million iPhones being thrust at her so she could see herself being carried in his massive arms and hear comments like it looks as if it hardly took him any effort. And she couldn’t disagree, either.
It was true. His biceps were barely tensed. She looked tiny and featherlight cradled between them, like some kind of doll of herself.
Though that wasn’t what stuck with her.
What stuck was the video she saw on her dorm neighbor’s phone.
Her name was Lydia? and she had gloriously thick bangs and eyes that seemed to house seventeen souls. She had been the only one on her floor who offered to help when Letty moved in, and the only one who had struck up a conversation. As the girl approached her, Letty even remembered the substance of their conversation. “Man, you really have to be good at trusting complete strangers to get by at college, huh,” she had said, as if she’d known exactly what made Letty jerk back when she’d grabbed for the box full of knickknacks in Letty’s hands. She’d somehow seen the sharp spines that covered Letty’s skin and understood that a sudden move from a new acquaintance made them stand up.
It clearly was the reason she didn’t just thrust her phone at Letty.
And probably explained why the video she’d shot was different.
This one didn’t focus on his arms, or her feet, or anything to do with the physical act of carrying. It instead focused on Tate’s right hand—the one that was carefully curled over her head, as though it were possibly made of glass on the verge of breaking.
And on his face.
She couldn’t look away from his face, tiny and blurry but still noticeably not right.
“I just thought maybe you’d want to see this version. If you know what I mean?”
“It…it just looks like all the others.”
“You sure?”
Lydia raised an eyebrow.
Letty did her best to ignore it.
“Yeah. Positive. He was just…being a good Samaritan. That’s all there is to it, I swear to god. We aren’t dating—he would never have wanted to date me. So if you’re interested you should totally go for it. I mean, you’re super hot so I can’t see any problem and even if there was I—”
“Are you aware you’re talking really, really fast?”
Not just fast, she thought. Calling it just fast was generous.
Her breath had gotten all high and tight, and every word was hurting her as it escaped. She had to take several breaths before she could answer, and even then it wasn’t right.
“I just heard it then, yes. But even that’s not what you’re thinking. I’m not trying to cover for anything he…he…” She gulped another breath in vain. Lydia was still looking at her with curiosity—of the kind sort, but curiosity all the same. And it was definitely making her jump and stutter and breathe in a completely clumsy way. “He’s just an acquaintance. I knew him in high school.”
“Well, I guess that’s the mystery solved, then.”
“Yeah. Definitely. Nothing more to it.”
“Right.”
She nodded, relieved that she could now safely escape. In fact, she was halfway down the hall to her own room when she heard Lydia speak again. Almost at her door, and through to safety.
Though she was actually glad she hadn’t quite made it, after the words.
“But you know, if you ever wanted to talk about how little there is to it, I’m right next door to you. Tap it in Morse code, if you feel more comfortable doing that. Send me smoke signals from a burned cheesy pita.”
“I will. Thanks.”
“Anytime. College is hard.”
“God yeah, sooooo hard.”
“Guys are even harder. In more ways than one.”
She laughed in response, sudden enough that it startled her. She couldn’t remember the last time she did that while talking to another person. Not so loudly at least, and certainly not as carelessly. It just popped out of her, new and alien enough that she tried to cut it off. She clamped her teeth around it as she disappeared into her dorm, but the laugh would not be denied.
It filled her tiny room, briefly.
And stayed with her all through the night.