Seventeen

Jonah smiled at her.

That’s the part that gets me. Jonah Marks comes across as cold, even forbidding, to most of the people he meets. I’ve seen another side of him—hotter than flame—but even when he’s got his hands on my body, even when he’s inside me, his smile is hard. Fierce.

To the woman in the white dress he gave a smile so warm that I know she’s not a mere acquaintance. She’s someone he cares about, deeply.

And yet he’s fucking me.

I never asked if he was seeing anyone else. It seemed to go without saying. Now, however, phrases he said that first night we spoke at Carmen’s ring louder in my memory—about other girls he tried this with, and how it never worked. They didn’t want to play rough. I think you do.

At that moment, I should’ve asked whether there was someone else in his life. Maybe the mysterious woman in white had already rejected his fantasy. Is he cheating on her with me because she can’t, or won’t, give him what he really wants?

That’s no excuse, even if it’s true. But I can’t stop wondering.

I realize I’m jumping to some conclusions here. There’s no guarantee the woman I saw was Jonah’s girlfriend, or that the two of them share any kind of committed relationship. I could’ve misinterpreted that smile. Possibly she’s just a beautiful woman he asked out for a night.

Even that is too much for me.

•   •   •

In the morning I send Jonah a text: We need to talk, ASAP.

Unlike me, Jonah understands the rules of remaining strangers. He doesn’t ask why, just gives me a time and place. So, just after lunch, I walk through one of the quads toward a bench where Jonah sits, waiting for me.

Even from a distance, I know him. We’re surrounded by students, who slouch around in their ubiquitous sweatshirts and pajama bottoms. Jonah wears gray pants and a black shirt, nothing fancy, but still clothes that tell anyone that he’s not an overgrown boy. He’s a man.

I’m wearing jeans, a T-shirt, and a scarf wound around my neck—which looks casual but is there to hide the faint bruises of Jonah’s hand on my throat. Yet he looks at me like I’m the sexiest woman on earth.

Even now he intoxicates me. I think he always will.

He rises from the bench as I walk to him, an old-fashioned, almost chivalrous gesture that touches me in a way I can’t define. As we sit down together, he says, “Is everything all right?”

“No.” I take a deep breath. “Jonah, I can’t keep doing this. Meeting you. Playing out our—scenes. It has to stop.”

At first he says nothing. His expression remains cool. Is he that controlled? Will he just get up and walk away like none of it ever happened?

But it couldn’t have ended any other way.

Finally Jonah speaks. “You weren’t unhappy with—what I did at the benefit.”

“No.” God, no. When I think about the way he slid his fingers inside my panties, I want to take back everything I’ve said, grab him by the collar, and drag him into the nearest building for a quickie in the stairwell. It would be as scorching hot as every other time Jonah’s put his hands on my skin.

And it would only be delaying the inevitable.

I take a deep breath. “This isn’t about anything you did wrong. Okay? You’ve kept every promise. You made me feel safe at moments I don’t think any other man could have, ever. And you—” My voice breaks. Dammit. I pull myself together. “You saw something in me I’ve always hated and made me feel less ashamed of it for a while. So thanks for that. And the sex. Definitely thanks for the sex.”

My crooked smile doesn’t fool him for a moment. Jonah leans forward; he brings his hand closer to me, as if he’ll touch my shoulder, but rests it on the back of the bench instead. “Vivienne, what’s wrong?”

This is normally where I bunt. Where I take the gentlest, easiest out for everyone involved, so we can walk away with no hurt feelings, no unresolved conflicts.

I’ve always thought of it as consideration, or poise. Doreen says it’s dishonesty, and asks me what would happen if for once in my life I just told the ugly truth and let people deal with it.

Jonah already knows one of my uglier truths. What the hell.

“I thought I could have sex outside a relationship, with no strings attached,” I say. “I did in undergrad, like anyone else. Probably I could do it again with someone else. But you and me—it’s not a normal situation. Not only because of, you know, the fantasy—” I glance around, but few students walk anywhere near us, and every single one is either wearing earbuds or absorbed in their cell phone. “It’s more complicated than that.”

“Our arrangement is simple,” he says flatly. “We were very specific about what this would be and how we would handle it.”

“This isn’t about logistics.” I look upward at a pale gray sky, the kind you see when the clouds have claimed the entire sky. Truth. Tell the real truth. “Jonah, every time I’m with you, it’s more than sex. Every time, I turn myself over to you, completely. I have to give you total control, and total trust.”

“I haven’t abused that trust, have I?”

Shaking my head, I say, “No. But don’t you see? I don’t just fuck you, Jonah. I bare my soul to you. Then we go back to being almost strangers to each other. The disconnect is getting to me, and I don’t think I can handle it anymore.”

Despite all our rules and resolutions, I have begun to have feelings for Jonah. To feel jealous of other women he might touch. To want to have not just his body but his heart. That means I want too much. Which in turn means I have to get out, now.

Jonah’s gray eyes become distant. The steel wall he keeps between himself and the rest of the world now separates us too. “If that’s how you feel.”

It’s not. I’m still drawn to this man in a way I’ve never felt for anyone else. While I thought that connection was purely sexual, I reveled in his power over me.

But now I want more from Jonah, and I have no idea what more would be. All I know is it’s not what either of us said when this began.

Goddammit, I’m going to cry. Not out here in the quad. Not in front of Jonah. I don’t have the strength for that kind of honesty; I’m all out. So I stand up. “This truly doesn’t have anything to do with you, okay? You were—my ultimate fantasy. Thanks for making that come true.”

Then I walk away. I never look back; I never stop hoping he’ll call my name, or run to my side, catch my arm, and keep me from leaving.

He doesn’t.

•   •   •

“You feeling okay?” Arturo says that evening, as we hang out in front of one of our favorite food trucks.

“Sure.” I scrape my shoes back and forth in the gravel beneath this red picnic bench. All around us, groups of people are eating the best fish tacos in town from small plastic baskets, using their cups to hold down brown paper napkins that would otherwise flutter away in the breeze. Shay’s gone to the truck across the lot to get us some churros for dessert. Nearby, a grackle hops toward our table and cocks his head in the hope we’ll drop a bit of food he can steal. Overhead, strands of kitschy multicolored lights with big, fat, 1970s-style bulbs stretch between the trailers and the tall tree near the road.

Arturo gives me a look. “That was the least enthusiastic ‘sure’ I’ve heard in a while.”

“I’m fine. Really. Just—having a down day.”

No doubt Arturo knows better than that, but he also knows when to let something go. “We all have those sometimes. You know what fixes down days? Tacos. So get to work, girl.”

“I think I’d rather fix today with churros,” I reply, because I see Shay walking back toward us. But then I realize she doesn’t have the churros. She has one hand to her forehead and is walking slowly.

Getting to his feet, Arturo puts a hand out to support her. “Feeling light-headed again?”

“Yeah.” Her smile is weak and watery. “You know, I don’t want to stick around for dessert. Can we just go home?”

“Sure, honey,” Arturo says. I mean to tell them it’s fine with me too, but that’s when I happen to glance downward.

When I see the red droplets of blood on Shay’s white tennis shoes.

“Shay—” I get up and support her other arm. “Don’t freak out, but—”

“Oh, my God.” Now she’s seen it too, and as we stare downward, another drop falls onto the gravel. And another.

“We’re going to the hospital,” Arturo says. “Don’t move, okay? I’m driving the car right here. You’ve got her, Vivienne?”

“Yeah, of course, go!” As Arturo runs for the car, I squeeze Shay’s hand. “You should probably sit down.”

“I’m okay,” she says faintly, as if nothing in particular is happening. I realize she’s on the verge of shock. So I put my arms around her to hold her steady and upright until Arturo gets to us—he’s already in the car, best to let her stand so we can get her into the vehicle and on the way as fast as possible. Shay’s head rests against my shoulder; the skin of her forehead is cool and clammy.

I’m scared, or so I think, until I look down and see the bloodstain spreading across her white skirt, darker and wider every moment. That’s when I discover just how scared I can be.

•   •   •

“Please, can Dr. Campbell come?” Shay pleads as the orderlies wheel her stretcher down the hospital corridor. Arturo and I jog beside them; he’s determined to stay with her until the moment they physically pry him away, and I want to be with him when that happens. “Is she coming?”

“An obstetrician will be here any second,” says a nurse in yellow scrubs.

“But I want my own doctor—” Shay’s voice is so faint. It sounds like she might pass out at any second.

As they get her into a room and strap a fetal heart monitor around her belly, Arturo clasps her hand. “It’s going to be okay,” he says. “It’s got to be.”

Please, I pray to a God I believe in but rarely speak to. Please let Shay be all right. Please let the baby live.

I’m ushered out just as the OB-GYN runs in, and I hear Arturo say, “Dr. Campbell!” before the door shuts. So her doctor was the one on duty anyway. Maybe that’s proof God’s looking out for the baby after all. Or maybe it’s just dumb luck. Either way, I’ll take it.

For the next couple of hours, I have two jobs. The first is to sit in the waiting room and try not to cry. The second—and worst—is to call Carmen and tell her what’s happening. Carmen arrives about ten minutes after she hangs up, in the faded jeans and ratty T-shirt I know she only wears when she’s working on her thesis. When she sits beside me, I hug her tightly; now we can only hang on.

Carmen whispers, “They think I don’t want them to have the baby, and if they lose it—”

“They’re not going to. And you’re going to be a great Tia Carmen. Wait and see. Hey, you want to help me throw the baby shower? Shay would love that.”

Slowly, Carmen nods. So I start talking about presents and party games and cupcakes and everything else I can think of that could possibly be at a baby shower, in the hope that all that pink and yellow and baby blue will erase the memory of dark red blood.

Finally Arturo walks into the waiting room. He looks exhausted and pale—but not broken. “She’s okay.”

“Dios mío.” Carmen jumps up to embrace her brother, and he hugs her back tightly. “What happened?”

“Something about the placenta—we have to watch it, but for now it’s okay. Shay can even come home soon.” His smile is crooked. “And the baby’s just fine.”

Carmen starts crying harder, and Arturo starts too. I might be an informally adopted sibling, but I realize sometimes I need to butt out and let them have a minute.

I walk out into the corridor and catch the attention of the nearest nurse. “Can Shay Gillespie-Ortiz have visitors yet?”

The answer comes from someone standing behind me, “Not right now.”

I turn around to see the obstetrician, a young woman wearing a doctor’s long white coat with the name tag Dr. Rosalind Campbell. She’s smiling, which ought to be the only thing that matters. But it isn’t.

I’ve seen this woman before. She was wearing white then, too. I saw her the night of the charity gala, first when we complimented each other’s dresses—and then when she left, with Jonah’s arm around her.