Chapter one
When they reached the front entrance of the dormitory, Allison stopped. She pushed out a deep breath from her lungs. “Maybe I should just go back to Providence,” she said.
Reagan’s eyes grew wide. “Tonight? It’s after midnight,” she pointed out. “I don’t even think there’s trains leaving the city anymore.”
Allison looked away. “It’s … I’m not feeling very well.”
Not buying Allison’s excuse, Reagan gathered her courage. “Can we talk about your total Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde act from the party now?”
Allison’s features were stoical. “I don’t know what you mean,” she said with equal passivity.
“Don’t give me that. We were having such a good time, or so I thought,” Reagan said, exasperated. “What happened to trigger High-School-Allison? I thought we were through with her.”
“I don’t know,” Allison said in a quiet voice. The sidewalk was suddenly very interesting, and her gaze remained downcast.
Reagan continued to stare at the uncomfortable girl before her. Something Ashley had said at the party poked at her brain—Are you sure you two hated each other in high school?
She repeated her original answer: “It’s complicated,” she whispered.
Allison looked back up, not having heard Reagan clearly. “What’d you say?”
“Don’t move,” Reagan husked. She took a step forward.
“Huh?” Allison’s eyes widened in alarm as she followed the trajectory of Reagan’s mouth. She watched her momentarily hesitate. Reagan bit down on her lower lip before pressing her mouth fully against Allison’s own.
Allison’s eyes remained open for a second before she felt Reagan press harder against her. Her eyes fluttered shut and she released an involuntary groan. She was startled by how soft and pliable Reagan’s mouth was. Although she’d often found herself staring at her thick, dimpled lips (although she’d always told herself that it wasn’t unusual for one girl to admire another pretty girl), she’d never imagined a kiss could feel so tender. It was a far cry from the chapped lips and rough stubble of a man’s kiss.
I rubbed at the back of my neck to find it hot to the touch. The temperature in my bedroom felt impossibly warm, even though I knew my parents kept the thermostat at a reliable 72 degrees, no matter the weather outside. I continued to read:
She felt something gnaw at the pit of her stomach. At first she thought it was dread, but when Reagan’s teeth softly nipped at her bottom lip, she realized what the feeling truly was—desire. With their lips moving freely against each other’s, Allison threw caution to the wind, shut her eyes, and threw herself eagerly into the embrace.
I turned my book to the next page before glancing toward my closed bedroom door. Had I remembered to lock the door?
No sooner had the question formed in my head when the door swung open and my mom’s head popped into my room. “Dinner’s ready,” she chirped.
Despite how my heart hammered, I shut my book as unobtrusively as possible. I sought shelter from a nearby pillow, wiggling the text underneath. “Okay. Thanks.”
My mom lingered in the open doorway. “What are you reading?”
I pushed the book deeper beneath my pillow. “Something for school.”
It wasn’t.
“Homework and the semester hasn’t even started?” She sounded impressed.
“Some professors have assignments due the first day of classes,” I explained. “Something about the semester not being long enough.”
That part wasn’t a lie, but it wasn’t true for me this semester.
Instead of leaving to finish preparing dinner, my mom seemed to get more comfortable. She crossed one leg over the other and leaned against my door frame. “I’ll be sad to see you go back tomorrow. I know you were only home for a month, but I got used to you being around.”
We had the same conversation every time a school break ended and I had to go back.
“It’s not that far away. And I’ll be back for spring break and summer,” I reminded her.
“I know; but it’s not the same,” my mom said, looking wistful. “And soon enough you’ll be graduating, and then I’ll really never see you.”
“I’ve still got another year and a half of school, Mom.”
“It’ll go by fast. You’ll see. The past twenty years flew by.”
“Mom,” I sighed.
She held up her hands. “I know, I know. Children grow up. They fly the coop. That’s how these things work. I just don’t know what I’m going to do with myself when you’re gone for good.”
I made a face. Her dramatics could be exhausting. “You make it sound like I’m dying, Mom. Besides, you still have Brian,” I pointed out. My brother had a few more years before he would leave for college.
“It’s not the same. You’re my daughter.” She passed her hand in front of her face to brush away imaginary hair. Instead, her fingers stopped to flick at newly-forming tears.
“I’m okay, I’m okay,” she proclaimed. She forced a tight smile to her lips—brave but watery.
She looked like she needed a hug, but I didn’t want to provoke waterworks any more than our brief conversation had already caused. I kept my body planted on my bedspread.
“I’ll be right down for dinner,” I promised.
Confusion momentarily passed over her features as if she’d forgotten the reason why she’d stopped by my bedroom. She nodded her head. “Okay.”
When my mom disappeared from the doorway, I waited to make sure she’d really gone before retrieving my reading material from under my pillow. Fear and guilt had caused me to hide it. The book’s cover and title were innocuous enough—far more innocent than some of the other covers I’d seen with their leggy heroines and bodice-bursting breasts.
The book belonged to the public library, but I hadn’t been brave enough to properly check it out. Instead, I’d tucked it into my backpack and had hustled out the front doors. The local branch was too small and old fashioned to have electronic sensors in their books. The librarian would stamp a small note card in the front of the book with a return date and recorded your name in her desktop computer. It was only a book, but I didn’t want my name associated with the novel. I lived in a small suburban town, and like any other city of similar size, gossip was the lifeblood of my community. I figured I would be back to college before anyone noticed the lesbian novel section was one book short.
I’d never stolen anything in my life. I’d never caught the kleptomania bug like some of my friends did in middle school—a pack of gum, a tube of chapstick, a pack of batteries slipped into an oversized coat pocket. My stomach had twisted itself into knots just having the knowledge that my friends had stolen something, petty or not.
I got out of bed to join my family for dinner downstairs. I put the book under my pillow again, but thinking better of it, I shoved the book under my mattress. The symbolism wasn’t entirely lost on me: I was literally sleeping on a bed of lies.
+ + +
“Hey, ugly,” my brother greeted as I descended the staircase.
“Hey, smelly,” I returned.
He curled his lip. “Takes one to know one.”
“So you’re admitting that you stink?” I teased.
“Why can’t you two behave?” my mom called from the kitchen. “I thought you’d have grown out of that by now.”
I couldn’t help one more quip: “Sure, once Brian learns how to use deodorant.”
My brother pressed his hands over his heart as though injured.
“That’s enough,” my mom admonished, exiting the kitchen. She held a ceramic casserole dish in her oven-mittened hands. “Some day when your dad and I are gone, you’ll be all each other has, and you’ll be glad for the company.”
“Yeah, just me, Hunter, and her sixteen cats,” Brian crowed.
My brother was quite the comedian.
I hovered near my chair and fished a cherry tomato out of the large wooden salad bowl. “Is Dad home yet?”
My mom’s mouth formed a hard line: “No.”
Dinner at the Dyson household followed a strict routine. We sat in the same chairs and ate off the same dishes we’d had for as long as I could remember. My mom cooked all day and had dinner on the table promptly at 6:00 p.m. while my dad tended to breeze home a reliable half an hour to forty-five minutes late. I could probably count on two hands how many times he’d made it home on time. I’d once asked my mom why she didn’t postpone the meal at least half an hour, but she’d looked at me like I was from another planet, so I’d never made the suggestion again.
“Brian, go wash your hands,” my mom instructed.
My brother, already seated, held his hands in the air like a surrendering criminal. “They’re clean.”
“Wash your hands,” she insisted, this time more sternly.
With the grumble that only a teenaged boy could muster, Brian slunk out of his seat and obediently left for the first floor bathroom. He moved as if he had no bones in his body.
My mom had a lot of rules at the table—no TV or music in the background. No hats, no phones, no reading. No elbows, no talking with your mouth full, no talking about unpleasant topics. Finish the food on your plate. Beverage choices were limited to two—water or skim milk. But at least she didn’t make us wait until my dad got home to eat. It was rude to let one’s food grow cold, she’d said.
The three of us ate in slow silence. A polite request for food to be passed around the table filled the quiet. We continued to eat even when the front door opened and closed, half an hour later, with my dad’s arrival.
“Sorry I’m late!” I heard him call from the front of the house. “There was an accident on 94.”
There always seemed to be a lot of accidents on the highway.
My dad walked directly from the foyer to the dining room after leaving his leather briefcase by the front door. He loosened his tie and surveyed the dining room. “Hello, family,” he cheerfully greeted. “How was everyone’s day?”
Not waiting for an answer, he kissed my mom on the cheek before he sat down. Unlike Brian, he didn’t have to wash his hands before dinner. My mom’s rules typically didn’t apply to him. “Smells great—what are we having?”
“Lasagna,” my mom answered. “If yours is cold, I can put it back in the oven.”
“I’m sure it’ll be fine,” my dad replied.
I chewed my food with silent resentment. I hated how my mom catered to him. He was the one always late to dinner; he knew how to work a microwave. I loved my parents, but these small, everyday, mundane interactions made me hate them—he for not working harder to be on time for once, and she for letting him get away with it.
“What’s new with everyone?” my dad opened, as if we hadn’t seen each other just that morning at breakfast.
“I bought mulch today to go in the flower beds,” my mom announced.
My dad drank the majority of his water in one, giant gulp. “Isn’t that a little early? We just packed up the Christmas decorations.”
“It was on sale at the garden store,” my mom defended. “And once I get you to sell that snowmobile that you never use, there’ll be plenty of room in the garage.”
“The cedar or the cocoa shells?” he asked.
“I went with cedar this year. The cocoa shells always blow around when you first lay them out.”
“That’s because you’ve got to wet them down with the hose,” my dad said. “I tell you that every year.”
“I know, but it seems like such a waste and expense,” she sighed. “I’m already paying more for the mulch, but then I have to spend money on water to make it last?”
“We could always have one of those yards like folks do in Arizona,” my dad said between mouthfuls. “I wouldn’t mind not having to cut grass anymore.”
“We are not going to have a cactus yard.”
My parents’ inane conversation faded in the background to an indistinguishable murmur as I tried to follow their back-and-forth volley.
Did they still love each other? I wondered. They were still together, unlike the majority of my friends’ parents, but that didn’t mean their relationship hadn’t lost its spark. But maybe it was unreasonable to expect anything more than housekeeping conversations after being together for over twenty years. When my parents had gotten married all those years ago, was this what they imagined their life would look like, two decades in the future? What had filled their dinner conversations before they’d had kids?
“Do you think we’ve seen the last of the snow?” my dad thought aloud. “I’m almost at the end of a tank of gas in the snowblower, but I don’t want to put more in if I’m just going to have to siphon it out in the spring.”
“God, you guys are boring,” Brian blurted out.
“Brian.” My mom shot my brother a look of warning.
“Well, it’s true!” he exclaimed. “Don’t blame me when I pass out in my lasagna from boredom.”
“Show some respect,” my dad growled.
“You think they’re boring, too, Hunter.” My brother flailed for some backup.
I bent my head down, eyes focused on the little flowered pattern at the edges of my dinner plate. I knew better than to get involved. I’d be going back to school the next day, and morning couldn’t come soon enough.
CHAPTER TWO
I tucked my chin to my chest as a particularly brutal gust of wind whipped around me. Why had I decided to stay in Minnesota? I asked myself for the billionth time. Calling this spring semester was a cruel joke. We had at least three more months of winter.
My college campus was compact, but cute—not necessarily at that moment when the trees looked dead and everything was covered in snow and ice; but in April the trees would be green and the scent of lilacs would float in the wind. For now, however, the stiff wind caused my body to seize and my already brisk step to quicken as I made my way to my first class of the day: English 111. I didn’t know much about the professor. A basic online search revealed that she was a tough grader—one of the many reasons I’d been hesitant to enroll, but it was required that all students take the class before they graduated, and it was the only section of the course that fit into my very proscribed nursing curriculum.
I tended to enjoy my classes, but writing and composition was a general education requirement that I considered a waste of my time and my parents’ money. I was going to be a nurse. When would I need to write an entire essay? I would be composing a few paragraphs at most about patients for their charts. My time would have been better utilized taking another public health or science class instead of learning about fragments and run-on sentences. Computers had grammar and spell checkers, after all. The only consolation was I only had to skate by with a C- for the class to count; I was fully prepared to do just enough to pass. I was a consistent A-/B+ student in my other general education classes, always on the cusp, not struggling yet not thriving either. I did what was expected of me, but nothing above and beyond, especially if it wasn’t a class directly associated with my major.
I hustled up a short series of steps when I reached the humanities building, not wanting to be late on the first day of classes. As much as I didn’t want to take the English course, I feared being late even more. I couldn’t handle all of those eyes on me if I interrupted the start of class. No matter what you did the rest of the semester, you’d be forever known as the student who’d shown up late on the first day.
With a few minutes to spare, I claimed an empty seat in a corner of the classroom. A quick scan of the other students confirmed that I didn’t know anyone in the class. I estimated about a dozen and a half students in the room. My college was small, but just big enough not to know everyone, especially if they were in a different major. Everyone in my nursing cohort had taken the required writing class earlier in their college careers, but I’d delayed it for as long as my academic advisor would allow.
The college had been founded in the late 1800s, but the buildings that housed the STEM disciplines were upgraded and provided students with cutting-edge facilities. The humanities, however, were apparently the red-headed stepchild of the college. It was like a time capsule from my parents’ generation—maybe even older. The classroom was small, just large enough for the horseshoe configuration of desks around the perimeter of the room. The thin, beige carpet looked older than me. An actual chalkboard, not a smartboard, hung on the wall at the front of the classroom. It had been cleaned over winter break and awaited the first chalk marks of the new semester.
I had just pulled a new notebook out of my backpack when a professionally-dressed woman entered the room. She slipped out of her wool jacket, set a leather satchel on top of the desk at the front of the class, and—still without acknowledging the class—strode toward the chalkboard. She plucked a piece of white chalk from the railing and began to write. Beneath her navy blue dress, her backside slightly swayed as she wrote her name and the title of the class: Dr. Graft. English 111.
She turned and smiled, and my body instinctively sat at attention.
The first thing that struck me was her youth. I hadn’t read anything in her online reviews about her being so young. She didn’t look like a professor—not the professors I’d had, at least. Her skin was unlined, with high, dramatic cheekbones made all the more prominent when she smiled. Nearly all of my previous instructors had been older than my parents by a few decades. I had expected my English professor to be an elderly woman who liked to knit and had a menagerie of cats at home.
She wore a three-quarter length cardigan over her navy blue dress. I could just make out the slightest hint of feminine muscle in her biceps when she crossed her arms in front of her chest. The knee-high skirt billowed out slightly like the pedals of a flower and exaggerated the slenderness of her long legs. She touched the short string of pearls that hung around her neck.
“Good morning, everyone.”
A few students returned a half-hearted greeting.
She set her hands on her slender hips. “Let’s try that again. Good morning, everyone.”
This time, the majority of the class repeated her good morning, myself included.
“Better,” she clipped. “Good morning and welcome to English 111: Writing Seminar. Hopefully you’re all in the right class.” She paused. “Hopefully I’m in the right class. That’s always my greatest fear on the first day of a new semester—that I’ll get in front of a room of students and start lecturing until they tell me the class is actually Intro to Accounting.”
A quiet murmur of giggles broke across the room. It wasn’t much of a reaction, but Dr. Graft smiled brighter, undeterred.
“Let’s take a look at the syllabus so you can mentally prepare for my expectations of you in this class.”
Her smile was blinding. Her chestnut-colored hair fell past her shoulders in soft waves. It looked to be the product of natural curl rather than a high-maintenance morning routine. She scanned the room with dark blue eyes, the color of rich sapphires.
“Here you go.”
The girl sitting in the next desk dropped a pile of stapled papers onto my desk, pulling my attention away from the woman at the front of the classroom.
“Thanks,” I murmured.
While she waited for everyone to get a copy of the syllabus, Professor Graft took a seat. She sat not in a chair, but on top of the desk. Her feet crossed at her ankles, and her legs began to slightly swing back and forth.
“All of my contact information is at the top of the first page,” she began. “That’s where you’ll find my email, office location, and office hours. The second page is the schedule of assignments, readings, and due dates.”
And that’s when I stopped listening. I didn’t register anything else. Her legs—bare, tan, and smooth—acted like a hypnotist’s pendulum, swinging back and forth, back and forth. I couldn’t blame my lack of focus on academic fatigue; the new semester had only started a few minutes prior.
I roused when I realized everyone around me was packing up their textbooks and putting laptops and notebooks back into their bags. At the front of the classroom, Professor Graft was erasing her name from the blackboard.
Shit.
I slowly stood from my chair and tucked my notebook into my backpack. I hadn’t written down a single thing.
“Do we have homework for next time?” I asked the girl who’d sat to my right.
She gave me a bewildered look. “Yeah. Reading chapter one in the textbook and a short written response. It’s on the syllabus.”
I gave her a tight smile. “Thanks.”
At the front of the classroom, a few students surrounded Professor Graft. I knew from my other classes that some students liked to single themselves out right away by introducing themselves at the end of the first class. I had never felt compelled to do the same, even in my nursing classes, yet my legs were carrying me to the front of the classroom.
I didn’t have time to reconsider my decision as the rest of my classmates had cleared out. Professor Graft and I stood alone in the room.
She was even more striking up close. She wore a minimal amount of makeup because she didn’t need it.
I stuck my hand out like I’d seen the others do. “Hunter Dyson.”
She clasped my hand in hers. Her skin felt warm and dry against mine.
“Elle Graft. It’s very nice to meet you, Hunter.” Her voice took on an even more velvety-soft tone now that she didn’t have to project to an entire classroom. “What’s your major?”
“Nursing.”
She smiled shrewdly. “I’ve had quite a few nursing students before. I hope I don’t have to convince you of the import of this class.”
My eyes widened. She could see right through me; only moments before, I’d resented having to take the required class.
“N-no,” I stumbled on the denial. “Of course not. Writing is important.”
Her smile broadened. “Indeed.”
+ + +
Writing is important. I scolded myself as I crossed campus to make it to my next class. Writing is important.
What an idiot.
Frustration had me quickening my step and maneuvering around other students who were similarly trafficking from one class to the next.
Why had I stuck around to introduce myself? I never did that, not even in classes I needed for my major. There was absolutely no reason to be teacher’s pet in the writing seminar; I only needed to get through the semester with a C- so the class counted for my general education requirements. All I had to do was keep my head low and turn in my assignments on time.
Spanish for Nursing was next on my schedule. We were only given ten minutes between classes, and since I’d stayed behind in English, I skated into my next classroom with only moments to spare. I slipped into an empty desk just as the instructor—a round woman with thick glasses and short curly hair—began the class.
“Hola!” she greeted.
“Hola,” we returned with far less enthusiasm.
Professor Kilbourn rattled off instructions in Spanish. She was bubbly and high energy, and bounced around the classroom as if her legs were pogo-sticks. I let my body and my mind relax; I was in no danger of being distracted in this class—unless I let my thoughts drift back to the previous period.
And I definitely wasn’t going to let myself do that.
+ + +
On the first day of classes of the new semester, I practically had the college library to myself. In a few weeks time it would be harder to claim a study table, but for now I was tucked away in a quiet corner of the library. I chewed on the end of my pen as I examined the question written at the top of my notebook page. It was the short response Professor Graft required for our next class: How did you choose your major?
The answer was pretty straightforward. I’d long wanted to choose a career that had purpose. And my parents had encouraged nursing since there was a state-wide shortage. It was the ideal combination of purpose and practicality. After graduation I would have no problem finding a job. It wasn’t a poetic answer, but it was the truth. I considered embellishing—drawing out some over-the-top, heartfelt response that would make me standout among my peers—but I banished the thought the moment it appeared. I had no reason why I should want Professor Graft to notice me.
I touched pen to paper, but before I could write anything, the table where I worked trembled from the weight of heavy books.
I looked up from my work to see my friend Meghan, to whom the stack of textbooks belonged.
“Don’t tell me that’s all for one class?”
She wrinkled her nose. “A & P.”
“Awesome,” I deadpanned, setting down my pen.
I was in the same class—Anatomy and Physiology—but I hadn’t bought my books yet.
Meghan sat in one of the empty chairs. She leaned back, balancing on the two rear legs. I could almost predict she’d fall if she tipped back any farther. It made me anxious, but I kept my worries to myself.
“What are you working on?” she asked.
“English.”
“Damn. Homework on the first day? Who’s the professor?”
I tried to school my features. “Graft.” I said the surname with as much nonchalance as I could muster.
“Oh, I’ve heard about her.”
“I know. She’s supposed to be a tough grader. But it was the only section that fit in my schedule,” I explained, “and I didn’t want to wait until next year to take it.”
“Oh, I don’t know what she’s like as a teacher,” Meghan amended as she returned all four chair legs to the ground. “I only heard that she’s gay.”
My friend’s words affected me more than I wanted to admit. “Who’d you hear that from?”
Meghan shrugged. “I dunno. It’s, like, common knowledge. Like, everyone knows.”
I hadn’t.
“She’s pretty though,” Meghan mused. “You can’t even tell.”
My fists clenched beneath the table, out of sight. “I didn’t know there was an official uniform.”
“You know what I mean.
I changed the subject. “Are we still doing study group this semester?”
A small group of our nursing cohort regularly met in the library, at least once a week, to help each other out. We were largely in the same classes, and it was nice to have study partners for collaboration and moral support.
“I hope so. I haven’t talked to the others, but if you’re in, so am I. It’s, like, the only reason I survived last semester.” Meghan drummed her fingers on the library table. “Do you think she’s easier on girls?”
“Who?”
“Graft.”
I didn’t want to keep talking about her.
“Is Dr. Witlan easier on girls?” I countered.
“I don’t know. Why?”
“Because I assume he’s straight.”
“I guess you have a point,” Meghan agreed. “I cried in his office once.”
I cracked a smile. “Are you serious?”
“As a heart attack,” she solemnly confirmed. “It was the first paper I’d written in college. He gave me a C+. I freaked; I thought it was the end of the world.”
“Did he change your grade?”
“Nope. He got super uncomfortable. Threw some tissues at me and made some excuse about having to get to a meeting.”
“Well, that’s awkward.”
Meghan smiled. “He remembered my name after that though. If we passed him on campus today I bet he’d still remember me.”
“I don’t know if I want my professors to know my name because of that,” I observed.
“I’m not picky; I’ll take what I can get.”
+ + +
The chat program on my open laptop chirped with a new incoming message: How was the first day back?
The message wasn’t unexpected. There was a seven-hour time difference between Minnesota and France, but Colette kept unorthodox hours. She was in art school, which seemed like a very French thing to do. She was also a procrastinator and often stayed up all night to finish art projects the day before they were due.
We had never met in real life, but that had never mattered.
In the fourth grade, my teacher, Mrs. Hudson, had assigned every student in class a pen pal. We’d been paired based on gender and age as part of a cultural exchange between my elementary school and a similar school in France. The program hadn’t lasted very long; most students lost interest in their French pen pal before we started fifth grade. This was before the popularization of e-mail, and postal mail across the Atlantic Ocean was expensive and took a long time in transit. Few fourth graders, regardless of their country of origin, had the patience to wait for letters that showed up every other week.
Colette and my friendship, however—through stubbornness or willpower—had stood the test of time. She had been there for me through every embarrassing moment and for every first, from my first kiss to my first heartbreak. She’d been my only friend when my dad’s new job had moved us to a house in the suburbs and I’d had to change schools. We’d gotten our drivers licenses together, our periods, and now we were both experiencing a taste of independence at our respective colleges.
Our letters had started out as handwritten. They’d graduated to typewritten and then eventually e-mail, which meant we could write and receive letters everyday if we’d had time for that. With the invention of instant messenger, we could chat in real time. If I had had a smartphone we could have spoken throughout the day, even when I was away from my laptop, but I’d never felt compelled to upgrade my phone. I knew my friends thought it strange, but I didn’t need to be connected all of the time.
I typed off a brief reply: I already have homework.
Isn’t that the point? she returned.
Sure, but professors on day one are only supposed to go over the syllabus. It’s like an unwritten rule. They’re supposed to ease us back into the swing of things.
In truth, only Professor Graft had assigned any work, and the short writing assignment wouldn’t take much time if I could stop over-thinking it. Writing is important. Thinking about our brief interaction, even hours afterwards, still made me flush with embarrassment. She must have thought I was a slack-jawed mouth breather.
I congratulate your professors who are making the most of your college education.
Colette was a creative, but she was also no-nonsense; she often checked me on my American privilege.
You sound like my parents.
Someone’s got to keep you in line when they’re not around.
Who’s keeping you in line? I countered.
I’m self-taught.
I swung around in my desk chair when I heard a knock on my open bedroom door. My roommate, Sara, stood in the doorway.
“How was your break?”
“They should really re-think calling it a ‘break,’” I quipped.
“Parent troubles?” she guessed.
“They’re okay,” I conceded. “They just insist on treating me like I’m still in high school when I’m home.”
Sara nodded sagely. “All the more reason not to go back.”
“Doesn’t your family guilt trip you for not coming home?” I posed.
“First, it’s not my home anymore,” she counted on her fingers. “Second, I’m sure they try, which is why I’ve stopped answering my phone.”
I shook my head. “If I stopped, so would the rent checks.”
“All the more reason to get a part-time job,” she replied.
“I don’t know how you do it,” I admired.
Sara had an off-campus job and was overloading on her courses so she could graduate a semester early, all while staying on the Dean’s List.
“It’s called not having a life,” she noted wistfully.
“It’s not like I have one,” I protested.
“You’ve got your nursing friends,” she countered.
“A study group that sometimes stumbles upon a bottle of peppermint schnapps,” I retorted with an eye roll. “Yeah, we’re a wild bunch.”
Sara shrugged. “Better than what I’ve got.”
I had no real response. Sara and I had been better friends in high school when our houses were on the same cul de sac. But sharing an apartment hadn’t made us any closer; if anything, we’d grown apart as we’d ventured out and forged new connections. Maybe it had only ever been a friendship of convenience in high school.
My laptop’s speakers chirped, and I looked over my shoulder at the sound. Colette’s message blinked back at me: Still there?
I had intended on ignoring Colette until my conversation with Sara had run its course, but my roommate had other plans.
“Say hello to Colette for me,” she said before walking away.
My eyes remained on my empty, open bedroom doorway. I felt bad for how our friendship had slowly deteriorated, but I also felt helpless to fix it. We were different people now with different priorities.
I spun back around in my chair with a heavy sigh. My fingers moved across the keyboard. Yeah. Sara says hi.
How’s that shut-in doing?
Be nice, I admonished.
This is me being nice.
CHAPTER THREE
There was a loud knock on the bathroom door. Sara called to me through the closed door: “Are you almost done in there?”
“Just a second,” I called back.
“Why can’t you go to school in pajamas like a normal person?”
My voice pitched in frustration. “I’m almost done, Sara,” I repeated.
It had been the same complaint nearly every morning since we’d started living together. She questioned my habit of showering daily and of actually doing something with my hair instead of tossing it up into a messy top bun. I had to flat-iron my hair; if I only used a blow dryer, my hair stuck out in all directions. Without it, I couldn’t even get a ponytail to behave. She teased me whenever she caught me ironing my clothes. I wasn’t doing college right, according to her—a sentiment usually echoed by my nursing friends.
Why can’t you be like everyone else? Why can’t you be normal?
My expressionless face stared back at me from the mirror hanging over the bathroom sink. Blue eyes. Pale eyelashes. Generic blonde hair. Pale skin that sunburned more easily than tanned.
Meghan’s words from the previous day had been rattling around in my head since she’d uttered them.
She’s pretty though; you can’t even tell.
She’d been talking about Professor Graft, but I couldn’t help applying them to me. I wouldn’t have described myself as pretty. Certainly not sexy. Not quite beautiful. Subjectively attractive, perhaps. Cute, even.
My eyes were located in the right spot on my face, but I thought my nose was a little too big and my mouth was a little too wide. My limbs were long and thin, which I appreciated now, but I’d felt like a scarecrow in high school before my curves had started to fill out.
The bathroom door rattled again.
“Seriously, Hunter,” Sara called. “Enough with the primping.”
“I’m almost done!” I hollered through the closed door.
I hastily unplugged my flat-iron and wrapped its long cord around the handle. I left the bathroom with only a fleeting glance toward the vanity mirror.
Sara had continued to stand directly behind the bathroom door. We nearly bumped noses on my way out of the bathroom.
“What were you doing in there?” she accused.
I hugged my flat-iron to my chest. “Getting ready for school.”
“I knew we should have sprung for two bathrooms,” she grumbled.
“It’s not that bad,” I defended.
Sara didn’t respond. The bathroom door closed with her inside.
+ + +
My early morning interaction with Sara left me in a sour mood. I was even less eager to go to my English class than the day before. Normally classes occupied a 50-minute Monday, Wednesday, Friday pattern or ran for 75-minutes on Tuesdays and Thursdays. The writing seminar had made itself even more obnoxious by running four days a week, with the exception of Fridays.
I shuffled into the classroom and claimed the same desk as the day before. There were no assigned seats, but we’re creatures of habit and most everyone else occupied the same space as well. I thought about introducing myself to the people who sat in the desks around me, but conversations came to a stop when Professor Graft entered the room.
She removed her wool jacket, tossed her bag on the front desk, and grabbed a piece of chalk like she had on our first day. The classroom waited in silence while she wrote a question on the board: Why did I choose my major?
It was the question from the prompt we’d been responsible for completing for that day.
Her dark blue eyes regarded the room while she rubbed the white, chalky residue off her hands. “Who wants to share their response?” she asked.
No one took the bait.
Professor Graft smiled despite the lack of activity. She leaned back against the desk at the front of the classroom and seemed to settle in.
“I’d prefer volunteers,” she sing-songed pleasantly.
The silence continued and eventually became oppressive, like a standoff between the classroom and our professor. Who would crack first? I stared down at my own prepared response, but there was nothing special about it—nothing that warranted me raising my hand, at least. I couldn’t look up at Professor Graft without feeling guilty. I hated that no one was responding and that she’d been put in this awkward situation.
“I’m majoring in criminal justice,” a boy on one side of the room announced.
The classroom seemed to release a collective breath that someone had finally spoken.
“My grandpa and my dad were both cops,” he continued, “so I guess it’s in my blood.”
Professor Graft rewarded the student’s bravery with an affable smile. “Thanks for sharing, Dan. Anyone else?”
A girl sitting near me raised her hand. “I’m a journalism major. I like to write, and I’ve always wanted to work for a newspaper or magazine.”
Another response, another personalized smile. It almost made me want to volunteer my answer if only to earn that smile. But before I could consider raising my hand, we were moving on.
“Looking ahead on the syllabus,” Professor Graft stated, “when next we meet you’ll be responsible for having read chapter two. There’s no written assignment due for next time, but remember that you’ve got your first rough draft due in two weeks, so don’t let that sneak up on you. We’re going to start today with a discussion of chapter one, but before we do that, I’ll come around and collect the assignment due for today.”
The sound of rustling papers filled the room as my classmates pulled out their typewritten assignments. I took a moment to review my own response, looking for typos, even though there’d be no opportunity make changes before she picked up my paper.
I didn’t dwell long on my word choice or spelling before watching Professor Graft make the rounds as she picked up our first writing assignment. She’d worn a pencil skirt, tucked-in blouse, and high heels that day. It was snowing outside. Why couldn’t she wear pants or at least boots like my other professors?
I considered it a personal victory when I somehow managed to tear my attention away from her legs long enough to make eye contact with her. She gave me a quick smile as she collected my piece of paper.
“Thanks, Hunter.”
I shouldn’t have been surprised that she knew my name already; she’d called on two of my classmates earlier without having to consult a seating chart or roster. But I was still impressed. Most professors took a few weeks to learn names if they bothered at all.
“You’re welcome,” I mindlessly replied.
I mentally cursed my stupidity. You’re welcome?! For the second time in two days I’d been rendered unintelligible in front of this woman.
Professor Graft collected my homework and moved on to the next student. As soon as she took my sheet of paper, I couldn’t resist another peek at the definition in her calves. It was going to be a challenging semester if she continued to wear skirts.
For the remainder of the class period, my eyes involuntarily followed my professor as she stalked around the room. The students sitting around me were more interested their laptop screens while my attention was torn between the content of Professor Graft’s lecture and the way her calf muscles flexed with each step. I marveled at the impeccable tailoring of her outfit. It didn’t bunch or gather awkwardly where her shirt met the high-waist of her fitted skirt. Her wavy hair didn’t require a flat-iron, but I bet she ironed her clothes.
We ended the class period with a worksheet on identifying sentence fragments and run-ons. We were given a few minutes to work on our own before we would share our responses with the rest of the class. I normally loathed mandatory class participation. It was particularly anxiety inducing because I didn’t know anyone in the class. I could picture nothing more horrifying than raising my hand and getting the answer wrong in a room full of strangers.
Professor Graft stood at the front of the classroom and rubbed her hands together. “Who’s got the answer for question number one?”
Unlike the beginning of class, hands popped into the air. I felt a kind of implicit peer pressure to participate as well. I didn’t want to look lazy or uninterested, plus twenty percent of our final grade was class participation. A few questions into the worksheet, my hand reluctantly went in the air.
Professor Graft called on me when she saw my raised hand: “Hunter.”
“Sentence?” I guessed.
“No, actually that one’s a fragment,” she said. “It’s a tricky one though.”
She jumped onto the next question rather than dwell on my mistake. “Who’s got the next one?”
She moved on so quickly, so fluidly, I didn’t have the opportunity to be embarrassed about getting the question wrong. I’d sat in many classes where the instructor made a big deal about errors. Professor Graft, however, had been matter-of-fact and swift in her correction. She’d almost been gentle.
I raised my hand again, and she came right back to me.
“Hunter.”
“Run-on,” I answered.
She smiled brightly, as brilliant as the absent sun. “Right. Good job.”
In the final moments before class let out, Professor Graft returned our graded prompts. She’d presumably read over them while we’d worked on our grammar worksheets. Her response was scrawled across the top of the first page: Thanks for sharing, Hunter! Nursing is a very noble profession.
Her handwriting was fluid and legible and decidedly feminine. Most of my professors, especially in the sciences, were men and you needed a decoder ring to decipher their chicken scratch.
I sat at my desk, holding onto my assignment while my classmates packed up their textbooks and notebooks. At the front of the classroom, Professor Graft was collecting her things as well.
I wanted to talk to her. I wanted to explain why I hadn’t raised my hand at the start of class. I wanted to apologize on behalf of my classmates who hadn’t participated either. But I had another class to get to and only ten minutes to get there. I put my books into my backpack and left the room, practicality winning out.
+ + +
The first week of classes passed by in a blur, which wasn’t unusual for the start of a new term. Each new semester came with growing pains—learning a new course schedule, discovering which classes and professors were going to demand the most time, and figuring out when I was going to find time in my week to get everything done.
The saving grace in my schedule was a free period on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons where I met with other junior-year nursing students to study for tests, share notes, and commiserate about our chaotic schedules. We came from various backgrounds, but our position in the nursing program had brought us together. We’d been assigned to each other during summer orientation in the months before our freshmen year at college, and we’d been meeting religiously ever since. I valued the group for keeping my GPA stable, but more than that, the people in my cohort had become my closest friends at school.
My friend Cheryl, a farm girl from central Wisconsin, flopped down in an empty chair at the library table, joining me and the rest of our study group. She tossed her book bag onto the table with a solid thud. “A & P is going to be the death of me,” she sighed. “Why do we even have to take it? If I wanted to memorize all the parts of the body, I would have become a doctor.”
“It’ll come in handy some day,” I assured her. “Don’t you want to do more than take temperatures and blood pressures?”
She curled her lip. “Not really.”
“At least A&P has something to do with medicine,” my friend Erica pointed out. She was the most academically focused of our group, with dark, serious eyes and black hair that she typically wore in a braid down the center of her back. “I don’t know why I have to take an art class in order to graduate. When am I ever going to use anything I learned in art history as a nurse?”
“Maybe they’ll let you pick out the art on the walls at your doctor’s office,” Meghan encouraged.
“Nothing but inspirational kittens hanging from trees,” Cheryl chimed in.
“I don’t know, I kind of like the required classes,” Taylor, a blonde as sunny as her hair color, piped up. “I had a lot of fun in ceramics last semester. Free Christmas presents for everyone.”
“Yeah, I forgot to thank you for that ashtray,” I laughed.
“It could be a jewelry holder, too!” Taylor protested.
“It doesn’t hurt that Professor Katz is a total dream boat,” Meghan purred. “I tried to get into that class, but it fills up right away.”
“All those girls wanting to recreate that scene from Ghost,” Cheryl snickered.
“And probably some of the boys, too,” Erica chimed in with a laugh.
“I should only sign up for classes with hot professors,” Meghan noted wistfully. “I might actually stay awake then.”
“Nothing but dinosaurs for me this semester,” Cheryl complained.
Meghan and Erica murmured their agreement.
“What about you, Hunter?” Taylor asked. “Do you have any cute professors?”
I blinked a few times. “Oh, uh, they’re all women.”
“That’s too bad,” she commiserated with a sympathetic frown.
“I think I prefer male professors,” Meghan announced.
“That’s very anti-feminist of you,” Erica countered.
“I know. But guy teachers are easier,” Meghan opined. “They don’t expect as much, especially in Gen Ed classes. All of my women professors have been hard asses.”
“Like who?” Cheryl pressed.
“Sandberg in Public Health. Gordon in Epidemiology. Diaz in World Lit,” she listed off. “I’m pretty sure Diaz hated me.”
“Maybe if you had turned in your essays on time,” I prompted with a knowing grin.
“Well, if she hadn’t assigned so many papers, maybe I could have kept up. It’s like these profs don’t realize we’ve got other classes to take and we’ve got lives outside of school,” Meghan complained.
“Speak for yourself,” Erica grumbled. “Outside of you guys, I have no social life.
“I hear that,” Cheryl agreed.
“We’re a disappointment to liberated women everywhere,” Taylor sighed.
“Next year, when all we have left is the internship,” Meghan vowed, “all of our hard work will have paid off.”
“But then we’ll be working forty hours a week at our internship,” I noted. “And then we’ll graduate, and we won’t have time for fun anymore.” I frowned when I realized I was starting to sound like my mom.
Our quibbling conversation continued until a staff librarian approached our small group. She was an older woman who wore her reading glasses on a chain around her neck. “Ladies, I’m going to have to ask you to keep it down,” she said in a harsh whisper. “More studying and less socializing.”
Everyone around the table murmured an immediate apology, myself included.
When the librarian was out of earshot, Meghan leaned forward in her seat. “What’d I tell you?” she murmured. “Nothing but hard asses.”
+ + +
My bedroom door didn’t have a lock, but Sara wasn’t the type to bust into my room if the door was closed. Unlike my mom, she respected boundaries. Even with this knowledge, however, I still moved an empty suitcase in front of my closed door if only to provide a false sense of security.
I plugged earbuds into the headphone jack on my laptop and tucked them into my ears. I opened up a browser window and paused with my fingers flexing over the keyboard. Beyond the lesbian novel I’d taken from the public library, I’d never actively sought out lesbian forms of mass entertainment. I’d never gone to a lesbian movie, I’d never participated in Pride, I’d never gone to a gay bar, and I most definitely had never looked up girl-on-girl porn.
I typed the word “lesbian” into my browser window and clicked the search function. The top results were surprisingly tame: A wikipedia entry. Local Pride events. A queer dating website.
Farther down the list one entry attracted my attention: “Take the Online Quiz: Am I a lesbian?”
The title reminded me of those quizzes in women’s magazines that my high school classmates had been into: Does your crush like you back?
I clicked on the hyperlink and continued to read: a quiz designed to help girls who are questioning their sexuality figure things out.
I was skeptical, but I was willing to try just about anything for more clarity.
Question One: Who have most of your male crushes been?
A. Celebrities
B. The bad-boy, popular kid at your school
C. The boy-next-door
D. I’ve never had a crush on a man.
I couldn’t think of any boys I’d known in real life who I’d been genuinely attracted to. I remembered one time in high school a boy that all of my friends had had a crush on had walked by, and I had experimentally checked out his butt. I wanted to know what was the big deal. Another girl whom I didn’t know very well had seen what I’d done and had called me out on it, and I’d never looked at another boy in high school again.
I clicked the celebrity response and read on.
Question Two: When you think about having sex with a man, how does it make you feel?
- Sounds good
- Repulsive
- I’m not sure.
In all of my twenty years, I had only kissed a few boys before. I hadn’t particularly enjoyed myself, but each time I’d also been in a situation where I’d thought we were going to get in trouble. P.D.A.s hadn’t been allowed at my high school, so I’d always worried someone might see us. The dread of being caught had haunted me more than being able to enjoy myself.
I clicked on “I’m not sure.”
Question Three: Are your hand bones relatively long for your height?
- Yes, I have trouble finding gloves.
- My hands are just right.
- No, my hands are short.
What?
The remainder of the quiz’s questions were equally unhelpful. Most had to deal with men and one’s attraction to the opposite sex. The questions frustrated me. If I wasn’t interested in dating a man, by default did that mean I was a lesbian?
I closed the browser window without finishing the rest of the quiz. I didn’t need an online test to tell me if I was gay or not. I already knew the answer.