Zack’s was even more satisfying: Can’t wait to get you alone again, Evie. I am counting down the hours.
CHAPTER SIX
For a day or two, I had no time to get back to Zack; in spite of the fact that I wanted nothing more than to be with him again, I still had the presence of mind to put my studies first. I sent Zack a few texts—teasing him, and getting teased in return—but I couldn’t make any definite plans until I knew I had all of my work done. I wanted to see him again, but I wasn’t going to make the mistake of letting my grades tank because I’d gone sex-crazed with a guy. I was also still nervous about the reaction from his teammates. Was the one who’d talked to me the only one who was worried about Zack being distracted, or was it something that the whole team was on board with? And had they noticed that Zack was apparently more distracted without me?
It was Wednesday morning when I woke up; I was already thinking of how I would hit Zack up to go to dinner somewhere off campus, maybe bring him back to my dorm to spend the night. I still had my own prejudices against this frat house—if he had to stay there for whatever reason, I would go to him there, but if I could have him to myself in my room, I wanted that a lot more. I got up and decided to wake up gradually, about an hour or so earlier than my usual wake-up time.
I was sitting in the common area of the dorm when Jess came in, eyes wide and face set in shock. I was watching one of the early-morning shows, drinking a cold coffee in my pajamas, and Jess made a beeline to me.
“Shit, Evie—have you seen this?” She brandished a newspaper and I furrowed my brow.
“What, did something come out in the school rag?”
Jess shook her head. “This isn’t the campus paper,” she said, straightening it and showing me the banner.
It was the Tribune, distributed throughout the state, though it was mostly local. Jess unfolded the newspaper. On the front page, a huge headline read, Up and Coming QB May Be Suspended for Partying Too Hard. My gaze moved down and I saw a picture of Zack, obviously at a party at his frat. He was wearing a toga and had a beer in each hand, streams of the drinks flowing into his mouth from both sides. There was a girl in the picture with him, grinding up against him with a huge grin on her face.
For a long moment I couldn’t do anything but stare at the picture, shocked at what I was seeing. I finally snatched the paper out of Jess’ hands and began to read. “The quarterback’s partying ways, as a member of the notorious Phi Alpha Kappa fraternity, recently came to light to the administration as well as the coaching staff at the university.” The article went on to describe the different highlights—or maybe they were lowlights—of the frat’s history on campus, and opined that it was a foregone conclusion that Zack would be lost to partying ways once he’d joined as a freshman. “Of course, the kind of behavior that a second string quarterback is able to get away with is impossible for a starting quarterback for a school that will be going on to nationals.” The article concluded with speculation as to whether suspending Zack would force the school to forfeit at the finals, whether or not the first string QB was going to be able to take up his mantle again, or whether there would be a backup quarterback who could be brought in. “It is certainly a shame to see a promising college ball career marred—potentially ended—by the bad choices of a student.”
I shook my head; his coaches would have had to have known that Zack was partying. Of course, with pictures of potentially underage drinking coming out, I could see why they were worried—and why they might suspend him, even if it cost us the big national championship. They had to at least look like they were being tough on underage drinking and too much partying. But my eyes went back to the picture and I felt my concern for Zack dissolve in a bitter thought. That girl, grinding on him, grinning like she was absolutely certain that she’d be getting him alone in next to no time. Zack had told me he couldn’t think about anyone but me—he had humiliated himself, and me, to demonstrate he had feelings for me. What the hell was he doing letting some girl grind up on him, practically rubbing his toga off, if that was the case?
SLAMMED #4
CHAPTER ONE
For what felt like a long time, I stared at the newspaper that Jess had given me, looking at the picture as my stomach churned. I’d had no idea that the morning was going to bring anything like this. My mind swirled around, alternating between fear and worry for Zack’s position—the possibility that he might be suspended from the team—and growing anger at the sight of a woman grinding up on him. The alcohol didn’t bother me in the slightest; I knew that Zack had started drinking before he even came to college, and the whole point of the frat he belonged to was to party as much as humanly possible.
“I don’t understand,” I said finally, looking from the paper to Jess. “I mean, I really just don’t understand.”
Jess sat down heavily, shrugging. “The school has to look like they’ll only tolerate a certain level of partying, and someone I guess turned Zack in.”
“But…” I shook my head, staring at the picture once more. Had I seen the girl before? Was she one of the girls that seemed to always be around Zack? Had he slept with her? When was the picture from—it had to have been recent to have been included in the article. “Who the hell is that and what is Zack doing letting her be all over him like that?”
Jess shrugged again. “I’d seen Zack around a few times before, and I mean, he’s sort of always been like that—wild, partying, hitting up whatever girl would pay him the least bit of attention. I mean, until you showed up, at least.”
I bit my bottom lip and put the newspaper down. I felt hot and cold all at once, my heart pounding in my chest, my head already starting to ache. Zack had been like this before I came back into the picture. He had fooled around with girls, let them grind up on him—well, in fairness, I thought, he and I had danced just like that the first time he had seen me in years; why should I be surprised? I shouldn’t. But it still hurt; especially since I had no idea if the picture was from long before I had come back into his life or if it was from earlier in the night during the party I’d gone to find him at. I couldn’t think straight—my head was spinning.
“Do you think I made a huge mistake getting back into his life?” I asked Jess. “I mean, that’s not the kind of person I am—do you think…do you think that’s the kind of girl he wants?”
Jess shook her head. “He knows what kind of girl you are and he clearly wants you. What are you so upset about, Evie?”
I swallowed against the tightness I could feel growing steadily worse in my throat. “I’m upset at the sight of the guy I like being dry-humped by some girl!” I said, standing up and pacing across the living room floor. “I mean, yeah, sure, whatever, double-fisting beers is an old hat trick, I’ve seen him doing that before. It’s not news. But what if he’s doing this…what if he’s still going after any girl who’ll pay attention to him?”
I thought of seeing him in the dining hall line with his arm around a girl, just a couple of days after we’d had sex for the first time in years. I thought of him telling me it was just sex.
But he’d acted differently since, hadn’t he? He’d asked me out on a proper date, he’d declared he was hung up on me in front of everyone. I’d been humiliated by the way he acted, but he was just showing off, just trying to get my attention. If he was really serious about having a relationship with me I could forgive him for what he’d done. But if he was dancing and flirting with other girls while keeping me on the line as a steady lay—if all I was to him was a reliable piece of ass—then I couldn’t stand that.
“Is that what you think is happening?” Jess asked me.
I shrugged, throwing my arms out wildly. “I have no fucking clue!” I ran my hands through my hair, trying to decide what I thought. “I just…he’s right there, some slut grabbing on him, and they probably slept together, and I don’t know whether it was from months ago or last year or last week!”
“Last week, if it was then, you were freezing him out.”
“What if it was the night of the party? What if he was grinding on that girl and hooked up with her and then got rid of her before I got there to talk to him.”
“Busy guy, then,” Jess said, smiling faintly.
“This isn’t funny, Jess!” Jess’ smile fell and she nodded. “On top of all that he might be getting suspended from the football team, and I don’t know how to feel about that…” I threw myself down on the couch. “What do I do, Jess? This is just…I can’t even handle everything going on in my brain right now.”
“First, take a chill pill. If Zack gets suspended from the team then I sure as hell hope they have a backup plan because I can’t think of any way they’ll manage in the championship without him.” Jess paused a moment to think before continuing. “As for the rest of it, I mean, are you really not okay with him drinking and partying? You’re worried about the kind of girl that he wants you to be—but are you okay with the kind of guy he is?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “If he’s the kind of guy—still—who would let girls get all up on him and rub up against him even if he’s with someone…with me…then no. But I don’t know.”
“You need to figure out what kind of guy he is, and you need to figure out if you’re okay with the kind of guy he is. I mean it. I can see you’re serious about him, but if he isn’t serious about you, you’re never going to be okay with that.” I nodded. “So figure it out, Evie, and do what makes sense from there.” Jess stood up, stretching. “Try and get some breakfast in your system before class.”
I went into my room, still shaking with anger and upset. I should change out of my pajamas and get to the dining hall, get ready for the rest of my day. I should just put the picture I had seen and the article I had read completely out of my mind until I could talk to Zack about it. But my heart was pounding in my chest and I couldn’t take my mind off of the picture. I couldn’t stop thinking about the lurid details that the article had featured, the highlights of the frat’s history. “In 2004, the fraternity was the subject of a long investigation by the administration when an early-admission student, aged 15, told her parents that she had had sex with one of the members of the frat…In 2010, the frat was once more temporarily suspended pending the verdict in allegations of underage drinking and public lewdness, with several students alleging that public sex occurred during at least one party…” Zack hadn’t been a member of the frat for the worst of the infractions, but the frat’s reputation lent itself well to encouraging someone like Zack to do whatever he wanted.
I pulled at my hair, groaning as I buried my face against my mattress. The thought of seeing Zack with another girl—both the way I had in real life, just a few short days after we had first reunited and then in the picture—made me angrier and angrier. I couldn’t put it out of my mind; it was impossible. I stood up and took a deep breath. I would have to actually confront him about it. There was just no two ways about it. I had to do it before I could psych myself out, before I had a chance to make myself miserable during my morning classes dwelling on it.
I strode out of my room, stepping into a pair of slip-on shoes and grabbing up the newspaper that Jess had brought in from the coffee table where I’d let it fall. I made sure to grab my keys and card so I wouldn’t be locked out of the dorms, but I didn’t make time or take time for anything else. As I walked down the hall to the stairwell, I considered where I could actually find Zack. It was early enough in the morning that my first thought was that he would be at the frat house, still asleep. But then I corrected myself; Zack had told me about his training routine in our interview together. He and the team would be in the school gym, in the weight room, working out.
I walked across campus, ignoring the chill in the air that cut through my pajamas and barely looking around me. It was early enough in the day that there weren’t very many people up and about; there was no one to see how upset I was at the whole situation. I caught sight of a few people rushing to early-morning classes in their pajamas, or heading for the dining hall, but anyone who was out of the dorms and the frats that early in the morning was focused entirely on themselves. As I walked I got more and more upset; how could Zack have led me on, if this was the kind of playing around he did? He and I—I thought—had had something special. The words from one of his frat brothers, the first night we had seen each other since we’d broken up in high school, filled my head. Zack was one of those guys, the kind I had started to avoid. All I was to him was a piece of ass—and that’s all I was to his frat brothers; another one of Zack’s conquests.
It was easy to get into the gym; the card that let me into the dorm building was just as effective on the locked doors in the rec center. As soon as I got into the nearly-vacant building, I could hear the hard workouts going on in the weight room. The entire team would be there. For just a moment I checked, remembering just how much I hated making a public spectacle of myself—and how much I had hated Zack for making me a public spectacle the two times he had done it. But I knew I couldn’t wait. If I waited and let myself cool off, I’d accept any explanation from Zack and never get to the bottom of the situation. I plunged into the weight room and looked around.
It wasn’t just the football team on the machines and using the free weights; the basketball team was also in the room, going through their own paces—some of them on treadmills, some of them on bikes, most of them lifting weights heavy enough to daunt me. I moved through the room as quickly as possible, ignoring the eddying pause of conversation all around me as I looked around for Zack. He was lying on a bench, a heavy weight hooked on a bar over him, getting ready to do presses.
“Zack!” I called out, intending only to get his attention before he started; but my voice was shriller, sharper than I wanted it to be. Zack started, pulling his hands back from the barbell as if it was hot. Looking around, he spotted me and grinned.
“Hey, Evie,” he said, slipping out from underneath the bar and standing up quickly. “I can’t really talk now—but I can hit you up right after class.”
I shook my head, my heart pounding in my chest. I could feel everyone looking at us, but I couldn’t make myself stop long enough to calm down and think about the best way to do what I needed to do.
“What the hell is this?” I asked, waving the newspaper in front of his face. Zack grabbed at it, looking at the picture and article. He went red, and then white.
“This is just some bullshit about them wanting to suspend me, it’s no big deal, Evie—”
I let out a little shriek. “I don’t care about that! If you get suspended it’s your own fucking fault!” I pointed at the picture hard enough to almost rip the paper. “That. That. What is it?”
Zack looked at the picture and frowned. “Evie, this is from a long time ago, I don’t even know…”
I closed my eyes. I was shaking with rage, my eyes stinging with tears that I couldn’t let myself shed in front of half the school’s athletics department.
“You don’t even know who she is, do you? Do you even care? Is that all I am to you too—just another girl to grab and fool around with?” Zack’s face got redder and redder and I saw him looking around at his teammates, at the members of the basketball team watching avidly.
“That’s not what I was going to say and you know it,” Zack said, his voice dropping low. “I don’t know who took this picture, but it’s from forever ago.”
I shook my head. “I don’t believe you. I thought you were different! I thought you gave a damn—I thought…” I shook my head again. “You’re just a stupid asshole like every other guy I’ve ever dated. Well, I hope you enjoyed it, because I’m not going to be your piece of ass anymore.”
I turned around quickly. My heart was pounding and my eyes were burning, and all I could think of was getting out of there before someone saw me breaking into tears. I hurried out of the weight room and through the rec center, swallowing down the tightness in my throat and trying to keep my trembling to myself.
I nearly ran across campus, slowing down only when I started to get a stitch in my side, avoiding looking at anyone that might be around as the tears started falling from my eyes before I got to the safety of my room. I couldn’t believe that I had actually thought Zack thought I was special, that I had let myself get suckered into falling for another guy who was just going to take whatever piece of tail came his way without any concern at all for my feelings. My hands shook as I tried to swipe my card to get into the building; it took me three tries before I was finally able to get the reader to scan my card properly.
I stepped onto the elevator and hit the door close button over and over again; the last thing I wanted was to have to deal with someone riding with me, watching me as I tried to hold myself together. I sagged against the wall of the elevator, against the railing, shuddering and still angry, still hurt. I tried stalling the tears that were already starting to spill out of my eyes. When the elevator finally managed to make it up to my floor, I hurried off, towards my room, not even bothering to tell Jess what I’d done or that I was back—she’d hear the door. I threw myself onto my bed and gave into the sobs that were pushing up through my chest, burying my face in my pillow. Hot tears flowed into the fabric and I shook with anger and depression, not quite wanting to scream in my frustration.
I lost all track of time, lying there and sobbing my eyes out, punching the mattress and grabbing at the pillow I’d buried my face in. After a while it finally started to dawn on me that before I had seen the newspaper article featuring Zack, I had been waking up, getting ready to go to class. I had class to get to.
I pulled myself up and looked at the clock; I had been crying for almost an hour, and now I only had ten minutes to get to class, all the way across campus. I had no time to get dressed. I sighed, grabbing up my backpack and shoving my journalism textbooks into it. At least, I thought, half the student body went to class in their pajamas, especially the morning classes; no one was likely to notice that I wasn’t fully dressed.
I hurried across campus, trying to focus my thoughts down on the class I was going to; I had missed my window for grabbing breakfast, so I would have to hope I had a little bit of time to get something to eat from one of the vending machines between morning classes or by the time lunch rolled around I would be totally useless. I hoped against hope that my face wasn’t too red, that my eyes weren’t too obviously bloodshot. My little spectacle in the weight room would already be making the rounds among the campus gossipmongers—the last thing I needed was for everyone to see me cried out, panicking that I wasn’t getting to class on time, and thinking that the whole reason for my upset was Zack.
I took my usual seat in class, feeling oddly conspicuous in spite of the fact that half the people in the room with me were also in their pajamas. Professor Grant came in a few minutes late, apologizing and looking around with a faint grin curving his lips.
“I can see that everyone’s starting to get a little less formal now that we’re past midterms,” he said, looking at the other people in the room, but not—fortunately—at me.
During the lecture, I tried to take notes but my mind kept going back to Zack. Why had I thought that he was any different from any of the guys I had ever dated? Because he’d been my first? I was an idiot. I should have known that Zack didn’t belong to the Phi Alpha Kappa group for no reason—he had loved to party even when we’d been in high school together, and clearly he’d just gone on doing that, getting more and more outrageous as he went. Hooking up with an ex-girlfriend wasn’t going to change that about him. I remembered Jess’ advice that I should figure out what kind of person Zack really was and decide if I was okay with it. I thought to myself that I had been acting like an idiot the whole time leading up to seeing that picture. I had believed that sure, Zack was rowdy and liked to get drunk and hang out with a bunch of guys who viewed women as conquests—but why would he hang out with people like that if he didn’t agree?
Zack had never really seen me as anything other than another girl to get with. The thought of it made me sick. I had let myself start to think of Zack as really special—as someone who wanted me because of who I am, who knew me and who wanted me. In reality he was just the same as any guy; he just wanted a girl he could convince to sleep with him on the regular, who he could toss aside when it was inconvenient. How much longer would I have kept going with him if I hadn’t seen that article and that picture?
I thought about everything that Zack and I had been through in the previous weeks, and I couldn’t make sense of it. If he really didn’t care about me, why had he performed so poorly when I had ignored him? He could have easily just moved on to someone else. But what if it was just a coincidence? If he had performed poorly because he’d had some other girl distracting him—and not because of me at all. Part of my brain argued that he had tried really hard to get in touch with me even when I was ignoring him, working hard to avoid even seeing him on campus. But had he really? He’d sent me some texts and made some phone calls, and had left a note on my door. I’d been avoiding him, but I had still kept to my usual routine; if he had wanted to find me, he could have gone to the Library, or the dining hall, any number of times and tracked me down.
I didn’t know how to feel about the weird mixed signals in my mind. I was glad I’d remembered my recorder; I kept it on my desk, knowing that I wouldn’t remember a damned thing about Grant’s lecture with the situation with Zack at the top of my mind, consuming my thoughts. I was barely even able to keep up with the notes on the board—I wondered at one point what I was even doing in class when I wasn’t getting anything out of it at all. But I was present.
I managed to grab a bag of chips from the vending machine on my way from Introduction to Journalism to English Literature; my stomach was twisting and grumbling inside of me, uncaring about the fact that I was trying to cope with the confrontation between Zack and me. I didn’t even taste the chips as I brought them to my mouth, pretending to pay attention to the discussion about Jane Austen, but still dwelling on the details of everything that had happened. I thought about how good the sex had been, my insecure jealousy at the thought that Zack had to have been with other women to have improved so much since we’d been together. That should have been my first red flag—the fact that Zack had gotten so much better at sex itself.
It seemed like I had been getting cues, hints, indications all the time about what Zack really was, and totally ignoring them in the face of what I wanted them to be. I had to face facts: Zack didn’t have any special attachment to me and he didn’t particularly care about keeping me as a girlfriend. I didn’t even know if he actually saw me as a girlfriend. I had been fooling myself all along and I should have stayed away when his team mate suggested it—even if his teammate had the interests of the team in mind instead of my own.
I decided after class that I didn’t want to see or talk to anyone. I went to the dining hall and scanned my card and took to-go containers, making a minimum of eye contact as I got into the line. I got a bowl of soup and a sandwich and then found myself loading brownies, cookies, anything remotely sweet and fattening into my box to take with me. I would have to make it to my afternoon classes, but I was going to stay in my room until the last possible moment and no one was going to stop me. I kept my head down all the way to the dorms, cradling my food close to me and not responding to anyone who seemed like they were trying to get my attention. I could only imagine what the team had said about my appearance in the weight room. I could only imagine what everyone on campus was saying about me—how stupid I’d been, what a crazy fool I was to think that Zack was anything other than a partying frat boy. I decided that I was going to stick with eating in my room, going to the library and my classes and otherwise just avoiding anyone. And if Jess tried to convince me to go to any more parties, I was going to tell her to go to hell.
CHAPTER TWO
After a few days, I managed to calm down. I was steadily miserable, but at least I was able to focus on my classes and my life once more. I was actually almost grateful for what had happened; it would have been really easy for me to totally and completely be distracted by Zack in my life if I hadn’t found out the kind of person that he was. I would’ve mooned along, totally wrapped up in him; having great sex, for sure, but probably missing deadlines and losing the quality of my work.
Jess had been keeping a wide berth around me—or maybe, I thought with grim humor, she was just too busy to be in the dorms very much. In the bottom half of the semester, everyone was focusing down more on their studies, trying to pull their grades up or finish strong. I had competition to book a private study room in the library every morning, but I hated the thought of being out in the middle of the room where Zack could see me and try and talk to me—if he dared. I didn’t want to have to listen to the murmurs around me either; so I kept my headphones on and just went straight to the room I booked for studying and stayed in there as long as I was allotted and came out with my headphones on. It would boil over in time, and someone else would do something humiliating to take the attention off of me. It was just a matter of getting through it.
I had somehow managed to get through all of my classwork—I even got ahead a few chapters on the American History syllabus and read ahead in the assignments for literature and Intro to Journalism. With nothing to do, I decided an afternoon of watching TV, eating snacks, and just letting my mind drift was the best possible use of my time. I popped cheese-flavored crackers into my mouth mindlessly, staring at the TV and relaxing, not thinking about anything in particular.
My vegetation was interrupted by the sound of the dorm door opening. Jess came into the room quickly, grinning as she threw herself into a chair. “Gotten over Zack yet?” she asked me.
I scowled.
“Come on, Jess, don’t be a bitch.”
Jess sighed and rolled her eyes, reaching over and snatching the box from the coffee table and dumping out a handful. She popped a few into her mouth, chewing and swallowing before she spoke again.
“Well, I mean, it’s been a few days since you kicked him to the curb. So I figured you wouldn’t mind doing me a favor.”
I raised an eyebrow and snatched the box of crackers away from her, pouring some into my hand and putting the box back onto the table.
“Oh, so not concern for my well-being, but my ability to help you out.”
Jess grinned broadly. “Well, see, it’s not just helpful to me, but it could be helpful to you, too!” I was suspicious of the chirpy tone of her voice.
“Okay,” I said slowly. “Tell me what this is about.”
“Well you know how I’m having a bit of trouble in Economics?” I had heard Jess moaning from her room over how difficult her Economics class was—and how little hope she had of finishing with a decent grade.
“Yeah,” I said cautiously. What did her problems with Econ have to do with my single status?
“So there’s this guy in my class, Derick.” I pressed my lips together. Of course. “Trust me, Evie, if I could have convinced him to help me by giving him a date with me, I’d have done it. But he’s not into me. He’s into you.”
“So you volunteered me for a date with some guy I don’t know so he’d help you pass Economics?”
Jess shrugged, still smiling. “Look, everyone benefits; I get help for Economics, Derick gets a date with a girl he’s into, and you get a chance to get back out there—and a free meal.”
I wanted to be angry at her but I had to laugh.
“You didn’t—I mean he’s not expecting anything other than the date, right?”
Jess nodded quickly. “Yeah, no, there’s no guarantee of anything other than you going with him to dinner. He’s on his own if he wants to get you to make out or sleep with him—I made that completely clear.”
I shook my head, smiling in spite of myself. On the one hand, it was kind of soothing to my battered ego that someone wanted to take me on a date. On the other hand, it was a bit irritating that Jess had volunteered me for a date with a stranger. One of the last things I wanted was to get involved with a member of the opposite sex; I was only just recovering from the aftermath of my feelings towards Zack.
“And you specified only one date, right?” I asked her, wanting to rebel but not quite feeling up to it. If Jess had guaranteed the guy that I’d go out with him for as long as he wanted, I’d say no flat out.
“One date. Dinner and a movie. That’s it. No sleeping with him, no guarantees for a second date, nothing like that.”
I sighed. “Well, what’s he like?”
Jess shrugged. “He dresses in polo shirts and khakis most of the time, kind of shy, not a bad guy but not all that interesting. But he’s got the highest grade in the Econ class and he’s smart.” I popped a few more cheese crackers in my mouth and chewed them meditatively.
“Fine,” I said, shaking my head again. A date was the last thing I wanted—but Jess was my friend, and it wouldn’t kill me to get out for once. “For you, I’ll do it. But next time you decide to barter me for favors, do me a favor and ask me first.”
Jess grinned. “You’d have just said no.”
“If you do this again I will say no and there will be nothing for you to do about it but find someone else.”
Jess’ face fell into more serious lines and she nodded.
“Fair enough. But we have a deal on this one, right? You won’t decide at the last minute not to go?”
“If he turns out to be horrible, I will leave him in the middle of the date if I have to, but I will at least give him a fair shot.”
“That’s all I’m asking. My GPA thanks you.”
CHAPTER THREE
In the few days leading up to the date, I tried to prepare myself; apart from the date with Zack, I hadn’t really gone out with a guy since junior year of high school. In my senior year, I’d been so focused on getting scholarships, and so wrapped up in my mom’s decline and death that I hadn’t been able to even consider the possibility of going on a date with anyone. It just hadn’t even been on my radar. Derick had gotten my number from Jess and sent me a couple of text messages, confirming that my friend’s offer was legitimate and that I was willing to go out with him. I said what I was supposed to—that I was looking forward to it, that I was happy to get to know him, all of the polite things. But my heart wasn’t really in it. I was still—in spite of the anger I had felt—more than a little bit turned around and flipped over in my mind about Zack, still questioning what had happened and whether it was for the best.
The night of the date, Jess pulled me into my room and went to work at making sure that I was appropriate for the evening.
“Jess, it’s just dinner and a movie,” I insisted with a groan. “It’s not even someone I particularly want to impress. I can go as I am.”
Jess shook her head, going through my wardrobe quickly. “He’s taking you to a really expensive restaurant; you need to look right for that. And anyway, you don’t know—maybe he’s just your speed.”
I sighed and rolled my eyes, but I knew that when Jess was in her educational mood, it was useless to argue with her. She pulled out one of the few really nice skirts I owned, a button-down silk shirt, and a blazer that I’d last worn to my college interviews. I raised an eyebrow, but at least, I thought, I couldn’t be accused of leading anyone on in an outfit like that. Jess went into her own room while I changed and came back with a pair of heels that went perfectly with the outfit—taller than I normally wore, but I could manage them. She pushed me down into my desk chair and quickly did my hair and makeup; in the end I looked like a sleek, put-together woman—kind of like my mom. The comparison made me almost want to cry; but I held back my tears, knowing that I’d just ruin the makeup and start my date off on completely the wrong foot.
I sat in the common area of the dorm to wait for the guy to show up. He apparently had quite a nice car, according to Jess; I’d never seen it myself, and I wondered if he was like the kinds of guys I’d known in high school who’d had the nicer cars—braggarts who didn’t care about anything other than their material possessions. One thing I’d always liked about Zack: he didn’t put that much importance on his possessions. I shied away from the comparison. I wasn’t going to think about Zack at all. I wasn’t going to compare him—especially favorably—to the guy that I was with. I would put him completely out of my mind.
Just when I was starting to become really impatient, there was a knock at the door. I stood quickly and heard Jess’ door slam open. She was right there at my side. “Remember,” she said quietly. I rolled my eyes but nodded, and opened the door to let Derick in. He was taller than Zack by maybe an inch or two, but not as muscular; where Zack had medium-brown hair and dark eyes, Derick had sandy blond hair, pale blue eyes, and slightly freckled pale skin that had an almost-translucent look to it. He smiled at me as he stepped over the threshold, dressed in a pair of slacks and a button-down shirt that was just slightly too big for him, though the deep maroon color of it complemented his skin and hair.
“It’s good to meet you, Evelyn,” Derick said, extending his hand. I shook it quickly, feeling awkward and uncertain. He seemed like a perfectly nice guy and Jess had said more than once that he was, but there was something stilted, something just a little bit off-putting about his excitement. “You look lovely.”
He pulled me closer by the hand, giving me a quick hug. I could smell his green, reedy-smelling cologne, with the sweat-smell underneath that told me he was nervous.
“Have a great night, you two,” Jess said, beaming at us both. Derick turned to lead me out through the door and she shot me one last cautioning look, mouthing “be nice,” as I let myself be pulled out of the comfort of my dorm.
Derick’s car was nice—it was a relatively recent model BMW, which was the first real topic of conversation that I could actually feel comfortable discussing; the ride down on the elevator had been awkwardly silent, and the walk to the parking lot wasn’t much better. “Nice Beemer,” I said, smiling politely.
“My parents got it for me as a graduation present; not new, but with a car like this new isn’t really needed.”
He opened the door for me on the passenger side and I reached over to unlock the driver’s side as he walked around the front of the car. When he started up the car, his stereo came on, not quite blasting Hot Hot Heat over the speakers. I gave him at least a few points for having decent taste in music and tried to relax against the lush seat as Derick pulled out of the parking spot.
He let me pick the movie and I tried to choose something that neither of us would hate. It was easy for me to see that Derick was trying to impress me; there was an intensity to his gaze on me, something in the way that he kept checking to see if I was comfortable, if I was happy. It wasn’t like with Zack—and I stopped myself hard and fast in the midst of that thought. Derick was a different person from the guy I had dated before. He was a little shy, he was a little awkward. The movie I picked was sold out for the closest showing, so we had twenty minutes in the lobby to stand and talk.
“Jess says you’re the best one in the Econ class,” I said, trying not to fidget or pick at my clothes.
“Oh yes,” Derick said, smiling quickly. “Economics is really fascinating if you can get into it and understand it.”
I was relieved and bored at the same time as he launched into an explanation of his theories as to how economics could explain anything and everything in the world, even how he’d been thrilled to have a chance to put his economic understanding to use in bargaining his help in exchange for a chance to impress me on a date.
When it was time to start heading in for the movie—a comedy that I’d seen trailers for on TV that at least cut the difference between the romantic dramas and action flicks that were the theater’s other offerings—Derick asked me if I wanted anything at the concession stand. Since we were going to dinner afterward, I settled for a soda; Derick bought some candy that he offered to share, and I found myself then agreeing to make sure I ate some of it. I checked the time on the big wall clock on our way into the theater and told myself that at least during the movie we wouldn’t have to talk much.
I wasn’t being totally fair to Derick and I knew it. He wasn’t a bad guy—he was nice and polite, holding the door for an older couple who came behind us, saying “please” and “thank you” to the ticket booth person and the concession stand person alike, and looking after my comfort constantly. But I couldn’t really see anything obvious that we had in common. He asked what I was studying and listened patiently as I explained why I went into Journalism, why I wanted to go on to work in that field.
“Your position at the campus newspaper will probably put you really ahead of your peers—and it’ll give you a head start on getting internships, too,” he told me, beaming at me proudly as if he was thrilled that I was thinking so far ahead.
I had already thought of it, of course; for news writing, a portfolio and experience counted almost as much as the degree did. But I also knew that if it came down to quitting the newspaper or preserving my GPA, I would pick my classes in a heartbeat—whereas I’m sure Derick would have found a way, in his smartest-guy-in-the-room way, to cut back on his sleep but still manage to do both. We struggled to find something that we had in common, comparing our interests in books, music, movies, and even—as a last resort—art. There was something about Derick that made me think he was subtly checking off a list in his head of expectations he had for me, that he was comparing me to some image he had in his mind of the perfect, economically sound girlfriend. There were some bands that we both liked, but our tastes were mostly different; in the back of my mind, I thought to myself that Derick was probably only agreeing on the few bands we did both like just to have something in common. He liked nonfiction books while I was a fan of fiction; he preferred documentaries and realistic art while I was more into light entertainment and the modern art movement, even post-modern, from an art appreciation class I had taken in high school.
The movie started and we both went quiet. I wondered if Derick felt as much relief as I did. I ate some of his candy at his behest—though sour gummies are not my favorite—and sipped at my soda as I got more and more into the movie. The most convenient thing about the kind of date that he had chosen to take me on was that there was the entire span of the three-hour movie where we didn’t, and couldn’t, speak.
My mind wandered a little bit as I watched the movie; the plot wasn’t very demanding. I thought about Zack, wondering in the back of my brain what he was doing while I was on this almost-disaster of a date. I shouldn’t have, but I pictured him in my mind at a party hosted by his frat—or maybe a sorority party down the block. He would be grinding on some girl, telling her all the sweet, sexy things he had said to me, conning another woman into sleeping with him. In spite of the fact that I knew I should just drop the question in my mind, I dwelled on it, getting more than a little irritated at him. If it weren’t for the fact that I knew full well that Derick had done nothing wrong in our date, and that Jess needed me to come through for her to get help in her class, I would have just left.
After the movie, Derick managed to finagle his way into holding my hand while we walked out to his car, talking about the funnier aspects of the story. It was nothing incredibly original, but I was at least more comfortable talking about that than I would have been talking about myself, or hearing about Derick. I already knew that there would be no second date; I just couldn’t make myself interested in him, in spite of the obvious evidence that he came from a well-to-do family and seemed perfectly nice. But I wasn’t about to demonstrate to him that I had already given up hope of finding any kind of spark between the two of us. It wouldn’t be fair or nice to him, and on top of it, I wasn’t sure that he would honor his agreement with Jess if I didn’t manage to make it all the way through the date. I was absolutely starving by the time we got into his car, and I was more than happy with the fact that we were going to dinner next.
I kept up my end of the conversation as we drove from the theater to the restaurant, telling Derick about the time that I had seen Hot Hot Heat play live and how I’d managed to talk myself into a quick meeting with the band. Derick peppered me with questions about it—how I’d convinced the roadies and the security people, what I had talked to the different band members about.
“Well,” I said, smiling slightly, “I had a press pass from the high school newspaper, and I basically just sort of…pressed my point with the security guy, saying that even though it was a high school paper, I was a very professional type of person, and that I really wanted to write an article for the school rag about the concert and the band.” I shrugged.
“And they actually bought that?” I laughed.
“Well it was partly true anyway; I did want to do an article. But I think it was mostly that I just stood there not being rude or fan girl-like, persistently arguing the point. The guy just eventually gave up and led me back to where the band was hanging out in their green room.”
It was one of the more daring stunts I had ever done in my life—the sort of thing that, looking back on it, was more the inspiration of the moment than something I could have planned. If I had tried to plan an attack to get backstage, it would have failed miserably from me overthinking it. But because I had just had the idea and acted on it, I’d pulled it off.
The restaurant that Derick pulled up to was obviously expensive; there were Mercedes, BMWs, and a few higher-end sports cars parked among Priuses in the parking lot, and the red, brick building had an understated sort of comfortable luxury appeal. Quietly elegant piano music filtered through the outdoor speakers, and when Derick opened the door, the smell of delicious things wafted out to greet us. When the hostess asked if we wanted to sit inside or on the terrace, Derick looked at me for my preference.
“Let’s sit outside,” I suggested; I hadn’t missed the braziers stationed around the patio—it would be comfortable enough even with the autumn chill.
We sat down and I looked at the menu; for a long moment I was both pleased and appalled. There wasn’t a single entrée under $25, and most of them were closer to $40. Derick was definitely pulling out the stops to impress me, and I was guaranteed a good meal—something that I would probably be able to remember long after my memory of my date had muddled itself into near-nothingness. I talked to Derick about the different items, trying to feel out just how much he was willing to spend—but he insisted that I should order whatever appealed to me the most, without worrying about price.
“If I had to worry about what your dinner would cost, I wouldn’t have brought you here,” he said, smiling at me happily. “I just really want you to have a good time, so please, anything that seems to be the most interesting or tasty—feel free to order it.”
It was a hard decision even if I tried to take the concern of money off of my mind. There were so many things that sounded so delicious, and I was so hungry, that I couldn’t even remotely make up my mind. I was a little surprised when the waiter came and took our drink order, not batting an eyelash as Derick ordered wine for both of us and not carding either of us. I supposed that if you went to such an expensive place, they didn’t really think that anyone under a certain age would be among their clientele.
I finally settled on my selections from the menu, giving into Derick’s insistence that I have one of each course: appetizer, salad, entrée, and dessert. It would make for a long dinner, but at least, I thought, there would be a good meal in my stomach and apparently wine to help lubricate the awkwardness between us. I tried to take an interest in Derick’s detailed explanations about the differences between several of the presidents and their policies, but I really couldn’t make myself do more than just nod and occasionally make comments about a particular president’s interaction with the press of their era and what it had done to contribute to current affairs.
When the appetizers arrived, I was absolutely relieved. Derick might be a perfectly nice guy, but he was tedious—and I couldn’t feel any kind of spark of interest in him. Our conversation lagged as we both tucked into our separate first courses; Derick had ordered oysters Rockefeller, while I’d taken seared scallops with a kind of crouton. It was delicious, and I savored every bite, taking only the few opportunities to talk to Derick that I had to—when he asked how I liked my food, if I’d ever had scallops before.
I sipped my wine and looked around idly; we were clearly the youngest people at the restaurant, and I wondered again at the fact that the waiter hadn’t been the slightest bit suspicious of the fact that two college freshmen were in the restaurant ordering wine. But I decided abruptly that it was just as well that no one had questioned it; it was easier to tolerate my boredom with Derick with the help of the wine and the excellent food. The salad came quickly and I used the excuse of more delight than I really felt at the dressed mixture of bitter salad greens, sweet citrus and crunchy nuts to keep my mouth full so I could avoid answering more questions about how much I liked the food.
Derick seemed to have settled in by the time the entrée arrived; at his goading, I had ordered filet mignon with pommes Anna, grilled asparagus, and hollandaise sauce. Derick had ordered swordfish with some kind of roasted tomato side and couscous, and seemed to be enjoying it quite a bit. I was definitely looking forward to dessert—not only because of the fact that I was excited for the crème brulée, but also because once we had finished dessert the night would be nearly over.
Be nice, Evie, I told myself firmly. It isn’t his fault that you find him boring. One of these days, if the universe is fair, he’ll find some girl who thinks his smarts and interest in economics and politics are absolutely charming.
The waiter came and removed the entrée plates, and I tried to rack my brain for something to talk about next. I wondered to myself if Derick was finding the date as hopeless as I was—if he was certain there would be no second date, or if that decision had only been made by me. I was spared the need to come up with something to talk about, however.
Before the dessert could come out, Derick and I were interrupted by someone who rushed up to the table, looking barely dressed enough to even be allowed into the restaurant at all. As the figure approached, I thought there was something familiar about it—and then all at once I realized it was Zack. I nearly dropped my wine glass in surprise at the sight of the man I least expected to show up to interrupt my date.
Oh god, I thought with dread. I thought his name too many times. It was actually as if I had summoned him with nothing more than my thoughts. I took a deep breath as Zack came up to the table, stopping short and looking from me to Derick.
“What are you doing here?” I asked him, setting down my wine glass as carefully as I could. My hands were shaking slightly at the sight of him.
“Evie, you’re making a big mistake,” Zack said, crossing his arms and looking Derick over.
“I don’t happen to think so—and besides, what business is it of yours?” Derick looked desperately uncomfortable and I couldn’t blame him; for the first time in the entire night I could actually sympathize with him.
“I went to your room to try and talk to you about this whole stupid mess we’re in, but your roommate told me you were on a date.” Zack scowled at me, his arms crossed over his chest and his dark eyes full of brittle anger.
“We broke up Zack,” I said, trying to keep my voice calm and level. “I didn’t see you chasing after me when it happened, and you haven’t exactly seemed interested in trying to fix anything. So it’s none of your business who I go on a date with.”
“Yeah, well, Jess obviously thought it was my business because she told me you’d be here with this guy.” Zack gestured dismissively towards Derick. “No offense, dude, but you are not the kind of guy that Evie should be dating.”
I rolled my eyes. “You’re a fine one to talk about who I should be dating! Why do you even care? I’m sure there’s some sorority sister just looking to hop into your bed and help you keep it warm.”
Zack let out a sound like a growl, his hands clenching briefly into fists as he looked from Derick to me.
“This is a big mistake you’re making, Evie. I could really make you happy but you’re never going to look past your own stupid insecurities to even listen to me.”
I shook my head. “The only person making a mistake here is you. What the hell did you think it would accomplish to barge in on me in the middle of a date? You know what, don’t answer.” Derick was frozen in his seat, humiliated, obviously unwilling or unable to stick up for himself. “You’re wasting your time and a stunt like this is not even remotely the way to get me back.”
Zack stared at me for a long moment and exhaled sharply, stepping back from the table.
“You’re making a big mistake, Evie,” he said, turning to go. “But it’s obvious you don’t even want to believe me.”
I let out a sigh of relief as he stalked away from the patio, out into the darkness of the parking lot beyond. I covered my eyes with my hand.
“I’m really sorry, Derick,” I said, smiling wryly. “I had no idea that he was going to do that—he and I aren’t even in a relationship anymore.”
Derick shakily reached out and lifted his wine glass, taking a sip. “You handled him well. I was starting to think we’d have to call the waiter over to boot him.”
I smiled weakly. All I wanted was to finish my dessert and get home, get out of the uncomfortable shoes, and take a long shower before throwing myself into bed. Fortunately, everything seemed to settle down once more as the waiter brought our desserts; I didn’t even put up a token resistance when Derick took the check the moment it landed on the table—I knew that I couldn’t even afford to pay for my half of the meal, or possibly even the tip.
I let Derick walk me to my room, and even let him put his arm around my waist, feeling shaken and frustrated and depressed by Zack’s appearance at the date, even if I hadn’t particularly enjoyed Derick’s company. I still had no intention of going on another date with Derick, but I did let him kiss me good night at my door; I kept it as chaste as possible and made the excuse that I was exhausted when I could tell that he wanted to be invited in.
Jess was waiting for me on the couch. The moment I had the door closed behind me, I kicked off my shoes and handed them to her. “Well, that was a disaster of epic proportions,” I said, sinking down on the closer chair and pulling my hair down and out of the style she had woven it into.
“Was Derick like a total jerk or something?”
I shook my head. “No, he was polite as could be. But Zack decided to barge in just before dessert and humiliate me in front of an entire restaurant full of people.”
Jess cringed. “I’m sorry,” she said, shaking her head. “He came in here and demanded to know where you were, and I told him I’d set you up on a date with one of my classmates in exchange for homework help. He got the restaurant out of me and I told him like five times not to go—that it would be stupid and you’d hate it—but I guess he decided that I had no idea what I was talking about.”
I leaned back, closing my eyes for a moment.
“Yeah, he came right up to the table and told me I was making a huge mistake, blah blah blah…it was awful. And Derick had about as much spine as an overcooked spaghetti noodle.” Jess grimaced again. “I will not be going out on a second date with him. If you need more Econ help, go to the library and get a regular tutor.”
“I will keep that in mind,” Jess said. “The food was good at least, right?”
“It was great. Now let’s see if I can make it to bed without hurling it all up.”
CHAPTER FOUR
It surprised me to realize that a month had passed since I had broken things off with Zack and since the disastrous date with Jess’ classmate. She did get the help that she had bartered a date with me for, and she was confident in finishing up the semester with a good grade that would let her go on to other more interesting classes. I had managed to put Zack more or less out of my mind, and to prevent Jess from sending me on any more dates, or even trying to make me go out with her to party; in fact, getting closer and closer to finals, she was cutting back on partying on her own.
It had been a good break, and I was finally starting to really and truly relax into life once more. After a week or two, I stopped trying to hide out in my room and started to actually get involved in campus life a little more. It helped that in the time since the final game of the football season, the campus newspaper had put me onto covering the basketball team. The first game I went to, when I interviewed a few of the players afterward, one of them ventured the opinion that he had been proud of the way I’d stood up for myself with Zack, that I was an impressive woman.
I kept up with all of my classes and even started to take on a few other responsibilities on the newspaper, not just doing my own assignments but also taking some of the proofreading load off of the editors, reading through articles that came in and checking them for spelling and grammar before handing them off to the editors.
“I keep finding new reasons to thank Professor Grant for signing you on,” Lisa told me once, shaking her head at how much my additions had helped the whole team. I hadn’t been there long enough to start pitching my own article ideas; I was still on assignments handed out by the editorial staff—things that they had no one in particular to cover—but I was gaining trust and I had gotten hints that in the spring semester I would start being able to put forth my own ideas in the weekly meeting.
I hadn’t even tried to date anyone at all in the time since the disaster with Derick. I told myself that I was swearing off of boys for good and that I’d just wait until I graduated and find some actual men to involve myself with once I could get started on my career. I knew it wouldn’t last, but for the time being, it was good enough for me. I had time to hang out with Jess, and I started to become better friends with some of the staff of the newspaper; I was satisfied with that and didn’t even want to try for more.
I went into Lisa’s office after classes, ready to be told that I was going to be covering something other than the basketball team; her email to me had hinted that I was changing up duties. “Hey, here I am,” I said, opening the door to the office after knocking. “What’s the sitch, Chief?”
Lisa laughed. “Take a seat. Let me just finish this email and I’ll give you the lowdown.” I sat down and took my notebook out of my bag, watching as Lisa tapped out the last few sentences in an email in a rapid staccato. “So, Evie. As I’m sure you’re aware, we’re coming up on the championship game for the football team.”
My heart started to beat faster in my chest.
“Yeah, I’m aware of that,” I said, more because I knew she was expecting me to say something.
In the back of my mind I had been counting down the days—I knew that everyone on campus was buzzing with excitement over it. Some of the students had booked their plane tickets and the boosters were trying to get as many people to the game as possible. I knew that there were some people planning a road trip out to California where the stadium was at. I had told myself over and over again that I didn’t care, that whatever happened to the football team was barely my business, but I had been hoping against hope that I would be too busy on other assignments when the game came up.
“Well, Coach Bullden specifically requested that we send you to cover the game,” Lisa said, smiling broadly at me.
“That’s—Wow. I wouldn’t have expected that.” I felt my cheeks burning. It shouldn’t have surprised me, with the praise the coach had lavished on me for my previous coverage of the team.
“I was pretty surprised too. You must have really impressed him.” I nodded. Lisa watched me intently for a moment, tapping idly on the top of her desk. “Look, everyone on campus knows there’s been… issues with you and Zack. If you can’t handle this, let me know and I’ll tell Bullden that you’re covering something else and we can’t spare you.”
It was tempting. If I could just back out of the situation completely—if I could avoid having to go to California and face the possibility of having to confront Zack again, it would be a major relief. But I thought about the fact that Bullden had requested me specifically. And the fact that I knew I had done well in my previous articles about the team and its games. Besides, it wasn’t likely that I’d have to interview Zack—he might not even be at the game at all. I had determinedly not kept up with the drama surrounding his suspension; I had banned all mention of him from Jess.
“Is Zack going to be playing, then?” I asked, trying to keep my voice as neutral as possible.
“Oh yeah, he’s definitely in the game. Didn’t you hear? The investigation found out that the picture they turned in was from like, two years ago or something. They had nothing against Zack that was more recent.” The words hit me like a ton of bricks; I felt awful. I hadn’t even listened to him when he’d tried to explain.
“That’s…good to know,” I said, smiling nervously. “I’ll let you know if I can do it with my classes.” I didn’t want to even hint at the possibility that Zack’s being present at the game would deter me. Even if Lisa knew—she had mentioned it directly, after all—that I had personal issues with the star QB, I didn’t want to make that the reason that I couldn’t go.
“Just as long as you give me a couple of days to find a replacement,” Lisa said, nodding.
I stood up and left Lisa’s office, my mind a blur with different thoughts. Could I really hold it against Zack that two years ago he’d had girls all over him? How could I know whether he’d changed? I sat down on one of the benches in the Student Union, watching people pass through on their way to classes or going to club meetings. I chewed on my bottom lip, putting my notebook back into my bag and trying not to look like I was a nervous wreck. It wasn’t that the idea of seeing Zack in person was so terrible, but knowing that I had misjudged him made me feel horrible.
But had I really? Just because they didn’t have anything on Zack—no evidence that he was still partying or involved in potentially illegal activities—didn’t mean he wasn’t still the party-rager he had been. Could I really trust that he had changed?
I thought about the fact that he had tracked me down on my horrible date with Derick specifically to try and explain to me what the real situation was. I hadn’t even heard him out; I was already angry—and the way he’d gone about trying to convince me to listen to him was definitely a bad idea. But ever since then, he had left me alone—and I had avoided him. I had judged him based on the thought that the picture had been recent, and I had been wrong. He had probably already moved on. I didn’t know how I felt about that possibility; in spite of the fact that I’d been avoiding him, and the fact that I had thought I was over him, deep down I knew that there was still something unresolved between us. It wasn’t fair of me that I’d taken my initial anger at him and blown it all out of proportion, and didn’t even give him a chance to explain his side. And I may have lost him for good because of that.
I spent the rest of the day with my mind on the game and on Zack. I couldn’t really blame him if he had given up on me. It seemed like almost from the beginning of the time we’d reunited, things had been stacked against us—though I was mature enough to admit that part of that was my fault. I was afraid of getting involved with him, afraid of how easily I could fall head over heels for him. If he had given up on me, that would never be an issue; and while it was a relief to think that Zack had probably found another girl who was a little more able to deal with having a relationship with him, it also made me miserable to think that I’d ruined my chances with him for good. I only had a couple of days to think about taking the assignment. Lisa sent me an email in the afternoon detailing what the newspaper wanted for the coverage; since it was a huge game and a major opportunity, it was going to be featured on the front page of the edition, with supplemental material in the sports section. She wanted interviews with the team and backgrounds and profiles on the different players. She also wanted full coverage of the game itself for the main story. It was a lot of work; it would be great for anyone’s portfolio.
I wasn’t sure what to do. I had to let Lisa know, and soon, but I had no idea how I was going to deal with the situation. I tried to go through my normal routines, to pay attention in my classes, but it was no use. Until I figured everything out, I was just going to continue being hopelessly distracted.
CHAPTER FIVE
The next day, I was sitting in the dorm, waiting for it to be time to get to my next class of the day—I’d had a gap between lunch and class, and of course the only way I could think to fill it was with thinking about Zack and the assignment to cover the national championship. I had told Jess that I would do it and she had given me the instructions I needed to get to the game; I would be staying at the same hotel as the team and I could bring someone with me. I also had prime seats in the enormous stadium.
Jess came into the room, practically bouncing. “So,” she said, throwing herself down onto the couch next to me, “I hear you’ve got the prime seats to the championship game.”
I rolled my eyes. “They want me to go and cover it. Apparently Bullden specifically requested me. I’m supposed to interview everyone, too.”
“So who are you taking with you? Got a date? That would be a primo way to convince a guy to help you dirty up a hotel room.”
I groaned, throwing my head back and shifting uncomfortably on the couch.
“I could just watch the game on TV and interview everyone once they get back,” I said, staring up at the ceiling.
Jess laughed. “Yeah, sure you can—and you could also hit up one of the sororities and join them. Come on, Evie. Just because you’ve got issues with Zack or whatever doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have a good time. Hell, take me.”
I sighed. “I really just…” I scrubbed at my face. “So I found out—and please don’t laugh at the fact that it’s old news—but I figured out that I’d sort of…misjudged Zack.”
Jess raised an eyebrow. “Oh, we can talk about that situation now?”
I rolled my eyes. “Anyway, I found out about it and now I feel like shit because I didn’t even give him a chance to explain what the picture was, and I’m pretty sure he’s probably already moved on. I don’t want to have to see him.”
“Well, I mean, you’re going to have to move beyond that eventually, right? So just take advantage of the fact that the school is basically paying you to visit California and watch a really awesome football game.”
“If I let you come with me, you’re not going to like…try and make me go to some crazy party after, right? I mean, I just want to do what I came there or and come back.”
“Okay—how about a compromise? I won’t drag you to a party, but if I meet a guy there and want to bring him back to the hotel, or even if you do, the other one of us will hang out at the pool or wherever to give the other some privacy.”
“Are you seriously thinking of snagging a guy at the championship game?”
Jess shrugged with a little grin.
“Adrenaline pumping, excitement; win or lose, it’s pretty much a sure thing, right?”
I tried not to groan again. Sometimes I really did wonder if Jess considered going to college to be little more than an excuse to get with as many guys as she possibly could. It wasn’t fair of me—I knew she was making good grades—but sometimes it seemed like she spent more time making plans to ensnare a hot guy for a night or two than she did on her classes.
“Okay,” I said finally, thinking to myself that it was likely I would easily regret this. “Okay, fine. I will go to the game, and you can go with me. And if either of us ends up actually hooking up with somebody, we will work out how to give each other privacy. Let me borrow your ID and I’ll get the information the office needs to issue our tickets.” I shook my head. The last thing I had wanted to do was actually go to the game; but if I had to go, I thought to myself that at least it would be interesting, with Jess there with me.
CHAPTER SIX
I had thought that our stadium was impressive; when Jess and I got out of the bus carrying students to the bowl game, I was shocked at the hugeness of it. The parking lot was crawling with people—tents and campers and RVs were scattered across the place, with team colors flying on every conceivable corner, and the smell of dozens of different kinds of food filling the air. In spite of the fact that I’d been dreading going to the game and having to watch Zack, I found myself getting swept up by the excitement that everyone else was contributing to. Everyone was amped—cheering as they made their way towards the stadium, calling out to the opposing team’s fans, in a mood for a really good game. I had to wonder just how well Zack would perform; if he was going to crack under pressure, it would be a game like this where he was going to be televised across the country, where the stakes were the highest—a rare, championship game.
Jess and I split away from the group at the gate. The tickets I had as a reporter for the campus newspaper were much better than the general; it was one of the perks of the job—after all, I needed a good view of the game to report on it. As we moved through the crowds flooding through the stadium, Jess was looking around—for the best food options, for people heading to our section that might be interesting, for the possibility of getting a cheap beer where she wouldn’t be carded. I was focused entirely on the game. How would Zack perform? Would we win? I was trying to think of just how I would cover it for the article, as well. After all, the game itself was a big draw—but what story about the game would I tell? It was one of the exercises Professor Grant had us do: pick an angle on an event and try to come up with the way that you would go about writing an article from that perspective.
We finally got to our seats and I started setting up, taking out my camera to get action shots and taking a few pictures of the steadily growing crowd. Some of the people attending the game were, I knew, folks who attended the championship every year; they weren’t invested in one team over another, but came just to enjoy that particular event. There were also—obviously—those who were either students or alumni of either school, crowding the stands in seas of school colors, faces painted and banners waving. It was hard to separate myself from the intense emotions that everyone around me was obviously feeling; I could barely hear the marching band for the other team across the stadium, but they would have been loud indeed for the fans of that school—just as our school’s marching band was on our side.
I snapped pictures of the crowd, capturing a few banners. One of them made my stomach flip-flop inside of me; on our side, a bunch of girls in school color bikinis and tiny shorts were waving a hand-painted banner that read, “Win the Game and Get a Kiss, Zack!” I told myself that I didn’t care—that I had broken up with him and he was a free agent. I might have my regrets, but I couldn’t hold it against the girls that they were cheering for a single guy and probably hoping to get invited to his hotel room at the end of the night.
I started to fidget as the pre-game dragged on; dance teams for both sides were doing routines, there were the mascots to watch, and I wondered just how long it would take for the enormous stadium to clear once the game was over. Jess was already having a good time, chatting up a guy who was seated near us, teasing him about getting her a beer and a hot dog because she was a poor, broke, college student who came here on my charity. I tried not to laugh too obviously at her ruse and instead focus on what was going on around me. When is this game even going to start? I thought, with more than a little impatience. More than anything, I wanted it to be over, the victory handed to one of the teams so I could get back to the hotel room and spend the next several hours dreading the interviews I would have to do—dreading having to interview Zack.
The teams ran out—ours first, unlike the home games I had covered. I tried to keep myself from looking for him, but in an instant, I spotted Zack running out with his team mates, his away jersey spotless and vivid.
“He’s not looking too bad,” Jess commented between cheers for our team.
They started their warm ups and I tried not to watch Zack’s every movement as I caught a few pictures for the article; I tried—I really tried—to make sure I was getting a fair sample of the whole team in their exercises.
They took to the sidelines and the other team came onto the field, looking just as energetic and just as strong. If nothing else, I thought, it would definitely be a good game—there would be no shutouts in this match. The other team’s crowd cheered while our side booed, and my heart was pounding. I don’t care if we win, I thought to myself; it would be nice if we did—my interviews the next day with the different members of the team would go a lot more smoothly if they weren’t all mourning their loss of the game—but on a personal level, it didn’t bother me at all. I don’t care if we win, but please don’t let Zack get injured.
The entire crowd on both sides watched with bated breath as the coaches went out for the coin toss. Even though it happened at every game, there was a definite tension in the moment that was gone from other games I’d gone to. I caught as many pictures as I could of the two coaches walking up to the center of the field, waiting for the ref, and then getting the result. The flip went to the other team, and they cheered loudly enough to almost deafen our side.
I settled in to watch the game as the teams took up their positions to start. I had done my research on the team we were up against, just as I had for the previous article I had done. They were known to have an aggressive offense-based strategy, which was similar to our team’s typical M.O. I wondered if Coach Bullden had managed to turn up the heat on the defensive line, and watched with interest as the first play started. For the whole first quarter, it seemed like our team and the other team were feeling each other out—neither side scored a point, but they were right on top of each other, finding ways through the defenses, working out where the weaknesses were. Every shift in the play—whether it was a pass, an interception, or a tackle—brought cheers up from one side or the other, and I half-wished I had brought ear plugs with me to at least muffle the huge amount of noise.
The second quarter started and I found myself watching Zack more and more. I could hear Jess flirting with the guy she was wrapping around her little finger, but my attention was entirely on Zack. He clearly wasn’t distracted or cracking under the pressure—he was on top of the game, working hard, staying focused. It seemed to me like he was probably not even remotely thinking about me, and while part of me was relieved, another part was depressed. The second half went back and forth; we scored, and then the other team managed to even the points; then, just like the first half, everything was neck-and-neck, with the teams moving from one end of the field to the other, not quite able to make a break through each other’s lines long enough to get another touchdown. It was a nerve-wracking game, and the cheers and shouts around me never abated for even a moment; if I wasn’t focused on taking notes on the game, watching to try and work out the different strategies, I might have been swept up in it myself.
The second half finally ended and the two teams ran from the field to go back to the locker rooms to rest and get ready for the back end of the game. The half-time show would be longer for this game than usual, and I was looking forward to watching the marching bands perform. The cheers cut back slightly, but didn’t die as the show got started. The two marching bands came out onto the field and started up, getting ready to do their competing routines. Even as I got excited, even as the two bands geared up and began playing, my mind was on Zack. I pictured him in my head in the locker room, drinking water or Gatorade, listening to Bullden catechizing the team—telling them what they’d done wrong in the first half and getting them hyped for the second half of the game. With a tie on the scoreboard, there’d be pressure for both teams to try and get the first score right out of the gate.
I watched and didn’t watch as each marching band took the field in turn. Our marching band went first, and I absentmindedly sang along with the crowd as they went through their four songs, recognizable classics that I thought had probably been played at every major football game from the first year the songs came out. I took pictures of the formations, grabbing as many as I could. I would have to ask Jess later on just what had been played, because I wasn’t sure I would be able to remember it. But I had the pictures, and I didn’t think the half-time show would be a major focus of the article and the features anyway. When the other team’s marching band took the field, I managed to pay a little more attention, catching a more modern song—OK Go’s Here it Goes Again among the more classic selections. I got one or two pictures of their routine, but it wasn’t important enough to do more than that.
“So what do you think about the first half?” I asked someone near me.
I started collecting quotes, recording people as best as I could in spite of the shrieking, screaming, cheering noise that surrounded me. I grabbed a quote from Jess and the guy she was talking to just as a matter of course—it probably wouldn’t make it to the final article, but it gave me something to do while I was waiting for the game to start up again.
From the start of the second half of the game, it was clear that both teams were looking to create a lead and break the tie. The two teams took the field with just as much energy as they had at the beginning of the game, rushing out and looking absolutely determined. The other team—the Wild Cats—managed to break through our defense and get a touch down all in one play a few minutes into the third quarter. I was on my feet, snapping pictures and taking notes in my mind and in my notebook throughout the fraught quarter. Our team tried to even the score but couldn’t seem to quite break through the other side’s defense. I thought to myself that the other team’s coach, Gulder, had clearly stressed defense in his team’s half-time briefing. I caught a few quick glances at the sidelines, watching the rest of the team, watching the coaching staff pacing, working hard to try and find a way to get that all-important score. The other team expanded their lead with another touchdown, and there was a collective groan through our side of the stadium while the other side shrieked.
I kept hoping that we would pull the lead that the Wild Cats had on us closed; but as the third quarter ticked down to the final seconds, we all knew it was impossible. We would have to have a monumental fourth quarter—we would have to at least tie the other team in order to get into overtime, where we might be able to pull ahead. It would really be a miracle if we were able to pull ahead before regulation time ended.
At the beginning of the fourth quarter, the first play by the other team—one of their key defensive players went down and we made it halfway into their end of the field before one of the other tackles brought our player down. We still had possession of the ball. The defensive lineman was obviously hurt; he didn’t get up for a long time and the refs came out to assess the situation. There was no penalty—the tackle had been perfectly legal—but as medics came out and helped the player limp off of the field, it was clear that he wouldn’t be playing for the remainder of the game. It was his bad luck, I thought with a bit of sympathy.
The loss of the other team’s key defensive lineman seemed to galvanize our team— finally they were able to break through fast and effectively. We scored a touchdown on our very next play; it didn’t even the score, but at least we weren’t so far behind. My heart was pounding in my chest and the people in the stands around me were losing their minds, screaming and shouting, cheering and chanting. The other team managed to continue to hold us off through a few more plays—they intercepted once and then lost possession of the ball in the very next scrimmage—but it was clear that they were really suffering from the loss of their best defensive player. I was worried about their offense; it had always been strong, and with one of their other players down, they’d be looking—at least subconsciously—to even things up and maybe take out our quarterback.
They nearly achieved it. In one of the plays in the middle of the fourth quarter, Zack went down under what was practically a dogpile of players from the other team. He was down for a few minutes, but before they could bring the medics out, he was on his feet again, shaking himself off, hopping up and down in place before he resumed his normal position. The next play after that we managed to finally even up the score—Zack using a deceptive move to convince the other team he was going to try for a pass instead of a throw, and then getting the ball as far downfield as he could to the running back who caught up to it just in time. I nearly went deaf once more with the shrieks that came up from our side of the stands, but I was grinning as broadly as anyone.
So, with only a few minutes left in the game—and the championship riding on it—the two teams were once more tied. My mouth was dry, and my heart was racing. We could end up in overtime, which wouldn’t be a bad outcome—as long as we won it. I noticed, almost absently, that I was becoming more and more invested in the game, in spite of wanting to remain impartial, in spite of convincing myself that I didn’t care who won. If we couldn’t score something in the next play or two, we would go into overtime—provided we could keep our defense up and keep the Wild Cats from scoring.
The other team started its play. Everyone in the stands—on both sides—was standing up, chanting, screaming, clearly at their wits’ end with excitement at the prospect of such a close game. I had my camera ready. If the other team managed to somehow get a touchdown in their play, they would have basically won—it would be nearly impossible for us to score sufficient points before the time ran out. I was bouncing on the balls of my feet at the snap, watching, watching. Waiting like everyone else in the crowd was. For the moment, I wasn’t a reporter at all; I was just another spectator, watching the fates of the two teams unfolding.
In a moment that made everyone go silent, our team intercepted the ball in the midst of a pass. After a shocked moment, everyone on our side cheered. We made it onto the other side of the field, landing in the Wild Cats’ territory by fifteen yards before they were able to scramble up their players enough to tackle the player. We had possession of the ball once more. There was time for one more play. I was in an agony of anticipation—what would the decision be? Would we go for a touchdown—a decisive victory—or would there be a field goal attempt? Just enough of a score to win the game by a few points. Both would be major risks. Zack ran to the sidelines to confer with coach Bullden, and some of the players switched up for the last play of regulation time. I wasn’t sure whether the shrieking of the fans or the pounding of my blood in my ears was louder. I watched the two sides form up. The players were in a tight formation, and I saw Zack and another player cautiously moving farther back from the line of scrimmage. It could be a field goal. It could be.
The play started and I watched with wide eyes: it was a field goal attempt. I clenched my hands into fists—it was a major risk. The defense kept the other team at bay while they set up the kick. I jumped up and down with everyone else, screaming as the kick launched the ball into the air. I watched as it turned end over end, moving inexorably towards the crossbars. Would it be good? Would it go through, or fall short, or would it hit instead of getting through?
It went through—and everyone went silent for just a moment, reeling in the stands. There were 30 more seconds left in the game, but there was no real chance for the other team to make the points up. The final play was almost anti-climactic, a formality to run down the clock. The game was decided and everyone in our side of the stands was cheering and screaming, already starting to celebrate.
I sat down heavily in my seat, happy but exhausted at how nerve-wracking the game had been. I knew there would be major celebrations in the city—a party at the hotel, partying in the parking lot, and probably wherever else any group of fans for our team were staying or could congregate. For sure, the football team would be living it up for the rest of the night. I stood as soon as I could recover from my shock and delight and snapped pictures of the field, the crowd, everything going on. Our team was running around the field, leaping up and down, the players delirious with excitement at their win; I managed to capture the moment when they upended the cooler of Gatorade on coach Bullden.
For a long time it seemed as though the on-field celebrations would never end. The members of the team were holding the trophy up in the air, kissing it, dancing with it—and I couldn’t blame them. Slowly, as gradually as molasses, people in the stands started filtering out; on the other team’s side of the stadium, they were subdued and quiet, probably talking amongst themselves about how they’d do it differently, or how next year would be better. On our side, no one seemed to want to leave, but everyone knew that there was a better celebration to go to. I looked around for Jess; she was making out with the guy she’d been flirting with, the two of them kissing in such a hot and heavy way that they were only one or two steps away from public indecency. I decided that I’d wait for her at the gate.
I watched the people passing by as I stood by the gate, waiting for Jess to finish up with the guy she had apparently decided to make out with. I didn’t know if the bus for students had already left, but there would almost certainly be cabs that we could take to get back to the hotel. If Jess had decided to take the guy with her, I’d have to hang out at the pool or somewhere else; maybe I’d start working on the rough draft of the front-page piece since I couldn’t exactly stay in the room while she screwed someone. But I was thinking longingly of the big, plush bed that had come with the room—bigger than my twin bed at the dorm at least, and much more comfortable. My body ached from all the tension in it, and I hoped that at least she would kick the guy out after she’d finished with him. I was glad—really glad—that we had separate beds.
After a few minutes, when the steady stream of people leaving the stadium had died down to a trickle, Jess appeared—and I was surprised to see that she was by herself.
“Hey, Evie,” she said with a self-satisfied grin.
“What about your boytoy?” I asked with a raised eyebrow.
Jess shrugged. “He wasn’t that great of a kisser. Anyone who isn’t a good kisser isn’t good in bed either, so I just made the excuse that I had to share the room with you and gave him a fake number.”
I rolled my eyes. “I don’t know if the bus is still here or if it’s gone already. For a guy who didn’t kiss that well you certainly gave him plenty of time to improve.”
“I was caught up in the excitement of it,” Jess said with an indolent shrug. “I mean, there were like three or four guys watching you all game—you could’ve easily had a we just won the game make out session yourself.”
I shook my head. “I was more interested in getting plenty of material for the article. C’mon, let’s see if we can catch the bus or at least a cab. I’m exhausted.”
We both turned to head out.
“Evie! Evie!” A man’s voice calling my name made me stop in my tracks. I turned around slowly; I was so exhausted that it didn’t occur to me that there were only a few people who could possibly be in the building still who would know my name, much less my nickname. So, when I spotted Zack running towards Jess and me, it actually surprised me.
“Looks like you’ll get your make-out session after all,” Jess told me in a quick aside as Zack came up to us.
He must have been the first one into the showers; he was clean, dressed in a pair of jeans and a long-sleeved tee shirt, his hair still damp but no sign of his exertions on him whatsoever. He stared at me for a long moment, smiling slightly, looking me up and down.
“Bullden told me he’d requested you to cover the game,” Zack said, the smile still not leaving his face.
“I’ll just go check on that bus,” Jess said, walking away quickly and leaving us perfectly alone in the echoing hall.
I looked down at my feet for a moment. “How did you know I was still here?” I couldn’t quite look Zack in the eyes. I was so ashamed of how I’d broken things off with him—and I was shocked that he had sought me out.
“I didn’t know, but I hoped. If I hadn’t been able to catch you here, I’d have just found your hotel room.”
For a long moment, there was nothing but silence between us. I didn’t know what to say—I didn’t know how to feel. I swallowed against the tight feeling in my throat.
“I wanted to apologize,” I started, speaking slowly, trying to keep my voice level. “I shouldn’t have gone crazy like that. I should have let you explain what the situation was instead of just assuming…” I swallowed again.
“No—I mean, I understand. I don’t have the best reputation. No one at the frat does.” Zack was still staring at me. I could feel his gaze lingering on the curves of my body, and then on my face, drinking me in.
“Still, I knew you before that. I should have known…” I shrugged. “I should have at least given you a chance to explain.” I finally worked up the nerve to look up, to meet his gaze. Zack was smiling still, looking as hot as ever.
“You know, Evie, I don’t even care,” Zack said, moving closer to me. He dropped his hands down onto my waist, holding me in place, only a few inches away from me, and my heart was beating faster again—only this time not from the thrill of the game but from the sudden rush of desire. “All I want—all I’ve wanted ever since you showed up in my life again—is to be with you.” He smiled again and leaned in closer. “If you’ll be with me, I can forget everything else.”
“Don’t forget your classes,” I said, smiling up into his eyes. “You still need to graduate someday, you know.”
Zack closed the distance, pressing his lips against mine. He kissed me hungrily, wrapping his arms tightly around my waist, pressing me against him. I moaned against his lips, feeling the heat of his body through his clothes, remembering all the times we had been together. Zack’s tongue batted against mine, plunging deep into my mouth, tasting and exploring me as if it had been months or years instead of a few short weeks since we’d broken up.
I lost track of time and place, uncaring of anything but the feeling of Zack’s body pressed against mine and the taste of his lips. If my phone, stuffed into my pocket, hadn’t vibrated, Zack and I might have stood there for hours continuing to kiss each other, with no more concern for the rest of the world than a couple of statues—at least until security came through the clear the building. But the buzz of my phone startled me enough to break the kiss, and I pulled back, reeling, my mind spinning with a dozen feelings at once. I slipped my phone out of my pocket irritably, wondering who in the world would text me at a time like this; it was Jess.
I am on the bus and it just left the stadium. I may see if any of these nice gentlemen with me is interested in sharing their room for the night. Have fun! I groaned and showed Zack the message. He laughed, pulling me up against him and kissing me lightly on the forehead.
“We’ll grab a cab,” he said. “We can start off in your room and if your roommate hasn’t found someone to spend the night with we’ll go to mine.”
He took me by the hand and led me out of the stadium, and I didn’t think there was a single woman in the city who was as happy as I was.
CHAPTER SEVEN
It was strange to realize that I felt nervous as Zack and I turned the corner in the hall leading up to the hotel room. Zack and I had had sex plenty of times; he had seen me naked when we were in high school and he had seen me naked a little over a month before. But there was something just a little bit different about this time—something that made it more like the first time we had ever had sex together. I fumbled with my key card, my hands shaking just enough to make it fall to the floor. I knelt down and grabbed at it before Zack could, forcing myself to focus just enough on the task at hand to keep from dropping the card once again and managing after two attempts to get it swiped and read properly. The door unlocked and Zack propelled me through it, following quickly behind me and closing out the world in a quick movement that I had to envy; wasn’t he tired after the tough game he’d played?
Zack threw me against the door and pinned me there, finding my lips and kissing me with a desperate hunger that I couldn’t help but echo, my whole body already beginning to tingle, hot and cold flashes shooting along my arms and legs. I could feel the hard ridge of his erection pressing against me as he began to rub up against me slowly, rocking his hips. I wrapped my arms around his broad shoulders, tangling my fingers in his hair as I melted into the kiss, moaning softly into his mouth. I hadn’t realized how much I had been starving for contact with him, how much I had craved the feeling of Zack’s body and mine together. Even with our clothes still on, just kissing, I was so turned on and almost overwhelmed by how good it felt. I nibbled at his bottom lip playfully, evading the probing movements of his tongue seeking mine, pulling him in to deepen the kiss more and more.
Zack took control, one of his hands moving up to hold the my head in place while he sucked my bottom lip into his mouth nipping sharply and then sweeping the rough, wet, wriggling of his tongue along my sensitive skin. I lost myself in the kiss, uncaring of how much time had passed, not even caring for the moment if we did any more than what was already happening. My mind was spinning, my whole body reeling and arching into his touch as Zack’s hands trailed over the curves of my body: touching and teasing and exploring me. I felt and didn’t feel the hard door at my back; I was too absorbed in the feeling of Zack’s body, muscled and hot, pressed along my front. Zack broke away from my lips and I was panting, shivering, my pussy already soaking wet. He dipped his head to the side and kissed along the column of my neck, nuzzling me with his cheek and then teasing me with his lips and teeth and tongue, finding every sensitive patch along my throat, my neck, my collar bones, and driving me crazy with the worship of his mouth. I was moaning out, twisting against the door, struggling to get better contact, to push my hips down against his. I was burning up, my whole body going tense with need.
Zack’s hands slipped up underneath my tee shirt, brushing against my bare skin, making the trembling in my arms and legs even worse as I got more and more turned on by the moment. He began to slowly pull my shirt up, dragging it against my skin, his fingertips gliding over my ribs, past my breasts. I put my arms over my head and Zack barely broke away from my neck to get my shirt over my head and throw it aside, uncaring of where it landed. He brought his lips down on mine once more as his hands cupped my breasts, squeezing them through the thin fabric of my bra, teasing me until my nipples hardened to his touch, becoming firm little nubs straining at the satiny material to try and meet his touch. I worked my hands down along his back and found the hem of his shirt. I tugged mindlessly, distracted by the way that Zack was touching me, almost unable to think from how turned on I was. I wanted nothing more than for us both to be naked already, for Zack’s thick, hard cock to be deep inside of me and for us both to be moving.
I somehow managed to get Zack’s shirt up and over his head—I could never remember afterwards how exactly it finally came together—and we spent a few more moments rubbing against each other, pressed against the door to my hotel room, kissing each other’s lips, throats, shoulders until I was in such a delirious state of arousal that I wasn’t even sure I could manage to keep myself upright. Zack lifted me up into his arms and carried me away from the door.
“Which one is yours?” he asked me breathlessly, moving towards the beds.
I laughed, shaking my head at the silliness of the situation. “The one farther from the door,” I told him, barely remembering. I was sure that Jess would appreciate me not having sex on her bed—but I would have easily done it without even thinking if Zack hadn’t asked the question.
Zack dropped me onto the bed and then climbed in next to me, wrapping his arms around me tightly and then pinning me against the down comforter. He kissed me again and the world spun around us as my hands trailed over his back, down along his spine. I kneaded and rubbed Zack’s shoulders as the kiss got deeper and deeper, as Zack went to work on the fly of my jeans with hands much steadier than my own. Zack let out a groan as I worked away at the tight muscles I found by touch in his back and shoulders, breaking away from my lips to smile at me.
“Just like high school,” he murmured, before ducking down to kiss a trail along the column of my throat.
He covered every inch of the top of my breasts in kisses, reaching up to pull the cups down. I gasped as he latched onto my right nipple with his lips, sucking and licking, sending jolts of electric pleasure seemingly straight to my pussy, making it wetter and wetter, making my inner muscles tighten convulsively with need. I lost all ability to think, trapped in a world of sensations as Zack finally finished opening my fly and then tugged my jeans down over my hips.
I kicked them the rest of the way down from my knees, desperate for more contact between our bodies. I wrapped my legs around Zack’s waist and pushed my hips down against his. I was soaking wet, my whole body needy for him, my hands touching everywhere I could reach. Zack groaned as I rubbed myself against the hard ridge of his cock in his pants, gasping and shuddering as the friction bloomed right on my clit. He began to rock his hips up against mine, rubbing firmly against me, and I felt myself soaking through my panties, getting closer and closer to orgasm just from the friction.
“God I’ve wanted you so much,” Zack murmured against my breasts, nuzzling against me before he brought his lips up to mine once more. He pulled me up just a little bit and reached around to my back, his hands trailing against my already sweat-slick skin to find the clasp of my bra.
I had no idea of how it happened—time went away—but then I was completely naked in his arms, rubbing my pussy against him as we moved together; at some point Zack’s clothes had fallen off, too, sent away to some corner of the room where we might never find them. He reached down between my legs and started to stroke and rub me firmly with his fingers, pressing against my clit and then retreating, torturing me with constant, teasing sensation. I twisted and writhed underneath him, wanting more contact, wanting to feel him inside of me—and then his fingers were, plunging deep into my pussy, rubbing along my inner walls to find my elusive g-spot as his thumb swirled in tight little circles around my clit.
“Fuck—Zack—Oh, god…Zack, please,” I heard my voice but didn’t think of the words that were tumbling out of my lips as he worked me with his fingers, twisting and curling them inside of me, dragging them along my tight, wet inner walls. I shuddered against him, crying out as he brushed my pleasure center.
I had to hold onto him very tightly; my whole body was shaking, my arms and legs seemed to have no bones in them at all as Zack began to drag his fingertips against my g-spot again and again, swallowing down my moans as he kissed me. Every muscle in my body tensed and released erratically, my body flexing around his fingers as if it didn’t want them to ever leave. I threw my head back against the pillows, my fingernails digging into his shoulder, into his back, as I hit orgasm all at once, pleasure coursing through my veins, sensation lighting up my nervous system. Zack murmured praise, encouragement in my ears that I could barely follow, while wave after wave racked me, pleasure intense it might have been pain. He finally began to slow down as the spasms began to abate, continuing to rub my clit but barely thrusting his fingers inside of me as my moans of pleasure began to slow down and then stop.
I lay there underneath him, panting, and my heart racing for a long time. My mind was a haze of pleasure, tingling electric aftershocks working through every nerve of my body. “Oh my God,” I said, as my breath started to return to normal finally. I shook my head, smiling like an idiot but not caring in the slightest. “I had almost forgotten how good you are at that. It’s not fair.”
Zack chuckled lowly, and I opened my eyes in time to see him bring his fingers up to his lips and lick them clean of my fluids.
“I’ll have to make sure that you never forget it again, then,” he told me with a little cocky grin.
I laughed, rolling my eyes. “I can still get you off in ten minutes or less with my mouth and don’t you forget that.”
Zack kissed me and I could taste myself on his lips and tongue—I was surprised by how much I liked it.
“Evie, I will never, ever be able to forget that,” Zack told me, kissing me on the lips again. “It is absolutely seared on my memory—I may have actually gotten off to it a few times while we were apart.” Zack’s hands moved over my body slowly but steadily, caressing and exploring my curves.
“Good. I should show you that again sometime.” Zack grinned, beginning to rock his hips against mine, letting me feel how hard he still was. “Is that a hint?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.
“No. No, it’s not a hint. I’ll be more than happy to be reminded about how good you are with your tongue later. Right now, all I want is to be inside of you.”
I could feel myself starting to get turned on again; I was already soaking wet from my first orgasm, and as the last aftershocks of pleasure glittering along my nerves began to abate, I was nearly ready to go again. I kissed Zack hungrily, reaching down between our bodies. I wrapped my hand around his thick, hard cock and began to stroke him slowly, not wanting to work him too hard—I wanted him inside of me as much as he wanted to be inside of me, if not more—but wanting to tease him the way he’d teased me. Zack groaned, breaking away from my lips to bury his face against my neck as I rubbed the tip of his cock with my thumb. He thrust into my hand, rocking his hips in time with my touch, his body going tense against me.
I brought him right up to the edge, paying attention to every detail—how his cock twitched between my fingers, how he moved, the sound of his moans—and then I backed off, chuckling at his frustrated groan.
“You were the one who said you wanted to be inside of me,” I told him playfully.
Zack pulled himself up and shook his head, smiling in spite of his obvious frustration.
“Okay, that’s fair,” he said.
He shifted down between my legs and brought his hips up against mine. He began to rock, and I shivered as his hot, hard cock slipped between the slick folds of my pussy, rubbing up against my inner labia and my clit. He turned my teasing around on me, tormenting me with the sensation of his cock pressed against my most sensitive flesh, rubbing and gliding, sliding in the midst of my slickness until all I could think about was how much I wanted him inside of me. Finally, we both seemed to agree at the same time that torturing ourselves was just no longer fair. Zack pulled himself up and reached down between us, guiding the top of his cock against my labia.
He thrust into me slowly, letting me feel every inch of him pushing past the feeble resistance of my body, deeper and deeper into my pussy. I shivered—he felt so good; so hot and hard and perfect inside of me, I almost couldn’t take it. Zack and I began to move together almost at once, kissing each other hungrily. I pushed my hips down to meet his thrusts, flexing my muscles around him. Tingling hot and cold waves of sensation shot through my body, pleasure building up inside of me with every movement of Zack’s hips as he filled me up over and over again, pulling almost all the way out before thrusting into me once more. I wanted the slow pace to never end—but I wanted it to speed up all at the same time, as more and more friction built between our bodies. I wrapped my legs around Zack’s hips, trying to get a better advantage, desperate for as much contact as I could get.
Somehow, Zack shifted against me, and then every movement of his hips pressed and rubbed against my clit, his cock buried deep inside of me. He kissed my face, my neck, and my shoulders—everywhere his lips could reach, and I echoed his worship, kissing and nipping along his throat and the line of his jaw. I tasted his sweat on my lips, the sweetness of his mouth. We started to speed up gradually, and I explored Zack’s body with my hands as well as my mouth, trailing along his back and shoulders, reaching down to grab his firm ass tightly. I was getting closer and closer to orgasm every moment and forced myself to hold back; I had already hit one orgasm for the night—it was Zack’s turn to go first, I told myself firmly.
But Zack seemed to have other plans. He reached down between my legs, holding himself up on one arm as he found my clit by touch. I cried out as he began to stroke me in counterpoint to his thrusts, rubbing in tight little circles that drove any ability at self-control completely out of my brain. I moved mindlessly underneath him, moaning and crying out, holding onto him desperately. I couldn’t take any more—in a matter of moments, it seemed, I was grabbing at him, my nails digging into his skin as his name left my lips again and again and again. Wave after wave of pleasure crashed through me in the span of a few heartbeats, shocking and jolting through my nervous system.
A moment after I hit my orgasm, Zack reached his own climax, and I felt his cock twitching inside of me, felt the sticky-slick flood of his orgasm shooting into me. We moved from sheer momentum, continuing to twist and writhe together until the very last waves of pleasure began to ebb. Zack collapsed against me, his face buried against my shoulder, as we both panted and gasped for breath. For a long time, I was content just to lie there, feeling the weight of Zack’s body against mine. I drifted, tingling all over, my breath gradually slowing and my pulse returning to normal.
“Yeah,” Zack said, still slightly breathless, as he pulled himself up to look down at me. “We are not allowed to break up again. You feel too good.”
I laughed, running my fingers through his hair and pulling him back down to kiss him lazily.
“So if we can’t break up again, then you’re not allowed to engage in any more public displays.”
Zack chuckled, kissing me on the lips lightly before he lifted himself up and sank down onto the bed next to me.
“Well, two of those were your own public displays,” he pointed out. “The thing with dumping my food on me, the thing in the weight room.”
I rolled my eyes, giving him a playful shove.
“Okay, okay, okay,” I said, smiling. I felt good all over—I couldn’t believe how good I felt. It just felt so right to be in bed with Zack; nothing could be better. “So neither of us will throw any kind of public fits anymore. If we have a problem with the other person, we will talk to them privately.”
Zack pulled me around, holding me close to him.
“I can agree to that,” he said, his hands beginning to wander over my body once more. “God, Evie,” he murmured, burying his face against my neck as he cupped my breast, giving it a careful squeeze. “I wanted to tell you so many times—as soon as you showed up again in my life, all I could think about was you.”
I blushed, hiding my face so that he wouldn’t see.
“Yeah, well, I was miserable without you, too,” I admitted, blushing a deeper red. “I kept thinking of you moving on, worrying that you’d never really thought of me as anything special, just another piece of ass.”
Zack pulled me up out of hiding and kissed me on the lips hungrily. His hands trailed over my body with more than just soothing intentions, and I knew in a moment we’d be right back at it again.
“Evie, I am missing out on the party of my football career. If that doesn’t tell you how important you are to me, I don’t think anything could.”
I laughed aloud, shaking my head and trailing my hands down along his chest, past his abdomen, to find his cock by touch. He was already starting to get hard again.
“I suppose that means I should do everything I can to make this night just as awesome as it would be if you were with your teammates at a raging arty, getting drunk.”
Zack grinned, lifting me up on top of him, positioning me over his hips. He thrust into my hand, reaching down to stroke me to another fever pitch of arousal.
“Evie, baby, you already have. Now, how many more times can we do this before we have to get dressed and go back to my place?”
I leaned in and kissed him.
“Let’s take our time.”
Zack thrust up into me slowly and I moaned against his lips, knowing that everything was finally right—and that we weren’t going to get shaken up by anything else.
GRIND: THE COMPLETE BOX SET
By Claire Adams
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2015 Claire Adams