Into the Deep 02 Out of the Shallows (7 page)

My butterflies slowly abated at her sincerity. “Good to see you too. How are you?”

“I’m well, sweetheart, thank you. And you? You’re even prettier than I remember. Your hair is so much lighter. I like it. How are Jim and Delia? Are they well? How are the florist and the auto shop?”

“Mom, slow down.” Jake laughed as he pulled me onto his lap. “I just got her back. Don’t scare her away with the Spanish Inquisition.”

“I know, I’m sorry.” She grinned unrepentantly. It reminded me of her son. “I can’t wait for you both to get back here. You have to come to Chicago, Charley. Stay the weekend. We’ll have a big family dinner. I know Lukas is looking forward to seeing you again.”

I relaxed deeper into Jake, the stress of my parents’ disapproval eased under the warmth of Jake’s mother’s acceptance. “I would love that, Mrs. C.”

After Claudia’s “asshole” outburst at The Brewhouse I chased after her. When I caught up to her she was hurrying down the street with the invisible smoke of her fiery rage pouring out of her.

“What happened?” I asked as I shoved her purse at her.

She snatched it off me, her nostrils flaring. “You first,” she snapped.

So I told her what had gone down between Jake and me. The resultant glower of her disapproval was nothing new. “And was he cool with that?”

I shrugged, not knowing what was going on with him. “I think so. It was weird. He wants to be friends.”

“Yeah, because that worked out so great for you last time. He didn’t put up more of a fight?”

“He was angry… but no.”

“That doesn’t make sense.”

Face carefully blank, I said, “We’ve both hurt each other. Maybe he gets that we don’t work.”

I received a grunt in response.

“So that asshole thing? What did Beck say?”

She started fuming again. “It’s like he just assumed I was going to fall all over him.”

“What did he say?”

“He said, and I quote, ‘This ignoring me shit? I’m done with it. You made your point but life is short, babe, and I want to spend what time I’ve got with you. I missed you like crazy this summer.’”

I knew it would be wrong of me to say I actually thought that was kind of sweet so I kept my trap shut and listened to her tirade continue.

“And I said ‘until you get bored with me and end up nailing your groupies again.’ And he said, ‘I’m never going to get bored of you.’ Pfft!” she made a face. “So I said ‘Yeah, well, I’m bored of this conversation.’ I told him I didn’t trust him. I told him I want a guy who loves me enough to put his own bullshit aside. I said he blew it.”

“What did he say?” I was almost too afraid to ask. This confrontation between Beck and Claudia had been a long time coming. It didn’t surprise me that it had ended the way it had.

Claudia’s face fell, and her voice lowered as she replied, “He said that he was sorry and he wanted a second chance… a second chance to prove how he felt about me. A second chance to make me feel as special as I am.”

“That all sounds… good?”

“I told him it was all just bullshit words, and I know how good he is at lying to get what he wants.”

“And…?”

“Oh, he was pissed. He said he’d always tried to treat me with care and that I should trust him. I said I didn’t. He said I was being impossible. I said, ‘Screw you, I’m moving on,’ to which he replied, ‘If you actually took a chance and screwed me, babe, the only moving on you’d be doing is with me. Forever.’ So I called him an asshole and got out of there.”

I was silent a moment before peeking at my friend out of the corner of my eye. “You were equally turned on as you were pissed, though, right?”

“So turned on I could kill him,” she snapped. “Arrogant asshole.”

We didn’t say anything else on the subject and two weeks later we still hadn’t discussed it further. We hadn’t talked about any part of that night. I hadn’t heard from Jake and I was trying not to think about that. I threw myself into my work and sometimes it helped. That’s why, while I laid on my stomach in our living room, surrounded by papers and textbooks, I nearly came out of my skin when my phone rang and it was Jake calling.

I could’ve ignored it but without really thinking about it, I answered and closed my eyes at the sound of his deep, rich voice on the other end of the line. He asked me how I was. I said I was fine. Studying a lot. And also that the apartment smelled of homemade soup all the time because Claudia was experimenting in the kitchen.

It was awkward and stilted… and painful… and I was thankful when Claudia got home because I had an excuse to get off the phone.

“I’ve got a date with the TA!” Claudia yelled as she stepped into the apartment.

I heard Jake groan on the other end of the line.

“Claudia’s home,” I said dryly.

“What she said… is that the kind of thing I have to tell Beck?”

“I don’t know. I’m not privy to the bro code.”

“Shit,” Jake muttered and I took that to mean under the bro code, he was obligated to tell Beck what he’d heard.

Claudia appeared in the doorway grinning, her eyes widening at the sight of me. “Oops, sorry, you’re on the phone.”

I smiled at her and said to Jake, “That’s my cue to go, I guess.”

“Wait. I’m, uh… I was actually calling to invite you to Lowe’s birthday party. It’s at the end of this month. We’re in off-campus housing together but Beck has friends at Bobb. One of the halls on campus. They’re letting us throw the party there. It would really mean a lot if you and Claudia would come.”

See him again? So soon? “Uh… I don’t know…”

“You should come. It’ll be—wait. Lowe wants to talk to you.”

I sat up, not knowing what to make of the invite and if I was perhaps reading too much into it to think that this was some kind of plan of Jake’s to get me back.

“Charley,” Lowe’s warm voice sounded in my ear. “You’ve got to come to my party.”

More than a little taken aback he was inviting me after his weirdness in the bar two weekends ago, I said, “Are you sure?”

“Of course. This summer wasn’t the same without you and Claud. Don’t make my birthday suck without you.”

“Let me just ask Claudia.” I covered my phone with my hand and turned to my expectant friend.

“What’s going on?”

“Lowe and Jake are inviting us to Lowe’s birthday party at Northwestern at the end of the month. You in?”

She bit her lip. “Are you?”

I shrugged.

And then, Claudia nodded. “Tell them we’ll be there.”

Feeling nervous at the mere thought of seeing Jake I said, “You sure?”

“Positive.”

I put the phone back to my ear. “We’ll be there.”

“Great. I’ll text you the details. See you then.”

“Bye.”

“Here’s Jake. Bye, Charley.” After some rustling, Jake was back on the phone. “Charley.”

“Hey. I better go, but I guess we’ll see you in a few weeks.”

“Great.” And he did sound like he thought it was great. It felt like a fist was squeezing my heart. “We’ll talk later.”

Yeah, because that’s what friends do and I’m an idiot.
“Later.”

Once I’d hung up, I made a face at Claudia. “You think that was wise?”

“You could’ve said no.”

“Well, you could stop making soup,” I growled.

Claudia snorted. “Way to focus your anger elsewhere.” She wrinkled her nose. “It does kind of smell in here, though, huh.” She threw her bag down and collapsed on the couch. “So, Jake’s calling you?”

“Well, I am the idiot who said we could be friends.” I shoved my papers aside. “I just didn’t think he’d actually enforce said friendship.”

“He seems to be dealing with your break up quite well…”

I glared at her. “Yeah? So?”

“How do you feel about that?”

“Right now? I’m thinking I want to throw your soup on you.”

She laughed. “I’m just saying… you seem kind of pissed that he’s doing okay.”

“Not pissed,” I huffed. “Confused. I’m a little hurt it’s not killing him like it’s killing me, okay. I think he’s as upset as I am, but then he acts like he’s not.”

“A bit like what you’re doing?”

My mouth fell open.

Claudia smirked.

I threw a cushion at her. “If I want a rational conversation, I’ll call Alex.”

Chuckling, Claudia got up off the couch and started for the kitchen. “Let’s have soup.”

“Let’s talk about the TA,” I called after her.

She smiled at me over her shoulder. “I found him. He’s a grad student now. So hot. He said yes within an instant of me asking him out. Apparently he wanted to ask me out sophomore year, but he didn’t think I was interested. I have got to get less subtle, Charley.”

“Oh yeah, because you’re a real shrinking violet.”

Two seconds later, an oven glove smacked my head.

“Subtle.” I threw it back in her general direction as I opened up my textbook.

Bobb was part of Bobb-McCulloch Halls on the north campus of Northwestern. It was a plain brick building that wouldn’t have been very inviting if not for the stream of students flowing in and out and the far-off beat of music coming from somewhere inside.

“This might not be such a good idea.” I stared nervously at the building.

“We could just go back to the hotel,” Claudia suggested as she stood by my side.

It was amazing how quickly the last few weeks had flown by. I spent my days studying, answering random texts from Jake, talking on the phone to Mom and having one-worded conversations with Dad, and holing myself up in the apartment. Alex would stop by sometimes and ask me to come out for drinks, but I was steadfast on my path to reclusiveness. While I did all this, Claudia studied, ignored phone calls from her parents and Beck, and went on a few dates with Will the TA. Unusually for Claudia, she didn’t talk about the dates and I didn’t ask.

I’d spent the interim weeks between the invitation and the actual party worrying about seeing Jake again and I had no doubt by how quiet Claudia was on the subject that she was anxious about facing Beck. She had major reservations, but I knew she put them aside for me because it was my first time back in Chicago since… well, since everything.

I felt guilty being there for this party when I should’ve been there long ago for a different reason altogether.

I looked at my friend, grateful for her support. “The hotel?”

The guys had invited us to stay at their apartment while we were in the city, but Claudia and I both thought it was safer to get a hotel room.

She smirked at me. “What? We’ve gotten pretty good at running from shit.”

“True. But this we can face up to.”

Once inside we followed the posters directing us toward the party. Not that we needed the posters. The music and kids with plastic cups in their hands were like flashing arrows.

We walked through the corridors in silence, the music growing steadily louder. We passed a couple of open dorm rooms, a few people mingling inside, as we neared the central point of the party.

Gazing into the large common room, I saw a whole bunch of people I didn’t know, drinking and chatting.

I felt Claudia’s hand curl around my wrist and tighten. “You were right,” she said just loud enough for me to hear over The Killers. “Maybe we shouldn’t have come.”

She sounded pained, her eyes locked on something to our left. I followed her gaze.

It took me a moment to register what I was seeing.

And when I finally did, I felt like I was back at that first party in Edinburgh, seeing Jake across the room for the first time in four years.

In the corner, past a group of college girls, was Jake. He was sitting on a table that had been set up with plastic cups of beer and standing in between his legs was a tall, curvy redhead. She had one hand on his shoulder, her other hand clutching a plastic cup, as she grinned down at him. He wasn’t touching her, but their proximity and his body language more than made up for it. I knew he was flirting in the way his dark eyes danced, in the half smile he gave her as they talked.

“Charley?” Claudia gripped my wrist. “We can go, babe.”

It was unfair of me, right? To feel betrayed. To feel the blade of jealousy score across my chest. To feel the burn of his loss in my gut. I only had myself to blame. Six months ago he was mine.