“Is that the one about actions and reactions?”
“Exactly! Every action has an equal and . . .” She pauses and swallows, and man, she’s so far gone. “Reaction. Equal and opposite reaction. So . . . action.” She gestures to an empty cup on the bar, then to her own drunken state. “Reaction.”
Then she does this little move that’s halfway between a fist pump and a celebratory dance. She’s so fucking adorable, it actually hurts. Somewhere between my chest and my stomach there’s a knot that twists every time I see her. And I’m starting to enjoy it, the strange pleasure pain of wanting her.
“I don’t get it,” the dude on the floor says. “She’s been going on and on about that law for an hour, but for the life of me I don’t get what it has to do with alcohol. And somewhere around the eighth shot, I stopped trying to figure it out.”
Christ. Eight shots. I hope to God that Nell hasn’t had that much to drink.
She pushes at my arms, wrestling out of my embrace, and says, “Here. Let me make you one.”
She wobbles over to the table, where there’s half a dozen different kinds of liquor and at least that many mixers. I follow and ask, “Any idea how much she’s had to drink?” Dylan shakes her head, and the ginger guy is still lying on the ground, silent. I think he might actually have passed out.
“I’ll make sure she doesn’t drink any more. Maybe you could get started on the food, Dylan? That will help if we can get her to eat any of it.”
“Sure. Of course. You sure you’ve got her?”
The look in Dylan’s eyes as she asks tells me this is anything but a simple question. I don’t know what this is with Nell. I don’t know how long it will last. But I know I’m not handing her over to anyone else to take care of. No fucking way.
“Yeah. I’ve got her.”
Chapter 13
Nell’s To-Do List
• Normal College Thing #18: Invent an alcoholic beverage.
• Remember the alcoholic beverage you invented.
• Don’t throw up.
Torres is somehow even more handsome than I remember. And at the moment there are three of him, which adds up to a whole lot of handsome. He’s talking to Dylan, and I keep getting distracted by his mouth. By the way it so perfectly forms words. It’s a really great mouth.
Which is why I just can’t help touching it.
I rest my fingers there, wanting to feel it move as he talks, but he’s just looking at me, and when I twist my head around, I realize that Dylan and Silas have disappeared into the kitchen.
I turn back and order, “Talk.”
“What do you want me to say, sweetheart?”
His breath is hot against my fingertips, and a sudden image of him sucking my fingers into his mouth pops into my head, and holy hell . . . where did that come from? Certainly not from any personal experience I’ve had.
“I like the way your mouth moves.”
He laughs, more warm breath, and pulls my hand away to kiss the center of my palm.
“Like I said before, you are a puzzle.”
Then I remember my reason for coming over to the table. My drink! I tear my eyes away from Torres and focus on the bottles in front of me, trying to remember how I made it. I started with something clear. Gin, maybe? Or vodka? I pick the one that’s in the prettiest bottle and dump some of it into a plastic cup.
“Whoa there.” Torres lifts the bottle from my hands, and I let him have it. I was done with it anyway. “I think you’re all good on drinks right now.”
“This one is for you,” I tell him.
Then I add some orange juice, a shot of the other clear liquor just to be safe, some grapefruit juice, and a squeeze of lemon concentrate. I swish it around with my finger, and then hand the cup to Torres, sucking the liquid off my finger while I watch him. For a moment all he does is stare at my finger in my mouth, and I wonder if he’s picturing the same thing I thought of earlier.
I pop my finger out of my mouth and say, “Drink.”
He raises the cup to his mouth, taking a gulp, and then pauses for a few moments before swallowing. His eyes narrow, his nose scrunches, and his Adam’s apple bobs forcefully.
“Oh God,” he says.
“Oh God good?”
“More like oh God please don’t let my esophagus melt.”
I frown. “It’s not that bad.” I stand on my tiptoes and dunk my finger in his cup again, pulling it back to my mouth to prove it. But he catches hold of my wrist before I get there.
“Uh-uh. Not that again. I can’t take it.”
“What?”
“You know,” he begins. “Maybe it’s not the drink that tastes good, but your skin. I think I need to test that hypothesis.”
“I do like hypotheses. Did you know that’s the plural of hypothesis? Hypotheses.” I hadn’t really registered much beyond the last word of his sentence, so he catches me completely off guard when he draws my hand up close to his face and slips my forefinger into his mouth.
“Oh,” I breathe, feeling as if the world’s previous gentle swaying motion has been pushed into fast-forward, and everything in my peripheral vision is moving fast enough to blur.
Not his mouth, though. That is crystal clear. And lusciously hot around my finger, and when he sucks, it draws my mind back to things he did to my nipples the night before. God, was that only the night before? My breasts feel heavy now, full and hardened at the tip, and there’s an ache between my legs. Not a heat or a buzzing or a tingle, an actual hollow ache.
I lean forward, wanting to kiss him, knowing instinctively that he can make the pain go away, but I lose my balance and topple into him, my face smacking into his chest.
“Easy, girl. I’ve got you.”
Heat curls over the back of my neck, but not the pleasant kind. My face feels clammy, and sweat gathers at my brow.
“I need some air,” I choke.
“Okay. I’ve got you,” he says again. He tries to draw one of my arms over his shoulder, but he’s too tall. Or I’m too short. Or we’re both too something. Instead he settles for wrapping his arm around my waist, and I do the same, leaning into his solid side. He’s hot, too, and I feel like I’m suffocating in a sauna, but I’m not sure I can walk without leaning on him. Or maybe I just don’t want to.
He shouts something in the direction of the kitchen, but my ears have gone a little fuzzy. All I can do is stare at the door, willing it to move closer so that I can feel the cool night air against my damp skin.
I manage a few steps, but when I whimper into Torres’s shoulder, he pulls me up and close, so that my feet are just barely skimming the floor. In three long strides, he’s opening the door, and I release him to throw myself against the railing of our porch balcony.
It’s too high for me to topple over, but even so, I feel Torres’s big hands settle on my hips, holding me in place.
“You know, I’ve never realized how stressful drunk people are,” he says. “I suppose that’s because I’m never the sober one.”
Too many words. I can’t process anything beyond the need to gulp down air and the cool touch of wind on my face.
I wish I were naked. Then the brilliant sensation of sweat turning cool against my skin could happen all over. Or I wish I were skinny-dipping again. The thought of that cold water sliding over my bare skin draws a small moan from my mouth. There’s a pool in the center of our apartment complex. I wonder if I could convince him to take me there. It’s poorly maintained and usually filled with a bunch of drunk college students, but hey . . . that’s me right now.
Chalk one up for being normal.
“I wish we were in a pool again,” I tell him.
He leans beside me on the railing, pushing some hair off my face and then lifting the thick mass of it off the back of my neck like he knows how hot I am.
“That was a lot of fun,” he says. “But I wasn’t sure you had fun. After the way you ran off.”
I close my eyes, enjoying the lightness of my head and
the air flowing over my neck. I hum my approval, and list to one side, leaning my head against Mateo’s hand. “I had fun,” I tell him. More fun than I’ve ever had.
“Then why did you leave? I realize things might have been moving fast—”
Because I’m a virgin and you terrify me.
He drops my hair, and I have to jerk myself upright to keep from falling when his hand disappears. “Hey,” I whine. “Why did you—”
I look up at him, and I can tell that he’s trying to keep a blank expression, but his eyes are wild and dark and just a bit too wide. I frown, trying to puzzle out the change in him. I think back, and when I do, I hear my last thoughts not as if they were in my head, but said in my currently too loud, slightly slurred voice.
Oh God. Oh my God.
And that’s right about the time a few more of his friends arrive, calling up at us from the bottom of the stairs. Brookes. Dallas and Carson, too.
It’s also right about the time I throw myself against the railing and lose the contents of my stomach over the side.
THE PRIMARY ADJECTIVE people use to describe me has always been “nerdy.” Despite this, there’s been a surprising lack of mortification in my life so far. I avoid it at all costs because me and embarrassment don’t work well together. I blush at the drop of the hat, and it’s rarely the pretty kind of blush that makes you look as if you went just a little heavy on your makeup. No, for me, it’s the full-bodied, so-red-it’s-almost-purple kind of blush. And it always takes forever to fade.
I’ve always gone out of my way to avoid situations that might stir up that kind of reaction. When I was getting picked on in middle school, I found a teacher willing to let me eat lunch in her classroom during her off period. I didn’t really do much dating in high school, because the few times I tried, I couldn’t handle the stress of not knowing what would happen next. The mere possibility of embarrassing myself was always enough to make me run in the other direction. I didn’t take any chances. Not that kind at least. And now it seems as if my social life is not the only department where I’m playing catch-up.
Welcome to Humiliation. Population: Me.
Thankfully, I’m so miserable that the next few minutes only occur in bursts and patches for me. When I next lift my eyes, Dylan is there, and we’re inside the apartment. I blink, and I’m in my room. It’s dark, only the lamp by my bed providing light, and she’s dabbing at my forehead with a damp cloth that feels like heaven.
“Why did I do this?” I groan. “Why does anyone do this?”
She doesn’t laugh, though I can tell she wants to.
“Hindsight is twenty-twenty.”
“I hate that saying.”
“But it’s the truth.”
“I hate the truth.”
She does laugh then.
“Why did you do it?” she asks. “I tried to ask Matt, but he sounds like a yeti when he’s this drunk. I couldn’t make out anything he said.”
“I hate yetis,” I mumble.
“Yes, well, before you say you hate water, drink this.”
She tilts my head up to meet a glass, and half the water ends up running down my neck. And I do, indeed, hate water.
The only thing I don’t hate is sleep. Sleep will take away the churning in my stomach, and the awful taste in my mouth, and the flushed heat I know is still marring my skin.
Maybe I’ll wake up, and this will all have been a dream. I won’t have thrown up in front of the people I’m trying to make my new friends. I wouldn’t have told the most attractive guy to ever show any interest in me that I’m a virgin.
Maybe I’ll wake up to find that this whole list thing was a long, elaborate dream, and I can go back to being blissfully weird and antisocial and . . .
Alone.
Somewhere between one forced sip of water and the next, I must fall asleep, because I wake up after what feels like hours to the sound of my door closing. Probably just Dylan checking on me, but I’m struggling to find the motivation to move my head the six inches it will take to confirm this suspicion.
Eventually, my bed shifts, slanting to one side, and my head ends up turning of its own volition. I decide I’m dreaming when I see who’s seated beside me, because there’s no way Torres would be in my room after everything that just happened. I’m sure Dylan wouldn’t even let him in. I decide that this must be my subconscious, trying to give me one last good-bye, unreal though it may be.
“I brought you some food,” he says.
I groan. My dream can’t even do me the courtesy of giving me a pleasant last memory. Or is it normal to be drunk in your dreams when you’re drunk in real life?
He breaks the corner off a bread stick and holds it up to my lips. I don’t open.
“Trust me,” he says. “I know you’re tired and probably miserable, but this will help. And the more food and water we get into you now, the less you’ll hate yourself in the morning.”
“Already hate myself,” I say, but I take a bite of the bread stick he’s offering. It takes me forever to chew it, and when I’m done, he holds up another. Grudgingly, I eat it.
“That’s my girl.” And now I know it’s a dream.
He offers me water, and I take it, if only to wash down the bread.
“What happened to our deal?” he asks, and he sounds almost angry. “If you’d waited for me, I could’ve taken care of you. Made sure you didn’t drink too much.”
Since it’s a dream, I don’t see the point in being dishonest.
“I don’t want you to help me with the list.”
“Why not?” Yeah. He’s definitely angry.
“Because I don’t want you to think I’m a loser.”
“Damn it. I think a lot of things about you, Nell. Some of them are certainly not nice, but trust me, they’re all complimentary.” I shake my head, too tired to pick out the meaning of his words. “You’re not a loser, Nell. And I’m going to help you with that list whether you like it or not. I didn’t like coming into your apartment and seeing you with that guy. I don’t like that he’s the one who you shared this first with. I want your firsts.”
I force my eyes open, and try to look at him with as clear a mind as I can manage. Is this the part where my dream stops being miserable and starts being wish fulfillment? Is that what I wish? That Torres would be my first?
But I can’t read anything in his expression, and he doesn’t say anything else. No sweet words. No assurances. He doesn’t even touch me. He just feeds me a few more bread sticks and some water, and then leaves what’s left of the food beside my bed before he turns off my lamp and plunges us both into darkness.
Chapter 14
Mateo
I want your firsts.
Christ.
I’m still thinking about it the next morning. About how she’d looked in bed, her hair spread across her pillow and her expressive mouth drawn down in frown. She’d been so miserable, and I’d hated seeing her like that. If I’d been there, if she’d called me, I could have taken better care of her. I could have watched her to make sure she drank just enough to get the experience she wanted, but not too much that she’d regret it.
But still . . . what in the world had I been thinking when I said that to her? Regardless of what I want, that V-bomb she dropped is the number one reason I have to stay away from her. It was one thing to use her to forget Lina when I thought it could just be some mutual fun. Hell, even a short-lived relationship.
But to be her first? That’s some next-level shit, and I’d be a first-rate asshole if I let it happen. I probably should have guessed, but once she’d gotten into our kiss, she’d been anything but shy. Wishful thinking, I guess. I already feel like an asshole for taking things as far as I have. But every time I think back to those moments in the pool, I don’t feel guilty. I feel possessive and greedy and territorial, and I can’t help but think that I do want her firsts. Even if I don’t deserve them.
When I shake off those thoughts, I catch Brookes looking at me from his
position on the recliner. I’m lying back on our couch, drinking a protein shake after my morning run. I don’t like the expression on his face, like he knows exactly what I’ve been thinking.
As if proving my point, he says, “So . . . Nell.”
“Is this a new game where we just say random people’s names? I’ll bite. So . . . Beyoncé.”
“Don’t play dumb, Teo. I’m not an idiot. There’s something going on there.”
“It’s called flirting. You should try it sometime. It might turn that frown upside down every once in a while.”
He rolls his eyes. “Give me a little credit, bro. I know you well enough by now to tell when you’re deflecting. There’s something different about this one for you.”
Knows me well enough. Bullshit. Brookes has always been like this, even when I’d known him a week. The guy has a gift for reading people. Comes in handy on the field or in the occasional pickup basketball game. In a roommate? It’s annoying as hell.
“So I like her. Do I really have to fucking sit here and analyze it with you? We gonna paint each other’s nails next? We could both get weaves and then braid each other’s hair. Maybe watch some My Little Pony. We’d make decent Bronies.”
He raises an eyebrow. “You done yet?”
“Not really. We could watch Titanic. Lament about how there was totally room for Jack on that door with Rose. He didn’t have to die, damn you, James Cameron!”
He sighs and stands. “Okay. I get it. You’re not going to talk about it. But do me a favor and think about this one. She’s not your usual type. You don’t know how to deal with girls like her.”
“I know plenty about girls like her, but thanks.”
“I’m just saying, she’s not the type to be happy with a quick fuck and an even quicker good-bye.”
“Jesus. How much of an asshole do you think I am? I like her. I genuinely like being around her. I can get to know a girl without having to sleep with her.”