Love Story(71)
Author: Jennifer Echols

The smile stayed on his lips, but his eyes looked worried as he leaned toward me again and said in my ear, “I’m not sure I can handle pre-med.”

I backed away from him enough so that I could look into his eyes. He was dead serious, and again, what he said rang true. I nodded. “I know exactly what you mean. But you will feel better tomorrow. You’ll hardly remember feeling like this tonight.”

He watched me, eyes serious. “Why will I feel better tomorrow?”

I shrugged. “Because your tests will be over, and you will have gotten some rest tonight.” I’d thought what I meant was obvious. Weird that I understood him perfectly, and he didn’t understand me at all.

“I will?” He leaned forward to talk into my ear again—but this time his cheek touched mine, and his stubble combed across it, dragging a tingling sensation behind. If our friends on the dance floor glanced in our direction, they would not be able to tell we were touching each other. They would think we were still leaning close to hear each other, like before. They would have no idea that every nerve in my body sparked to life and burned as he growled in my ear, “Would you like to dance?”

I gave him a small nod. He stood and held out his hand to me. I put my hand in his. He led me onto the dance floor, in a clear space in a dark corner where the strobe light did not quite reach and the pink searchlight never swept.

Pulling me close, he wrapped one arm around my waist and put his other palm to my cheek. “I’ve done this all wrong,” he whispered in my ear. “I want to start over.”

At the feel of his breath on my earlobe, my heart shivered, sending tingles across my chest. My lips parted. I moved my cheek against his hand so he stroked me softly.

“This is a slow country song,” he whispered, his voice audible over the throbbing techno beat only because his lips moved against my ear. “And we are alone.”

Then he kissed me. His lips were on mine, pressing hard and hungrily. His hands were on the back of my neck, his fingers weaving into my hair, holding me in place as he opened my mouth with his tongue. His hands moved from my neck down my back and around to my front—not far enough to cup my br**sts, but far enough to tell me what he wanted. I could not see whether anyone was watching us. He did not look. His eyes were closed, fists gripping my slinky blouse, lips on mine, like he would never let me go.

My heart was beating out of my chest. I did not want to do this with Hunter when I knew he was only toying with me. I did not want to do this in front of my friends. Eventually they would find out that he was toying with me, and that I had known this and had let him.

But there was no way I would break that kiss. His warm tongue was in my mouth, tangling with my tongue, sweeping over my teeth, claiming me as his. My blood raced through my veins and seemed to throb toward him like the ocean tide pointing toward the moon. It was one of those things in life a writer needed to experience: feeling smitten, rendered helpless, being taken.

“We have to go back to the dorm,” he mumbled against my lips.

I nodded just a little, gently enough that I didn’t remove my mouth from his.

This time I was the one who led him by the hand through the crowd. I was shocked that he put up with this all the way across the flashing dance floor. He must have reasoned that if he could keep me happy long enough to bed me, I would listen to reason about my career choice, he could talk me into running back to my grandmother, and a college education would be his. He let himself be led.

Summer glanced up from her dancelike tangle with Manohar. Her eyes widened. I’d told her in the afternoon that I would fill her in on my weekend with Hunter after I finished my history paper, but I hadn’t implied—or thought—that I would be leading him by the hand out of a club later. She spoke to Manohar. He jerked his head up wearing her astonished expression. So Hunter hadn’t told Manohar about us, either. Not that there was any “us” to tell.

We hurried through the cold night scented with Italian garbage, holding hands, hardly speaking.

The dorm was Sunday-night quiet as he backed me against the outer door to my room and kissed me hard. His hands reached around my waist, found their way up to my br**sts and touched them through my blouse and bra this time. I put my hands behind his head to mash him closer, but by then he’d fumbled through my purse and stuck my key in the lock. The door opened behind me.

We crossed the larger room quickly and closed ourselves in my tiny bedroom. As we embraced again, I began to understand the mistake I was making. He was in my bed, and I would never be able to sleep again without thinking of him here. He kissed me, and if I opened my eyes a sliver, I could see my makeshift bedside table, actually my filing cabinet, sporting the New York City magnet. He lay down on top of me, and past his shoulders I could see my laptop glowing. I smelled him and tasted him and now when I came here every night, I would think of him, which was exactly what I never, ever intended to happen.

17

Half asleep, I opened my eyes and puzzled through what I was seeing. Hunter Allen lay beside me. His bare muscular arm crossed me. He reached to my filing cabinet and touched the New York City magnet.

IN THE BLUE GLOW FROM THE streetlights outside, he slipped out of bed. I watched him pull on his jeans and move toward the door. He didn’t fasten his belt. Maybe he didn’t fasten the jeans, either, because they sat very low on his hips, so low that I would have turned around to watch him go if I’d passed him in the hall like that.

With his hand on the doorknob, he glanced back at me and saw me staring.

He came back and knelt on the side of the bed, leaned forward, and kissed the tip of my nose. “Go back to sleep,” he whispered.

Then he was gone, carefully opening the door without a squeak and shutting it most of the way behind him.

The outer door to the hallway closed softly. I felt this more than heard it, a little bump through the building.

Footfalls sounded in the stairwell, higher and higher in the walls.

Then silence.

I took a long breath, enjoying the last of his warmth lingering in the sheets around me. As my chest moved, the warm sheets slid against my skin as if he were still here. But it was over and he was gone.

Eventually the breath had to come out again as a sigh, and I was sobbing, coughing. I rolled over and coughed into my pillow so I wouldn’t wake Summer and Jřrdis. The pillowcase smelled like him.

I was lucky I’d found out in Kentucky that I’d been fooled all this time. I’d slept with him to get him out of my system, and that plan had backfired. He had jumped up and beat a trail out the door and up to his own floor as soon as he came to his senses and realized where he was. If I had expected anything different, I was still the fool I’d been trying so hard not to be.