“I have no idea why you’re crying, but you look like you could seriously use a hug. Let’s go upstairs. My roommate is gone.”
We took the stairs to the second floor and walked down the second of what I knew were four identical hallways that jutted out from the center of the building. I’d been here once before, and I’d needed Hannah’s help to navigate that time, too. On the campus map, Hannah’s building looked disturbingly like a swastika.
She unlocked her door with her key and pulled me inside.
“Sit. I’ll make you some tea and then we can talk.” I flopped down on her futon and grabbed one of the pillows. Her laptop was open on her desk and playing music that I recognized as The Black Keys “Howlin’ for You.” I would have complimented her on her choice in music, but I was a little preoccupied.
My phone went off again. Dusty had been blowing it up ever since I’d driven away from his apartment. I’d thought I’d seen him following me in his Golf, but I did a little maneuvering and lost him by pretending I was going to Yellowfield House and then doubling back to Hannah’s.
Hannah’s microwave dinged and she handed me a mug of Lemon Zinger tea.
“I started drinking it because of you. We’re not allowed coffeepots, and sometimes I’m too lazy to walk down to the dining hall.” Even though the mug was screaming hot, I held on to it for dear life. Hannah sat down next to me and touched my shoulder.
“What is it, Jos? Did something happen with Dusty?”
My phone went off again.
“Is that him?” she said, and I nodded. “Do you want to talk to him?” I shook my head. Words weren’t my method of communication right now. They were just too much work.
Hannah picked up my phone, turned it off and tossed it on her desk.
“There. Now you can talk, or not talk. If you want to sit here and watch Buffy, we can do that. Whatever you need.” She stared at me and it was with so much love and care that I started to cry again. Dusty was right. I had all these people in my life that would do anything for me. I didn’t deserve it.
“I can’t tell you. I just... I can’t.” I’d carried it for too long, this thing inside me. I’d locked it away and shoved it aside, put it to the back of my mind, where it sat there, not letting me forget. It was a devious little thing, always making itself known when I least expected it, when I let my guard down a little. It was always looking for an opening to jump into my mouth and scream itself out loud. I wouldn’t let it. Not now, not ever.
“It’s okay, Jos. I understand the secret thing. I seriously do. So what do you need? You know, within reason.”
“I need...” What did I need? A f**king time machine. A do-over. A different life.
“You gotta give me something, girl, something I can do. I’m not good with this emotion stuff. Like, you know how some girls are, like, awesome at the consoling and knowing the right things to say? I am not one of those girls.” This made me almost laugh, and given the circumstances, that was something.
“I’m so confused, Hannah.” I stared at the steam rising from the mug and took a sip of the tea. It tasted of comfort and home and waking up. If only it could solve all my problems.
“I sorta got that. Reading between the lines.” I had another sip of tea and started to feel weird that Hannah was staring at me, as if I was a bomb she was waiting to go off.
“I’m not going to explode, you know.” She shook her head back and forth.
“Yeah, I know. Like I said, I’m not good with this kind of thing. So, I’m going to do what I do when I am suffering from life suckage—watch Buffy. It works. Every time.” She got up and went to her DVD collection and pulled down the first season of Buffy. I couldn’t remember where we’d stopped, but Hannah seemed to, so she put in the disk and found the right episode and hit Play.
And for some weird and unfathomable reason, I stopped thinking about the ugly thing in the back of my mind. I acknowledged its presence, but I chose to focus on something else instead. Like a teenage girl fighting vampires. Too bad my ugly thing wasn’t a vampire I could stake that would just turn to ash. That would make things a hell of a lot easier. Bam, staked. Done.
As Buffy navigated the tangled web of high school and vampire slaying with her trusty sidekicks Willow and Xander and her watcher, Giles, I wondered, distantly, if Dusty had gone to the house, and if he had, what he would say to them. It wasn’t like he could tell them the whole story without making himself look bad, so what would he say? In a weird way, I hadn’t lied to Renee. Here I was, at Hannah’s. Yes, we weren’t working on a project, but I was where I said I would be. I’d just made a stop in between.
I could have gotten over Dusty lying to me. But this...I couldn’t. He definitely wouldn’t, if he knew. He’d never forgive me. He’d hate me. It was way better for him to just think I was a freak than to have him know that I was...
Yeah, it was much, much better to let him think I was a freak.
“Are you hungry?” Hannah said. “I have Skittles and crackers and we can raid my roommate’s fancy cookies. She’ll never know.” She went into her roommate’s closet and pulled out a bag of Milano cookies. I hadn’t had those in ages.
Hannah mentioning food reminded me that I’d left the entire bucket of candy Dusty had made for me. It was a loss, but there was no way I was going to try to get it back.
She handed me the bag and I took out one of the cookies and she took one for herself.
“What size shoe are you?” I knew her feet were several sizes bigger than mine.
“Six.”
“Perfect.” She got up and rooted around under her roommate’s bed and handed me a pair of cheap slip-on sneakers. “These should work.”
“Um, Hannah? I’m not stealing your roommate’s shoes. Besides, that’s kind of nasty.”
“Oh, please, she never wears them and just think of it like buying shoes at a yard sale. Except without the paying-for-them part. You need shoes on your feet. You can just bring them back tomorrow or something.”
She had a point. It was going to look nuts if I walked back into the house without my shoes on. That would definitely raise suspicions with Renee and it was going to be hard enough to act like everything was normal without worrying about my feet.
I took the shoes and slipped them on. They weren’t that different from a pair I owned, so hopefully Renee wouldn’t notice. Hannah grabbed another Milano out of the bag and clicked onto the next episode of Buffy when we heard a loud banging.