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He shrugs off his old-man coat and drops it on the couch. Then drops himself down next to it.
One of his eyebrows is a little lifted, which I guess is supposed to mean, Well, Caroline?
I sit on the bed. I pull my pillow onto my lap, pluck at the pillowcase, which has Smurfs on it. They’re supposed to be ironic Smurfs, but maybe that’s like ironic whale pants. An impossibility.
I remind myself why I made West come over here. Because I kissed Nate and he put my naked pictures online. Then I kissed West and he stopped talking to me. I’m tired of this shit.
“What’s the matter with you?”
“Nothing. ”
“You’re mad at me. ”
“I’m not. ” He’s fixated on this spot on the floor, like all the world’s secrets are written there, pinhead-small.
“You’re disgusted with me. ”
“No. ”
“You wish you’d never kissed me. ”
He meets my eyes for a fraction of a second. Looks at the secret spot again. “Yeah. ” But then he looks back at my face. “No. ”
“Which is it?”
“Both. ”
“What am I supposed to do with that, West?”
He sighs. His hair falls forward, covering his eyes, and he clasps his hands between his knees, that bracelet at his wrist spelling out the letters of his name, a symbol of everything he won’t share with me. “I told you from the beginning how it’s going to be with us. ”
“You said you wouldn’t touch me. ”
He nods but doesn’t look up.
“You did touch me, though. ”
“I fucking know that, Caroline. ”
“Don’t get snippy with me. You don’t have any right. We were both up there. We were both kissing. ”
“Yeah, but I’m the one who had to jump off the balcony, aren’t I?”
“That’s why you’re pissed at me?”
“I’m not pissed at you!”
Finally he’s looking at me, but it’s not any help. His indrawn eyebrows and scowling mouth mean he’s mad about something. If it’s not me, then what? “You sure seem like it. ”
He stands up. Paces back and forth a few times. Glances at the bunked beds, Bridget’s empty desk, my cluttered one. He picks up the framed picture of me with my dad and my sisters at my high school graduation and sets it back down.
He points to the picture. “You know what I said to him?”
“Who, my dad?”
He crosses his arms. “I said, ‘So that’s your daughter?’ This was after I’d carried you up the stairs and laid you out on the bed. I stood right over you, staring at your tits, and I said, ‘I’m right across the hall. Coed dorms, man. This is going to be sweet. ’”
He uses his drug-dealer voice, his stoner voice—utterly fake if
