“We need to talk.” I keep my voice to a normal volume, cognizant of the neighboring rooms, but I let all of the frustration and embarrassment I’ve felt this whole evening come through in my tone. “Look at this!”
I yank down the neck of my sweater to show them my hickey. “I wasn’t cold tonight. I was hiding the fact that one of you gave me a hickey.”
Sebastian is the first to speak. “I get it,” he says, and I start to relax. Until he keeps talking. “It’s not symmetrical. There’s only one. We can fix that for you.”
“The lack of symmetry is not the problem,” I say through gritted teeth. “The problem is that it’s here at all. And all of your parents saw it!” When they still don’t say anything, I turn to Felix and Lukas. “Which one of you gave this to me?”
“Hmm,” Felix hums, looking to Lukas and then back to me. I wonder if they really aren’t sure, or if they’re just being assholes and refusing to tell me.
“Hickeys are not okay,” I say slowly. “You promised no PDA this weekend.”
“It’s not PDA,” Lukas is quick to point out. “It happened here in the room.”
“But then it left the room when I did, and I only even knew about it becauseyour mother pointed it out to me.” My volume is rising, and I can’t help it. For being such smart guys, they sure do miss a lot of things when it comes to people and feelings.
“Oh. Okay.” Lukas rubs up the hair at the base of his neck and stares down at the carpet as if that’s going to give him the answers.
They all just stand there for a minute, contemplating the floor, before Elliot quietly slips off his shoes and slides his room slippers onto his feet. I’m sure he held out as long as he could, so I can’t even be annoyed, but it’s the cue the guys need to break the spell and begin to move silently around the room. No one looks at me or speaks as they get ready for bed. I can’t tell if they’re pissed or sad or embarrassed, so I don’t even know if they understand that we’re having a fight. Do they just not know how to act, or are they pretending it’s not happening?
The room fills with tension the longer none of them speak. It’s so much worse than the sexual tension I felt with them last night, and it needs to burst soon because I’m not sure how much longer I can handle this.
I shut myself in the bathroom to get ready for bed and try to wash away the day. By the time my face is clean, I’m barely even angry anymore. I’m just … drained. Even looking in the mirror and seeing the hickey as I braid my hair back off my face, I’m having trouble mustering up any of the outrage I felt earlier,instead feeling guilty for upsetting them even though I do feel it was valid for me to be mad.
I feel like I kicked them when they were down. Today was stressful for them. Sebastian flipped the equator on one of his scrambles and Felix DNFed on his blindfolded event, so even though they are still competing in many of the events tomorrow, they did take some losses and have to be feeling bummed about that. And then here I come, yelling at them over a hickey that can be covered by a turtleneck.
My apology dies on my lips when I exit the bathroom and see all four of them shoved into one bed together, their elbows knocking into each other. That can’t be comfortable. Are they expecting me to join them?
“What are you planning now?” It comes out sounding accusatory, and all their faces fall as they swivel in my direction. I feel another pang of guilt, and open my mouth to issue the apology I lost upon seeing them, but Lukas speaks before I can.
“We can all sleep in this bed,” he says, his voice flat and his eyes trained on a spot on the wall. “You can have the other bed to yourself since there’s no trundle bed available.”
“We promise, we did call and ask,” says Sebastian, earnestly. “It’s just that the hotel is full, with our competition and the other conventions here too this weekend, so they don’t have any extra trundles.”
“Guys, no. That’s not what I want.” I plop on the edge of the empty bed, facing them. If there was an ounce of anger still left in me, it’s gone. Seeing them looking this dejected and pathetic, I want to gather them all up and tell them everything will be okay. “I’m sorry I got so angry. I just felt embarrassed to have all of your parents see a hickey on my neck.”
Now Lukas pins me with a stare. “You’re … embarrassed by us?” he says.
“What? No! No, not at all!” As if I didn’t already feel bad enough, now I feel like pond scum. “I just don’t want to be seen as one of those girls.”
“What girls?” Sebastian looks to his friends in case they understand what I’m talking about, but they all look as lost as he is.
“The ones who only chase boys and don’t really have any other goals or aspirations.” I try to find the words to explain my complicated relationship with, well, relationships. “You all know how important school is to me. I want to graduate with honors, and have a job lined up already so as soon as I’m done with school, I can hit the ground running as a journalist. I’m not one of those girls who’s in school as much to hook up and party as to get an education, and I hate the idea of anyone thinking I’m anything other than a professional, competent person.”
Felix blinks owlishly at me, speaking slowly as he tries to understand. “And me giving you a hickey makes you feel like you aren’t a professional, competent person?”
Aha, so it was him. “Did you mean to mark me?” I point to my neck and the hickey that is clearly on display with my hair pulled back.
“Yes,” says Felix, immediately and with confidence.
“And you didn’t stop to think everyone would see it when I went downstairs?” For such smart guys, they really are dumb sometimes.
“So youareembarrassed by us.” Sebastian looks so dejected, and my guilt pings again, but I shove it down. I need to make them understand that it’s not about them at all, it’s about peoples’ perception of me.
“If I were embarrassed by you, why would I be here with you? Hanging out with you in front of an entire ICF competition? Or spend the day with your families?”
“You’re not embarrassed by us, but you don’t want anyone to know anything that is going on between us,” says Elliot, as if he’s talking himself through this idea that I’m presenting to him. “That feels a lot like you’re embarrassed.”
Suddenly, I’m absolutely exhausted. I slump down on the bed, flinging an arm over my face to cover my eyes.
