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This gets him to quit and he starts backing away down the hall, picking up his pace as he goes. “Tell your mom I said hi. Text me if you need anything.” With that, he turns and is swallowed up by a herd of students lazily milling off to their next class.
I laugh softly to myself. He’s never met my mother, but ever since seeing an old Christmas photo of me and her in my planner last year, he’ll throw out random jokes about being just the kind of guy she needs in her life. And he’s right, too. Not about him, of course, but about my mom finding a good man to share her life with. It’s sad how unlucky she’s been in love. I can’t imagine the mom I would have now if things had gone better in that department. Less bitter, more open, quicker to laugh, maybe. Kind of like me when I’m with—
“Do I even want to know what that stupid grin is all about?”
I’m so lost in my head, I didn’t even hear the class let out or Heather come up beside me. She’s staring, and I can’t help but fidget awkwardly under her studying gaze.
I haven’t told her about Peter yet, of course. It just doesn’t feel like the right time with everything else going on. I’m not so sure that I should even be flirting with the idea of him right now either. Talk about bad timing. Between school and my psycho stalker, I have no business getting involved with him. And now he wants me to move in? How am I supposed to concentrate on my studies now that I know what he looks like naked? What he feels like inside me?
I feel a hot flush spread over my cheeks and realize I have to get out of my head fast if I don’t want to give anything away.
“Earth to Emily,” Heather says, waving her hand in front of my face.
I slap it away and we begin our walk to the other side of campus. “Stop. It’s nothing,” I say. “Just thinking about what a clown Mark can be sometimes.”
She gives me a suspicious sideways look, but thankfully doesn’t press the issue. “Fine, have it your way,” she says, with an over-emphasized air of disinterest. “Did your mom get back to you yet?”
“Yeah, she’s picking me up in the library parking lot.”
We step outside, and although there’s a fresh bite in the air, the sun’s bright and glorious in the middle of a pale blue Boston sky. Heather and I amble along Harborwalk, unhurried, immediately lost in the bustle of students taking advantage of the weather.
“And she didn’t ask why you changed your mind about meeting her at the cafe?”
I shake my head. “Nope. She did get into a long-winded story about how it messes with her schedule, and don’t I know she also has things to do, and time is precious to her, blah blah.”
Heather snorts. “Of course she did.”
“But no, it didn’t occur to ask about me. I suppose she’s saving that for later. When she has me cornered, in person.”
“Ooph. Good luck with that. And you’re still not going to mention this whole thing with the stalker?”
I take a breath. My gut is telling me it’s a bad idea to get Trish McAfee involved in this thing. She’ll just find a way to make it about her, and I’m in no mood to babysit her feelings.
“I’ll see how it goes today,” I say, taking that moment to scan my surroundings.
It’s broad daylight, with several people around, and yet I’m still creeped out by the thought of what happened. The freak could be here right now. Watching.
Heather obviously picks up on the shift in my demeanor, because she says, “Relax, Em. He wouldn’t dare to try anything here. Not with us.” She waves a hand, motioning to all the students around us. “And not with me here. I’m a black belt,” she says, with a mischievous chuckle.
“Since when? And in what exactly do you have this black belt?”
“High fashion and big drama,” she says, without missing a beat.
Both of us laugh. I love how she can do that, turn something horrible on its head and make me feel better. I guess that’s her black belt achievement.
“What are you going to do? Write him an angry email?”
She flips her hair over her shoulder with a graceful air of superiority. “And buy a new Gucci bag after I hit send.”
That does it, I’m done. I gasp for breath, holding my aching middle. I can’t think of the last time I laughed this hard.
Just then I get shoulder-checked by Heather, who goes crashing into me like a renegade bumper car. Her sling bag goes flying out in front of us.
“Hey, watch it, asshole!”
But the guy who rudely shoved her out of the way just keeps going, weaving his way through the students.
“What a jerk,” I say, standing on my toes to see the guy’s head bobbing off in the direction of the JFK Library parking lot. “Hey, Heather, isn’t that Trevor?” I turn back to find her putting her bag back on, a tight scowl on her face. “Are you okay? I’m sure that was Trevor just now.”
