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Simon
Samantha clinks a fork against her champagne flute. “A toast to the man of the hour.”
I swallow my discomfort. All eyes are on me as Professor Westfield stands at the head of the table, and I’m not much for being the center of attention. Samantha’s smile stretches clear across her face, as does Mrs. Westfield’s. Brett smiles though clenched teeth, though I know he’s probably fantasizing about doing me in with his steak knife right about now. He sees me as the guy who stole his scholarship. According to Brett, it’s his year, not mine. Winnie, my West Virginia friend, leans in and whispers, “You’ve earned it.”
“A near perfect score on the LSATs. A stellar undergraduate academic record, a degree earned with honors while conducting research, tutoring fellow students and holding down a job. And completed one year early no less!” He shakes his head, smiling. “I’m in awe of this young man. Raise your glass, everyone, and join me in congratulating this year’s recipient of the Honorable James W. Crawley Memorial Scholarship.”
“Here, here,” Winnie chimes in, clinking her glass with mine. “I hope I’m sitting in your place next year.”
Samantha sits on my other side and touches her glass to mine. Her free hand lands on my upper thigh, giving me a reassuring squeeze. “I’m so proud of you.”
How did I get here?
“I feel like I’m an ESPN commentator asking the top recruit which team he’s going to play for next year,” Professor Westfield jokes. “Is it going to be U Penn, Duke, Michigan, UVA, Cornell or good old Northwestern?”
“I’ve narrowed it down some, but I’m still not sure. U Penn is out, Cornell too.”
“The two ivies? I’m surprised.”
“I don’t want to be in New York, I’m sure of that, and for some reason Penn doesn’t appeal to me.” The reason is that mere mention of the word Pennsylvania turns my stomach. I blame the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections for that. I am not going back. And I throw New York under the bus because Cornell and NYU have top ranked MFA programs for creative writing, and Samantha has mentioned both in passing when she talks about her future. “My mother is down in South Carolina now, so Duke and UVA are still contenders, but I’d say Northwestern and Michigan are my top two.”
Samantha is my girlfriend now. There’s nolet’s not put a label on thiswith her. The distinction was made after a bout of pneumonia that literally knocked me on my ass this past January. I was basically running myself ragged between taking on extra credits and then getting my applications together. School broke for the semester, and so did I. Samantha called an ambulance for me when my fever was still running wild after four days and my wracking cough turned into a wheeze. She tells me that I said, “I have to go to work,” as they were loading me onto a stretcher. I don’t remember it that way, but hell, Iwasout of it. She loves that story, tells it whenever she gets the chance. It’s always followed by the tale of her nursing me back to health. And she did. It was two weeks before I was fully back on my feet, and she was with me every step of the way. Samantha did my laundry, made me homemade soup, registered me for classes with the help of her dad, and lugged my textbooks back from the bookstore at the start of the semester when I was still too weak to do it myself.
I’ve never been sick like that in my entire life, and it did something to me. With my brother and Brandon having left for Oregon the year before, I was truly without family. I could scarcely get out of bed and I was alone. And for the first time, I was actually suffering from it, from loneliness. She swooped in, made it all better.
As I recuperated, we spent nights watching television together and talking. I saw her in a different light, I guess.
Three months later and I’m doing everything in my power to land myself in a different state. She has another year left before she graduates, so if I choose somewhere other than Northwestern, I can extricate myself from this relationship in a relatively painless way. Career wise, though, Northwestern is where I should be. I’ve made connections here, and since I’m not a fortunate son with a daddy on the bench or in corporate law, I need every hand up I can get.
The fact that I’m even considering another school is proof of how much I want to be free of her. And I care about her. I do. I care enough that the idea of hurting her pains me. Initiating a break-up literally fills me with dread, so much so that I play a game with myself sometimes. It’s called: What if I did wind up with Samantha?
Would it be so bad? I get along great with her parents, know I’ll fit right into the fold. She’s good to me, has proven time and time again that she cares about me. Samantha doesn’t come with the baggage of a fucked-up background like I do, and I reason that can only bode well for a relationship. Fact is, I can see how my life with her will play out, and it’s not a bad life. But deep down I know it will be like a custom-tailored suit that still doesn’t fit quite right.
I’m back in my room now, exhausted from the effort it took to keep the smile on my face tonight. I slip the picture out of its frame. I keep it tucked behind the one of me, Tim and Mike that sits on my desk. It’s been so long that I don’t know if I’d be able to see her face if I didn’t have this picture to remind me. It feels ridiculous to think of her the way I do. I’m still stuck on a sixteen-year-old girl when she’s not that person anymore.
But this faded picture in my hands is everything. It’s a reminder that I’m capable of love, the kind of love for another person that consumes you. It’s a reminder of why I can never make a life with Samantha.
When I took her home tonight, I wanted to leave her at the door, avoid the lie I’ve be telling her with my kisses and with my touch. She was happy tonight, happy for my success and envisioning her place in the future I have, one that is all but guaranteed now. I couldn’t do it, couldn’t hurt her tonight. So when she drew me into her room, when she undressed and invited me in, I went to her. I closed my eyes and saw the face of another girl, remembered the feel of someone else’s skin when I held her body beneath mine.
I made love to Charlotte.
I always do.
Part Three : A Sort of Homecoming
Chapter Twenty-Three
Charlotte
“We should get going, Charlotte. Long drive ahead of us.”
“Yeah, I’m coming.”
Lawrence looks as sad and as washed out as I do. The past three weeks have been among the most trying of my life. Right up there with finding out I was pregnant, my baby’ life-saving surgery, and the harrowing weeks spent last winter nursing Ethan through a respiratory infection that landed him back in the hospital.
I’d been on such a high. Half-way through my sophomore year, I’m kicking ass in school. I’ve made friends, a few guys and girls in my dance ensemble group mostly, and a few acquaintances from study groups. Ethan, now almost three, has weathered storms but is healthy and happy. It’s like the rug has been pulled out from underneath me just when I was starting to feel so…normal.
