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“Sorry, babe.” She didn’t sound that sorry. “Maria’s boy is visiting while he, like, figures out his life, and Ashley’s sister is here this week and she’s got the living room couch.”
“I can sleep on the floor.” I gritted my teeth. I hated, hated, hated begging like this.
“You know, there are so many fricking people in our apartment already, I just don’t think so. It takes forever to get the shower, and I cannotget any privacy…”
I rubbed my forehead, then turned involuntarily. Patrick still stood at the lamppost, flipping his phone back and forth in his mammoth hand. His expression had changed. No longer amused, but alive, curious.
My lips were parted. My eyes were wide. They were glued to the face of this almost-stranger, pleading with him to help me in a way I’d never do with anyone I actually knew.
He looked right back at me with a slight smile. A flare of cold rolled over my shoulders and turned into heat between my legs. Suddenly, I could feel his lips on my neck. That smile. His huge hands were tangling in my hair. Unzipping my coat, slipping under my sweater…
Poor little girl,a deep voice murmured in my head.You’re in such a mess, and you’ve only got yourself to blame.
Pulling myself together, I gave him some serious side-eye. He looked down at his phone.
“Okay. I get it,” I chirped to Sydney. “No big deal.”
“Ask your parents, girl. They’ll help you.”
“Mm-hm.”
Sydney didn’t understand my relationship with my parents. When she needed something, she phoned Daddy.I call him Dada,she’d say.It’s his downfall.
If I called my parents, it would be a totally different conversation.
Christina, we are beyond disappointed in you. How could you let this happen? This isn’t how we act in the Ramirez family. The agreement is that we pay rent and you pay utilities. You need to handle this on your own so you can learn some responsibility. Has your sister ever screwed up like this? No. Alexis would never, ever…
“Maybe you can find someone to keep you warm tonight,” Sydney said helpfully. “Dexter misses you. When I run into him, all he talks about is Christina, all the time. Except when he talks about his band. Why’d you dump him, anyway? You know how many girls would kill for that? Everyone wants him when they hear him sing.”
My stomach knotted. My ex-boyfriend couldn’t understand either why I’d dumped him during December finals. He’d sent incessant texts over winter break — that he was so worried about me, that I wasn’t myself, that I was drinking more and pushing away the people who cared the most.
“They can have him,” I said airily. “He’s a good guy, but not such hot stuff in the bedroom, you know? He’d finish in, like, two minutes, and I never finished at all. Besides, I’d never hook up with someone just for a warm bed to sleep in.”
“You’re a better woman than I am. See you, babes.”
I stared at the phone after she disconnected.
My throat was tight. My eyes prickled. I didn’t dare look up to see if Patrick was still there. One glance at those eyes, and I’d make some kind of terrible decision.
Instead, I got to my feet, stumbled around the corner of the nearest building, leaned my forehead against the frozen stone, and cried.
The tears were hot on my cold cheeks. I hated crying. I hadn’t done it in years, and never in front of other people. I buried my face in the puffy sleeve of my coat as my nose ran and hoped no one was watching. I felt horribly alone.
Finally, I stopped choking and my vision cleared. As I looked for a tissue in my purse, a piece of paper in the snow caught my eye.
A frat party invitation. Tonight, at Kappa Sigma.
I recognized it, because I had an identical invitation at home from my friend James. Someone must have dropped it. Maybe Kappa Sig was desperate enough for guests to throw exclusivity to the wind.
I stooped to pick up the invitation. A tiny inscription at the bottom, in inhumanly neat handwriting, stopped me short.
Meet me 11 pm
That was all it said. The party started at ten.
I knew that handwriting. I’d only seen it once, but it was burned on my brain.
This invitation hadn’t fallen in the snow by accident.
