Page 42

WILLOW

B y the time I make it back to my dorm, I feel like my bones have been replaced with boulders. My arms barely work as I swipe my card and push it open. The hallway and common area are empty and everything would be quiet if it wasn’t for the muffled thud of someone’s music playing from their room.

I somehow make it to my room and let the door slam shut behind me with more force than necessary. My backpack hits the floor as I shrug it off my shoulders and I’m only slightly grateful that I left my laptop here, so it didn’t suffer any injuries when my bag hit the ground.

My temples are pounding, and I know it’s from the exhaustion that is settling into my body.

I press my fingertips against them, trying to massage away the tension that's been building all day.

Between this being the first week back at Crestwood and figuring out my new classes, the things I need to do for Crestwood Chronicle, and pretending everything is normal when nothing feels normal anymore, I'm completely drained.

I collapse backward onto my bed without bothering to take off my shoes. Honestly, they’re the only thing keeping me from passing out right here and now. Moments like this, I’m glad that I don’t have a roommate because no one can judge me for how I look right now.

I only get about a minute before my ringtone begins to play. Part of me wonders why my phone couldn’t break when my bag hit the floor, but the other part of me knows I would be upset and Mom would be pissed if that happened, so here we are.

I somehow make it off my bed and manage to get to my bag without my entire body dropping to the floor. I pull my phone out and see that it’s Ari.

And if there is one person who will not accept “Sorry, fell asleep!” as a valid excuse for avoiding her calls, it’s her. Well, sometimes.

It takes a second for my guilt to beat out exhaustion. “Hey,” I answer as I flop back down on my bed.

“Willow? Girl, what’s up?” Ari’s voice is all bright, which instantly makes me want to crawl under the bed and die. “You alive? You sound like you got hit by a bus.”

It’s too much. All of it, all at once. I almost say as much. “It was only a small one,” I mumble. “I’ll recover in a semester or two.”

She snorts and it almost makes me want to laugh. “You know I take time out of my busy schedule to check in and this is the thanks I get. You should feel so lucky I don’t call your mother and file a missing person’s report.”

“I think she’d up the reward if you told her I was already dead.”

“You’re such a drama queen,” she says, and I almost laugh for real because look who’s talking. “You want me to bring you a funeral casserole, or do you want to actually tell me what’s up?”

I close my eyes and picture her: stretched out across her own twin bed, laptop open to six tabs, a legal pad of to-do lists on her knees, her phone always tucked between chin and shoulder.

It almost makes me feel better knowing that somewhere on campus her room is just as full of chaos as mine. Except hers is much neater chaos.

“I’m fine. Really,” I say, trying to sell this version of events to her even though I know it won’t work.

“You’re a lousy liar,” she says. “I’ve known you for too long, Wills. If you’re going to lie, at least make it believable. Or sell the rights to your fictional tale to Hollywood.”

There's nothing I can say that will stop her, so I just roll my eyes and sigh. “Fine. Everything’s fine. Classes are fine. Campus is fine.”

“Put all that in writing and I might believe you,” she says. “Have you seen Blaise on campus yet?”

I refuse to let her know this question actually makes my heartbeat speed up. “It’s the first week, Ari, I’ve barely seen anyone. Except for professors and the people that work in the dining hall. Oh Madison and I grabbed coffee at Brewed Beginnings yesterday.”

“Liar,” she says again, stretching the word until I can feel her suspicion reaching through the phone. “I’ve seen you track down people for interviews like you worked for the FBI, but you haven’t seen Blaise.”

I pinch my nose, try to keep my voice even. “Maybe a couple times. He’s around.”

Ari goes silent for a bit. I can hear her flipping a page. “You haven’t talked?”

I pause for a second before I respond. “Yes. We’ve been texting a lot actually. But we’re both trying to keep it low-key.” There. I said it.

Ari knows more than anyone how much I edit myself because sometimes I just don’t want to get into the details of the topic at hand.

Which is funny given what I’m studying and what I plan to do after graduation.

Based on the fact that she’s still silent, I’m sure she’s glaring at her phone because she’s on high alert after that answer.

“And how’s that going? Is he being normal? ”

“He writes essays for texts every so often, but I have no idea if that’s normal for him. Let’s be real, he’s probably using me as a warmup for his poli sci mid-terms.”

She makes a fake gagging sound. “Hot. There’s nothing sexier than a bibliography.”

“Or a thesis statement,” I say with a straight face and immediately regret giving her a joke to run with.

That makes her laugh. "Do you two even sext or do you just cite sources and argue about Oxford commas the entire time?"

"We don't argue about Oxford commas," I say, fighting a yawn. "We agree. The Oxford comma is essential and anyone who thinks otherwise is a monster."

Ari isn’t amused with me. "You are a lost cause. I bet your couples’ safe word is Chicago Manual."

That does it. I snort, which sets off a round of coughing, which in turn makes my brain feel like it’s been shaken inside a snow globe. "Okay, so maybe we text like nerds. It’s not the worst thing."

"Yeah, okay, but the lack of gossip is offensive. Has he said anything about seeing you again? Going on dates? Hellooooooo.”

“Honestly, nothing major to report,” I say, fighting the urge to prop my phone on my face and close my eyes. “We’re both busy and don’t want to anyone to run and tell Knox. That’s the deal.”

"That's smart," Ari says, though I can hear the disappointment in her voice. She loves drama that doesn’t include her almost as much as she loves solving other people's problems. "But seriously, after Puerto Rico and everything that happened between you two, I'm surprised you're managing to keep things so. ..casual."

Puerto Rico. Just thinking about it makes me wish I was back there. I haven't told Ari everything yet, but she knows enough. She knows everything changed there and now we’re just in this limbo of our own making.

"It's not casual," I say quietly. "It's just...careful."

"Careful can be good," she agrees. "But don't be so careful you miss out on something real."

I want to tell her that it already feels real.

That the texts we send aren't just intellectual foreplay, but actual conversations that mean something to me.

That I find myself checking my phone constantly, not for assignments or deadlines, but for his name on my screen.

But that's exactly the kind of thing I can't say out loud. Not yet.

"Speaking of real," Ari continues, "we need to catch up properly. I feel like I haven't seen your face in forever. Want to grab lunch tomorrow?”

"Tomorrow sounds perfect," I say, already feeling a little lighter at the thought of seeing her. "I could use some normal human interaction that doesn't involve pretending I'm fine when I'm not."

"Good. I’ll text you. We can grab sandwiches, and you can tell me all the things you're not telling me right now."

"Deal. But I'm warning you, it might be boring."

"Honey, your life has never been boring. Complicated as hell, yes. Boring, never."

After we hang up, I let my phone drop onto my bed and stare at the ceiling.

I should probably get up, take a shower, do something productive with what's left of the evening.

Instead, I just lie here, too tired to move but too wired to actually fall asleep.

My fingers reach for my phone again before I can stop myself.

I know I should leave it alone and try to get some actual rest, but I'm already scrolling through my messages to find Blaise's name.

Our text thread is longer than it should be for two people who are supposedly keeping things casual. The timestamps show we've been messaging daily since we got back from Puerto Rico, sometimes late into the night when we should both be sleeping.

I scroll up to yesterday's conversation and feel my stomach tighten as I reread the exchange.

Blaise: How was your day? You seemed stressed in your last message.

Me: Just the usual first-week chaos. Nothing I can't handle.

Blaise: You know you don't have to handle everything alone, right?

Me: Says the guy who probably color-codes his stress levels.

Blaise: Only on Tuesdays.

Me: Such a smartass.

Blaise: You like it when I'm a smartass.

Me: Maybe. Depends on the context.

Blaise: What context are you thinking about right now?

That's where the conversation had shifted. Where the playful banter took on a different turn that made my pulse quicken even now, reading it again.

Me: Wouldn't you like to know.

Blaise: I would. Very much.

Me: Then you'll have to use your imagination.

Blaise: My imagination has been working overtime since Puerto Rico. It's becoming a problem.

Me: What kind of problem?

Blaise: The kind that makes it hard to concentrate in practice. The kind that makes me think about your hands when I should be thinking about defensive strategies.

I remember staring at that message for a full minute before responding.

Me: Just my hands?

Blaise: Among other things.

Me: Elaborate.

Blaise: Not over text. Some things require a…face-to-face conversation.

I scroll down to this morning's messages, and the tension is even more obvious.

Blaise: Good morning. Sleep well?

Me: Define well.

Blaise: More than three hours, no nightmares, woke up in your own bed.

Me: Two out of three. You?

Blaise: Same. What's keeping you up?

And there it was. The opening for honesty that I'd completely dodged.

Me: Just the usual insomnia that I tell everyone is actually me being a night owl. You know how it is.

Blaise: I know how it is when you're avoiding something.

Me: I'm not avoiding anything.

Blaise: Aren't you?

Me: Are you psychoanalyzing me via text now?

Blaise: Would you prefer I do it in person?

Me: That's probably not a good idea.

Blaise: Why not?

Me: You know why.

Blaise: I know what you keep telling yourself. That's different.

Me: Blaise...

Blaise: What are we doing here, Willow?

Me: I don't know what you mean.

Blaise: Yes, you do.

And that's where the conversation had died hours ago. No response from either of us because what was there to say? He was right, and we both knew it. I did know what he meant, and I was avoiding it wholeheartedly.

Instead of dealing with that, I toss my phone down on my bed and walk over to my laptop. Maybe I can get some work done for the Chronicle or at least pretend to be productive while my brain processes everything that's happened today.

The desktop appears and I automatically check my email first and the only thing I find are our campus newsletter and some spam. Then I click over to Discord because why not? I haven’t checked on it in a couple of days and I do have friends that I still game with online.

There's a notification. One new message request.

My cursor hovers over the notification icon.

One message request from someone named CozyCraft4Eva .

The username is familiar, but I can’t place it.

It’s not uncommon for people to try to message because they find me through mutual gaming contacts all the time.

But something about seeing this request feels different.

I click.

CozyCraft4Eva (Lilly) : Hey. I know this is random. But I heard you used to date Leo. Something happened and I don't know who else to talk to.

The words hit me like ice water. My hands freeze over the keyboard, cursor blinking in the empty reply box. Leo. Of course it's about Leo. No matter what I do recently, it seems like I can’t get away from hearing about the fucker.

I stare at the message until the letters start to blur.

My relationship with Leo was a big deal years ago and a lot of people knew about us.

Yet this message makes my stomach want to flee my body.

This girl knows something and now I know that something happened.

Why else would she reach out when I haven’t been in Leo’s life in years?

I should close my laptop. Delete the message. Pretend I never saw it.

But my finger hovers over the keyboard, and despite every instinct screaming at me to run, I can't look away. Because this girl, there’s something about the simple message that is ringing every alarm bell in my head.

WillsNet56 : Who is this? How did you find me?

The response comes back faster than I expect, like she was sitting there waiting for me to reply.

CozyCraft4Eva (Lilly) : I'm sorry. I know this is weird. My name is Lilly. I'm a sophomore at Thornfield College. Leo and I have been...we've been seeing each other for a few months.

My blood turns to ice. The familiar nausea that comes up whenever I think about him rises in my throat as memories I've spent years burying claw their way to the surface.

WillsNet56 : What happened?

CozyCraft4Eva (Lilly) : I don't really know how to say this. But I think he's been lying to me about a lot of things. And when I asked around about his exes, your name came up. People said you two dated for a while in high school.

WillsNet56 : We did.

Two simple words that don't even begin to cover the disaster that was Leo and me. Dated makes it sound normal, healthy, like something you'd smile about years later. Not like the slow-burning nightmare it actually was.

CozyCraft4Eva (Lilly) : Can I ask what he was like? As a boyfriend, I mean. I'm starting to think I don't really know him at all. Not to mention there have been other things…

This girl has no idea what she's asking me to relive. But there's something in her messages that reminds me of myself at seventeen, confused and isolated and starting to realize that the person I loved was slowly destroying me. With that thought, I quickly make a decision on how to handle this.

WillsNet56 : Please share your story and I’ll share mine.