Page 10 of Practice Makes Perfect (Pine Barren University #2)
Before I can respond, the bathroom door opens and Declan emerges, still adjusting his sweater. His eyes meet mine, and a knowing grin spreads across his face. He gives me a wink that makes me want to evaporate on the spot, given what happened with his friend the night before.
“Well, I should probably head out,” he says, strolling over to kiss Lea on the forehead. “Let you two catch up.”
“You don’t have to go,” I say quickly, willing to endure Declan’s presence if it means postponing Lea’s inevitable interrogation.
“Oh, I definitely do.” He chuckles and heads for the door. “Best friend time is important, especially when said best friend hooked up with the campus stallion.”
My face heats to nuclear levels. “I didn’t?—”
But he’s already gone, the door clicking shut behind him.
Lea’s face is practically vibrating with excitement as she sets her mug down and pats the spot beside her on the sofa. “Well?”
I dump my bag by the door and trudge over, delaying the inevitable. “Well what?”
“Don’t play dumb with me, Em Dubois. You left O’Neil’s with Linc Garcia, then you’ve been AWOL all day, including avoiding my texts. So…” She leans forward, eyes sparkling. “I want all the dirty details. Was he as good in bed as everyone says?”
I feel my face—my whole body—utterly and completely sag. Reading my body language like a book, Lea stops abruptly, her enthusiasm fading as she actually looks at my face. Her expression shifts from excited gossip-hunter to concerned friend instantly.
“Em?” she asks, gentler now. “What happened? Are you OK?”
I collapse onto her bed and stare at the ceiling. “Nothing happened.”
“Nothing nothing? Or something nothing that you don’t want to talk about?”
I sigh, covering my face with my hands. “Closer to the second one.”
“Did he…” Her voice takes on a dangerous edge I’ve only heard a few times before. “Did he do something you didn’t want?”
“No!” I sit up quickly. “No, it wasn’t like that. He was…” I search for the right word. “He was perfect, actually.”
The tension leaves Lea’s shoulders. “Then what happened? Because you look like someone ran over your puppy, backed up, and ran over it again.”
I laugh despite myself. “That’s a horrifying image.”
“Stop deflecting,” she says, nudging me with her shoulder.
“It wasn’t the worst,” I mumble. “It was… nice. Until it wasn’t.”
She waits, giving me space to continue, but when I don’t, she pokes me in the ribs. “Time for a bit of your own medicine, Em. I’ve spilled my guts to you about Declan for months—including the bits involving literal snot-coming-out-of-my-nose crying—so tell me what happened.”
I take a deep breath, steeling myself. “We went back to his place. Things were… progressing. And then he asked if he could unbutton my jeans, and I freaked out. Like, full-on panic attack freaked out. I pushed him off me and ran out of there so fast I’m surprised I didn’t break the sound barrier, and then?—”
“Whoa, slow down, you’re in turbo mode again…” Lea smiles and puts a hand on my leg, trying to calm me. “So… why?”
“Because there was a guy in high school who freaked out and destroyed my reputation when I said ‘no’ and I haven’t been with a guy since, OK?” I blurt out.
“That’s… Em, I’m so sorry,” she says, wrapping me in a hug. “And did you tell him?”
I close my eyes, trying to calm my racing brain. “There wasn’t time for a heart-to-heart between my freak-out and my Olympic-worthy sprint to the elevator.”
She grabs my hand and squeezes it. “Em, he probably thinks he did something wrong.”
“I know.” I groan and flop back onto the bed. “But what was I supposed to say? ‘Sorry, it’s not you, it’s my intimacy issues from high school?’ How lame is that?”
“Maybe not in those exact words,” she says gently, clearly aware she’s walking in a minefield. “But something.”
I shake my head. “It doesn’t matter. It’s not like there’s going to be a second chance.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Trust me, I do. Guys like Linc don’t waste time on—” I gesture vaguely to myself. “Whatever this is.”
“Hey.” She bumps my shoulder with hers. “Be kinder to yourself. After what happened?—”
“I don’t want to talk about that, Lea.” The words come out sharper than I intended. “I’m sorry, but I can’t.”
“You never do,” she says softly. “But maybe you should. With someone. It doesn’t have to be me.”
I stare down at my hands, picking at a hangnail until it bleeds. “It was a long time ago.”
“Not that long.”
“Four years.”
“And in those four years, how many guys have you dated?”
The question hangs in the air between us. We both know the answer.
“I don’t know what happened back then, Em, and I’m not saying you need to jump into bed with the next guy who looks at you,” Lea continues. “But maybe avoiding relationships entirely hasn’t been the healthiest coping mechanism for you?”
I feel something crack inside me, like ice breaking on a frozen lake. “I had a bad experience, OK? Late in high school. This guy, he…” I swallow hard. “He wasn’t who I thought he was. And when I wouldn’t… when I told him no… he made sure everyone thought I was the problem.”
It’s the most I’ve told anyone at college about Derek.
Lea’s eyes soften with understanding. “Em, I had no idea. Are you sure you’re ready to put yourself out there again?”
I chew on my lower lip. “Yes. No. Maybe? I don’t know.” I laugh without humor. “That about covers all possible answers, right?”
“Not quite.” Lea smiles. “The honest answer is probably somewhere in the paragraph of thoughts racing through your head right now.”
She knows me too well. My brain is indeed whirring with a thousand different responses, each one fighting to get out first.
“I’m actually proud of myself for last night,” I finally admit. “I mean, not the running-away part. But before that, I was forward, Lea. I asked him to go outside. I kissed him without overthinking it. For about ten glorious minutes, I felt… normal.”
“That’s huge progress.”
“But my inexperience—” I shake my head, frustrated. “It’s like trying to climb Mount Everest when everyone else is already at the summit having a picnic. Linc has probably been with dozens of girls who knew what they were doing. And I’m over here needing an instruction manual for kissing.”
Lea shifts on the bed, careful consideration in her eyes. “First of all, you do not need an instruction manual for kissing. I saw you and Linc at O’Neil’s, and trust me, whatever you were doing was working just fine. So this is a victory, not a failure.”
I pull one of her pillows to my chest and hug it. “It doesn’t feel that way at the moment.”
“Because you’re focusing on the wrong part.” She gently pulls the pillow away. “Focus on the part where you took a step forward, not where you stumbled.”
“I am, to some extent, believe it or not…” I shrug. “In fact, I’ve worked up a plan to start dating again.”
Lea nods, her eyes thoughtful. “Knowing you, it is probably color-coded and laminated.”
“It’s not laminated,” I protest. “It’s… in a spreadsheet.”
She laughs. “Of course it is. Let me guess—organized by likelihood of success?”
“No, actually.” I grin, suddenly feeling a little better.
“I’d planned to start with the dating apps, but they’re…
ick. Then I decided to go all in with Linc…
but now I think I need a new approach: get with someone who understands that I might need to take things slow, and who won’t pressure me or get frustrated. ”
“That sounds reasonable.”
“And definitely not an athlete.”
Lea’s eyebrows climb toward her hairline. “What’s wrong with athletes?”
“Nothing’s wrong with them,” I say quickly, aware that her boyfriend is one. “But they’re like… gods on campus. Everyone wants them, everyone knows them, and they have way too much experience. Everything with them is high stakes and very, very public.”
“So what you’re saying is, you want a nice, hot nerd.”
I laugh, feeling some of the tension leave my body. “Exactly. A nice, hot nerd who won’t mind if I need to take things slow.”
“I’m not sure I know many nice, hot nerds. But…” Her eyes light up. “There are a couple of parties this weekend. We’ll go, scout the scene, and find you a nice, non-threatening nerd who thinks calculus is sexy and won’t mind taking things at whatever pace you need.”
The idea isn’t terrible. And it beats sitting around feeling sorry for myself.
“Fine,” I sigh.
Lea raises her hand. “I promise to be the best wing woman at Pine Barren.”
I feel a surge of gratitude. “Thanks, Lea.”