“What else goes on at these frat parties? Girls must be throwing themselves at you, right?” Kelsey knew she should stop, but she couldn’t. She was in a pit, alone, and she wanted to drag Davis down with her.
Davis lifted his hands. “Where are you getting this stuff?”
She kept her voice loud. “I’m curious.”
“You’re picking a fight.”
“Tell me, then.” Her chest was in knots, and she wished she could press it, smooth it, beat it all out. The liar that she was. The hypocrite. “If you’re so sure, then tell me.”
“I’m not going to fight with you, Kelsey,” Davis said, his eyebrows raised. “Yell at me, fine. I’m sorry I didn’t call you about the stupid arrest. But don’t accuse me of things I haven’t done.”
Kelsey’s stomach turned when she realized the real reason she was doing this. If Davis could admit he wasn’t the perfect boyfriend, maybe she wasn’t so bad herself. Her voice came out quieter this time. “You’ve never cheated on me?”
Davis’s face didn’t change. Kelsey couldn’t tell if he was hiding how he really felt, or if he just didn’t feel anything but disbelief to begin with.
“I’ve never cheated on you,” he said, and that was that.
Kelsey couldn’t fight anymore. And what’s worse, she knew Davis was telling the truth. She was already sorry. But she wasn’t going to show it. He didn’t seem to need the apology. He wasn’t even angry.
Kelsey shrugged and said, “Well, when you do, tell me. People tell each other these things.”
They finished their food without a word. Davis reached out for her hand, and Kelsey let him hold it, limp.
When the waitress brought the check, Kelsey stood up, walked through the tables, out the door, and waited, shivering, on the sidewalk.
A few minutes later, Davis emerged from the restaurant and put her coat around her shoulders.
“What do you want to do now?” he asked.
“I think I should just go home.”
They got into Davis’s SUV and sat as it idled, warming up. After a moment, he asked, “Since when have you been jealous? You’ve never been jealous before.”
“Things change,” she answered.
Davis took a deep breath. “I’m sorry, Kels. I’m just not sure what I’m supposed to be sorry for.”
On the ride home, she wondered if he would ever bring it up again, or if he’d just try to pretend the fight had never happened, like always. When they were a block away from her house, she looked over, trying to read his expression.
Davis’s face was outlined in light from the half-moon. His mouth was straight and resting, his eyes as calm as a stranger’s. She didn’t know what he was thinking, and wondered if she ever would.
2/19, 12:25 pm
From: Farrow, Peter W SPC
To: Maxfield, Michelle
Subject: Last one in a while
Beautiful Michelle,
We’ve stopped in Galuch Valley. It is HOT HOT HOT. I live in a big tent that doesn’t do much to keep the sand out. I’m like the walking crust man. There appears to be no plumbing, and hardly any food, but we have Internet. The advantages of military intelligence, I guess.
With all this Willy Wonka talk, you’re making me miss American candy. As I sit here, that’s what I miss most (besides you) (and my family) (and my dog). Nougat. Are you familiar with nougat? It’s the cloud of chocolate nonsense that fills a 3 Musketeers bar. It’s like solid but not quite. It’s almost salty, too. Just the slightest hint of hazelnut. Then the contrast of chocolate shell, hiding it but hinting at its presence little by little as you bite away, peeling the softness. And putting seven sour Skittles in your mouth at once. I used to just sit on my back patio and go through a whole bag of those suckers. Salty-sweet-sour-salty-sweet-sour. I think I’m hungry. Or maybe I’m thirsty. Sorry to waste an email on candy, meant to write more but there are like ten people behind me waiting to use this computer, including Sam so he can email his dogs back home. Just joking, Sam. You can’t email a dog. I think I’m hungry and delirious.
Yours,
Peter
2/20, 2:13 pm
From: Maxfield, Michelle
To: Farrow, Peter W SPC
Subject: Sexy pics (3 attachments)
Pictures of nougat attached. What did you think it was?!
Open at your own risk.…
xo
Michelle
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Several days later Kelsey was sitting on her side of the porch, trying to keep a pile of Art History notecards from escaping into the March wind as she studied. The smell of grilled burgers hung in the air, as it often did when her father tested recipes for the restaurants’ annual menu changes. Kelsey was happy to see him experimenting with portabella mushrooms for the sake of the vegetarians. It was in memory of Mitch, he told her. Meanwhile, her mother had attempted to organize the growing stacks of marked-up papers and books that now nearly hid her wild hair as she sat at her desk. “Organize” apparently meant “buy plastic bins from Target and let them sit near the stacks of papers,” but at least she was trying. They were all trying, even Kelsey. Midterms were coming up.
From Art Through the Ages, she read, “In Cubist artwork, objects are analyzed, broken up, and reassembled in an abstracted form—instead of depicting objects from one viewpoint, the artist depicts the subject from a multitude of viewpoints to represent the subject in a greater context.”
Like looking at an ice cube that has broken on the floor, she wrote in the margins. Looking at all angles of something three dimensional all at once.
It was nice to be at home in the afternoon.
Basketball season was over, so dance practice wouldn’t resume until after spring break. She and Gillian had been carefully toeing the line between the way they used to be and the way they were, just enough to convince everyone at school that nothing was wrong.
Kelsey and Davis had exchanged conciliatory texts, then emoticons and funny pictures, because that was the way they did things, and her senior year was passing so quickly, and the work was piling on, and it was easy to forget a fight when mint-green leaves were poking through the soggy ground. And today, Peter was supposed to call. When he called, nothing else seemed as important.
Right on time, bright beeps floated from the laptop beside her. Out of habit, Kelsey wiped her eyes, then remembered she wasn’t wearing makeup today. Her hair was already down, too, waving just like Michelle’s in the cool, wet air.
Peter was in a gray army-issue T-shirt, the too-powerful floodlights casting definition on his chest, the tattoo on his forearm. It was night there. When he saw her, he clapped his hands together, giving her the biggest smile Kelsey had ever seen.
“Guess what?”
“You’re not in your uniform,” Kelsey observed.
“These are my pajamas,” Peter said, dismissing them with a pluck of his sleeve. “So, I’ve got—”
“When do you get to wear the fancy version of your uniform, the one with the hat?”
“Privates don’t get fancy uniforms, and I think you’re thinking of the Marines. Anyway, I—”
“You do have a hat, though,” Kelsey said, her smile growing as Peter got more and more flustered. She liked to tease him, especially since she could tell whatever news he had was good.
“Hey!” he called out. “Yes, I have a frickin’ hat! But, that’s not what I want to tell you.”
Kelsey waited, folding her hands calmly as if to say, I’m all ears.