Consumed: A MMA Sports Romance (37 page)

I writhed and squirmed on the couch,
thinking that my reaction had painted me firmly as the naïve freshman girl who
thought that sleeping with someone meant something—the insecure,
hyper-sensitive girl who was probably a virgin. I wanted to go back to the
dining hall and tell everyone who had seen me dumping Zack’s food on him that I
wasn’t a virgin—that I wasn’t naïve, or a dumb, freshman girl. That the reason
I had thought it meant something was that Zack and I had a history. But that
would only make it worse. I buried my face in the throw pillow and groaned,
picking my head up and letting it fall over and over again. It was so stupid to
think about Zack. I should have just let it go and never thought of him again.

I had no idea if the girl Zack had been
talking to was his girlfriend, or some other girl he was sleeping with, or even
just a friend as he claimed. He had seemed pretty close to her; he had seemed
comfortable with her. It grated on my nerves that Zack could have had sex with
me for the first time since we’d broken up and just consider it regular sex
while I was completely and totally hung up on him without even knowing if he
was really single.

I heard the dorm room door open and close
and looked up to see Jess, her face dancing with amusement, her eyes
practically sparkling. “Evie! Baby girl! Is it true what I heard?”

I groaned and sat up. “That depends,” I
replied, rubbing at my face to get rid of the last traces of tears I had shed
over my own stupidity. “What did you hear?”

Jess laughed and sat down. “I heard you
humiliated Zack in the dining hall. Someone said you dumped his lunch over his
head.”

My cheeks burned and I buried my face in
my hands. “Ugh, please tell me that only a handful of people saw that. I feel
like such an idiot for doing it.”

Jess shook her head when I looked up.
“It’s all over campus. Trust me, no one thinks you were an idiot—there are some
girls who want to elect you class president for it!”

I smiled slightly. So it was true then:
Zack had been sleeping around since we broke up, as soon as he got to college.

“Yeah, but I’m sure plenty of people are
calling me a naïve freshie who thought a one-night stand actually meant
something.”

Jess shrugged. “If there are, who cares
about them? I’ve told a few people you and Zack had a history, so it’s going
around that he’s the kind of stupid asshole who sleeps with an ex and expects
it to mean nothing.”

I chuckled. “As long as he’s the one who’s
being called an idiot, I guess that’s okay.” I sighed. I wanted a shower—in
spite of the fact that I’d already had one that morning. “I thought I had zero
feelings for him. Like—I thought I was completely over the breakup, Jess. I
didn’t expect to see him at that party, and I didn’t even think of him when we
went to that game.”

Jess shrugged, shaking her head. “That’s
the thing with exes. You think you’re over them and then boom! You get
blindsided by feelings the next time you see them.” She shook her head again.
“But I do have to say, if you had to get involved with an ex, Zack isn’t hard
on the eyes. And you said you had a good time.”

I blushed. “He was…much better in bed than
I remembered. I guess that’s part of why I sort of…let myself think that there
was more to it than just sex.”

“Girlie, there is more to it than just
sex, even if Zack doesn’t think so. He had to know it when he got you back to
his place. I never saw a guy work harder to convince a girl to take a walk with
him.”

I rolled my eyes. “That might be because
you never make them work very hard if you’re interested in them, and if you’re
not interested, you shut them down early.”

Jess laughed. “It works for me. Look,
Evie: don’t think about it too much. You ran into an ex, you screwed him; he
turned out to be an ass. It happens. Just take delight in the fact that there
are plenty of girls who won’t screw him now.”

I chuckled, but in spite of the fact that
I was feeling—at least a little bit—better, I couldn’t quite make myself stop
thinking about Zack. Had I been totally wrong about him when we’d been dating
as teenagers? And why couldn’t I get him out of my mind now?

CHAPTER
TWO

A few days later, after I had gotten over
my humiliation, I decided that I was being stupid. I would just put Zack out of
my mind completely and plunge back into my studies. I’d get a fresh start and forget
that anything had ever happened between us. It was a big enough campus; as long
as I didn’t go to any more frat parties, my chances of running into him were
not that great. I put him out of my mind completely and told myself that there
were plenty of other things that I could fill my time with and enjoy more. The
biggest thing on my mind was the first meeting of the campus newspaper; I had
read up on all of the threads in the group forum the newspaper used, and
familiarized myself with the style guide, just like Professor Grant suggested
in class. I expected my first assignment would be a softball—something hard to
screw up, that would give them a chance to evaluate my ability to do the work.
But that didn’t mean I could slack off on it; I should turn in the absolute
best work that I could.

I grabbed a coffee before the meeting and
hurried down to the student union so I wouldn’t be late. I’d been to the
student U a few times in the weeks I’d been at the college so far but never
really paid the building that much attention; there were banners for our
football team, of course, and all kinds of things covered in the school colors.
Just inside the entrance there were benches and couches scattered around for
chatting and relaxing, and artwork by students was on display. I could smell
coffee—clearly I wasn’t the only one who needed a lift—and the lingering smells
of a party given by the Latin American Club a little earlier in the afternoon.
It felt homey and comforting, and I started to relax.

I went into the room that the campus
newspaper had taken for its own and sat down; there were the same beat-up
couches as in the big room, a couple of desks, a projection screen, and a
podium. Professor Grant was already there, as were a few of the members of the
editorial board. “Ahh, Evelyn, thanks for getting here early.” Dr. Grant said,
looking up from his laptop. “Michelle, Lisa, Alex, Nathan, this is Evelyn.
She’s one of my most promising freshmen and I thought you’d like to give her a
shot.”

The editor-in-chief of the newspaper,
Lisa, came over and shook my hand. “Good idea to bring coffee,” she said with a
grin. She was a bit shorter than me, with auburn hair and creamy skin, dressed
in a kind of fashionable-librarian look that I had to kind of admire. “These
meetings end up going on for hours sometimes, people arguing about pitches,
trying to campaign to keep a piece in contention.”

“Not that different from a regular
newspaper then, I guess,” I said, feeling a little nervous. I had no idea of
any ideas to pitch.

“Of course, since you’re new, you won’t be
pitching for a few weeks. We’ll give you a few assignments to sort of feel out
your aptitude. Every newbie gets to do a rotation of the different areas—so
even if you start out in say, politics, you probably won’t be there permanently
unless you decide you want to be.”

I nodded. Other members of the newspaper
started to file in and I took my seat at the back of the room, wanting to just
observe. Since I had no articles to pitch, I didn’t really have a dog in the
fight. I opened up my laptop and got ready to take notes, just in case there
was anything I needed to remember later.

I quickly got to see what Lisa meant; as
the meeting came to order, everyone started putting their ideas forward,
arguing for their pitches, for a better position in the finished paper—anything
and everything a group of journalists could possibly argue about. I drank down
my coffee and listened, taking occasional notes about what people were saying
about the paper’s layout and other details. I lost track of time, but it had to
be a couple of hours—I was glad that the meeting was after all my classes, and
that they’d ordered in pizza, because the dining hall would almost definitely
be closed by the time it was over.

“Okay!” Lisa said, taking a deep breath as
the arguments came to a close. “Now that we’ve gotten all that out of the way,
it’s time for assignments. There’s a fencing tournament that needs at least a
little coverage—Simon, you can take that one since you’re friends with someone
on the fencing club. There’s also a big event by the Feminist Club; Elizabeth,
that one’s all you.” Lisa went through a list and I waited my turn, knowing
that I would probably not get a very plum assignment. Finally, Lisa came to the
last item. “The football season is coming to a close, so we need to cover the
last game. Evelyn, it’s kind of a big one—but I think from what Professor Grant
said about your writing that you can cover it. I’ll also need you to get an
interview with the QB; everyone’s talking about him. Zack’s his name I think?
Have you met him?”

I fought back the deep, hot blush I felt
starting across my cheeks. “He and I went to the same high school,” I said,
struggling to keep my voice neutral. I swallowed the lump I could feel forming
in my throat, wondering if the people looking at me had been in the dining hall
when I’d had my scuffle with Zack.

“Awesome—then it should be easy to get him
to give us some good snippets. Deadline is Sunday night—we’re publishing
Monday.”

I was glad I wasn’t on the editorial
board; there’d be a lot of last-minute editing and proofing. The game would be
Saturday—I had a few days to prepare myself for it. I smiled as graciously as I
could as everyone started to clear out of the room, talking about their
assignments and the deadline. I went back to my dorm full of pizza and coffee,
telling myself I would get back to work right away—get some homework done,
maybe do some studying. But as soon as I was in my room, I sank down onto the
bed and groaned, covering my face with my hands. It wasn’t fair. I had wanted
to make a clean break and get a fresh start, and here it was: I had to
interview Zack for the newspaper. It was as if the Universe was forcing me to
deal with that jerk. I shook my head and buried my face in my pillows, wishing
that there was some way that I could turn down the assignment without making
myself look like an idiot or making Professor Grant doubt me.

Suck
it up, Evelyn,
I told myself firmly, giving myself a
shake and sitting up.
This isn’t the last
time you’re going to have to deal with awkwardness. Do the interview, write the
article, and be done with it.

CHAPTER
THREE

I was still trying to figure out what
exactly I was going to do about the situation with Zack when I got out of my
classes the next day —it would be awkward no matter what. I walked across the
campus wishing I’d grabbed a thicker sweater; it was starting to get cold. I
gritted my teeth and reminded myself I was headed to the library, where it was
always warm. It would be colder once it got out closer to sunset, but the dorms
weren’t that far. I could grab a heavier sweater before I went to the dining
hall for dinner.

I had been consciously avoiding Zack ever
since I’d made my decision to get a fresh start. That wouldn’t work, of course,
with the interview I had to get with him. But at least the library was
somewhere I wouldn’t have to think about him. I could just get some studying
done and pretend like he didn’t exist for a couple of hours. It was a relief.

I went into the library and found myself
instantly relaxing, muscles I hadn’t even known were tense beginning to uncoil
along my back and shoulders. I took a deep breath—the library smelled like
books, a faint trace of ozone from the copiers and computers, and something
clean and lemony. I’d come to the library almost every day since classes
officially started—though I’d changed up my time slightly in recent weeks. It
was comfortable and homey to me. I made my way past the circulation and
services desk and into the library proper, taking off my sweater; the
classrooms were all pretty chilly, but the library always seemed to be a little
warmer than any other building on campus except the student union.

I found a seat in the quiet section,
sitting down next to a girl I didn’t know; it was oddly busy—sometimes I’d go
into the library and there would be no one but me and the staff. I didn’t think
anything of it; after all, midterms were coming up, and people were probably
cramming and making up for last time. I got out my American History textbook
and my notebook, and started to flip through for the section we were currently
covering. In the thick silence of the quiet section, I heard the library
entrance doors squeak open and looked up in spite of my determination to plunge
into my studying.

Of all of the people to come walking into
the library, it had to be him. I almost groaned as I caught sight of Zack
walking past the circulation desk and heading to a different section of the
library, not even looking around as he made his way past the section I was in.
In a million years, I would never have guessed I would see Zack in the library
looking as if he knew exactly where he was going, looking focused. I knew I was
staring. I couldn’t believe my eyes; Zack, who had barely kept up his grades enough
to get through high school, who had always joked about my bookworm habits, was
in the campus library, textbooks in hand, looking as if he was going in for a
prolonged jam session of studying.