Learning to Fall (23 page)

“She’s getting that look in her eye again,” Whitney warned. “Better do something quick.”

Daniel made a quiet sound of amused assent before he gently cupped my jaw and kissed me, lingering over my mouth just long enough to blur away all of my anxious thoughts and questions. As I slowly relaxed, the curve of my spine settled perfectly against his chest. We fit together like two puzzle pieces that had been made for one another, and when the kiss finally ended
I
was the one clinging to
him
.

Whitney whistled and clapped her hands. “Encore! Encore!”

Blushing, I let go of Daniel’s neck and slid off his lap. “Can you give us a few minutes Whit? Please?” I added when she started to protest.

“Fine. But I was serious about that muffin sampler. I’ll be around all day tomorrow,” she said, pointing straight at Daniel. “And just so we’re clear, I want
two
of the double chocolate chip.”    

“You got it,” Daniel said. Waiting until she’d left the room, he slid his gaze up to me. “I guess this is the part where we discuss the pros and cons involved in furthering our relationship?” Though his words were serious, the grin lurking in the corners of his mouth was not. “At least, that’s what I’m assuming you’re about to say.”  

“Yes, I think that would be best.” Giving him a stern look, I retreated to the couch and sat down on the very edge. “There is a lot more we need to consider than just our…well, that is to say…um…” 

“Our chemistry?” Daniel suggested.

“Precisely.” In my sixth grade science class I’d once received a note from the boy who sat two seats behind me. I waited until after class to open it, and remember being both shocked and secretly thrilled to discover the note - scrawled out in horrible handwriting littered with various misspellings - was an invitation to be the boy’s girlfriend. The simplicity of checking
yes
or
no
had been lost on me at the time, but I yearned for it now. “Daniel, you’ve come to mean a great deal to me and I really like spending time with you-”

“I like spending time with you too, Imogen,” he said solemnly.

“-but the fact remains that you
are
my student and any personal relationship between us outside of the classroom is clearly prohibited.”

“According to who?” he demanded with a scowl. 

“The Faculty Code of Conduct. It’s really quite clear. In section four, page seventy-”

“You read the Faculty Code of Conduct?”

I blinked at him. “Of course.”

“Of course,” he echoed as a reluctant smile replaced his scowl.

“Is there…something wrong with that?” I asked hesitantly. 

“No.” The corners of his eyes crinkled as his smile deepened. “It’s just a very Imogen thing to do.”

I sat up a little straighter. “Reading the Faculty Code of Conduct is a requirement of all new employees. I’m not the only one who did it.”

“But I’m willing to bet you’re the only one who knows what’s on page seventy. It’s not an insult, little fox,” he said when I frowned. “More of an…observation.”

An observation that made me seem like a goody two-shoes, an epithet that had been following me around since grade school. Was that how Daniel saw me? As a conformist? A square? A stick-in-the-mud? Well, little did he know! “I don’t
always
follow the rules,” I informed him coolly.

“Oh no?” Stretching his long legs under the coffee table, he rested his hands on the wooden armrests of his chair, fingers enveloping the ends. “I don’t know if I believe you.”

“Are you calling me a
liar
?”

“Yeah,” he said with a lazy inclination of his head. “I think I am. Give me a few examples.”

Examples. Of course he would want examples.

“You,” I decided after a long pause.

“I’m your example?”

“Yes.”

He rubbed his chin, skimming across the golden bristle that clung to his throat and jaw. “Can’t say as I can argue with that. Seems to me like everyone should break the rules from time to time. Especially if they have a good excuse.”

“And I suppose you think you’re a good excuse?” I asked, my voice marked with suspicion as I wondered if it hadn’t been his intent all along to make our relationship seem like a good thing instead of a bad.

Clever man.

“I think I am.” His tone deepened. Grew huskier. And even though we were on opposite sides of the living room I felt the sensual weight of his gaze like a kiss when he said, “Don’t you agree, little fox?”

“I…”

“Don’t think about what you should say. Or what you think the college would want.” Gaze intent on mine, he leaned forward, forearms bracing on his knees. “What do
you
want, Imogen? Because I already know what I want. And I know I’m willing to break every damn rule in that conduct book to get it.”

“I…”

“Come hiking with me,” he said abruptly.

“What?” I stared blankly at him, quite certain I’d misunderstood. “What do you mean, hiking? As in the woods? Daniel, it’s almost the middle of January.” While I enjoyed physical activities and nature, my comfort level ended with country roads and cows. I knew when I moved to Maine I would eventually need to learn how to sail, ski, and snowshoe, but hiking had never been very high on my priority list, most likely because I’d always had a small fear of heights. Also of moose, which were far more aggressive than people realized.

“There’s a mountain just outside of Camden that only has an eight hundred foot summit.”

“Oh is that all,” I muttered under my breath.

“The trail is fairly easy. People hike it all year round. There’s even a road to drive up, although that sort of defeats the purpose. It will be fun.” He winked at me. “What do you say, little fox? Up for a little adventure? No one will be there,” he said, correctly anticipating my next objection. “We won’t be seen and it will give us all the time and the privacy we need to figure out exactly how we want to play this. And I promise I won’t try to distract you.”

“You won’t?” I asked suspiciously.

He held up three fingers. “Scout’s honor.”

Don’t think about what you
should
say.

“Yes. I will go hiking with you.”

Daniel nodded, as though he’d been expecting my answer, but I saw the faint flicker of relief in his eyes before he managed to conceal it. Unfolding his body, he stood up and stretched, twisting his lean torso side to side before he walked over to my chair. My body came alive at his presence and I braced myself for another steamy makeout session, but he only rested his hands lightly on my shoulders and kissed the top of my head. “I have to get in a run before work. I’ll pick you up tomorrow morning at eight. It’ll be cold, so wear plenty of layers and boots with insulation and rubber soles. There shouldn’t be much snow, but there might be a little ice here and there.”

“Is it safe?” I asked, a bit intimidated by the idea of trying something I’d never done before.

“Imogen.” He hooked his arms around my waist as I stood up, pulling me tight against his chest. “I would never do anything to hurt you. I hope you know that.”

The double meaning behind his words did not go unnoticed. “I know,” I said softly. “It’s just…it’s a lot. I never…I never thought I would be climbing a mountain with you.” It wasn’t ‘I love you’, but right now it was all I was capable of giving.

Daniel’s jaw clenched.

“No matter what happens,” he said fiercely, “I won’t let you fall.”

“I know you won’t.”

As we gazed into each other’s eyes, I couldn’t help but wonder if this was the last time Daniel would ever be at my house. Were we creating the first of many wonderful memories, or making one last moment to remember when we were no longer together?

Either way, I knew one thing with absolute certainty: when Daniel and I came down off that mountain, we would either be together…or we’d be broken apart.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Bangor

“So are you guys going to have sex on a tree or what?”

Not even bothering to validate Whitney’s question with a response, I kept my eyes on the road and flicked on my left blinker as I merged smoothly into traffic. An eighteen wheeler roared past, dwarfing poor little Roo and causing my knuckles to turn white as I gripped the steering wheel with unnecessary force. “How much further until the exit?”

In preparation for my little hiking adventure with Daniel tomorrow, I’d decided to drive up to Bangor, the closest city within fifty miles, to do some shopping. Whitney had agreed to ride shotgun as long as we were back by five because she had a date to dress up for and (in her words, not mine) she needed to ‘get laid yesterday’.

“Umm…hold on. I have to respond to this text.” Whitney’s face disappeared behind a curtain of dark hair as she hunched over her phone, thumbs flying across the glossy screen.

“Whit…”

“One more sentence…okay…done!” Sitting back with a triumphant grin on her face, she smacked her lips together. “Poor guy isn’t even going to know what hit him.”

I risked a glance at her out of the corner of my eye. “And that’s a good thing?”

“Are you kidding? It’s a great thing. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: the key to any great relationship is to keep the other person guessing.”

“I don’t really think-”

“Not you and
Daniel
,” she said, cutting me off. “You two have some weird, honest, admit-all-your-feelings shit going on. Which is cool, I guess, but just so you know that’s not how it’s supposed to work.”

After Daniel had left this morning I’d gone upstairs and found Whitney sprawled on her bed in a muffin comma. After nudging her awake, I told her everything Daniel and I had talked about. She’d listened quietly and waited until I’d finished before she yawned and said ‘
See? I told you he loved you, muffins don’t lie’
before pulling the covers over her head and going promptly back to sleep.

“How
is
it supposed to work? And what exit are we supposed to get off at?” I asked tersely. “I need to know. I don’t want to miss it.” As a blue Volvo came flying past on the left, I nervously tapped the brakes and checked all of my mirrors.

It wasn’t that I was
afraid
of driving on the interstate. Not really. It was just that after reading various articles, I knew how dangerous and distracted other drivers could be. Phone calls, texting, and talking to other passengers all contributed to a higher crash rate than drunk driving. Some studies even suggested that texting while driving was the equivalent of getting behind the wheel after drinking four beers, and the annual death toll from texting related accidents was climbing higher and higher with each passing year. In 2014 alone over three thousand people were killed because of distracted driving.

All of that knowledge, coupled with the fact that I had far fewer driving miles under my belt than most twenty-four-year-olds courtesy of all my time spent at Harvard, meant I was more tense than I should have been, but since letting Whitney drive was out of the question (at last count her speeding tickets almost equaled her number of ex-boyfriends) there was little I could do but grin and bear it. Or, in this case, grimace and bear it.

“Relax,” Whitney said as she fished her phone back out of her purse and brought up Google maps. “We have plenty of time. The exit isn’t for another…oh.”

“Oh?” Sweat sprang from my palms as my grip on the steering wheel intensified. “What do you mean, ‘oh’?”

“Nothing. Just turn here.”

“Turn where?”

“Here!”

I yelped as Whitney grabbed the wheel and wrenched it to the right. For one terrifying second the wheels locked in protest against the sharp, sudden turn before Roo straightened herself out. “Oh my God,” I gasped. “Oh my
God
. Whitney!”

“What?” Blinking innocently, my best friend shrugged. “We’re fine. I didn’t want to miss the exit. Google says turn left up here and Eastern Sports should be two miles down on…hold on…the right.” Clicking her phone off, she twisted in her seat and grinned at me. “You should have seen your face. Too funny!”

“Not funny at all,” I corrected. “At
all
, Whitney. Please don’t do that ever again.”

Seeing the genuine fear in my eyes, she sombered. “Sorry, Mo. Didn’t mean to scare you.”

“Well you did.” It took a lot to provoke my anger, but Whitney had managed to do it. Being nosy about my sex life was one thing. Trying to kill both of us was something else entirely. “I don’t believe it would hurt you to think before you acted every once in a while.”

“And I don’t think it would hurt
you
to be stop so judgemental!” Whitney shot back. While my temper was deeply rooted and carefully controlled, Whitney’s festered right under the surface, ready to break free at the smallest provocation. “I can tell what you’re thinking,” she continued as I waited for the light to turn green before turning left and merging into the far right lane.

Bangor was small by Pennsylvania standards, but compared to Camden it was a bustling metropolis. Four lanes dissected the middle of the city, two going towards the ocean and two going away. We were too far inland in to see any water, but the various boat shops we passed revealed it wasn’t too far away. In addition to being Maine’s third largest city, Bangor was also home to Stephen King, and I was hoping to drive past his house on our way back.

“You think I’m a slut.” 

“I -
what
?” The light in front of me went from green to yellow. I slammed on the brakes, causing the car behind us to lay on their horn. I threw a hand up in the rearview mirror to apologize before I turned towards Whitney so fast the seat belt retractor mechanism deployed, snapping me back in my seat. Yanking the seat belt away from my collarbone I said, “Are you serious? Whit, I - I would
never
think that. Ever!”

Her mouth formed a hard, stubborn line before she stared out the window, refusing to look at me. “Forget about it,” she muttered.  

I swallowed a sigh. The last thing I wanted - or needed - right now was a fight with my best friend. Whitney was the only person in the entire world who completely understood me. The only person I could turn to. The only person I could talk to about Daniel. “Whitney, I’ve never thought that about you. Ever. I don’t know why-”

“The light’s green,” she said, cutting me off.

Before the car behind us could honk again, I hit the gas. We rode the rest of the way to Eastern Sports in uncomfortable silence. Whitney jumped out the second I put Roo in park and was halfway across the lot before I could pull the keys out the ignition.

Mulling over the possible reasons behind my best friend’s anger I followed at a slower pace, stopping to allow a woman with three small children in tow to push her cart past in front of me.

“Thanks,” she said, flashing a tired smile.

“You’re welcome.” I waved at the children. “Have a nice day.”

“You too,” they chorused in unison before their mother herded them into a tan minivan.

If only someone
else
could be so polite.

From experience, I knew the one good thing about Whitney’s temper was that it faded quickly. Chances were she had already forgotten why she’d become so mad in the first place.

My suspicions were confirmed the instant I stepped into Eastern Sports. Holding a pink fleece in one hand and a pair of purple running sneakers in the other, Whitney came charging towards me with an enormous smile on her face.

“Mo, get a look at these.” She shoved the sneakers in my face. “They’re sixty percent off!”

“You don’t run,” I pointed out.

“So what? They’re on
sale
.”

If there was one thing Whitney loved more than sex and gossiping about sex, it was a good sale. It usually didn’t matter what was
on
sale. It could have been sneakers, shirts, sparkly headbands… If it was discounted, she had to have it.

“Well…they’re definitely you,” I conceded. “And the fleece looks nice, although maybe you should try to find something a little heavier. It’s only going to keep getting colder out.”

“Something heavier?” Whitney looked at me as though I’d just told her the earth was flat. “But the fleece jackets are on sale.”

“Then get what you want,” I said, a bit harder than I had intended. “I’m going to look at the hiking equipment.” I felt Whitney’s eyes following me as I brushed past her. After a quick consult with one of the friendly faced employees, I stalked to the hiking section.

As I stared at the jackets and boots and backpacks, I couldn’t help but replay what Whitney had said in the car because that was how
my
temper worked. Did she really think I was judgemental? Frowning, I picked up a pair of black binoculars and turned them over in my hands. I wasn’t judgemental. At least, I didn’t think so. I may have doubted a few of Whitney’s life decisions, but I’d never told her what to do. Well, almost never. It
had
been my idea to move to Camden, but Whitney had agreed to it. She’d wanted a change as much as I had, and aside from a few snarky remarks here and there lamenting that there was nothing to do, I’d thought she liked Maine.

Maybe I was wrong.

Quickly setting the binoculars down after I happened to glance at the price (two
hundred
dollars?!) I picked out three pairs of thick wool socks, a silver thermos, and a tiny, clip-on compass. I wanted to buy more - if only to feel completely prepared for tomorrow - but my bank account was already on the lower end of the spectrum.

Six months in to being cut off from the family fortune, and I was still adjusting. I’d never been wasteful or prone to exorbitant spending habits, but I had also never known what it felt like not to buy something because I simply couldn’t afford it. It was the little things I’d always taken for granted that kept surprising me.

A tank of gas.

The cost of groceries.

Lunch at the college pub.

Two hundred dollar binoculars.

Once I would have purchased the binoculars without thinking. Now I gave them a wide berth as I brought my carefully selected items up to the counter.

“Just these today?” asked the clerk, an older man with the scruffy beard, weathered skin, and flat, rolling accent of a born and bred Mainer.

“Just these,” I confirmed. With a nod the clerk began to ring up the socks, thermos, and compass as I glanced behind me, looking for Whitney amidst the hanging kayaks and pitched tents. My brow furrowed when I didn’t see her, especially since we hadn’t talked about going anywhere else. Aside from a pizza shop, a dollar store, Goodwill, CVS, and a thrift store, there wasn’t really anywhere else
to
go. Not when Roo’s keys were still tucked safely inside my wallet.

“And your total comes to twenty seven dollars and thirteen cents,” the clerk said, drawing my attention back to the counter. He smiled pleasantly. “Cash or credit?”

“Cash.” Opening my wallet, I counted out the bills one by one. I had a debit card, but while researching ways to live on a budget I’d learned that paying with cash cut down on impulse purchases by nearly sixty percent. Swiping a piece of plastic didn’t have nearly the same effect on the human psyche as being forced to give something away - in this case, paper money - you wouldn’t get back.

Maybe
that
was why I was having such a hard time admitting my true feelings to Daniel…and to myself. Because once you gave it away, unconditional love couldn’t be taken back. At least not in the same condition you’d given it in.

Hadn’t I already learned that lesson time and time again? With my father. With my mother. Even to some extent with Justin, although I’d never felt for him even half of what I felt for Daniel. And that scared me. Because love - true, head over heels, I’ll want you until the day I die love - didn’t care about the Faculty Code of Conduct. And it didn’t care about logic. And it didn’t care about doing what made sense.

True love wasn’t something that could be researched and studied. It wasn’t a test that would be passed. It wasn’t a diploma that could be earned. It was an electric, living, breathing force. A force that defied all reason. A force that couldn’t be controlled or contained.

“You have a nice day now.”

I blinked at the clerk and mustered a delayed smile. “Thank you.” Accepting my change and a blue plastic bag with ‘Eastern Sports’ written across it in bold white font, I did one more loop around the store, looking for Whitney. By the time I doubled back around to the counter, two things were clear: my best friend was gone…and I was more confused about Daniel than ever before.