Amends: A Love Story (15 page)

We both laugh and find ourselves next in
line. Professor Carmichael is a middle-aged man with large
protuberant eyes and shoulder-length, iron gray hair. He signs our
cards with a flourish.

"Where are you off to?" I ask as Amity stuffs
her card into her bag.

"Chemistry professor," she says, grimacing.
"Hardwick the hard ass."

"Good luck," I call as she hurries away.

As soon as she disappears into the mass of
students, I pull my phone out of my pocket. I skip the messages
from Ember—I'll deal with her later—and send Amity a Facebook
friend request.

I feel a burst of happiness when she accepts
my request within seconds. I tell myself this is all part of the
plan.

/////////////////////////

"The coffee here tastes like ass," complains
Teo as he dumps three packets of sugar into his cup.

"It's not so bad," I reply. "It's got
caffeine."

Teo makes a face. "I don't know why we had to
meet at the Adams Apple. They don't even serve decent beer."

"It's centrally located," I say, adjusting my
seat so I can get a better view of the barista. It's Amity, of
course, looking sweet and kind of ridiculous in a huge white apron
emblazoned with a big red apple and her piles of gorgeous hair
squashed into a hairnet.

Caspar plops down next to Teo with a groan.
"I forgot how much Econ sucks, man. Give me military history any
day."

Finally, Hoover arrives with the biggest
redhead I've ever seen on his arm. He swats her on the ass, and she
waddles off to a table full of girls I've never seen before.

"What," asks Teo looking thoroughly
nonplussed, "was that?"

Hoover chuckles. "Oh, that was Darcy. I ran
into her at the party the other night. She's a hacker, and she's
fucking hilarious."

Amity steps out from behind the coffee bar
and greets the giant redhead and her friends. I can't believe how
long her legs are. I wish she wasn't wearing that bulky apron so I
could get a better look. I'm wondering if she's told any of her
friends about me, when I feel a sharp, bracing kick in the shin. I
remind myself that Amity is off limits for what feels like fiftieth
time today. Then it occurs to me that I didn't kick myself in the
shin.

I glance up, and Teo is
rolling his eyes.
Damn it, he
knows
. He kicks me again, harder this time.
"OK, fearless leader. Let's get this meeting over with."

"Got it," I say, taking a slug of hot coffee.
"We need a theme for the new brothers' dance after Hell Week.
Something memorable that won't get our collective asses in a
sling."

Caspar kicks things off with a long and
possibly incoherent soliloquy about the Civil War. Out of the
corner of my eye, I watch Amity waiting on a customer whose tense
posture screams anger. He's tall and rangy with shoulder-length
hair pulled into a ponytail. His arms are covered in ink, and his
face has an intense, moody quality I don't like.

He points a finger at Amity, and she shakes
her head. Instead of getting him a coffee or a sandwich, she ducks
under the counter and stands beside him. They talk some more, and I
can tell she's uncomfortable. Her shoulders are hunched up by her
ears, and she's looking down at the floor as if she'd like to
dissolve into it. He takes her arm, and she visibly stiffens. Then
they slip out a side entrance.

"'Scuse me for just a sec,'" I say, leaping
to my feet. As I hurry towards the same door that swallowed Amity,
I hear Caspar's nasal whine. "But I wasn't finished..."

/////////////////////////

I find Amity and Hostile Hipster Poser under
a street lamp. Amity looks scared, and Poser looks intense. I stand
in the shadows. Neither of them seems to notice me.

"You owe me," says Poser, looming over Amity.
"I got you that job at Dirk's club. I showed you how to be a woman.
Something other than the Amityville Horror."

Amity stands her ground. "You have a fiancée,
and I'm not going to help you keep cheating on her." Her voice is
low and firm.

"There was a time," he growls, taking another
step towards her, "that you didn't give a shit about my so-called
fiancée."

"I was just a kid, you asshole. I'd just lost
my parents, and I wasn't exactly brimming with healthy
self-esteem." He keeps moving towards her, and she keeps stepping
back until she's literally backed against the wall.

"You still haven't explained why you're
here," she says.

Now her voice is higher and tinged with fear.
Hot anger rushes through me. I position myself behind Poser, taking
care to stay in the shadows. When he reaches for Amity, I grab his
fake leather jacket and pull him into the darkness with me. We
grapple for a moment before he stumbles and drops onto the
pavement.

"Who the fuck are you?" he asks, rising
slowly to his feet.

"Her friend."

"Her friend?" He coughs up a wad of phlegm
and hawks it onto the ground in the general direction of Amity's
feet. "Good luck with that. Good fucking luck." I watch as he walks
away slowly, as if he has nothing to fear. I wonder what kind of
history he and Amity have together, and how things got so ugly.

Once Poser is completely out
of sight, I turn towards Amity and curse under my breath.
Fuck.
She's run away. I
decide that I'm going to have to change my plan a little. If I
start spending time with her, that asshole might think twice about
bothering her again. It will be hard to keep from getting too
close, but that's a risk I'm now willing to take. She has to be
protected.

I also have an idea that could keep her safe
when I'm not around—and it will make Caspar very, very happy.

Chapter 17: Amity

Darcy can barely fit into her seat. She huffs
and groans with a look of terrible embarrassment on her round,
freckled face.

I try to say something comforting or, at
least, funny. "Girl, I bet those chairs have been in this lecture
hall for more than hundred years. They were probably built for
elves or something." It's a lame attempt at humor, but it does win
me a wan smile.

Once Darcy is more or less in her seat, I
squeeze by and fold all five feet ten inches of me into the wooden
desk-chair combination right next to her. Almost immediately, my
knees bang into the desk attachment. Then I slide down and—ouch!—my
knees smash into the seat in front of me, earning me a glare from a
tiny, pink-cheeked sorority girl.

Darcy giggles. "Elves, you say?"

"This is going to be a long hour," I say,
shifting position once again.

Darcy is about to say something, when Laird
enters the auditorium and waves at me. I wave back uncertainly. I
can't believe I ran away from him yet again. I guess I was afraid
that he would ask questions about Ethan, and I'd end up having to
explain our twisted, ambiguous relationship. My latest theory is
that Ethan keeps stalking me not because he wants me, but because
he can't stand that I don't want him any more.

Darcy nudges me with barely contained
excitement. "I was right! You know that guy."

"A little," I concede. I've only known her a
few days, but it's already clear that lying to Darcy is pointless.
She's great at reading faces, and she can hack into anything.

"Spill it, girl. How do you know him?"

I try to come up with an answer that's both
truthful and vague. "We're from the same general area in Florida.
I've seen him around."

"That's about as nonspecific as it gets.
What, exactly, does that mean?"

I sigh and close my eyes for about half a
second. Darcy would make a great interrogator. I throw her a few
more details, hoping they will sate her hunger for information.

"We both lost our mothers at about the same
time. I met him briefly at the cemetery when I was, um, making a
family visit. I ran into him again on Registration Day."

"Oh," gasps Darcy. "I'm so sorry. That must
be really hard."

"You get used to it. It's been almost three
years. Most of the time I'm fine. It's just part of my reality
now."

Darcy nods as if I've said something very
wise, and we watch the professor write Borderline Personality
Disorder on the blackboard. My eyes scan the auditorium, and
somehow they land on Laird. He winks at me, and I smile back.
There's just something about him that makes me feel good. He may be
a rich asshole from Jasper Heights, but maybe—just maybe—we can be
friends.

/////////////////////////

My head hurts from Professor Carmichael's
description of Dialectical Behavioral Therapy and the lengthy
puppet show he used to illustrate it.

"That was...interesting," says Darcy sounding
equally stunned. "Want to get lunch at the Apple?"

"No, I've got organic chemistry this
afternoon and a ton of homework to finish."

Darcy wrinkles her nose. "Organic chemistry
is so brutal. How can you stand it?"

I laugh out loud. "How can you stand advanced
Neural Networking and Heuristic Theory?"

Darcy blushes so deeply that her freckles
practically disappear. "Software is easy. It's just another
language, except you're talking to machines instead of people. It's
all basically logical. But naturally occurring systems? Ugh." She
mock shudders.

Finally, the lecture hall is almost empty,
and we get up to leave. As I'm stuffing my laptop into its case,
Darcy whispers, "I think someone's looking for you."

I raise my eyes and see Laird making his way
through the row of seats immediately opposite us. He smiles and
waves. Shit, I'm stuck.

Before I can say anything, Darcy moves down
the aisle towards the exit with surprising speed. Before she ducks
out the door, she turns and mouths something like, "Tell me all
about it!"

"My buddy Hoover thinks she's hilarious,"
says Laird, who has somehow materialized at my side. I practically
jump out of my skin when I see him standing there. He moves
incredibly quietly for a guy his size, but I guess I knew that. How
else could he have snuck up on Ethan so easily?

My stupid heart is flopping around in my
chest, but I force myself to meet his eyes. "Yeah, she's great." I
pause to take a breath, and he keeps gazing into my eyes as if they
contain the winning lottery number—which, I suppose, wouldn't
matter to the son of billionaire. "She's my r-r-roommate," I
stammer, feeling increasingly awkward. What is wrong with me?

"Are you OK?" he asks. "I was worried when
you ran off the other night. I was relieved when I saw your status
updates on Facebook."

"Oh, I'm fine. S-s-sorry I took off. I was
just a little f-f-freaked out." My stammer is getting worse, and I
can feel my face turning red. I'm acting as if I have a major crush
on him, which is probably the dumbest idea in the world. We're
barely even friends. All we have in common are dead parents.

Laird doesn't seem to notice what a freak I'm
being. "Who was that guy? Does he stalk you all the time?"

His voice is low and intense. I feel a rush
of warmth and can't help wondering if his concern is more than
friendly. I try to explain Ethan as quickly and simply as I can.
"He's an old friend from back home. He has some, er, personal
problems, but he's harmless." When Laird's expression turns
incredulous, I add, "Well, m-m-mostly harmless."

"Just be careful. I bet he has full blown
Borderline Personality Disorder." We both laugh and fall quiet. I
finish wrestling my computer into its case and get ready to go.
He's being a good friend, checking in to assure himself I'm not a
drooling basket case after our run-in with Ethan. Still, I feel
strangely disappointed, even though I have no real reason to
be.

"Thanks for everything," I say. "I'll see you
around."

"Amity?"

I go from disappointment to excitement in a
flash.

"Can I ask you one thing?"

His voice sounds a touch less confident. My
pulse is pounding in my ears. "Yes. I mean, sure. Ask away."

"Would you like to get dinner tomorrow night?
"

/////////////////////////

I keep telling myself that it's just a
friendly dinner, that it doesn't mean anything, that he won't want
anything to do with me once he finds out I'm a mostly ex-stripper
with cerebral palsy. Still, I can't stop myself from smiling.

I smile at Kendall as she tells me to adjust
my hairnet before a strand of my dark, coarse hair contaminates
someone's food. I smile at the sorority girl who orders a
half-caf-skinny sugar-free mocha latté. I smile as I wipe
fingerprints off the metal napkin dispensers.

I especially smile when a familiar-looking
bombshell blond with short curls and deep red lips approaches the
counter.

"Amity? Is that you?"

"Oh my God, Maggie! What are you doing
here?"

Maggie is wearing a long filmy dress under a
classic black leather jacket. "Visiting you, silly!"

"Just a minute." I run into the back and tell
Kendall I'm taking my break. She scowls, but lets me go. It's late
afternoon, and the Adams Apple is quiet. Everyone is studying or
lingering over their free refills.

I emerge from behind the bar and give Maggie
a quick hug. I lead her to a corner table.

"Do you want anything to drink?" I curse
myself for not asking earlier, but she shakes her head.

"I'm way too jacked up on caffeine already."
She smiles softly at me, and my eyes sting. She reminds of me of
high school and home and Mom. "You look great," she says with a
chuckle. "The hairnet kind of agrees with you."

Maggie looks around and frowns slightly.
"There are a lot of frat guys in here. I didn't realize Adams was a
big Greek school."

I shrug. She's right. A lot of the tables are
filled with large-armed frat guys. I wonder if one of the frats
that doesn't have its own house is having a meeting, or
something.