Do-Overs (6 page)

-13-

Cookie Dough & Dishing the Dirt

Fall break had come and gone. It was amazing how fast the end of the semester was approaching. When all those papers were assigned back in August they had seemed so doable, the end of October they were suddenly impossible. As always I had procrastinated.

Fall break had already come and gone. I had twenty-two sightings of Mr. Gorgeous. Still no introduction. I had almost met him four times, but all in bad situations that had required a do-over. I had spied him in the cafeteria numerous times. Always with the “theater” crowd and that black haired skank. I found out from Olivia that she was also a theater major named Taylor. To paraphrase Olivia’s description, she was not a very nice girl. Go figure. Twice I
noticed
him picking that nasty, trampy, Taylor up in his adorable red Miata. Once he saw me watching, but with a quick little flip of my wrist that scene was rewritten.

I spent some time looking for him on social medi I had been able to find him in photos of mutual friends. But he didn’t seem to have his own page. Yes, I was a Facebook creeper. And a stalker. I either needed to find a twelve-step program to get over this fantasy perfect man, or I needed to call in the big guns.

I’m an American girl. I went for the ammo.

“You look a little stressed tonight,” Rachel said after my fifteenth sigh while reading
Jane Eyre
. It was 11:30 and Jane was trying to figure out the mysterious secrets surrounding Mr. Rochester. I still had two chapters more to read for the next day’s class and a paragraph for Old Testament to write, yet all I could do was wonder about a guy I had never even officially met. It was time to take a break from Mr. Rochester’s secrets and get answers to a few questions from this century.

“I think we could all use a cookie dough break,” Olivia declared as she went to the mini-fridge and retrieved the Holy Grail.

“Olivia, Stina, you two know everyone on campus. There’s this guy. . .”

I was quickly interrupted.

“Tell me, tell me. Please don’t say Geoffrey Hale. He is soooo stuck on himself. Every girl on campus thinks she wants to meet him and after two minutes changes her mind.” Stina was on a roll. “And that British accent he uses is so fake. Why, he’s from Talala, Oklahoma, for pity sake.”

“I bet it’s that Jacob Smith. He is cute. I’ll give him that. We went out
once.
That’s all it took,” Olivia spoke as the all-knowing authority on men, which she was. “Nice guy, but cheap!! Took me to a restaurant and used a coupon and then asked me, me—Olivia Corazon—to leave the tip. Why I never. . .”

“Oh yes, you have,” interrupted Stina.

“And we’ve been there to put you back together each time,” added Rachel with sympathy, not ridicule in her voice.

“Well, not with cheapo Jacob-o,” Olivia responded. “Enough about me.”

That was a first. I’d never had a conversation where Olivia had decided that there had been enough emphasis on her.

Olivia continued, “So, who is the guy?”

I started to sweat. My heart was racing. It was absurd. There I was just asking about a guy, like the outcome of the conversation was crucial to my entire future. He was just a guy I had seen across the campus a few times (make that twenty-two.) Just an absolutely gorgeous specimen of the male species. Not that I’ve been staring. Just thought about him a few times. Okay every night for weeks. He was just a guy. And it was time I left the realm of fantasy and started on reality. Good or bad.

“I’ve noticed this guy once or twice on campus. I’ve passed him when I was late for class a few times.”

“I didn’t think you were ever late for class. You seem to have some built in clock that always makes you punctual,” said Rachel.

It was hard to keep all the real time and do-over time sorted out when telling what had happened in a day which too often was coming off as if I were either crazy or a habitual liar.

I couldn’t give them his name, although I had discovered it through my social media stalking. Instead, I tried to play it like I only knew a few facts about him. “Well, um. . . I think he might be a theater major. I saw him go into the auditorium a couple of times.”

“Well, that narrows it down. Male. Theater major. That leaves about twenty guys,” Rachel started the process of elimination.

“Oh, but she said he was cute,” Stina added. “That eliminates about ten. Olivia, who are the hunk actors on campus?”

“What color hair?” she asked.

“Brown. With just the perfect highlights,” I was blushing. How stupid. “Real highlights, not fake. The kind you wish the beautician could get just right in your hair.”

“Height?”

“Perfect.”

“What is perfect?” Stina giggled.

“You know. Tall enough to give that feeling of protection, but close enough to be able to reach up and kiss.”

“I think you might have happened to see this guy more than a few times,” Rachel said in her all-knowing voice.

I was beginning to feel like I was on
CSI Oklahoma
.

“Does he have a car?” Stina asked back in a just-the-facts mode.

“I think I might have seen him in a little red convertible. Maybe a Miata.”

“Oh, honey child, I’m so sorry. That’s Al Dansby,” said Olivia with actual sympathy on her face.

“Oh Al. Yes, he is cute,” agreed Stina in a sad voice.

Obviously the thing with the black haired fashion model must have been more serious than it appeared in my
not
stalking observations.

“What’s wrong with him? Does he have a girlfriend?” I had to ask even though I didn’t think I really wanted to hear the answer.

“You wish that was the problem. No, he’s gay,” responded Olivia matter-of-factly.

“You don’t know that for sure,” said Rachel. “He’s never said he was. You know it’s wrong to go labeling people just because they don’t fit perfectly into your preconceived idea of how a man should act.”

“He doesn’t act gay,” added Stina. “Um baby, he’s so cute.”

“Oh, but let’s look at the facts. He’s a musical theater major,” said Olivia as she started counting facts off her fingers.

“That’s not a guarantee. There are musical theater actors who aren’t gay,” responded Rachel. “Okay, I can’t think of one off the top of my head. But I know there are.”

“Okay, you may be on to something Olivia. It’s true I’ve never seen him date anyone, although I doubt any girl would ever turn him down if he asked,” added Stina without her usual bubble. “And he turned you down. No straight guy has ever turned Olivia down,” Stina turned to tell me.

Well, that was that. My fairytale was just that. I thought I was going to cry. I had built this up so in my imagination. There I was feeling as if my heart had been ripped out for a guy whose name I had just learned and I had never met in my current time sequence. My friends were giving me that look—some sympathy, but more confusion. I had said I’d seen him around campus a few times, yet I reacted as if he had just broken off our engagement. I was pathetic. I could see it in their eyes that they thought I was either a drama queen or some horribly psycho love junkie latching on to any guy who halfway paid me any attention. This conversation wasn’t going to happen.

And suddenly it didn’t.

“You look a little stressed tonight,” Rachel said after my fifteenth sigh while reading
Jane Eyre
. It was 11:30 again and I still had two chapters more to read and a paragraph for Old Testament to write.

“I think we could all use a cookie dough break,” Olivia declared.

Mr. Rochester had his secrets and so did I. Al Dansby went in the lost cause file and the topic was closed before it was ever opened.

-14-

Coffee, Tea, or... Never Mind?

I left the room ahead of schedule for class that Monday morning. That was a rarity. It was a beautiful autumn day, not much wind. That also is a rarity in Oklahoma, not the beautiful day, but the absence of wind. I decided on the spur of the moment to make a quick trip through the student center for a cup of coffee. Not that I really liked coffee. I preferred Diet Dr. Pepper. But coffee looks sophisticated. At twenty I wanted to look adult. Mature.

It was my lucky day. No line. Actually quite empty as it was early and most intelligent people were still asleep, either in their dorm rooms or in classes, but snoozing nonetheless.

“I’d like a skinny cinnamon dolce latte,” I requested of the poor work-study employee stuck with the early morning shift. I really had no idea what that was, but it sounded urbane. He seemed less than impressed.

“I’ll have the same,” came the most glorious, cultured, sexy voice from behind me.

“Sure, Al,” the barrister replied, much more enthusiastic about his job than before. This gay thing was so unfair. I wanted a chance with the Al of my dreams, but no luck. In my mom’s day the dilemma was always all the good ones were taken. In my day they all are gay. How could I ever compete with that? I thought I was going to cry right then and there. I was so deep in thought that it took Al repeating
good morning
, I don’t know how many times before it sunk through into my gloom.

“Are you okay?” he asked. Not in that obligatory way that people ask when they don’t really want a truthful answer and hope to not have to deal with an awkward situation. No, he asked as if he really cared. I must have looked like a mental case, tears starting in my eyes and my face getting all red and splotchy.

Up close he was even more magnificent than my memories, my dreams, my fantasies had remembered. I had to get away, fast. Even if he wasn’t a possibility for me, I still couldn’t stand the idea of making a fool of myself in his. . . oh so green eyes that were looking into mine. Breathe. Yes, that was what I needed to do, breathe. I had to grab that eraser and get out of that God forsaken student center before I threw myself on him babbling platitudes of how if he just gave me a chance I could make him straight.

I left the room ahead of schedule for class that Monday morning. That was a rarity. It was a beautiful autumn day, not much wind. Now that also is a rarity in Oklahoma. Yet, I wasn’t enjoying it. Should I have stayed in the student center? Should I have taken the chance to have a conversation with Al Dansby? No, no point in attempting a relationship that just couldn’t happen. No coffee for Lottie Lambert, and no Al Dansby either. Some things couldn’t change no matter how many special erasers I had nor how many times I did the moment over. Some days life just hurt.

-15-

Things That Cry In The Night

A party in the hallway at four in the morning, even on a Friday night—actually Saturday morning—is inconsiderate. Especially since I obviously hadn’t been invited and it had disturbed the most beautiful dream. Mr. Knightly, Mr. Darcy and Al Dansby kept morphing from one to the other, all desperately in love with me. Ah. Then somewhere in the background of absolute bliss came the shouts of a wild, debaucherous festival. We were suddenly at a nineteenth century ball. Mr. Darcy was asking me to dance. I should have been thrilled, yet I knew there was someone I wanted more. I looked over just in time to see Al Dansby making a move on Mr. Knightly. That was what had shattered my bliss.

I awoke upset. Couldn’t he even be straight in my dreams, if not in reality? The fog slowly cleared in my brain enough to focus in on the actual noise in the corridor. It wasn’t the sound of a happy party after all. I heard sobs, then Rachel’s voice. I couldn’t make out exactly what she was saying. It sounded like a loving mother trying to comfort a distraught child. I heard Stina trying to lighten the mood with, “You’re better off without him.”

“But, I thought he was the one. He promised,” sobbed one of the K’s.

I didn’t have to listen any longer. We’d all been there and done that in differing degrees. He promised. “Trust me,” he said. “You’re the only one for me.” “It’s okay if we really love each other.” Then out of the blue, the old heave-ho.

There was more murmuring. It seemed more K’s had arrived. I heard Stina slip quietly into our room, trying not to wake me.

“I’m already awake. Which K was it?”

“Keesha.”

“The soccer player?”

“Seems he was putting in some extra practice elsewhere.”

“How bad is she?”

“Pretty bad. She’s been sleeping with the guy for a month and now she finds out she’s not the only one. He’s been dropping Keesha off at night and then going out with that Taylor, theater witch, the rest of the night.”

“Hope she was using some kind of protection?”

“Said she was. Nothing is fool-proof though.”

Symbolic choice of words I thought.

I contemplated Keesha’s situation and felt her heartache. “Sadly, there’s no protection for a heart. It breaks every time.”