This Is Falling (24 page)

“Well, Tucker. Again, thank you
so
much for the help in class today,” I say, reaching to shake his
hand before I cross the street to my dorm—like a business deal. He
just laughs lightly while shaking his head, then shakes my hand
back and pulls his backpack up on his shoulder.

“You got it, Rowe. Hey, I’ll see ya in class
next week,” he says walking backward and leaving his eyes on me.
“And thanks for the drink! Next one’s on me.”

“Sounds good.”
Sounds good?
No, it
sounds awful, awkward, uncomfortable, stressful, unfortunate, and
pretty much like the last thing I want to have happen. But the
walk
sign is now blinking, and Tucker has turned around, so
I pick up my step and head for the front door to the dorm before he
can see where I’m headed.

“Who’s mister hottie?” I hear Cass say as I
round the corner to the front door to the lobby.

“Ahhhhh, okay. Uh, I need to have a serious
talk with you and Nate about scaring me. Honestly, I’m thinking of
making you two wear bells.” I keep my pace up and head to the
elevator bank, but Cass is right in step with me.

“Right, got it. Won’t scare you. Now spill it
about mister pecks and abs,” she says, pulling her sunglasses down
on her nose to give me the full effect of her raised and suspicious
eyebrows.

“How did you even see him?”

“Oh, easy. I was walking in with Nate, and he
saw you both across the street. Then I stayed to watch for a while
longer…pretty much because I’m
super
nosy, and I wanted to
see what had him so pissed off. I get it now. That guy’s hot.”

Uhg. Nate witnessed that. I’m pretty sure I
ceased any and all flirting immediately, but still. I wouldn’t be
happy if it were Nate walking home with the female equivalent of
Tucker. There’s a small piece of me that likes that Nate is
jealous. We don’t talk about our feelings much, and I know that’s
partly my fault. We talk about my fears mostly, and we’ve broken
through so many of them. But we don’t talk about how he feels about
me, and how I feel about him. Not really.

There was that brief moment, where he told me
he loved me in the car on our way back from the airport, and when
he said those words, my entire heart filled up with a joy I didn’t
know existed. But then it left me just as fast—when he said he
didn’t mean it. And I’m too afraid to open up that conversation
again. Because I don’t know how to be in a relationship—when you’re
not sixteen, and in high school, and going on dates that require
you to be home before ten on weekends.

I told Josh I loved him almost immediately.
We both said the words while making out in my driveway. But I know
now we didn’t really mean them then. I meant them eventually,
months after we’d been dating, when I realized how important and
special he was to me. But I must have said them a hundred times
before, and every time they were empty. I think that’s why I’m so
afraid to say them to Nate, because I don’t want him to say them
back just because he thinks he has to—like lines in a play, a
reaction to my action. I don’t want this to be like when I was
sixteen.

“So, I’m pretty sure you’re going to have to
deal with that conversation with mister hottie,” Cass says to me as
the elevator slides open, and she steps outside. She sees Nate
waiting outside our door first, and when I step out and see him,
shivers run down the length of my entire body. He. Looks.
Pissed!

The closer I get, the more he tries to force
coolness, but I can see there’s something simmering underneath. He
kisses my cheek quickly, then sits backward at my desk chair, his
legs wrapped around either side, and his knees bouncing up and
down, just teeming with jealous energy.

I toss my backpack on my bed and pull my
shoes from my feet before crawling up next to it, getting out my
notebooks. Cass, obviously feeling the tension, just smiles at Nate
with a nod and then leaves our room, actually shutting the door
behind her. Oh god.

“What time do you think we should leave?” I
ask trying my best to pretend like everything about the atmosphere
in our room is normal.

“I don’t know, it takes an hour to get there,
so five-ish?” His knees are still bobbing. I can see the motion
from the corner of my eyes.

“Okay, I don’t need to do much to get ready,
so we can still eat something before we leave.”

“I’m not that hungry,” he says.

Oh.

And now we have silence. I’m busying myself
flipping through pages of my notebooks, pretending to look for
something, just to avoid eye contact, and Nate’s knees are still
jumping, and his eyes are still on me, and there’s still this awful
awkwardness. And then suddenly they stop, and Nate stands.

“All right, just come by when you’re ready,”
he says before quickly escaping through the door. The second it
shuts behind him, I flop down on my back. What the hell? Cass comes
back in a few minutes later.

“Girl, what did you do to that boy?” she
asks.

“Honestly, I have no idea. He just sat here,
silent, but edgy. I mean SUPER edgy. And then he left.”

“Awe, jealousy is cute on him,” she says,
crawling up next to me and laying her head next to mine. I just
look at her with my eyes wide. “You should use this. I bet you
could get him to do anything you want right now.”

“Okay, when did Paige take over your body?
Bring back Cass,” I say, standing to change into a comfortable pair
of jeans and a blue shirt for the basketball game.

“Hey, we are twins. Some of those
characteristics are genetic,” she winks.

Shaking my head at her, I pull on a clean
shirt and work my hair into a loose ponytail, suddenly wanting to
make myself as plain as possible—so no other boy notices me
ever
and Nate can start acting normal again.

Nate

“Dude, what crawled up your ass?” Ty asks
when I shove through our door, popping the handle with enough heat
to lodge it against the opposite wall. I pry it loose and close the
door again behind me, then I let my head fall forward against
it.

“Ohhhhh you know, just lost my shit a little
seeing Rowe with some bodyguard-looking dude,” I say, rolling my
head to the side to look at Ty with a raised brow.

“Ha. You’re jealous. That’s funny,” Ty says,
going back to whatever he’s working on at his laptop.

“Uh, it’s not funny. And I hate it. And I’m
pretty sure Rowe doesn’t like me like this either.”

“Yeah, well, then maybe she won’t go hanging
out with…what did you call him? Bodyguard-lookin’ dudes?” Ty’s not
quite teasing me, but there’s a little bite to his comment.

“He was just big, that’s all,” I say, not
really wanting to go into how good-looking he was, knowing that
would just send Ty into fits of laughter.

“The girl practically got you floor seats to
the Thunder game, and she’s over here more than she’s anywhere
else. You’ve got nothing to worry about, unless…have you closed
that deal yet?”

Silence. I keep my back to him while I pull
out my sweatshirt.

“You’re kidding me!”

“She’s different, Ty. This isn’t some girl
from summer ball that I’m using to forget about Sadie. She’s…more,”
I turn back away from him, hoping like hell I’m going to get
serious-Ty and not the asshole that also inhabits his body. When he
doesn’t say anything for a while, I start to relax.

Ty doesn’t say another word, and when Cass
comes over, the two of them sit quietly, studying. Rowe comes about
a half hour later, and despite all of the sense I’ve talked myself
into since I left her room, the minute I see her, my selfish,
king-of-the-jungle, pound-on-my-chest instincts move right back
inside my body.

She’s wearing a pair of tight jeans, black
Converse shoes, and a thin, blue T-shirt. I know she’s going to get
cold later, but I don’t want to tell her, because I want her to
have to wear my sweatshirt—something of mine. And I want
bodyguard-guy to run into us while she’s in it, so we can clear
that shit up right then and there.

“You look nice,” I say, doing my best to push
the beast that wants to pound his chest back inside. She leans into
me, and I kiss her cheek, pulling her close to my side. Her hair is
pulled back, and all I want to do is bite her neck.

“Okay, look for us on TV,” she says to Cass,
and I reach down to hold her hand again. My teammate Reece was nice
enough to let me borrow his car again so I could drive us into the
city. I was starting to think I needed to bring my car up from home
just so I didn’t have to rely on others so much. It wasn’t a big
deal when it was just Ty and I, but now that I want to do things
like take Rowe places, it just seems to make sense. I think Ty
would like it if I had my car here, too. It’s modified so he can
drive it.

Rowe is biting at her lip when we get in the
car, and I can tell she’s nervous. I know the crowd is going to be
a big deal for her. I tried to talk her out of coming, but I know
she wants to prove to herself that she can do this.

“I’ll be right next to you, the entire time,”
I say, reaching for her fingers again as I back out of the parking
spot. She just smiles nervously.

For the entire drive, we talk about nonsense.
Rowe tells me stories about spending Thanksgivings at her
grandparents’ farm up North, and I talk about our non-traditional
ones with my parents, where we order in a bunch of things that have
no relationship to turkey whatsoever. She likes the rambling
stories I tell, and I think it’s setting her mind at ease, so I
just keep talking. But inside, all I’m thinking about is that
asshole that walked her home, and how I want to ask her about him.
But I know now is
definitely
not the time—it wouldn’t come
out right.

The parking lot is packed, so we find a spot
near the roadway. We have to walk far, but at least the exit is
close, assuming a line of traffic doesn’t block our car in when we
leave. The closer we get to the entrance, the tighter Rowe is
holding my hand, until eventually my knuckles are actually turning
white.

“Rowe, we don’t have to do this. I would be
just as happy spending the next hour driving home with you, and
then we can stop to get Sally’s or something,” I say, my heart
breaking from the terrified look in her eyes as we stand along the
sidewalk while hundreds of people pass us. The crowd is so thick,
people bump into our shoulders, and Rowe closes her eyes every time
it happens.

“Come on, what do you say?” I ask, urging
her, almost begging her, to let us leave. Her mouth opens slightly,
and she’s about ready to speak, when a voice fills the space behind
me.

“Nate? Preeter? Is that…you?”

You have to fucking be kidding me? My heart
has just lodged itself into that uncomfortable place in my throat,
the spot that makes it hard to talk or breathe. The look on Rowe’s
face has shifted from terrified to confused, and in a split second
I see the suspicion take over her face—and she’s right.

“Sadie. Wow,” I say, turning to fully take in
the all-too-familiar vision in front of me. She’s wearing a pair of
really short black shorts and black heels. She’s my height, maybe
an inch taller than me in those shoes; while I see in her eyes the
girl I gave my everything to in high school, her body is
different—older, more…
fuck, I don’t know. Just more.

“What are you doing here?” she says, reaching
for me to give me a hug. I let go of Rowe’s hand to hug her back,
but when I reach for Rowe again, her hands are stuffed deep in her
pockets.
Shit!

“Oh, it’s…well, a late birthday celebration,
I guess? We just came for the game,” I sound like an idiot. I’m too
panicked to even think straight, and I wish like hell Rowe would
give me her damn hand again. “Mom and Dad said you’re playing for
OSU?”

“Yeah, it was just a really great
opportunity. That’s what I’m doing here tonight. They’re announcing
us at halftime—some publicity something or whatever,” she says, her
eyes drifting over my shoulder every few seconds while she talks,
and eventually my brain gets the message.

“Cool. Oh, this is my friend Rowe. We met at
McConnell.” I know they’re the wrong words the second the sound of
my own voice hits my ears, but it’s like an avalanche—I pushed a
rock from the top of the mountain, and now all I can do is watch it
tear down the snow in its path. The two girls—the only two I have
ever cared about—are shaking hands in front of me, and the one I
love is giving me a glance that says I just broke her heart.

“Well, I’ve gotta go catch up with the girls.
Maybe I’ll see ya again,” Sadie says, reaching to give me one more
hug. I don’t know what to do with my arms, and all I can think
about is how I can signal to Rowe that this—that Sadie—is
meaningless, despite the massive mess that just spilled out of my
mouth.

“Let’s go get our seats,” Rowe says, brushing
past me and following in Sadie’s wake. On the bright side, her
fears seem to be gone. There isn’t a trace of the nervous girl I
was worried about just a few minutes ago. But something cold has
definitely filled her space, and it’s my damn fault.

We get to our seats, and I notice Sadie is
sitting across from us with her team. She waves at us, and I hold
up a hand to signify that I do in fact see her too. Seriously,
universe—not cool. Not cool!

Rowe’s arms are covered in goosebumps, and I
know she’s cold, so I offer her my sweatshirt, but she just shrugs
me off and says she’s fine. She doesn’t even fake a smile. She
shivers through the entire first quarter, just to prove a damn
point.

“Rowe, please. Just take my sweatshirt,” I
say, pulling it over my head and handing it to her.

“I would kind of rather die,” she says, her
smile a tight flat line.
Fuck.

“I’m going to get something to drink. You
want something?” I say, standing, almost ready to run I’m so
uncomfortable. Rowe just shakes her head
no
and crosses her
legs in the other direction. I let out a heavy sigh and make my way
to the aisle. At least she seems comfortable with the crowd.