Accepted (8 page)

I’d like that very much, but not enough to chance losing the things I’d gained since coming here. I couldn’t chance Becca seeing me differently.

I trusted her, but I didn’t trust myself, and I didn’t think — not even for a second — that my story wouldn’t change her opinion of me.

In every place but here, every person who knew me felt sorry for me, pitied me. I would not have that here.

"I’m sorry, Bec. I’m just kind of a private person." It was a lousy answer. I couldn’t even look at her while I said it, but it was the best I could give.

Becca tugged my arm. "Come on," she said as she resumed jogging. I followed.

We ran in silence for a few minutes. All the while, I struggled with whether or not to open up to her at least a little bit.

After a while, Becca slowed her pace again. "I didn’t mean to pry," she began softly. "It’s just that sometimes I feel like I don’t know you at all." I looked over at her, and she continued, "Sometimes I feel like no one here does."

I managed a small smile, attempting to lighten the mood.

"I know. Sometimes, I feel like that, too."

We ran in silence for another couple of minutes. Then, this time, I broke the silence.

"So, what do you want to know?" I slowed my pace to a walk.

Becca didn’t say anything for a long moment. I suppose she was looking for the right question.

Then, I guess she found it.

"Well, why are you so private? Why don’t you ever talk about your life at home?"

I thought for a minute about how to answer these questions, looking for a way to be honest to my friend while holding on to my privacy.

"Becca." I looked into her face. "I’m happy here. This has really, truly been the best month of my life." I paused, hoping that she understood that I meant that. That this is the best my life has been. "I have a good life here—a home with wonderful friends. You, Amber, Colin, and Randi are like a family to me. Everything is perfect here." Again, I paused and looked her directly in the eyes. "Everything was not perfect in my life before here." I tried to smile but didn’t succeed, so I continued. "But that’s not my life anymore. This
is
, and I don’t see why I should dwell on that."

Becca gazed at me, a sad look on her face.

"But this isn’t a home, Ash. It’s a dorm. It’s just a bedroom with a desk. There’s no family here." She shrugged. "We can’t even stay here. They kick us out every four months."

Like I wasn’t used to that.

"It’s the only home I have, Becca."

And I watched the sadness leave her face, and the pity replace it.

"Don’t feel sorry for me, Becca. Don’t pity me." It came out harshly. "I told you. I’m happy here." And I smiled, as if to convince her I was.

She looked back at me, a gentle look on her face, then she smiled back as if to convince me she believed me.

I turned and began jogging again. "That’s why I don’t talk about myself."

She just looked at me, confused.

"The pity, Becca. You think differently of me now. You see me differently than you did an hour ago. I don’t want that."

"Ashley, I don’t think less of you!" she exclaimed.

"No, but you think differently." I picked up my pace.

She dropped it and followed.

****

As I was studying later that night, someone knocked on my door.

I looked up and saw Becca standing in my doorway.

"Hey," she said quietly.

"Hey."

"Can I come in?"

Becca never asked to come into my room. She barely ever even knocked.

"Sure." I closed my notebook. "You okay?"

She looked serious as she stepped into the room. "Yeah. I just wanted to make sure you weren’t mad at me."

"Of course I’m not mad at you. Why would I be mad at you?"

Becca looked visibly relieved. She moved further into the room and leaned against Amber’s dresser.

Then, she shrugged. "I shouldn’t have pried. I shouldn’t have pushed you…" She trailed off.

I guess I wasn’t the only person worried about losing my friend.

"Becca, it’s fine." I really didn’t want to talk about it anymore. "I’m not mad. I just want everything to be normal — like it was this afternoon. No different. Okay?"

"Okay." She turned to walk out of the room but stopped. "Hey, Ash, can I ask you one more thing?"

Oh no. What now? Waiting, I raised my eyebrows at her.

"What’s going on with you and Colin?"

It took a minute for Becca’s question to sink in.

As soon as it did, I felt my entire body heat up. I mean, I must have blushed from head to toe. I knew the pink color my skin was turning would give me away, but that wasn’t going to stop me from denying any feelings.

"What do you mean?" I was going for incredulous, but it’s possible I came across as rude. Judging from the grin creeping up the corners of Becca’s mouth, she didn’t mind.

"I mean, what’s going on with you and Colin?" She repeated the question slowly, annunciating each syllable of each word.

"Shh!" I jumped up and closed the door to my room. "What are you talking about?"

She was beaming now. "Come on, Ash. It’s obvious that something’s happening between you two."

Oh crap.

"Obvious to who?"

"Obvious to me."

"And?" Please don’t say Randi. Please don’t say Randi.

"Does anyone else matter?"

Yes.

"No."

"Then, obvious to me."

I just stared at her, my eyebrows lifted, waiting.

She chuckled. "He’s always loitering somewhere near you anymore."

"He is not!" I interrupted. Yeah…acting indifferent wasn’t my strong suit.

She chuckled again. "Let me finish."

I shut up like a good girl.

"He’s always loitering somewhere around you. I know, I know—you have a class together, but the boy’s got four other classes, and I don’t see him following around people from those classes."

She said it so matter-of-factly, that I had to stifle a laugh.

"He sits next to you at every meal—well except for all the meals that the two of you have privately."

I opened my mouth to argue that Colin and I never eat alone anymore—Randi and Amber always show up at the dining hall during our lunches after class — but Becca stopped me by holding up her hand.

"Not to mention all the little things that happened during the first week here — the way he always sought you out..."

This time, I did interrupt her. "So a guy can’t help the new girl find her way without having an ulterior motive?"

This time, Becca’s look shut me up.

"Plus," she drew the word out. "The way he looks at you, especially when you haven’t noticed him yet. Or, the way he smiles at you, especially when you have noticed him."

At this point, I wasn’t even trying to stifle my laughter.

Becca stopped, looked me in the eyes, and smiled — a truly genuine smile. "Not to mention the way you look at him…"

I smiled back at her.

Then, I tried to deny it.

"There’s nothing going on, Bec." I wish something could, but at least I wasn’t lying. "We’re just friends."

"Because of Randi?"

I looked up at her, surprised.

"No." I shook my head. "Why would you think that?"

She gave me a knowing look.

"You know, he doesn’t like her like that. She likes him like that, but he doesn’t like her. They’re just old friends."

"Well, I don’t like him like that either," I argued.

She just smirked and said, "Sure, you don’t."

"Plus, even if he doesn’t like her, she likes him, and she’s my friend."

"You just met her, Ashley." Her tone was disbelieving.

"Yeah, well, I’d like to keep her, Becca."

She just laughed.

I looked at her seriously, "I told you, Becca, I’m happy here. This is my home. You guys are my family. I’m not doing anything to jeopardize that. Colin and me—that could definitely jeopardize it."

She looked at me for a long minute. Then, slowly, she nodded, and the corners of her lips rose.

"I understand, Ash." Then, her smile widened. "I totally knew you liked him, though." And she laughed.

"I didn’t say that!" But I was giggling with her.

Chapter Six

"Seriously? You’re studying again?" Amber didn’t even try to hide the disdain in her voice.

I laughed and looked up at my roommate as she walked into our room, dropped her bag on the floor, and flopped onto her bed.

"What do you expect me to be doing? Midterms are next week."

She shrugged, making a face. "I don’t know, but it’s Friday night, Ashley. You’re like the only person in the world who studies on Friday night."

I chuckled at her whiney tone. "That’s a bit of an exaggeration, don’t you think? I bet I can find at least ten people in this building who are studying tonight. Besides, what else am I going to do? Becca and Randi both went home, and you have Danny coming to visit." She opened her mouth to say something, but I cut her off, "And I am not playing third wheel to the two of you."

Amber’s boyfriend Danny was coming to visit her for the first time this semester. He was making the twelve-hour drive by himself and had left New Jersey early that morning. Amber was expecting him any minute.

He was staying in our room, which would not have been a problem at all, except that midterms started on Monday, and all I wanted to do was study. I could not, for the life of me, understand why they chose this weekend. Amber needed to study for midterms as much as, if not more than, the rest of us. His visit was further complicated by the departure of both Becca and Randi for the weekend. Not only was I being exiled, or sexiled, as Randi had put it, but I had no place to go.

Becca went home for her mother’s birthday and to have some peace and quiet while studying. She was extremely nervous about her Calculus II midterm and wanted to shut herself in a room to study for hours straight. Even with Randi gone for the weekend, the likelihood of hours of uninterrupted study time in a dorm is low, so she used her mother’s birthday as an excuse to drive home last night.

Randi, on the other hand, wasn’t particularly concerned about her midterms. She went home for her cousin’s wedding and was thrilled to be getting away for the weekend. She even asked Colin if he wanted a ride home and to attend the wedding with her, but he declined saying he needed to study.

Now, I was stuck here with Amber and her boyfriend while they’re reunited for the first time in months with no alternate rooms to sleep in. I should have asked Becca for her key before she left.

"Are you listening to me?"

Oops…no…

"Yes," I lied.

"What did I say?"

Oh crap.

"That you can’t wait for Danny to get here." I took a shot.

She looked appeased. Apparently, it was a good shot.

"So, what are you going to do when he gets here?" she asked way too innocently.

"What do you mean? I’m going to study."

She rolled her eyes. "I figured that. I meant where are you going to go"?"

Apparently, I was getting kicked out of the room earlier than expected.

"The lounge?" I said it like a question, because I really hadn’t figured it out yet. I knew I’d be getting the boot; I just didn’t realize it would be so early.

Amber looked pleased and opened her mouth to say something but, before she could, was interrupted by the ringing of her cell phone. She didn’t even wait to look at it before screaming and jumping off the bed.

"He’s here! Oh, thank god!" She exclaimed, as if she thought he was going to change his mind between the time she spoke to him an hour ago and now.

She ran to the door, stopping when she got there, and turned around to look at me.

"Have fun studying!"

And that’s my cue.

****

I gathered up my books, threw a sweatshirt on, and headed down the hall to the common lounge. There was a small group of students from the floor, along with a couple of girls I didn’t recognize, already in the lounge, settling in to watch a movie.

I nodded hello before shuffling over to a table as far away as possible from them, while wishing I owned an MP3 player or something of the sort to drown out the movie and their commentary.

This was not an environment conducive to studying, but I was going to make the best of it.

I decided to begin with Spanish. Since, I was not a fan of the subject, so I just wanted to get it out of the way.

I opened my book and began reading about preterit and imperfect tenses and, before I knew it, was completely engrossed in the movie that the other students in the lounge were watching.

This was so not going to work.

I closed my Spanish book and notebook, stacking them on the corner of the table, and reached for my Organic Chemistry book. Organic Chem was a subject I liked, so hopefully, that meant I’d be able to focus on it for longer than three minutes. I leaned under the table to pull my notebook out of my bag, and when I looked back up, Colin was walking by the lounge.

He spotted me and turned around to come into the room.

He entered to a chorus of "heys," "yos," and "Colin’s," but he just waved to his friends and continued over to me. He stopped at the table I was sitting at and squatted down next to me.

"You’re studying here, in the lounge, on a Friday night?" He raised his eyebrows.

"Midterms are Monday." I was annoyed that I was getting teased for studying again.

He chuckled at my tone. "I didn’t mean it like that. Why the lounge? Why not your room? I can’t imagine you’re getting anything done in here." He gestured around the room.

My eyes turned to where he was gesturing as I relaxed a little. "I’m not," I complained, "but Danny’s here to visit, so I’ve been kicked out of my room."

He laughed and stood up, grabbing my book bag as he did. "Come on."

I stood up and started gathering my books on the table. "Where are we going?"

"My room."

"It’s Friday night. Do you really want to study on a Friday night?"

Colin just looked at me. "What do you think I’ve been doing? If I’d realized you’d been sexiled, I’d have asked you to study with me earlier. I could really use your help."