Down to Business (Business Series) (4 page)

“Yeah well, I don’t have to meet guys at parties. I’m sure there are plenty of other places to meet them. Besides, I don’t drink.”

“Not anymore you mean.”

I glared at Lindy. “You know why.”

“Autumn,” she said with a motherly look. “Would you lighten up? At least go to one party.”

Just as I opened my mouth to argue, our food came. My ten-ounce New York steak brushed with butter landed on the table before me and I salivated. All my apprehension faded away as I cut my first piece of meat and placed it in my mouth.

“Mmm…” I moaned when my taste buds exploded in happiness.

Lindy laughed. “God Autumn, you sound like you’re having an orgasm.”

“I think I am,” I laughed. “You have no idea how good this tastes. I forgot how good steak is.”

“Someone is deprived. If she gets this excited over steak, I can’t imagine her with a guy,” Tyler taunted as he chewed.

Lindy giggled. “Yeah, no kidding.”

I rolled my eyes. There was no way I was going to change my mind about partying. Partying and meeting guys was not part of my plan. I promised myself I was going to focus on my classes and get good grades.  That was my plan, and I was sticking to it.

I spent the next couple of days preparing for my new life in college. I shuffled from the registration office to the bookstore and got familiar with the campus layout. During that time, I barely saw Lindy. She was always busy shopping, going to the gym, or hanging out with Tyler. I felt like I had moved in with a complete stranger. Lindy never would have chosen to hang out with a guy over me. College really did change people.

The night before classes began, I felt homesick. I sat on the floor of my room and sorted through a shoebox of old pictures to help ease the ache. I started to think I made a terrible choice to choose Adelphi University just to be with Lindy. I never saw her anyway. I should have listened to my parents and stayed in Hamilton and went to Colgate College only a few miles away.

I had my iPod blasting so I didn’t have to hear Tyler and Lindy having sex. That happened every night around eight o’clock like clockwork. I knew they were going at it because her bedroom door was closed and if I didn’t turn up my music I could hear the faint groans, which made me want to throw up.

I was so involved in reminiscing with my photos, I didn’t hear Lindy come in until her perfectly pedicured toe nails appeared next to the pile of pictures I sorted through already.

She was already dressed for bed in a white camisole and shorts that resembled underwear with broken hearts all over them.

“Hey!” she shouted over the music. “Whatcha doing?”

I stood up and tugged at the bottom of my maroon Hamilton High Cougars t-shirt. “Nothing, just going through some old pictures…” I said, pulling out my gym short wedgie and went to turn down the music.

“Oh my God. I remember this day…” She waved one of the pictures at me and took a seat on the floor. “It was your grandpa’s 75
^th
birthday and we made him that lemon cake that tasted like shit.”

I remembered the day vividly. “Yeah, too much lemon, not enough cake.”

She giggled. “Do you remember his face when he took the first bite? I thought he was going to spit it out, but he just swallowed it and thanked us. He was such a sweet old man.”

“Yeah, he was,” I sat back down on the floor next to her and admired the picture in her hand. We were standing on either side of Grandpa, holding the lopsided lemon cake in front of him with a candle sagging in its center.

“Grandma’s never been the same since he died.”

“Yeah,” Lindy said with a sad smile. “I can tell she still drives your mom crazy.”

“She drives us all crazy.”

After Grandpa died, we didn’t trust Grandma to be alone so we moved her in with us. That decision will haunt my mother until she dies. In the last five years, my mother has aged twice as fast from stress.

Lindy brushed the pictures around until she found another one that interested her. It was a picture of us with my father when he took us to the pumpkin patch when we were ten. We were sitting on Dad’s lap on a haunted hayride, holding hands and looking excited. Our faces were painted. I was a tiger and she was a bunny.

Seeing pictures of my father still brought so many bottled up emotions to the surface. I felt abandoned when he left. I’ll never forgot the night he sat my brother and I down at the dinner table and told us he was moving out because he and my mother were not in love anymore. I argued that point, saying they were fine. I pleaded with my mother, demanding that she tell him she loved him. Instead, she started crying and ran off to their bedroom. The next morning, Dad packed his suitcase and moved in with his parents. My grandparents on his side of the family lived in Connecticut and always sent Christmas cards with their two Lhasa Apso’s on it.

He recently moved back to Hamilton with his new wife Mindy, but things were never the same between us.

“I remember your Dad always called us Cinnamon and Sugar.”

“Yeah, I remember,” I said, my heart aching.

“How’s he doing these days? Is he still with Mindy?”

“Yep.” The mention of her name still put me in a bad mood.

No matter how much time had passed, I knew my father’s new wife and I were never going to get along. In my opinion, my mother was amazing compared to blond bimbo, magazine model, Mindy.

Mindy was a runway model in her mid-twenties that lived on a steady diet of salad and nicotine. She always wore dangly earrings and so much lipstick that I was surprised her lips weren’t permanently stained. It always got on her teeth, and I never told her when it happened. I always waited for someone else to do it, and I’d secretly enjoy her embarrassment when she had to rub away the shame.

Silence fell over us. I looked down at the pictures and bit my lip while I searched for a new one to comment on.  “You’re not hanging out with Tyler tonight?”

“No. He’s getting ready to go to the gym and then he’s going to hang out with his wrestling friends,” she answered and tucked some of her long blond hair behind her ear. “You don’t him, do you?”

“What?” I feigned shock, though an explosion of warmth flowed over my face. “I like him.”

“You can’t lie to me, Autumn.”

I shrugged and swept some unruly strands of hair back into my messy bun. “Lindy, I don’t even know him. I just thought it would be the two of us. I was expecting us to hang out like old times when I moved in. We haven’t really had the chance to catch up because you’re always doing things with him.”

She leaned back on her hands and stretched her legs out. “To be fair, I haven’t only been spending time with him. I asked you if you wanted to go get a pedicure with me last night and you said no. Same with shopping at the mall and lunch two days ago.”

“I don’t get pedicures, Lindy, and I had to take care of my registration.”

“You should start getting pedicures. Guys don’t like girls with dry flakey feet and snaggly toe nails.”

I curled my unpainted toes into the carpet. “What the hell, Lindy! My toes aren’t snaggly and I am not looking to find a guy with a foot fetish.”

She laughed. “It would be nice if you at least painted your toe nails. Don’t you want to try and date someone?”

I shrugged and felt a nervous tingle electrify in the core of my stomach. “I don’t know. I want to focus on school.”

She rolled her eyes. “I know that, but college isn’t just about studying and getting good grades. You can still have a social life.”

I looked down at my unpainted toenails and pressed my lips together. “I guess I’m still kinda hung up on last time I tried to fit in.”

“Autumn,” she said giving my sleeve a tug, “It was six years ago. We were freshmen in high school and you were drunk.”

“I know, but that experience ruined sex and dating for me.”

“You’re letting one bad decision dictate the rest of your life. That’s stupid.”

I looked up at her. “I’m just afraid I’ll do something I regret again.”

“You think I’d let that happen?”

“No, but I don’t want you to feel like you have to babysit me.”

“I like babysitting you. Remember, I was the one who sat and held your hair while you puked all night. I promised I’d never let someone take advantage of you again. That hasn’t changed.”

I rubbed my forehead. “Ugh, thanks for reminding me.”

She put her arms around me and squeezed. “Autumn, I love you. You’re the closest thing I’ve had to a sister. And as your semi-sister, it’s my job to get you to come out of your boring shell and experience life. You’re finally far away from your controlling mother like you always wanted, so why don’t you enjoy life for once and have some fun?”

I rested my temple against her shoulder. “I do want to have fun, it’s just...I don’t feel like I’ll fit in with that sort of fun.”

“Okay, so tomorrow after class we’re going to change that. We’ll go to mall and get you a complete makeover. We can get you a haircut, buy you some make-up, and new clothes. High school gym clothes don’t qualify as pajamas. It’s time to grow up, and stop looking like you still belong at Hamilton High.”

I sighed in resignation and looked down at the cougar emblem on my shirt. “Okay fine.”

She leaned her head against mine and gave me another squeeze. “You’re going to turn every head at Adelphi when I am through with you.”

I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not, but I was due for a makeover. I was tired of feeling like a twelve-year-old redheaded stepchild. I was convinced anything would be an improvement at this point.

I
woke up to a near heart attack the next morning. The escalating siren ringtone was meant to wake me up, not make me think the apartment was on fire. I turned it off and stayed in bed a while longer, relishing the warmth of my covers until I realized what day it was. Apprehension filled my stomach and forced me out of bed. I stumbled down the hall to find the bathroom already occupied.

Great…

I could have sworn Lindy said she took all afternoon classes because she liked to sleep in. So who was in the shower? I sighed, figuring Tyler was the culprit. I panicked and looked around, knowing I only had an hour to get to class, and getting ready wasn’t going to be easy. Just when I was about to barge into Lindy’s room to complain, I heard the shower turn off. The curtain rustled followed by the flapping sound of a towel.

I crossed my arms and glared at the door. I couldn’t wait to tell him what a piece of shit he was for inconveniencing me. I heard a deep cough and paused thinking it sounded too deep to be Tyler. Before I could back away from the door, it swung open and a guy that was definitely not Tyler crashed into me.

I screamed and backed away, staring at a guy that was Tyler’s opposite in every way. He was shirtless, dressed in only dark blue jeans and a Mediterranean tan. My eyes helplessly followed a droplet of water as it rolled down his perfectly toned chest and abdomen, absorbing into the waist of his jeans. My gaze drifted upward at the sound of his voice.

“You must be Lindy’s roommate?” His beautiful light brown eyes met mine and his lips pulled into a flawless white smile surrounded by a five o’clock shadow. “I’m Vinny, Tyler’s friend.”

I couldn’t believe how attractive he was. I watched another droplet of water plummet down his chest and realized he was holding his palm out to shake my hand. Heat spread over my face. I roughly slapped my palm into his and shook with him.

“Oh, hi, I’m Autumn.”

“Nice to meet you, Autumn. I like your name.”

“Thanks...yours is nice too…really traditional,” I said, nodding enthusiastically like an idiot.

Traditional?  Really? That is all I could come up with?

Another burst of heat singed my cheeks and I let my hand fall back at my side.

“Did you need to use the bathroom?” he asked, arching a brow.

“Oh…um…no,” I stammered. “I mean yes! Yes, I need to use it. I wasn’t expecting a stranger, I mean you, to be in there. In my bathroom…” I shook my head and my own stupidity. I couldn’t even put a complete sentence together, let alone a thought.

What was the matter with me?