Fireworks: A Holiday Bad Boy Romance (62 page)

“I’ve had a couple of
drinks,” she says.

Abs is a little difficult
to classify on the alcohol/behavior scale. She’s not really a lightweight, but
even with a small amount of alcohol in her system, it’s as if she was born
without inhibitions. That said, she can drink everyone else under the table and
never actually get to the point of being sloppy.

It’s a pretty
entertaining dichotomy, really.

“The second plowed,” she
says and then dissolves into giggles.

“It’s sex,” I say. “You
really didn’t leave that difficult a code to crack.”

“You coming?” she asks.
“I know, not yet, right?”

She’s laughing
boisterously now, drawing the attention of a few of the guys sitting on the
front lawn with their clear plastic cups of beer. I’m wishing I was back in the
café being the object of surprisingly large bets.

“Come on,” she says and
grabs my arm. “Hey look,” she says, “I’m tipsy and I’m still more gentle than
you were with me.”

“I think it’s ‘gentler,’”
I correct, but there’s really no point. Whether Drunk Abs is an act or just a
particularly strange way her body’s found to process alcohol makes no
difference. She’s not going to listen to anything I have to say unless there’s
some source of adrenaline attached to it.

We get into the packed
house, and I do my best to breathe without gagging from the stench of stale
liquor and cologne-infused sweat.

“Do you know anyone
here?” I ask.

“Of course not,” she
answers. “That’s part of the fun.”

“They don’t care that
we’re crashing their party?” I ask.

“Oh, come on,” she says,
snatching a drink from the hand of an unsuspecting frat boy with a backward
baseball cap. You actually don’t see that too much, anymore. “We’re two
attractive women who are willing to get drunk at their party. What’s not to
like about us being here?”

Judging by the often,
though not always furtive glances from the guys around the room, I’d say she’s
right about that much.

“Oh, hey, look who’s
here,” Abs says, and I already know I’m going to regret turning around to see
whoever’s standing there.

One of the most
impressive things about Drunk Abs is that she can form meaningful connections
with people in no time flat. She turns on her drunken charm and, if she decides
to let someone in, that person’s got a drinking buddy until one of them gets
bored with the other.

It usually happens about
three hours into any given party, but sometimes, those inebriated connections
can last for years.

Actually, come to think
about it, the first time I met Abs, she was drunk.

The two of us work
because we’re so different, or at least that’s what we tell each other whenever
one of us questions the friendship.

It doesn’t happen as
often as you might think.

Anyway, I turn and,
standing there like nothing’s wrong, is Ian.

“Where were you?” I ask.
“You left me in that café and you never intended to show up.”

“Oh,” he says, “that’s
right. We were supposed to get together for that thing.”

“I left right after you
texted me,” I tell him. “It’s not like it was some distant plan that you were…”

I trail off because he’s
not listening. He’s not even looking at me.

Abs is putting a drink in
his hand and batting her over-mascaraed eyelashes at him. Neither one of them
speaks, but they both seem to come to the same conclusion and they walk off
together.

I’m not sure what I’m
supposed to do, how I’m supposed to respond, but I instinctually walk after
them right up until they’re opening the door to one of the many rooms in this
house.

They walk inside and
close the door after themselves, and I’m beyond livid.

Not only was I stood up
for the main project in one of the fundamental classes of my degree, but now
I’ve been publicly snubbed by my best friend and the guy I was supposed to meet
at the café so they can go off and do some degree of I-don’t-want-to-know in
the bedroom of a frat house.

The worst part of all is
that it’s starting to dawn on me exactly why I’m so upset.

There are plenty of valid
reasons for my irritation right now, but the simple fact is that I didn’t like
seeing Abby and Ian walking into that room together. The fact that they just
decided to go off right in the middle of our conversation was an extraneous
rudeness.

The disregard for my time
would be tolerable, but it’s the fact that she’s in there with Ian that’s got
me wanting to break down the door or leave the party without wasting another
breath.

I’m actually jealous and
that ridiculous truth has me cracking my knuckles and thinking of vengeance.

Chapter
Four

Down to It

Ian

“I’m here, aren’t I?” I
ask the very irritated chick in the Converse shoes in front of me.

“You’re late,” she says.
“We were supposed to have something solid to go on a week ago.”

“Mia,” I sigh. “You’re
missing the point.”

“What’s the point?” she
asks, avoiding any kind of eye contact with me.

“The point is that I’m
here,” I tell her. “So, let’s get to work.”

“All right,” she says.
“We’ve decided that we want to study the prevalence of extreme views, whether
religious, political, or social, but how are we going to go about that? It’s
something that people often try to hide, especially around strangers. How do
you think we’re going to get a good set of samples?”

“I like your eyes,” I
tell her. “Most people with naturally dark hair seem to have brown, or at least
green eyes, but yours are pale, pale blue.”

“Are you listening to
me?” she asks.

“I’m in and out,” I
answer and let the last three words repeat and change order in my head.

“I’m not going to do all
of this,” she says. “At some point, I
am
going to expect you to contribute, or I’m going to end up in front of the
professor with bags under my eyes when it’s time to hand our results in, and
I’m going to feel obligated to tell her that you didn’t bother doing anything.”

“I’m with you,” I say.
“I’m listening. We’re looking at how many crazy douchebags we’ve got in the
general area. It should be fun. I’m betting the number’s going to be pretty
high.”

“Yeah,” she says. “It’s
fifty percent of the people sitting at this table.”

She keeps telling me that
she’s not uptight, but if that were the case, why is it that I find myself
fantasizing about giving her a massage every time I see her? I might think it
was just a run-of-the-mill sexual fantasy, but it never goes past the massage.

Apparently, the more
imaginative part of me just wants to see this chick relax.

“So, how long have you
been into skating?” I ask her.

“I don’t know,” she says,
“a long time. Now, I don’t think it’s enough to just get a general idea how
common extreme viewpoints are. I think we should see if we can tie it to
anything, see if there’s any common thread among those who do hold particularly
fringe beliefs. Maybe something in their childhood or their economic status; I
don’t know. Just having a filled out sheet of paper saying that this person
thinks the government is corrupt and needs to be overthrown or that person
thinks that anyone who’s not a white protestant is a drain on humanity, I
really think we should see if we can learn something from this whole thing,
don’t you?”

My ears take in every
sound of her voice and my eyes go back and forth between her dark purple
lipstick and those almost unnaturally pale blue eyes of hers. It’s in my brain
that the information gets routed the wrong way and I end up savoring the sight
and sound of her speaking without actually giving it the consideration I
probably should be.

“You know,” she says, but
she doesn’t finish the thought. She just goes silent and starts breathing
loudly through her nose.

“I really get under your
skin, don’t I?” I ask.

“It would be nice if it
felt like you cared even a little bit about this project,” she says.

“I
do
care,” I tell her. Sure, I’m not even certain I’m not lying, but
she doesn’t have to literally bite her tongue. “I don’t think that we’re going
to get the best results by having people fill out a piece of paper, though.
We’re really going to get what we’re looking for by interviewing people,
talking to them, giving them a chance to vent whatever hateful nonsense they
have in them and giving them the chance to justify it with whatever hateful
nonsense they justify it with.”

She blinks a few times
and tilts her head to the side. “Do you think we’d have time to do something
like that?” she asks.

“I don’t know,” I tell
her. “I’ve got the competition coming up and everything, but if you wouldn’t
mind doing a little bit more down the road, I can step it up now and I think
it’ll all even out in—”

“You’re joking, right?”
she asks.

“What do you mean?” I
return.

“You think I’m just going
to pick up everything for you while you’re off skating in some competition?”
she asks.

“I told you, I’d step it
up before then so we’d end up doing the same amount of work,” I defend.

“I’m not your girlfriend.
I’m not going to take the bullet to better facilitate your hopes and dreams.
This is a project for a class, and I’m not going to let you make me do all the
dirty work,” she says.

It’s probably a
mistake—screw that, I know for a fact that it’s a mistake, but I go ahead and
say it anyway, “You know,” I start, “I have great hands.”

“What are you talking
about?” she asks, her head flinching back a little.

“I also have massage
oil,” I tell her. “Why don’t we head back to my house, we can get you nice and
relaxed and maybe we see where it goes from there?”

“You know what?” she
says, “I’m done. Pitch in, don’t pitch in, I don’t really care. You make your
decision whether you want to be a part of this—a
real
part of this—and
 
you
give me a call. Until then,” she says, getting up from the table, pulling her
wallet from her back pocket, “why don’t we assume that I’m just going to do
everything and your name isn’t going to end up anywhere on it. That work for
you?”

I go to answer, but she’s
already walking away and I’m trying to figure out how she didn’t know I’d
genuinely enjoy giving her a massage. Maybe it was the “calm down” implied in
the offer.

Who knows?

Either way, she’s out the
door and we’re still no closer to being prepared for the final project.

I’m not sure quite what I
think of her, apart from the knowledge that she’s too uptight for me. I guess
that’s all I really need to know.

I just wish the pretty
ones could be a little bit more chill in their daily lives. It really shouldn’t
be that much to ask.

Maybe I shouldn’t be so
hard on her. People are going to judge my intelligence by my appearance just as
long as I’ve got these sleeves coming out of my sleeves and the beanie
permanently affixed to my head.

I find myself expecting
more from her, though I have no real insight into her on a personal level.
Maybe what I’m starting to realize is that the whole abrasive “hate you” vibe
may very well be just another part of her personality.

Whatever the case may be,
I just earned myself a night off of doing what I love in order to write the
paper we were supposed to outline when she walked out the door.

We’re really not that far
apart in what we think would be the best direction, but with her perpetual
state of uncalm and my propensity for screwing with people when they’re
teetering on the brink of blowing a fuse, I’m kind of surprised it took her so
long to walk out.

We’re oil and water.
Naturally, my dick is telling me to shake things up and see what happens, but
even I don’t understand the metaphor, so for now, I just need to focus on
getting this paper done and then I can get my mind back where it should be.

*
                   
*
                   
*

I think this is the first
time I’ve walked into the classroom before the top of the hour, and I’m quick
to make my way to my seat. Due to the long night I spent picking a firm
position and expounding on it, I missed out on my daily routine.

Today’s going to be a
long day.

Mia comes in a few minutes
after I do, and she hesitates when she turns down the aisle and sees me already
seated.

“We’re going to have to
figure this out,” she says, coming down the aisle toward me, toward her seat.
“I can’t keep picking up everything you don’t want to work on.”

“I think you’ve got me
all wrong,” I tell her, but I’m nowhere near interested enough to explicate.

“Whatever,” she says and
sits down, setting her denim bag with all those weird stick figure patches sewn
to it. “Let’s get together right after class,” she says. “We can go over what I
prepared for today and—”

“All right, why don’t we
get started?” the prof asks, interrupting Mia. “Go ahead and pass your
proposals forward, if you would. Today, we’re going to be talking about the sex
drive from adolescence through the different stages of adulthood.”

The girl behind me passes
me a paper and I pass it up to Mia. I wait until Mia’s passed both hers and the
one from the girl behind me up before I tap Mia on the shoulder with mine.

She turns and grabs it.

“Whose is this?” she
asks.

“I wrote it up last night
after you decided to be unreasonable,” I tell her. “I hope you don’t mind, I
took our initial idea and I gave it a bit more clear a focus.”

“I just handed ours in,”
she says. “Save this for when you retake this class next semester.”

I clear my throat,
catching the attention of a few people in the general vicinity, specifically
the slovenly guy sitting in front of Mia. I hold up the paper and pass it up to
him, past Mia.

He takes it and passes it
the rest of the way up.

“I don’t know what you
hope to accomplish,” she says, “but we’re going with my paper. It’s what we
talked about, and—”

“It’s what
you
talked about,” I interrupt. “I think
we’re going to find out which is the better proposal.”

The professor starts
talking again and I drift off into a daydream where the physically gifted poser
chick is a little less up her own ass. It’s a pleasant diversion.

We talk about penises and
vaginas for a while, but mostly, today’s class is a long discussion about what
sort of things constitute sexual abnormality and whether the term sexual
abnormality is considered the proper terminology.

What can I say? Human
sexuality is one of my keener interests. I keep the conversation going.

The further off track I
manage to maneuver the conversation, though, the more frustrated I become that
I’m so far from the watering hole.

You know, it might be
stuff like referring to sex as proximity to a watering hole that’s kept Ian
Junior out of the swimming pool for so long. You know, the term swimming pool
really isn’t any better.

In my head, I’m somewhere
around helping Mia find her bra when a few of the professor’s words get through
the din: “Mia and Ian, if the two of you wouldn’t mind staying after for a
couple of minutes. We’re done for the day, everyone. Have a good weekend.”

I actually thought it was
going to be a couple of classes before the professor noticed we’d both turned
in proposals for the same project. Apparently, Professor Enterlastnamehere
(it’s German, I think,) is a little more on top of her game than I’ve been
giving her credit for.

Once the rest of the
students have left the classroom, the professor starts.

“I don’t know if there
was some confusion, but I just wanted to make sure I was receiving the right
proposal here,” she says. “I only need one per group, and it’ll be the one with
the outline that the two of you have agreed upon.”

“We’re going to use
mine,” Mia says.

“Hold on a minute,” I
object. “Mine is better written and offers a more meaningful approach to the study.”

“In your dreams,” Mia
scoffs, and I’m just surprised people are still saying that.

“You two really can’t
agree?” the professor asks.

“I think we might be able
to agree on something if he paid any attention when we’re supposed to be
working,” she says and I roll my eyes.

“Please,” I scoff.
“You’re the one that’s always crusading to make sure that your voice is the one
that makes everyone go deaf.”

“See, I don’t even know
what that means,” Mia says. “I think you like to play smart every once in a
while just to freak people out, but the problem is, you don’t have the goods to
back it up.”

“Will the two of you be
quiet for just a minute?” the professor asks. “Jeez,” she exhales and sits on
her desk. “If I’d known you were having so much trouble working together, I
could have reassigned you, but we’re already a couple of weeks in, and it’s not
fair to have people split off from each other. Is there any way I give these
papers back to the two of you and you come back next class with a mutual
decision?” she asks.

Mia and I look at each
other, then turn to the professor and answer almost simultaneously, “Nope.”

The professor frowns and
drops her head a little, looking down at the papers in her hands.

“Give me a couple of
minutes,” she says. “I’m going to read both of these and I’ll choose the one I
think is going to give you the best shot at an A presentation, but I need total
silence. The first one of you who speaks gets their paper thrown in the trash.”