My Summer Roommate (14 page)

“Don’t beat yourself up about Chris.”

I risk a sideways glance, but I quickly lose half a stride to him. I don’t want to get into a discussion about Chris with Harper
, of all people.

“He’s a guy,” he says, like that explains it all. The arrogance of it annoys me so much that it gets me to speak.

“So?”

“Guys do stupid stuff, Chloe.” He chuckles. “Haven’t you learned that already?”

I stop. Now I want to talk about it, but I can’t do it with my heart trying to gain independence by jumping out of my throat.

A few paces ahead, he stops too when he notices I’m not following him.

“So? Is it supposed to be okay because he’s a dude?”

He walks back the few yards separating us. He looks intimidating, so tall and serious.

“No,” he says. “But you’re too smart to be blinded by one stupid act.”

“It was a pretty big and pretty stupid
act.”

Getting love advice from Harper is surreal. I wonder what Isabelle will
have to say about it. I don’t know how much he even knows about Chris and me. I never discussed it with him, so whatever he knows must’ve come from Izzy.

“
Was it a pretty big love or a pretty small fling?” He raises one eyebrow at me, like a displeased teacher, and I want to slap him across his gorgeous face and thank him at the same time.

“Shouldn’t we be running?” I grumble and start off again, although my legs are killing me.

I wish things were as simple as he put it. But they’re far from it.

Uh-huh.

****

After Harper dropped me at Izzy’s, he went home. I told her about our talk. She tried her best to avoid my eyes while I repeated word for word everything Harper said.

“I know you two talk about me. It’s okay, Iz.”

“I only told him the basic stuff.”

“I said it’s okay.”

She nods, but she seems confused. It occurs to me then that she must agree with Harper, and that is why she’s avoiding my eyes. I want to ask her about it, but her phone rings.

As I go to take a shower, I think that I should be glad for this turn of events. I should be grateful to Chris for accepting the bet, for ruining everything. Because
this is what I wanted, isn’t it—nothing happening between Chris and me? Nothing is going to happen between us now, that’s for sure. So my wish came true.

But I don’t feel grateful
. I’m far from feeling happy about it. There’s no consolation in the fact that at least I didn’t have sex with him. None whatsoever. Him stopping us from becoming an item didn’t spare me. Far from it.

I feel miserable. I’ve had the worst summer ever.

I feel heartbroken.

****

Ten days after what I refer to in my mind as ‘the incident’, we’re moving. Or Mom and Eric are. I should’ve known Mom was up to something when she insisted that she didn’t need my help. But my daughterly love for her made me blind to the signs. I mean, why wouldn’t she want me helping unless there was something going on that I was not supposed to know about? It made so much sense afterwards, but when I was driving to our new place, it never occurred to me that I might be running straight into a mess. I just wanted to help.

I park
my car on the curb, a few yards in front of the moving truck. I walk up the driveway and knock on the front door. Despite this being my home, technically, it feels strange entering without knocking.

I open the door and walk
into the small hallway. Through the door into the living room, I notice some boxes. The place already looks less empty than last time.

“Hello?” I
hear a noise somewhere in the back of the house. “Mom?”

“
I’ll get it,” someone calls, and I think I recognize the voice, but it isn’t either Eric’s or Mom’s.

All the pieces
fall together when I see someone walk out into the hall. He is carrying a large box with my name scribbled across in black permanent marker. His blond bed hair sends my heart into a race. His green eyes widen when he sees me. He stops dead in his tracks.

“Chris?
”

He doesn’t speak.

“
What are you doing here?” I ask, my temper beginning to bubble just under the calm veneer. I’m beginning to see what Mom meant when she said I’d better not come.

Mo
m comes through a door to my right and stops when she sees Chris and me, facing down the length of the hall. Chris is starting to speak, but Mom interrupts him.

“I asked Chris for help, love. Don’t be mad at him.”
She extends her hand as if she were trying to stop me from physically attacking Chris.

Mo
m’s scheme leaves me speechless. She asked him for help while she refused mine. Why would she do that? I’m her daughter. She’s known Chris for a month.

“Chloe,”
Chris starts again, but I ignore him, turning to Mom instead.

“What’s wrong with me?”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“I wanted to help and you turned me down.” I’m gasping for air,
I am so outraged.

Chris again opens his mouth to speak, but I step to him and tear the box he’s holding out
of his hands. “This is my stuff. Don’t you dare touch it.”

I almost drop it because it’s so heavy.
I turn to carry it in through the living room, but Mom says in a small voice, “The bedrooms are this way, love.”

I’m so angry that
the embarrassment of losing my direction doesn’t even register with me. I turn and retrace my steps, turning right into my future bedroom. I slam the box onto the bare floor. Something rattles in it. I hope it’s not the one filled with all my favorite tea mugs.

“Aren’t you being unreasonable?”
Mom says, when I snarl with frustration.

“Yes,
Mom, I’m being unreasonable. I’m technically still a teenager. A guy broke my heart. And you, my own
mother
, are all friendly with him behind my back. So yeah, I think I have every reason to be unreasonable.”

Only when I finish, I realize Eric has joined my small audience. All three stare at me, stunned at my outburst. Or possibly at
the hot tears rolling down my face.

“I didn’t do it on purpose
,” Chris says, finally managing to finish a sentence. I don’t know whether he means coming to help Mom or breaking my heart.

“Not now,” I say and I sound exactly how I feel: angry, broken and violent.

“Don’t be like this,” Mom begs and glances at Eric. For support, no doubt. But he doesn’t speak. “I thought Chris was a strong young man and could help Eric carry all the heavy stuff. You and I, we’d do the smaller stuff later on.”

“It’s not just about this,
Mom. When have I not helped you? Huh? I’ve been your secretary, your answering machine, your everything my whole life and now that I want to help you turn me down and ask Chris instead? What the fuck? So everyone’s just dumping me now? I’m not good enough all of a sudden or something? Huh? What’s wrong with me that no one wants me anymore?”

Mo
m stands there gaping at me, Chris is staring at his feet, and Eric is being his usual stoic self. Despite that, I think right now, if I had to choose my favorite person of the three in front of me, he just might be the one.

No one speaks. My throat is raw and my gaze is blurry from tears. My hands shake, so I cross my arms on my chest to hide it.

“I mean, I get Chris … He’s a guy and to him it’s all about sex, so yeah, his betrayal at least makes sense. In a way.” The past few days, I’ve been starting to think that it was more than just sex to him, but I say that just to hurt him. Because right now I want to see other people hurting as much as I am. I want revenge.

“But you,
Mom … Why would you dump me like that? I’ve always been there for you. I don’t get it, you preferring Chris to me … I just don’t.”

I want them all to see how much they’ve hurt me, but the sobbing that overwhelms me is unintentional. I don’t want to fall into pieces in front of them.

“I didn’t mean to upset you, love. That’s why I didn’t tell you about Chris coming here.”

“Mo
m, tell me you understand how wrong this is. Please. Because otherwise I’ll think you’re doing it on purpose, although I can’t think of a good reason why you’d do that.”

I’m proud that I managed to get the words out
at all. My throat’s closed up and I can barely swallow.

Mo
m’s lips tremble, but she doesn’t speak. Chris has a look on his face that says he’d rather be anywhere else but here. I can’t blame him. So would I. Another planet would do.

It’s Eric who speaks first. “I think your
mom didn’t mean anything by it when she asked Chris for help, Chloe. He’s a decent young man who was willing to help her out. He didn’t know you’d be here. None of this was done on purpose to hurt you.”

I’m about to protest, but he raises his hand to stop me.

“But … But I also understand you feel played and mistreated. I guess I would too, if I were in your position. But let’s keep our heads calm and let’s not make a big deal out of it, shall we? Chloe?”

I know he’s right. I analyzed the facts long before he spelled them out. I
know none of this is Mom’s fault. Or Chris’s. Still, I am hurt.

I wipe
my tears with my palms, probably leaving a trace of dust on my cheeks from the box I held earlier.

“Whatever,” is all I manage to say
.

I push past Eric and Chris standing in the door. I feel a hand trying to sto
p me. I don’t know whether it is Eric or Chris because I don’t look back. Mom calls my name, but it’s barely a whisper and it can’t stop me.

I dart to my car, slamming the door so the
shock absorbers wheeze with the rocking motion. I drive off before anyone follows me from the house. The part of me that feels sorry for myself is convinced no one even thought of following me out and trying to stop me.

Chapter
Twenty

CHRIS

I volunteer to help Sal clean the bakery. Amara seems to appreciate it, but Sal keeps grumbling he’d rather do it alone than watch my miserable face.

I can’t help it. I try thinking of other stuff, but what else is there to think about when the girl you love hates you? Really, tell me, I need ideas. Because I sure can’t think of anything else to distract my mind
... So I have to get out of the apartment or I’ll suffer myself to death. Me wallowing around the place––not a pretty sight. There’re pizza boxes and beer cans all over, my clothes stink and I don’t bother changing. The remote control is shattered from me flinging it at the wall when there was nothing on TV for hours on end. My phone keeps blinking from missed calls and messages from friends, which I don’t reply to. Really, I don’t need to go out and get shit-faced drunk and do some random girl. It won’t help, I tell ya. Plus, that would ruin even the infinitesimal chance of getting back together with Chloe if she ever forgives me.

“Did you not hear me?” Sal bellows
, and shakes me out of my miserable thoughts.

“What?”

“If you’re gonna use that detergent, put some gloves on, for fuck’s sake. You don’t wanna get a rash all over your hands. Jesus, boy, get a grip.”

“Sorry,”
I mumble, and go to the locker room to get gloves out of the closet.

Sal’s washing the floor with a large brush, while I’m supposed to scrub the machines and counters with a grease-removing detergent.

I spray the counter and start wiping it. I hear Sal pause his scrubbing movements as he lifts up the bucket and pours clean water over the tiles.

“Look, I understand,” he says.

I glance over my shoulder, not sure if he’s talking to me or someone else.

“Huh?” I say, when he keeps staring at me.

“Them love troubles. I get it, boy. That’s why I prefer my serials to real-life fuck ups.”

I don’t want to discuss it. I volunteered to do this specifically to distract myself from thinking of Chloe. Sal’s
not helping, but my silence doesn’t deter him.

“I used to
have a life, until I made a huge mistake and slept with my girl’s bridesmaid.”

I’m about to say something dismissive, when his words register with me. “Wait, what?”

“Told you I know more about the ladies than I let on. Y’all think I’m clueless, don’t ya? Well, I ain’t.”

“
What did you say about sleeping with someone’s bridesmaid?”

“Long story short, she was a girl from a Spanish immigrant family
, the girl I married. Gorgeous and sweet enough to eat.” He kisses his fingertips. “Of course, I wasn’t such a lump of a man back then. I had the looks and the moves, if you know what I mean.”