On an Edge of Glass (23 page)

I’m Alright

“Chica, you can’t avoid the place forever.”  Mark pushes the frosted glass door with the heel of his hand.  “I need caffeine or I’m going to lose it.  Like, seriously lose it, so you’re going to have to man up and take one for the team.”

             
“Fine.”  I step behind him into the warm, bustling space where I’m bombarded by the scent of coffee and the sounds of conversation.  I don’t take a visible breath or grab my heart or anything dramatic like that, but I do feel the sharp sting of memory.

             
Mark sneaks a look over his shoulder as he steps toward the line of people threading out from the barista counter.  “You have to see him every day at home so I don’t think you can rationalize us being deprived of caffeine anymore.  And I’m telling you now that I’m never drinking a cup of that heinous stuff from the cafeteria again. 
Ever
.  They shouldn’t even be allowed to call that junk coffee.”

             
Mark’s right, but it still feels weird for me to be here.  Ever since that first encounter back in October, I’ve been thinking about this place as
his
coffee shop.  I might have to deal with the real Ben at home but I certainly don’t relish the idea of warring with the ghost of him when I don’t have to.  But, Mark’s right and I know that I’m being ridiculous.  This place has the best coffee in town, and it’s convenient, and I just need to get over myself.

             
I sigh.  “Mark, I said it was fine to come here so let’s drop it.”

             
Mark’s scrolling through his phone, reading his texts, but he pauses long enough to look at me.  “You are completely full of crap and I think that you know it.  But, if you really don’t want to talk to your bestest friend in the whole wide world about Ben Hamilton and your tragically broken heart, that’s okay.  I get it.  Instead, let’s talk about the way that you’ve been acting for the last six weeks.”

             
Six weeks. 
That’s how long it’s been since the night that I went to see Ben play at The Hill.  Since I got drunk and stupid and burned everything down.  Winter break was shitty and sad but at least I was able to occupy myself with mailing out law school applications and Christmas and other family obligations.  At least I didn’t have to fall asleep every night trying to distract myself from the fact that
he
was sleeping one room over, and if I were to take the wall down, our beds would only be about eight feet apart.  Eight measly feet. 

             
I can’t say that Ben’s being difficult or trying to make things harder for me.  He isn’t.  He wakes up in the morning and I can hear him shuffling around in his room or the bathroom and then he leaves and doesn’t come home until late.  Usually it’s after I’m in bed and so the only slice of Ben Hamilton that I get each day is the sound of him on the other side of a closed door.

             
When I do see him, everything is changed. I let my eyes skip over the lines of his face, never settling in one place for too long.  He does the same when he sees me.  It’s as if we’ve come to a silent agreement that direct eye contact is not allowed. 

E
ven without looking too closely, I can tell that Ben is different.  Darker somehow, and disconnected to his surroundings. His eyes are dim and guarded.  It’s almost like he’s wearing a mask, and I think about how I’m the one that put it there. 

The few times that we’ve been forced into
using words, he’s been polite bordering on indifferent.  It’s the
indifferent
that’s gutting me. 

             
“How have I been acting?”  I ask, shifting the scarf off my neck and draping it over the strap of my tote bag.

             
Mark’s eyes roll back.  “Ugh—don’t act phony baloney.  You know how you’ve been, Ellie.  Moody, quiet, and annoyingly studious.”

             
We both step forward as the line moves.  “I told you that I’m still trying for that summer internship in New York, and if I’m going to get it then I really need to apply myself right now. Last semester I let myself get distracted and I blew the LSAT because of it.”

             
“Whatever.” Mark drops his hand dismissively.  “You already told me that Brian and Pam were fine about the LSAT and Columbia.”

             
I shake my head and give him a look.  “Yeah, my parents were surprisingly okay about my lackluster scores, but that doesn’t mean that
I’m
happy that I flushed my entire future down the toilet.”

             
That’s the truth.  And,
that,
I remind myself is exactly why I shouldn’t devote any more of my time to Ben Hamilton.  I let myself get engrossed with him last semester and look what happened.

             
“Will you stop being such a drama queen?  You applied to a hundred other law schools and I know that you’re going to end up someplace just as awesome as Columbia.” 

             
I incline my head.  “I doubt I’ll end up someplace
just
as awesome.”

Mark rolls his eyes.  “Ellie,
I told you weeks ago to scream, shout, or cry, then get over it.  Instead of purging all that negativity, you’ve become a dweller.  And you know that I hate dwellers.  All that sniveling and whining…”

“
Thanks Mark.  You make me sound like a cranky toddler.”

“Well, if the shoe fits.
”  Mark nudges me with his elbow.  “I just don’t want to see you turn your very last semester of college into some arbitrary self-inflicted punishment, Ellie-bear.”

I close my eyes.  “I know that you’re just t
rying to help, but I’m fine.  I really am.  And the stuff that happened with Ben is for the best.  We were doomed for a bad ending from the beginning.”  This is the line that I’ve been feeding my sorry self for six weeks and I’m almost to the point where I believe it.  Ben and I were always too different to make it work.  We were destined to choose separate paths.  He’s a musician and I’m an aspiring corporate attorney.  Logic tells me that the two roads never shall meet.

“Maybe not…”

“Mark, you’re the one who warned me that he was just getting out of a relationship and orbiting a completely different planet than the one that I live on.”

“I know, but—”

I’ve had enough of this conversation.  Just thinking about this stuff twists me inside out.  “No
buts
.  Let’s just leave it alone.  Ben and I are fine as friends.”

Mark turns
away to order but it’s obvious that he still wants to say something.  After we get our cappuccinos and sit down at a small table in the corner, I tell him to spit it out. 

The sides
of his mouth are turned down in a thoughtful frown.  “If you and Ben are so fine then what’s with the radio silence?”

“
For your information, we’re not
silent. 
Did it ever occur to you that maybe we don’t have a lot to say to each other?”

Mark’s eyebrows go up a notch
, and I know that he doesn’t believe me.  That’s understandable.  I don’t really believe me either.

“Ellie, I
still think you should at least try to talk to him about what happened.  Maybe if—”

I don’t let him finish.  “
Maybe
we should go back to when you said that it was okay if I didn’t want to discuss Ben.”

“
Touché,” he chides as he takes a sip from his cup.  “If we’re banned from talking about your calamitous love life, then you realize that we’re going to have to talk about mine, right?”

Despite myself, I laugh
.  “Oh Lord, and the Hal Shepherd saga continues.”

Mark leans across the table
and lowers his voice.  “So listen to
this
…”

When I get to my statistics class that afternoon, some guy is in my seat.  I’ve noticed him before.  Aaron or Elliot or something like that.  He raises his hand a lot and I get the impression that he likes the sound of his own voice.  I think he’s a Political Science major. 

Ainsley would call
him a “tall drink of water.”  He’s got sun-kissed chestnut hair smoothed back away from his forehead, broad shoulders, and a clean-shaven jaw that surrounds an oval mouth.  He’s wearing an ironed button down paired with a simple sweater.  God, it’s like stumbling into a parent’s wet dream.

             
This class doesn’t really have assigned seating, but it’s pretty standard to choose your seat on the first day and stick with it, so I find it a bit odd that he’s lounging in my chair with his ankle cocked casually on one knee.  He’s writing something in a spiral notebook. 

             
I look around and decide that I’ll skip the confrontation and grab a seat one row over.  As I pass, the tall drink of water lifts his head and looks directly at me. 

             
“I’m in your seat,” he says matter-of-factly, folding his arm over the back of the chair. 

             
My forehead crinkles.  I’m not sure whether I should laugh or be annoyed with this guy.  “I can see that,” I say carefully.

             
“You were supposed to ask me to move.”

             
Now I do laugh.  “I was?  I’m sorry.  I wasn’t aware that I was supposed to be following a predetermined script.”

             
He looks a little frustrated.  Deep green eyes move over my face.  “Yes.  You were going to ask me politely for your seat back.  I was going to act confused and apologize profusely and
then
I was going to introduce myself.  Hopefully by the end of class we’d have plans.”

             
It takes me a few seconds to process the meaning behind the words, but when I do, a slow blush climbs up my neck and over my cheeks.

“Plans?”

“Yep.  Plans.”  He smiles and sticks out his hand.  “I’m Evan.”

             
I smile back and shake the offered hand.  He has a firm grip that verges on painful.  “I’m Ellie.  Ellie Glass.”

             
“I know who you are,” he says with a wink as he picks up his notebook and slides from my chair to a neighboring seat.  “Elizabeth Glass, daughter of Brian and Pam Glass.”

             
“How in the world do you know who my parents are?”  Is this guy a stalker or something?

             
He shrugs.  “I’ve heard things.  Your parents are kind of a big deal.”

             
“I guess,” I reply guardedly.  This is such a strange almost-conversation.

             
Evan gestures to the recently vacated chair with his hand.  He smiles.  “Please play along or I’m going to spend the rest of this class feeling like a wanker.”

             
“Who uses the term wanker?”

             
The smile grows wider.  “My mom’s British so I’ve picked up a few things here and there.”  He tilts his head.  “Actually I can do a near perfect accent.”

             
“That must make it easy to charm the ladies.”

             
His eyebrows lift.  “Easy is relative.  I’ll let you know at the end of class.”

I shake my head and sit
down and spend the next hour trying my damndest not to glance over at Evan despite the fact that I can feel his eyes grazing the side of my face and occasionally dropping lower.  He really is cute.  I shift in my seat and clear my throat nervously. 

By the end of class, we don’t have plans, but
after an unrelenting assault, I did agree to exchange numbers.  Evan put himself in my phone contacts as “Evan the Wanker.”  I’ll admit that it made me laugh. 

Like I do most afternoons when I get home, I drop my bag by the door and hea
d to the refrigerator for a drink.  There’s a strange car in the street in front of the house.  It’s covered in band stickers that I’ve never heard of and I wonder if Payton has finally gotten Ben to bring Nick, his drummer friend, over here. 

The delicate sounds of an acoustic guitar drift to me through
the walls and as I pop open a can of soda, I take a tentative step into the hall. 

The music is coming from Ben’s room.  I walk to the door and close my eyes for a moment, listening intently. 

After a few minutes, everything goes flat.  It’s not because of the music.  Ben’s playing is beautiful like always.  I’m all flat inside because I know that he’s on the other side of a closed door and that I’m the one who put him there. 

I can talk about how fine I am all day
long and I can flirt with cute, well-dressed guys that say “wanker” and smile at me, but it’s just a substitution for what I really want.  So, why am I so afraid to admit it out loud?