“So that’s it then? You’re breaking up with Nico?” Lucy asks the next afternoon as we catch up between classes. I watch from the bed as she changes into purple Emerson sweatpants and a vintage Dunkin’ Donuts sweatshirt.1
“Yeah, I sent him a text this morning and blocked his number so he can’t call me back.”
“Harsh!” Lucy chides.
“Breakups always suck, why prolong the agony? We weren’t even together for very long. I prefer to just rip the Band-Aid off and get it over with.”
“I dunno, Elliot,” Lucy says as she pulls the sweatshirt over her head. “That’s pretty cold, even for you.”
“Well, whatever. It’s too late now.” I’m hoping she’ll leave it at that but the look she is giving me right now is a little scary. “Okay, fine! If I see him in the halls I’ll apologize, all right? Man . . . I should have just listened to Rose from the start.”
“What do you mean?” Lucy asks as she finishes getting dressed and joins me on my bed.
“Do you remember when I was getting ready for my first date with Nico and I couldn’t stop sweating?”
“I think you need to see a doctor about that . . .”
“Well, while Rose was helping me with that whole pituation, she made this off-handed comment about Nico being wrong for me.”
“Really?” Lucy asks.
“I kinda put it out of my memory, but then I saw her last night and she brought it up again. Don’t tell her I told you this, but she was right. I think I just wanted Nico to be right for me, but I knew it from that first kiss that I just wasn’t feeling it. Rose was right all along.”
Lucy freezes in that intense stare she gets whenever she’s deep in thought. “Huh.”
“What?” I ask her.
She holds her stare for a moment longer and then abruptly returns to Earth. She sits up, crosses her legs, and folds her hands together in her lap as she addresses me. “How often do you hang out with Rose?”
“I dunno.” I shrug. “Not that often? And it’s usually by accident—why?”
“It just seems like you really care about Rose’s opinion. You talk about her a lot,” Lucy says and I make a face.
“No I don’t!”
“Yeah you do! Rose is my RA too, but I think I’ve only ever spoken to her a handful of times and we’ve never talked about anything other than resident stuff.”
I narrow my eyes at Lucy. “What are you trying to get at?”
“Nothing!” Lucy says, relaxing her tone. “Sorry, you’re right. She probably hangs out with a lot of her residents. I mean, she is really nice. Last semester she helped me with this marketing project on colors in advertising and let me borrow some of her fabrics for a presentation. She has such great style and she’s just so . . . cool, you know?”
“Yeah, I get it,” I reply. “She’s so effortless.”
Lucy tilts her head. “What do you mean?”
“The woman crushed me in Ping-Pong while wearing a tutu. I mean, who does that?” I say. And without really thinking about what I’m saying, I keep going. “I love that she doesn’t hold back, you know? She’s bossy as hell and I hate that she’s always calling me out on my shit, but she’s also protective as a motherfucker. I mean, she really had my back that night with Kenton. She’s smart and focused and competitive. But she’s not always serious. I mean, she knows how to name a mouse and secretly vapes in the stairwell and she’ll probably win an Oscar for costume design someday. Plus she looks mega hot in overalls, which is nearly impossible, but to be honest she is such a babe she could wear a trash bag and make it look couture—” AND OH MY GOD DID I JUST SAY ALL THAT OUT LOUD?
I stop talking and glance over at Lucy. She’s covering her mouth with both of her hands. She looks like she’s about to burst.
“I KNEW IT!” Lucy smacks me in the arm. “I TOTALLY FREAKING KNEW IT!”
Lucy jumps out of bed and starts heating up water at our tea station by the window. When the electric kettle chimes, Lucy pours steaming water into our matching Golden Girls mugs and the room is instantly filled with a woody, fresh aroma from this special Armenian mint tea her grandma gave her for Christmas.
“I feel so confused right now,” I say.
“First, you need to drink this. My grandma insists this will boost our moods, clear our skin and has antioxidants that are good for preventing cancer.” She hands me a mug and I take a sip and grimace. It tastes like ass.
“No offense to your grandma, but this tea is bullshit, I don’t feel any prettier.”
“Oh, shush your mouth and drink it,” Lucy scolds. She takes a seat on the bed next to me and takes a sip for herself. She lets the water dribble out of her mouth back into her mug.
“Oh no. This is bad,” she says.
“So bad.”
She takes our mugs, sets them aside on her desk, and then gives me that head-tilted, pinched-eyebrow, narrowed-eyed look that means she’s about to get all serious on me. “Elliot, I’m about to say something that is going to make you very uncomfortable.”
“Oh god—”
She rests her hand on my arm. “Elliot. . . I think you like Rose. As in, like like. As in you have genuine feelings for her.”
“Shut up, I do not.” My cheeks are on fire right now.
Lucy smacks me in the arm. “You do! Ohmygosh, you totally do! Look at you, you’re blushing!”
“You cannot diagnose my feelings based on blood flow, Lucy,” I retort, glaring at her.
“I can and I did,” she says, looking very proud of herself. “I’ve known you long enough now to recognize something new and this? This is new.” Forgetting how nasty the tea is, Lucy reaches for her mug and takes a victory sip and immediately spits it out again. “Oh god! Why do I keep doing that?”
I bury my face in my hands in disbelief. “There is no way I like like Rose! The woman drives me crazy! She is always lecturing me and shit, I mean, she literally took my phone and changed my class registration once.”
“Yes, but you could have changed your class back just as easily. You could have ignored all those lectures . . . but you didn’t. You chose to listen to them.”
And then it hits me.
HARD.
I have opened up to Rose. I have told her all about my issues with sex and intimacy, she’s even seen me and helped me through one of the worst moments of my life. I shudder at the memory of that night.
And yet . . .
. . .
And yet . . .
I don’t feel like running away.
In fact, I want to run toward her. I can’t believe it took me this long to realize it.
I look over at Lucy. Time for the truth. “You’re right. I like Rose. I like like her, Lucy. I like her a lot, a lot.”
Lucy gasps and scrunches up her shoulders like she’s about to explode but instead she tackles me. “I KNEW IT!” she yelps as she smothers me with love. She bounces on my bed and when that’s not enough, she grabs my pillow and starts hitting me in the head with it.
“Woman! Settle down!” I peek out from under her but she keeps whipping the pillow. When Lucy finally gets off me and regains composure, I ask, “What should I do?”
“Tell her!” Lucy says.
“I can’t,” I whimper.
Lucy immediately deflates. “Aww what? Why not?”
“Oh, I don’t know, a MILLION REASONS?” I flail backward on the bed.
“Give me one,” she insists.
“Fine. Here’s one: She’s my RA.”
“That’s not a real reason, that’s an excuse. There are no rules saying students can’t date their RAs. Give me a real reason.”
“Okay, fine! She has a girlfriend! There are very few lines I won’t cross, but that is one of them.” I cover my face with a pillow and scream for a minute. When I’ve calmed down, I reemerge. “It’s just going to be me and my vibrator for the rest of the semester then . . .”
“What? No more casual flings?” Lucy asks, looking surprised.
“One day, sure, but not right now. I dunno, this whole Nico thing and now the Rose thing . . . it’s bumming me out. I think I need to be alone for a while.” I turn on my side and face her. “But what about you? It’s been two months since—” I wince at the thought of saying his name again. “How are you feeling about all of it?”
“I miss it, being loved,” she says and my heart aches for her. “But I don’t miss him. I think it’s going to be a good long while until I’m ready to—”
“Dip the wick.”
“Ew.”
“Bake the potato?”
“No.”
“Ride the bony express?”
“Why?”
“Beat that meat. I could keep going—”
“All right, all right. You can stop now,” she says while laughing. “At least we can be old, boring, dried-up ladies together this semester.” She reaches over the top of the covers and takes my hand. I give it a squeeze.
“In time, you’ll be ready to put yourself back out there. And when you are, boys will be lined up around the block,” I tell her.
She squeezes my hand back. “Do you think you’ll ever tell Rose how you feel?”
I sigh. “I think that’s a secret I gotta be buried with. Even if she was available—and she isn’t—if I tell her how I feel, I run the risk of it going unreciprocated. I don’t even know if she likes me like that. She’s so hard to read.”
Lucy sits up in bed and looks back at me. “Elliot, the woman sat atop a metal washing machine for two hours and watched The Matrix with you. She likes you. It’s a terrible movie.”
I squeak in shock and sit up. “Take that back or I’m breaking up with you right now.”
“You can’t, you’re my wife,” she says with a straight face.
“Well then I’d like a divorce. I can’t be married to someone who doesn’t love The Matrix.”
She tilts her chin up and crosses her arms in front of her chest. “It’s too late. We signed the binding friendship contract when I ate your Cheez-Its. You’re stuck with me for life.”
“Ugh, why won’t you just be my girlfriend already?”
“Because I am way out of your league.”
“True.”
“And because you’re in love with Rose.”
“SHUT UP I AM NOT.” Lucy looks deeply disappointed, so I shrug her off. “Look, it’s fine—I’m fine. Really! It’s just a crush, I’ll get over it.” Lucy gives me one of her patented side hugs and I rest my head on her shoulder.
“Are you sure?” she asks.
“Yeah, I’m sure.”
“Unrequited love is such a bitch,” she says woefully.
“Yeah,” I sigh. “It really fucking is.”
1 I can’t believe I made it this far into a book set in Boston without mentioning Dunkin’ Donuts (or Dunkies as it is known by the locals). It’s a big thing here, but I still don’t get it.