Dart was all smiles and excitement when he opened the front door, one hand gripping the top as it swung open. “Hi, sweetheart,” he said to Julia, resembling a kid about to take a pony ride.
“Hi,” she replied, managing to blush. They’d been together for three months and she still acted like every time they saw each other was their first date. Apparently, Dart was a sucker for good girls. And you couldn’t get more “good” than Julia.
I wondered if she would have the guts to wear that mystery item of black lace for him. Then I reminded myself to have a serious talk with her about Anabel. Someone like Julia did not need to be guided by the resident Kardashian sister of Stanford. But when Dart moved in to kiss Julia and she tilted her face so he got her cheek, I figured that talk could wait.
My time previously spent inside the Knightly/Charleston abode was fleeting, and I’d never been over when Knightly was there. I preferred to keep our relationship—such as it was—at a professional distance.
This was not supposed to include sleeping in his house for a week.
The place wasn’t your typical college bachelor pad. No flashing neon signs on any of the walls, no beer cooler coffee table, no kitschy lava lamps, and not a single barbell or free weight scattered on the floor, which was what I usually tripped over when entering any other testosterone-filled dwelling on campus.
As we crossed the threshold into the living room, Knightly was sitting on the couch, bent over a stack of opened textbooks, a laptop at his side. He was wearing dark pants, and the top two buttons of his solid blue shirt were undone. A dark blue tie was draped over the back of the couch.
“They’re here.” Dart beamed, ushering us in.
Knightly looked up from his work, his expression cordial. “Hey, there,” he said, closing his book and standing. “Is there anything I can do? All the bags in?”
Julia and Dart were too busy cooing at each other to answer.
“Got everything. I think we’re set,” I answered, kind of feeling like a idiot.
He nodded and it was quiet again. I should have been used to his patches of silence by now. We’d had five study sessions in the last month; half the time we were debating, the other half, you could hear a pin drop. We were experts at the classic impasse.
“Umm, we really appreciate this,” I forced myself to utter, trying not to sound like I was swallowing medicine. “Thanks for letting us stay.”
“Sure,” he replied. “Once I learned your circumstances, it didn’t make sense any other way. We’re neighbors.”
“Right,” I said. “Neighbors.”
He eyed me. “Why do you say it like that?”
I felt like laughing. Last time we’d met to go over my thesis, we’d almost come to blows. Well, I’d almost come to blows while Knightly had sat there, watching in silence as I’d become more and more angry at the way he thought my project should go. But if he still considered us just neighbors, then fine.
“Never mind,” I said.
Dart’s shoulder bumped me as he swept by. He had one of Julia’s suitcases in his hand. She followed behind him, towing the other on its wheels.
Knightly glanced at me. “I suppose they know where they’re going.”
I smiled a little awkwardly.
“May I?” he asked, looking down at my side. I wasn’t sure what he meant until he picked up the straps of my bag.
“I can carry it.”
“I’m sure you can, but I’ve already got it,” he said, walking deeper inside the house. I followed him around a corner to a narrow hallway.
“Have you been here before?” he asked.
“A few times. Only the living room.”
“We’ll save the grand tour for later. I’ll give you the five cent version now. It’s a very logical setup. Purposefully logical. There are five bedrooms and only the two of us.” He glanced over his shoulder. “Dart and myself, I meant. Not you and I. How would that look?”
“Frightful,” I said, laughing.
He led me up the stairs.
“Each room is painted one dominant color,” he explained. “You most likely didn’t notice the red room we just passed. It’s the only bedroom on the first floor. Lilah will stay in there.”
“Can’t wait,” I muttered.
He paused on the landing, his brown eyes sizing me up. He must’ve read my sour expression. “Oh, that’s right. You two don’t get along. Why is that?”
“I get along fine. She’s the one who wants me dead.”
Knightly thought for a moment then nodded sagely. “Got it. No more questions.”
“Thank you,” I said, and we continued up the stairs.
“This is Dart’s room.” He gestured to the first room behind a closed door. “Gold. I told him he could repaint, but he likes the color, calls it Zen. Your roommate is across the hall from him. Naturally.”
“Naturally,” I echoed, walking past her room. I heard muffled voices through the crack in the door.
“Also Dart’s,” he said, gesturing to a bathroom as he breezed by.
We passed by two more closed doors without any details. I guessed they were being saved for part of the later “grand tour.”
The last door of the hallway was wide open, lights on. “I’m assuming green is your favorite color, Ms. Environmentalist.”
“How long did it take you to think that one up?”
Knightly stood at the doorway, allowing me to enter first. The room had clean, bright white walls with three-inch green, black and white checkered borders around the ceiling and floor. Behind green striped curtains, one huge window faced east. The cozy boudoir was fancier than any hotel room I’d stayed in.
“Thanks. This is really nice.”
“You’re our first official guest,” he said, leaning against the door frame. “Lilah doesn’t count, in my book.” He dropped my overstuffed Adopt a Rainforest duffel bag in front of him. “Well, you should have everything you need.” He turned on his heel and took one step into the hall. “Bathroom’s next door. It’s mine. We’re sharing.”
And he disappeared.
I stared at the empty doorway where he’d been standing.
Sharing a bathroom? With Henry Knightly? That won’t be awkward at all…
My mind quickly calculated how much I had on my one emergency credit card. I moaned, arms hanging limply at my sides. I hated feeling so helpless, so financially strapped. I wished I could call my mother to bail me out, but that was never a realistic option. After I graduated, hopefully I wouldn’t have to stress so much about money.
But for now, like a good little soldier, I hung clothes in the closet, tossed shoes under the bed, gathered together my absolutely necessary toiletries, and headed next door.
The bathroom was immaculate, not a speck of dust, not a single lock of hair. Even the glass shower doors were spotless. The room was the same combination of brown, gray, cream, and black as the living room, and smelled of aftershave, pinecones, and bleach.
The cabinet unit was a warm cinnamon color with black hardware. There were two doors on either side, and three drawers in the center. The middle drawer was empty, and had been pulled out almost all the way and left open. Knowing my host’s etiquette, I was sure this was meant for me. My few hair products, toothbrush and toothpaste, soap, and face cleanser all fit nicely inside.
After securely locking the door behind me, I snuck a peek at the shelves behind the mirror. An electric toothbrush, green Speed Stick, a small brown bottle of cologne with an Italian label peeling off, and an urn of MAC hair putty.
On the counter next to the sink sat a blue-and-gray-glazed pottery mug of shaving cream and a lathering brush.
Yep, I thought as I took a quick whiff of the spicy foam, that’s him.
The linen closet next to the shower was that same warm cinnamon. I creaked open the door and examined the contents. Nothing out of the ordinary there, either. Down on my knees, I stuck my head under the sink. I didn’t know what I was expecting to find as I ruthlessly snooped through other drawers and cabinets. Perhaps I was hoping for that one item that would tell me all about him, that elusive clue to confirm everything.
But whatever it was I was searching for, I didn’t find it. Henry Knightly had all the earmarks of any other twenty-three-year-old conservative student of jurisprudence.
I headed downstairs to join the others, somewhat disappointed.
Everyone was in the kitchen. The grand meal wasn’t for a few days, but Julia was already in full-blown domestic mode, chopping vegetables for nibbling, and a platter of crackers and dip sat on the table. Dart was rinsing something at the sink. When Julia came up behind him, she slid her first two fingers into the back of his jeans at the waist. It was a tiny gesture, to which Dart didn’t even react. I don’t know why it caught my attention.
As far as I knew, Julia hadn’t had sex yet, being a little more old-fashioned than your average twenty-one-year-old. There was only one other virgin in the room that I knew of.
I guess I was just…I never had time for such entanglements. My philandering youth was spent trying to get into Stanford, and then trying to stay in Stanford.
Well, that’s what I told myself. If I was being brutally honest, the thought of even the tiniest chance of having to stop my life to have a baby scared every ounce of all-the-way libido out of me. My mother had me at seventeen, and never let me forgot how she sacrificed everything to keep me. She struggled, my whole family struggled. I was not going to spend the rest of my life like that.
Catching a glimpse of Julia and Dart in an intimate moment surprised me. The beginning of their relationship was all-consuming. Which wasn’t odd for Julia—she never let the physical get very far. She was always more emotionally invested. That was probably where Anabel’s gift of black lace came in.
Dart’s hand slid to her side, curling low around her hip. Huh. Maybe they had already slept together. Julia and I were close, so I was a little surprised she hadn’t told me. I couldn’t help sneaking more tiny glances their way as they huddled over the sink. Her fingers were out of his jeans, but the way they were standing next to each other, her hair up in a pony tail, his hand on the back of her bare neck. Innocent, yet…not.
I swallowed and looked away. Having that kind of comfortable, complete intimacy was not in the cards for me, not with my parents’ disaster of a marriage as my prime example. For as long as I could remember, I wanted no part of that. But suddenly, watching Julia in her bare feet lift up to her tiptoes to kiss Dart on the cheek, I wondered if I might be missing out on something.
