HOW MORTIFYING to end up crying in Graham’s arms.
I pulled myself together after a few minutes, wiping my face on my sleeve. “I’ll be okay,” I promised.
“Yeah, you will be,” Rikker said softly. “But we have to get that picture taken down. Who’s the asshole? We want to help you with that.”
“Absolutely not,” I said. There was no way I would contact him. Ever, ever again. And I wasn’t going to turn Graham and Rikker on him, either. How ugly would that get? My two gay friends, beating down the door of the football fraternity? That was the worst idea I’d ever heard.
“What they did must be against a whole lot of rules,” Graham said.
“Don’t be so sure,” I argued. “It isn’t a Harkness website. It isn’t even an official…” I almost said “Beta Rho website,” but caught myself just in case they hadn’t already made the connection. “It’s just a random spot on the web, where no names are given. Including mine.”
“So you’re just going to ignore it?” Graham yelped.
I pressed my hands against my hot face, trying to stay calm. “In a few days they’ll humiliate someone else, right? My picture will sink down on the page.”
“That is so fucked,” Rikker complained.
“What would be so fucked,” I said icily, “is making a complaint that doesn’t stick.” I’d thought about this for many hours already, and I was positive there was nothing to be gained by reporting Whittaker. “Humiliation is not against the law. And if marking up a drunk person was illegal, every frat in North America would be shut down. If I make a big stink, then anyone who hasn’t seen the picture will see it.”
“Sexual harassment is not okay,” Rikker said quietly. “The college is obligated to put a stop to it. I could have won a judgment against St. B’s if I’d gone after them. And I don’t see how this is different.”
“You’re right,” I said brightly. “It is the same thing. And you didn’t go after them in court, did you?”
“No, but…”
“But nothing. I’ve seen what happens when someone like me goes up against someone like him.”
“Like who?” Graham asked.
God, did he think I was that stupid? “Nice try, Graham. But I’m not exactly Snow White. Nobody cares if somebody says a few shitty things about me. Right now, my name is not on the front page of that newspaper you write for. If I report him, tomorrow it will be. How is that better?”
Graham’s eyes squeezed shut, probably because he knew I was right. His arms tightened around me once again. “I can’t make you turn him in. But I really need to know one thing. Was the ink the worst thing that happened to you that night?”
“No!” I spat, and his whole body stiffened. “The fucking picture was the worst thing that happened. Duh.”
He let out a breath, and I felt just steeped in misery and drama. As a rule, I didn’t do drama. I didn’t manufacture it or traffic in it. But now it was all around me.
What I didn’t tell Graham — or Rafe — was that I knew those assholes had put something more than alcohol in my drink. But that’s not what Graham had been asking. He’d wanted to know if I’d been assaulted, just like Rafe had tried to ask, too. In their minds, it was the worst thing that could’ve happened to me. And maybe they were right. It’s not like I had any experience with that.
But I’d had enough experience with other kinds of assholery to know public humiliation was no trip to Hollywood, either. I wasn’t about to make my own life worse by making a complaint against the fraternity, because there was no way I’d prevail. The Beta Rho national chapter probably wrote their own slut-shaming tactical handbook.
“A lot of guys would want to help you.” Rikker gave my lower back a supportive rub.
I disentangled myself from the two of them. “I know.” I cleared my throat. “Thanks.”
“The hockey team knows you always have our backs. So we’re going to have yours.”
Now that was naive. Because it didn’t matter how many clean jerseys I’d handed out before practice, or how quickly I could organize fifteen hotel room reservations. If I walked into that locker room right now, those guys were still going to wonder: What did she catch? I wonder who gave it to her?
I was tainted. And nobody was ever going to let me forget it.
“I’ll be fine,” I fibbed, rubbing the drying tears off my face. “Seriously. And I have a whole lot of homework tonight.”
Graham and Rikker exchanged a loaded glance. “Will I see you at practice tomorrow night?” Rikker asked.
“Sure,” I lied.
Graham kissed me on the eyebrow. “Will you come to Capri’s Pizza tomorrow night?”
Fat chance. “Maybe.”
“All right.” Rikker stood up. “Call us if you need us.”
“I will,” I promised, just to shut them up. What I needed was for everyone to stop talking about it.
They left, and my room was silent again.
Before my life went to hell, I used to sleep like a baby. Now? Not so much.
At four in the morning, I found myself tangled up in the sheets, trying to find a way out of my misery. Sometimes my mind would drift, and I’d end up thinking about normal things — the next Rangers game, or a psych essay that I’d read. But then a glimpse of the faded ink on my arm, or the memory of picking up that drink that I’d been served at the Beta Rho house… Shudder.
I lay there, working it through my mind, like a logical puzzle that might be solved if I could only find a way. But short of time travel, there was no solution at all.
If I’d only said no to the drink.
If I’d only told Whittaker over the phone…
A girl could go crazy this way. And whenever my brain veered any further down this path, I had to force myself to turn back toward the light. The memory of waking up on the floor of Beta Rho that morning was not a place in my mind I could visit without becoming fearful. So I tucked that away to think about sometime later.
Much later.
After tossing and turning for hours, I finally fell asleep again when the first light was in the sky.
Whatevs. I wasn’t going to class, anyway.
Unfortunately, it’s not easy to hide from the world when you have nosy neighbors.
Lianne walked into the bathroom while I was brushing my teeth around ten in the morning. “Don’t you have class?” she asked.
I did, as a matter of fact. The seminar was an upper-level psych class with only a dozen or so people in it. But I would have had to cross the entire campus to get there, and I just didn’t feel up to it.
“Did you eat breakfast?” Lianne tried, even though I’d never answered her first question.
“Who eats breakfast?” I countered.
“Did you get coffee?”
Seriously? “What’s it to you?”
“Want to hit the coffee shop with me?”
I couldn’t help but sneak a look at her in the mirror. Since when did Lianne make friendly overtures? Rafe probably put her up to it. “I’m good,” I said. “But thanks.”
She gave me a single, frustrated frown. Then she darted into her room and shut the door again.
If Lianne had picked any other day this year to be nice to me, I would have responded differently. But it was going to take a little more than coffee to extract me from the privacy of my room.
I wrote an apologetic email to the grad student who led my psych seminar and stayed home.
As soon as I settled on my bed again, my phone rang to the tune of “The Saints Go Marching In.” And as soon as I heard that little tune, I realized I’d made an error of epic proportions.
“Oh shit,” I said to the walls of my room. I answered the phone anyway, because ducking my own fuck-ups wasn’t my style. “Hi Mom,” I said.
“Bella, your sister—”
“I know. I’m sorry. I’ve been frantic, and it totally slipped my mind.” That was sure true. “I’ll call her immediately.”
My mother’s sigh was loud. “You’ve offended her, sweetie. The grant and the award are very important to her. How busy could you be?”
Well, the total implosion of my life has been surprisingly consuming. “I’ll call right now. But you have to let me hang up with you.”
“Don’t you dare forget the banquet.”
Shit! The fucking banquet. “I won’t forget.”
“I’ll see you then, sweetie.”
“Yes, you will.”
“Call your sister,” she couldn’t resist saying once more.
“Doing it now!” I hung up and inspected my ceiling again. But the task could not be avoided, so I dialed my sister.
And, lo! God smiled down and gave me her voicemail, which meant I could say my piece without groveling in real time. I opened with, “I’m so sorry,” and then I followed up with enthusiastic congratulations, followed by more apologies.
“That should do it,” I said to nobody, throwing the phone down and rolling toward the wall. I recommenced my hibernation.
But the world would not be ignored.
Rafe showed up next, and he was not so easily shaken off as Lianne. “Bella,” he said, knocking. “Open up.”
I decided opening the door would be the quicker method of ducking him. Seeing as I’d brushed my hair and made my bed, he might not call the authorities.
When I opened the door, he walked in wearing running clothes. He had a pair of those spandex compression shorts sticking out from underneath his running shorts, which somehow managed to highlight how muscular his thighs were. Rawr. The boy was practically edible.
Or rather, he would be, if I were still into men. Which I wasn’t.
“It’s time for our run,” he said, as if we were running buddies.
“I don’t run,” I reminded him.
“Sure you do. I’ve seen you. First we run, then we go to class.”
Lovely. He thought he had me all schooled up. “And what if I don’t?”
“Same threat applies today.”
God! You bossy…! I wanted to scream. “Look. I’m fine. And you can’t keep blackmailing me like this.”
“Funny.” He chuckled. “Hanging out with you is not the effortless payoff that blackmail implies. But I will tell someone if I think you’re not okay. And if you leave the building with me, then I know you’re all right.”
“You could just take my word for it.”
“Not happening, chica.”
With a curse, I got up to find some running clothes.
We jogged a little farther than last time. By the time we arrived panting at our entryway door again, I was tremendously impressed with myself. But I sure wasn’t about to admit it to Rafe.
He looked at his watch. “You’ve got twenty minutes to get cleaned up for class. I’ll knock on your door.”
“I’ll just meet you there,” I tried, climbing the stairs slowly. My legs were shaky from exertion.
Rafe just shook his head. “We go together, Bella. I’m not falling for that.”
Christ.
I took the world’s fastest shower and then hopped into my nicest jeans and a fancier sweater than I’d usually wear to class. As if that mattered. As if anyone in the lecture hall would look at me and decide I wasn’t actually a filthy slut because I was wearing a cashmere sweater from Bergdorf’s that matched my eyes.
Rafe was maddeningly prompt, of course. When he knocked on my door, I followed him downstairs and outside. The closer we got to the lecture hall, though, the more my feet dragged on the flagstones. Urban Studies was a big lecture with at least sixty people in it. I did not want to sit there and wonder how many of them had seen my picture.
My feet stopped altogether.
Rafe drew up behind me. “By all means, move at a glacial pace.”
I whirled on him. “You’re quoting The Devil Wears Prada while I’m about to lose my shit?” Whoa. Too much truth-telling.
His big brown eyes went wide. “What’s the matter?”
I looked up into his handsome face and felt like punching him in the teeth. “What’s the matter? Just everything. And your only concern is a project that’s not due for an aeon.”
His face softened. “That is not my only concern. Let’s just go sit down inside.”
“No! I’m not going in there.”
I tried to duck around him, but he caught me around the waist. “Bella,” he whispered into my ear. “What’s the alternative?”
“Transferring.” The word popped out as if it had been waiting there all along. I needed to be somewhere else — a college where I wasn’t that mess of a girl in that picture. Graham had said I shouldn’t let the assholes win. But right now I was willing to hand over the trophy without a fight.
“Bella,” he said again, his voice low and steady. The sound of it cut through the clatter of the hamster wheel in my brain, the one that was running scared. He put his arms around me, and I hid my face against his soccer jacket. “We’ll sit in the last row. Nobody will even know we’re there.”
I doubted that was true. But, as he’d pointed out, what was the alternative? I didn’t really have a Plan B. There were seven months left of my college career. I used to think of myself as a person who could survive anything for seven months.
Obviously I’d thought wrong.
My heart thumped spastically against my ribs as I considered leaving school. But where would I go? If I showed up on my parents’ doorstep, they’d want to know why. That would be a fun conversation. This problem wasn’t going away, even if I ran.
All these thoughts battered around in my brain while I stood pressing my nose into my neighbor’s shoulder. Because that wasn’t weird or anything.
I took a tiny step back, even though I didn’t want to. “All right. Let’s go.”
With his hand at the small of my back, Rafe walked me into the lecture room. He didn’t let go until the second we took our seats in the last row. When class was over, I was up and out of there faster than you can say later, suckers.
“Going to lunch?” Rafe asked, practically jogging after me.
“Not yet,” I said, hoping he wouldn’t slow down my getaway.
“I have to work. I’ll see you later?”
I gave him a salute, then jogged toward Beaumont as fast as my legs could carry me.
Who knew running was so useful? Obviously I’d never been mortified enough before to understand its charms.
