“So my classes aren’t that bad so far,” she tells me. “Except for Intro to Marketing. Ugh…” She buries her face in a pillow. “They’re making us do a group project.” Her words are muffled, and she pops back up after a second. “I thought I had abandoned those at Dalton Academy. But no, they’re in college too, and they are the literal worst.”
“Agreed,” I say to the video.
She brushes hair off her cheeks and her hazel eyes drift to the screen. She holds back tears. “Garrison.” She says my name like she’s mourning it. “Could you…could you call me when you get off work? Even if it’s super early my time. It’s nothing important. I just want to hear your voice.”
My chest hurts like someone dropped a fifty-pound dumbbell on it.
I didn’t call her. It was midnight by the time I left the office, and that’s 5 a.m. her time. She’s got a “hellishly” difficult morning class, and I promised myself that I wouldn’t fuck with her studies. College isn’t easy, and I’d hate myself if I distracted her.
My plan: call her during her break between classes tomorrow afternoon.
The oven beeps, my pizza done, and just as I rise off the couch, my phone lights up. Vibrates loudly. Her name is big across the screen. WILLOW.
I catch myself smiling. Selfishly, the first thing I feel is happiness. Like a tidal wave, it surges through me.
My lips downturn fast. And then worry follows close behind. I stand and click speakerphone. “Hey, Willow, isn’t it early there?”
“It’s six,” she says into a yawn. “Did you watch my video?”
I could lie. But that’s not something I ever want to do with her. “Yeah,” I admit. “I was planning on calling during lunch, so you could sleep in.”
She yawns again. “You’re too nice, and also I’d rather talk to you than sleep.”
Too nice is not something most people say about me. And the fact that she’s willing to go without sleep for me is what I didn’t want.
I lean against my kitchen counter, eyes transfixed on the screen, even though I can’t see her. “Everything okay?”
“I just miss hearing your voice. In real time. Not like through a video clip. How was work?”
I tell her all about my failed drug test, and how Connor didn’t even care that I smoked weed. When I end the story, Willow says, “He’s right, you know. You’re going to figure out what you want to create faster than you think.”
Her confidence in me is like a drug. I close my eyes and grip the edge of the counter. It hurts to be away from someone you love so much. God, it fucking hurts.
“Garrison,” Willow breathes. “Are you still there?”
I swallow a lump in my throat. “Yeah.”
A beat passes before she says, “You remember the night we had sex.”
I stop breathing. It’s impossible to forget that night. Everything about it was incredible. And I’ve spent most nights remembering what it felt like to be inside of her. Afterwards, I always try not to think about when it’ll happen again. Because likely—it’s not going to be anytime soon.
We agreed I wouldn’t fly out to visit until her second semester because if I’m up there with her, there’s a chance the media will start hovering around Wakefield. Give it some months. Let her settle in.
I still believe that.
But the hornier part of me—that thinks with the wrong head—isn’t fucking thrilled about it. Of course I want to touch her. I want to physically be with her.
I think about her words right now: you remember the night we had sex.
“I remember,” I tell her. “It was a good night. The best night.”
“So you’re not upset about it?” she asks, worry in her voice. “You don’t think it’s goodbye sex, right?”
Jesus. “No, Willow. It wasn’t goodbye sex.” My pulse races. “If it were, we would have broken up. We’re still together.” Fuck. “Aren’t we?”
“Yeah, I think so,” Willow says, and I imagine her frowning.
We’re on separate pages. Separate books. Shit, we’re literally on different continents. I don’t know how to jump back. “Willow, you’re my girl.”
“What about the broken heart?” she asks.
I rack my brain for a second, trying to figure out what she’s talking about. “What…broken—” Oh shit. I pinch the bridge of my nose, remembering. “The questionnaire.”
I can barely even explain what overcame me to want to fill one out. I was on Tumblr and scrolled past it, and it just reminded me of her. It was enough to quickly fill in the questions. But why did I have to answer with a broken heart?
I’m an idiot.
Willow says, “I just thought that since I left after we had sex, you were upset about it.”
“Fuck no,” I say strongly. “Willow, that was the best night of my life. I put the broken heart because we’re in this shitty long distance thing and I just miss you.”
She lets out a giant sigh of relief. “That makes more sense.”
“Good.” I pause and sniff the air. I smell something…burning.
Shit fuck shit. I forgot to take the pizza out of the oven. My joints unglue and I race to the oven. As soon as I pull down the oven door, dark gray smoke floods out at my face. I cough into my arm, and seconds later, the smoke detector lets out an angry wail.
“Garrison?” Willow sounds panicked.
“Burnt the pizza!” I yell over the alarm. “Call you later?”
“Yeah, go. I love you,” she says quickly.
“Love you, too.”
She hangs up, and I switch the oven off and try wafting the smoke away from the alarm with a dish towel. It’s not working. I have to find…something that will reach the alarm. Fuck you, eight-foot ceilings.
Seriously.
A knock sounds on my door. “Garrison!” my neighbor yells. “Everything okay?!”
Jared and I haven’t bumped into each other since his girlfriend’s birthday, but the fact that I haven’t deterred him either means he’s a good guy or he just really wants my connections to Loren Hale so he can score points with Ana.
I can’t tell which.
But I do open my door for him.
He glances past my shoulder.
“No problems here, man,” I tell him. “Just burnt a pizza. You can go home.” I’m about to close the door, but he puts his hand on it, stopping me with unwanted force.
I glare.
He’s still looking past me at the oven. “Shit, that looks bad. Hold on a minute and I’ll grab my broom.” He leaves quickly, and I rub at my eyes. Against better judgment—or maybe worse judgment—I don’t shut my door on him.
Jared is back in a flash and instead of passing me the broom, he walks right on into my apartment. I tense considerably. My space is my space, and I don’t remember giving him an invitation. Oh wait, that’s because I didn’t.
I cross my arms over my chest and stay near the doorway, watching as Jared jams the end of the broom up at the alarm. It takes two whacks before it stops wailing.
“These smoke detectors are ridiculously sensitive in the building,” Jared says. “Just a heads up.”