“Sure.”
“Great. See ya later.” With that she spun away and hurried down the hallway.
I headed in the opposite direction, finding the lecture hall at the end of the hall. I stepped through the door, and the room opened up to a five-hundred seat auditorium. I started up the stairs toward the back of the room, preferring to always sit in the back row. Unfortunately, every seat was taken. So, I relented, slipping into the aisle seat of the second to last row.
As more students made their way into the lecture hall, I scrolled through the newsfeed on my phone, checking on the college soccer scores at my friends’ schools.
“Okay, settle in everyone. I’m Professor Barnes and this is Art History.”
I tucked my phone away and looked to the female professor. Something out of the corner of my eye caught my attention.
Freaking great.
Chase.
He was staring at me from the opposite side of the room.
I refrained from flipping him the bird and averted my gaze.
This campus clearly wasn’t big enough for the two of us.
***
I was watching Netflix on our television when someone knocked on the door. I rolled off my bed and hurried to answer it.
Valerie stood there. “Ready for dinner?
“Oh, right.”
Her face fell. “Did you forget?”
I shook my head. Since Chantel blew me off the night before for Chase, and I ended up eating alone, I figured that Valerie only offered to be nice and wouldn’t show. “Let me just throw on my shoes.”
The walk to the dining hall was a quick one, but enough time for Valerie to fill me in on her first couple days of classes. Inside, we grabbed sandwiches, and I grabbed chocolate cake, before we made our way over to a small table by the window overlooking campus.
“This is a lot nicer than my last school’s dining hall,” I said, glancing around the vast space. Hungry students sat at long tables and music played softly from speakers. “It’s bigger and there are so many more food options.”
“If you’re a Texas girl, what made you go to Maine?” Valerie asked before biting into her sandwich.
I contemplated letting her in. Letting her know what a huge mistake I made by leaving Texas. Letting her in on what I’d lost because of it. But in the end, I just kept it simple. “I thought I needed to get away.”
“Now?”
“I’m definitely a Texas girl.” I pressed my fork into my cake and took a bite, savoring the sweet taste of chocolate coating my tongue.
“Dessert before dinner?” she asked.
“Chocolate trumps everything else.”
She smiled. “Are you liking it here at Crestwood?”
“So far.”
“And how about Chantel?” she asked with her mouth full. “How are you two getting along?”
“Honestly, I barely see her. Our schedules are completely opposite, and then she has Chase.”
Valerie rolled her eyes.
“Uh, oh. What’s that mean?”
She shook her head, her eyes growing distant. “I don’t know why she hasn’t moved on yet. He doesn’t want her.”
“He was over yesterday,” I countered.
She shrugged. “He gets lonely. He dials her up.”
“What’s his story? Is he a senior too?”
“Yeah.” She took another bite of her sandwich and spoke with a mouthful again. “He transferred second semester last year from Washington and was already a brother at their chapter of Kappa Sigma. Though, I always get the impression he doesn’t really enjoy being in the frat. But then again, look at me. Sorority sister for life.”
“Why did you join? You seem…different from the others.”
“My mom was a sister.” Disappointment swept across her features. “So, I’m a legacy. It was expected.”
I ate more of my cake.
“Are you planning to rush?”
I shook my head. “Sororities aren’t really my thing—no offense.”
She laughed. “None taken.”
“And, I can’t really see myself agreeing to do all those ridiculous pledge things you’ve gotta do just to get in.”
A mixture of regret and shame flashed across her eyes.
Shit. Why was I always saying the wrong thing? “So, I’ve told you about me. Tell me about you.”
Valerie’s face lit up. “Me?”
I laughed. “Yeah. Where are you from? What do you like to do?”
She spoke for the next fifteen minutes, barely coming up for air. It was as if no one had ever asked her about herself. And that light I thought was missing from her eyes the other night, shined brightly for the remainder of our dinner. We laughed—almost cried—as she told stories about all the beauty pageants her mom entered her in growing up and how she tried sabotaging every last one because she hated them so much. Valerie seemed like someone who’d been forced into situations she didn’t want to be in. But the longer we spoke, the more I saw she was working on shedding that habit. And with me by her side, I had a feeling I’d get to know, and grow to really love, the real Valerie.
CHAPTER FOUR
I arrived early to History through Film the next morning, taking my seat in the back of the small classroom. Students filled the room over the next five minutes. Chase wasn’t one of them.
I slipped my laptop out as Professor Irons set up a movie clip. He asked us to look for the various instances where art imitated life.
I pulled up a word doc on my computer and began recording my findings as the clip played.
The classroom door creaked open a few minutes into the clip. My focus remained on my computer screen as Chase slipped into the seat beside me. I did my best to ignore him, my eyes jumping between the movie clip and my computer screen.
“What are we doing?” Chase whispered to me.
I glanced over with a raised brow, then turned back to the movie.
“You’re not gonna tell me?”
I typed the words the actor uttered on my computer.
Chase leaned over to see my computer screen. “What does that mean?”
I turned my computer away from his prying eyes.
The girl in the seat in front of him twisted around and gladly offered up the assignment.
His looks are a disguise, sweetheart. The guy’s a total jerk.
Once class ended, I closed my computer and stood up.
“Thanks for nothing,” Chase muttered from his seat.
I gave him a sidelong glance. “Seriously?”
“Someone needs help and your reaction is to ignore them?” he asked.
If he thought he could make me feel bad for my behavior, he had another thing coming. “If memory serves me right, it sounds exactly like what happened outside your frat when you told me to leave.”
He scoffed as he pushed himself to his feet, towering over me by a foot. His blue eyes riveted between mine. “It’s gonna be a long fucking semester.” He walked away, leaving anger clawing at my insides and my pulse thrashing against my skin.
***
“Put those by the far side of the tent,” Chantel called to Valerie and me.
We rolled our eyes at each other as we carried boxes from Chantel’s Mercedes to the huge white function tent in the sorority house’s backyard. Chantel had guilt-tripped me into helping her, since half her sisters were in class until five and her rush event started at seven.