“Do you want your coat?”
“I want to kick some beer pong ass. Let’s go.” She smiled, no longer seeming cagey. It was the quieter, more intimate moments in front of others she shied away from, but when it came to the big loudness in front of other people, she seemed the same. At least that was one part of whatever we were now that was no longer confusing.
Now I just needed to unlock the rest.
23
Marisa
I flexed my fingers on the keyboard and my tongue was heavy in my mouth, my throat and chest tight. It was giving up, but there wasn’t any other way.
“Don’t do this, Marisa. Just wait a little while longer. I can come up with something.”
LJ perched on the edge of my desk, hovering.
“The final payments to Venice are due in May. They need to secure my housing and the only way they can do it is if I pay. There’s no way I can come up with the money before then, even if I tutor seven days a week.”
“But I’ll have the money by late April. Early May at the latest.”
“Your money. The money for you and your family.” I wasn’t going to fall into the trap of becoming someone LJ felt he had to take care of. I’d been taking care of myself for a long time now.
“Stop being so damn stubborn. Or at least hold off on paying the tuition bill.”
“If I don’t pay it now, I can’t register for classes and there’s only one section of Managing Museums offered in the spring and I need it to graduate. If I wait, I’ll get locked out.”
“Maybe…dammit. Come on. Just wait.”
“What’s the point in waiting?”
“Fuck, I’m going to get some cookies to soften the blow. I’ll warm them up and we can have them with milk, okay?”
“I’m not going to say no.” I offered up a half smile.
His face was a cross between deflated and dejected.
“Stop acting like you’re the one who won’t be going to Italy at the end of this summer.” Saying it out loud hurt. My lips went numb and I sucked in a choppy breath. I could maybe get a position at the museum or a local gallery. My hands were clammy and shaky.
At least I’d be able to see LJ, but what if he ended up on a team thousands of miles away? My stomach clenched like I’d done a keg stand after a tuna-and-Cocoa Puffs sandwich.
“I know how much you wanted this.” He leaned in and ran his lips along the line of my neck. His nose tickled me and I scrunched up my shoulders, pushing him again.
“Go get me my cookies, so I can drown my sorrows in sugar, vanilla and chocolate.”
He took my hand and rubbed his fingers across my knuckles. “It won’t be all bad. I know you wanted to go, but I’ll make this summer worth it. We can take a trip, go somewhere amazing. Penthouse suite. First class all the way.”
The temptation was strong. So strong, I wanted to lean right into it and forget all my problems, but I needed to course correct. “Stop spending money you don’t have.”
“You saw the game. Three interceptions, and we won by the biggest margin all season.”
“Someone’s getting a big head.”
He glanced over his shoulder before dropping my hand onto his crotch. And no, it wasn’t his phone or a remote in his pocket. “I mean, something’s big.” The deep, syrupy way the words dripped from his lips did a number on my heart, sending it speeding. A playful noise of disgust shot from my throat. “Go get my damn cookies.”
He laughed and hopped up from the desk, darting into the hallway.
The cursor blinked in the search bar of my browser. I typed in the student accounts website and logged in. My big dreams of going to Italy dried up with each keystroke.
I hadn’t heard a word from Ron since I’d screamed in his face for a solid fifteen minutes.
But I wasn’t going back to Monday dinners, which meant I was on my own.
I wiped my hands on my jeans and clicked through the student accounts portal. Rummaging through my drawer I found the unused book of checks, which I’d need for the account and routing numbers for the archaic website. It looked like the first website ever created.
The big number in bold at the bottom had sent bile flooding to the back of my throat that last time I logged on.
Typing it in, I was glad LJ wasn’t here, so he couldn’t see my fingers shaking.
I filled in all the information and clicked submit. A big red notice popped up at the top of the page.
Error: Overpayment not accepted.
The number I’d memorized while trying to think up a way out of this situation wasn’t there anymore. Instead, at the bottom of my account balance was a big, bold $0.
Checking through the transactions on my account, I saw that the last entry was a staff tuition waiver applied yesterday.
He’d done it. Ron had turned it in.
I slumped back in my chair and stared at the screen. Surprise and shock detonated in my head. This had to be a mistake. I refreshed the screen twice.
LJ’s steps thumped on the stairs.
Scrambling to log out, I closed the laptop screen.
“Maybe after graduation, we could do a road trip first.” He walked into the room with two glasses of milk and a plate heaped high with cookies.
“A what?”
Setting the plate and glasses down, he spun my chair around, whirling me in a circle. “A road trip. We could drive down to Florida or up to Niagara Falls. We could drive to California.”
“What is going on with you?” My gaze darted to the laptop and my lips parted to tell him. The disbelief still clouded out almost everything else.
He beamed, excitement glinting in his eyes. “If you’re not going to Italy, I want to make this a summer you won’t forget. I’ll have plenty of free time and more money than I’ll know what to do with, if things go as planned.”
“Let’s not count our eggs before they hatch.” There was no point in telling him now. I needed to find out if the balance was real. If it was, I could still go to Italy. I could turn in the money like I’d talked about with the Venice committee and fly to Europe for the next two years.
“This also means you can come to my games. Maybe be there for some of the pre-season.” His excitement increased with every new step in this plan he was creating. A plan where I didn’t go to Italy. A plan where we’d be together. But what happened if all that changed and I wasn’t by his side every step of the way? What if I left for two years and he was here being a pro football player and forgetting all about me?
“Marisa!” LJ’s voice carried up the stairs.
“In my room. Those ten-year-old tour groups are brutal.” I’d kicked my shoes off and was sitting on the edge of my bed, massaging my feet. My go-to tour guide outfit of my only skirt and a white button-down shirt was wrinkled and needed to be washed. Wednesdays were my turn to do school tours, and I’d need to buy new shoes before I lost a toe. Now I could, since my bank account hadn’t been drained paying for my last semester’s tuition. I’d checked in with the student accounts team about the payment, and they’d assured me it couldn’t be reversed.
He thundered up the stairs. “How did the tours go?”