Hey Hunter, you wanna talk about what happened yesterday? Maybe later?
Before I could hit send, I received a message from Hunter. Hey Lorrie, just wondering what you’re up to.
I deleted my original message and typed out a reply. Just sitting on a bench outside Wheatley. It’s cold. Brrr.
I hit ‘send’ and waited for a reply. It came seconds later.
I’m at the Engineering building now. Sit tight, I’ll see ya in a bit!
I waited a few minutes but didn’t receive a reply. Shrugging, I put my phone back in my pocket and turned my attention back to my sketchpad.
“Hello,” a voice called from directly behind me.
I jumped in my seat and crumpled up the sketch. “Hunter, stop sneaking up on me while I’m drawing!”
He came around the bench and took a seat next to me. “Why’d you crumple up your sketch? You’re gonna ruin it that way. Can I see it?”
I shook my head. “It’s not ready.”
“Okay. Well, you know I like seeing the drawings you do. I think you have a lot of talent.”
I turned to him and saw he had a rose in one hand and a box of chocolates in the other. My heart skipped a beat.
“What are those for?” I asked.
“Brought you some gifts,” he said brightly. “I messed up, Lorrie. I wasn’t sure how you felt about me so I didn’t get you anything for Valentine’s Day. I thought about it, but then I figured you might get pissed off or feel awkward if I got you something.”
A bit confused, I tried to put a smile on my face as I took the gifts from him. “Hunter, this is really sweet, but you didn’t have to do this.”
“Of course I did.” He sucked in a deep breath, his large chest expanding. “Lorrie, you mean a lot to me. I know you’re afraid that I’m gonna hurt you but I hope you know by now that I’d never do that. After that kiss, I was thinking that we should give dating a shot.”
My eyebrows raised. “Wait, what? Who said anything about dating?”
He smiled and laughed. “We kissed yesterday. It meant a lot to me, and I know it meant a lot to you too.”
Suddenly feeling uncomfortable with the whole situation, I offered the rose and chocolates back to him. Knowing Hunter’s casual relations with other girls, I hadn’t anticipated him interpreting the kiss as seriously as he did. “Hunter,” I said soberly. “I really appreciate all of this. But a kiss is just a kiss. It doesn’t mean I’m ready to date you.”
He furrowed his brows, ignoring my attempt to give him back his gifts. “Why are you trying to give me back your presents? Are you saying it didn’t mean anything to you?”
I brought the rose and chocolates back to my lap. “No, that’s not it at all. I’m just saying I’m not ready to move beyond friendship. I don’t want that kiss to change anything between us.” I took a calm breath, expecting him to be as understanding as he had been when I got angry about sleeping over at his place. As sweet as Hunter was, and as much as I enjoyed hanging out with him, being ‘just friends’ had enough stressful moments—gossip, drama, being distracted from school work. Dating would only multiply that.
He paused for a moment. “I can’t accept that. Not after what happened yesterday.”
My eyes widened. “What? Why?”
“I felt the way you kissed me back. I was fine being just friends if you didn’t have romantic feelings for me. But now I know you do, and you already know I have feelings for you.”
Was he really going to argue with me about how I felt? I fished for an appropriate response. “My feelings for you are purely platonic,” I said evenly. “I think of you as an older brother, not as a romantic partner. One kiss doesn’t change that.”
“Platonic?” he asked, his eyebrows high. “Do you even know what platonic means? The way your hips moved against mine was anything but platonic. Dammit Lorrie, I even tried to pull away. I wasn’t sure you wanted it, but you pulled me right back in.”
Blood rushed to my face as I remembered the sensation of his leg against my crotch and his hair between my fingers. I looked around to make sure no one was listening. “So I let myself get caught up in the heat of the moment and now we can’t be friends?” I asked, my voice rising. “You of all people shouldn’t be making assumptions off of one kiss.”
He narrowed his eyes. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
Did I really have to spell it out for him? “Those girls gave you a blowjob and you didn’t think anything of it.”
“That’s different,” he said, his own voice rising. “Those girls don’t mean anything to me. You do.”
“You mean something to me too,” I said sternly. “As a friend.”
“I don’t see how you can’t tell the difference between kissing someone purely for pleasure and kissing someone who really means something to you. Kissing for us is something special.”
My jaw clenched. He was treating me like an idiot. “Trust me, I do see the difference. That kiss is looking like it might cost me a close friend, and that’s very disappointing.” I paused to let that sink in. “Like I said, I don’t want anything to change between us. But it seems like you won’t let that happen.”
He kicked a small rock on the ground, sending it tumbling in the distance. “I don’t get it. What’s the matter with you? I’m spilling my guts here and you’re turning to stone.”
“You might say ‘those girls’ mean nothing to you, but at least you respect ‘those girls’ enough to be upfront about the arrangement,” I snapped. “Frankly, the longer this conversation goes on, the more I feel like you’ve just been biding your time waiting for things to become romantic between us. Did you ever even want to be friends?”
“Lorrie, come on,” he said with a sigh. “I was totally cool with being friends. But I like you. You’re different. I know you like hanging out with me, and last night shows you’re definitely more than just attracted to me. So now I can’t understand why you’re denying your feelings. Especially when I’m being upfront with mine.”
“Here are my feelings,” I said, my fists balled up in frustration. “I don’t want to be in a romantic relationship with you, and I wish you would respect that. Maybe I got confused because we spend too much time together, and it was Valentine’s Day, and I was caught off guard. I don’t know, but it won’t happen again.”
“Lorrie—”
“Hunter, stop. I’m sorry, but we can’t. I told you before and I’m telling you again: I’m not ready. Maybe we shouldn’t be spending so much time together. It seems like things are getting confused.”
“We need to spend more time together.”
I looked into his gray eyes. “You’re willing to jeopardize our friendship for a chance at a relationship?”
His eyes became big and round. “We can be friends and in a relationship, Lorrie. We can have it all.”
“No,” I said, pursing my lips, my heart thumping in my chest. “I can’t do that. I really think we should have some distance.”
He looked at me carefully before standing up. “Fine,” he said. “You want to spend time apart. That’s what we’ll do.”
He turned and walked away. Halfway to the corner of the Social Sciences Building, he kicked a trash can over in anger. Empty bottles and cans tumbled across the ground.
My stomach churned as I watched him turn the corner out of sight. When I was sure he was gone, I took out the sketch I had been working on and uncrumpled it. The eyes were all wrong. I had drawn them sharp like they were when he was fighting, but I knew there was also a softer side to him. A vulnerable side.
I looked at the box of chocolates and rose in my lap. Sighing, I put the box in my bag to share with Daniela—no sense in wasting perfectly good chocolate —and left the rose on the bench. Once I packed up, I got up from the bench and fixed the trash can that Hunter knocked over. Then I crumpled up the sketch again, threw it in the trash, and went to my next class.
Chapter Sixteen
THE STUNNER
I s
pent the next few days praying I wouldn’t see Hunter. Every time my phone jingled its reminder to feed the kittens, I had a mild panic attack. When I would go to his apartment, I would check the windows to see if his lights were on or if I could see some other sign he was home, but he never was. The most I heard from him was the notes he left on the whiteboard above the kittens’ bed: “need to get formula” or “Bones wouldn’t eat make sure he gets enough” or “has Georgia been sleepy for you too?”
He was giving me time apart, that was for sure. The more I didn’t see him, the more I wasn’t sure if that was what I wanted. I had dreamed about kissing him twice in four days, each time waking up with an annoying ache between my legs and my lips pressed against my pillow.
The situation was on my mind as I walked into the dining hall with Daniela on Thursday night. All I had was swimming on Fridays, so this was practically the beginning of my weekend. That meant I should’ve been happy, like a normal college student when the weekend rolled around. Instead I was a nervous wreck. All I could think about was whether I would run into Hunter over the weekend.
“Hey, cheer up!” Daniela said as we stood in line for the cafeteria. “Let’s go out this weekend and do something fun. Go to a house party or something.”
I shrugged. “Yeah, maybe.”
“Lorrie, I know you’re trying to give it time because you guys said you’d give each other space, but you’ve been really bummed out the past few days. If it’s really bothering you, you should talk to him again. From what you told me, it sounds like he would want that.”
Maybe she was right. I didn’t want to admit it, but maybe it was time to admit my feelings for Hunter were more than platonic. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get him out of my mind.
We handed our student IDs to the cashier to allow her to scan them, took our trays, and got in line for food. The Barnyard was serving chicken broccoli bake, an Arrowhart favorite. Once we got our food, we searched for a place to sit. The cafeteria was buzzing with excitement for the approaching weekend. All around us I heard people making plans, gossiping, complaining about the upcoming midterms, and generally getting ready to relax for a couple days. It was then that I saw Hunter on the other side of the cafeteria.
He was sitting at a table and talking to a girl with shoulder length blonde hair and a perfect tan despite the lack of sun in winter. Her black coat hanging on the back of her chair, she was wearing a lilac colored cotton tank top that showed off her ample breasts, and looked very comfortable with Hunter.
They were eating off of one plate. I felt sick as I watched her lean over and whisper into his ear, tracing her fingers along the muscles under his tight-fitting navy t-shirt. He looked over at her and smiled, making suggestive movements toward her lips with a peeled banana in his hand. She playfully slapped his arm but then lunged for the banana with her mouth, taking a bite. He laughed and took a bite himself. I was starting to feel dizzy. Daniela looked at me, then followed my eyes and gasped.
“Come on,” she said pointing to a table away from Hunter. “Let’s go sit over on this side.”
She walked to the side of the cafeteria opposite from Hunter and sat down. I followed her numbly, barely able to process what was happening.
I’d been hungry when I was in the food line but when I sat down, I couldn’t even look at my plate. Who was that girl and why was she so cozy with Hunter? Had he moved on that quickly? Just a few days ago he’d been baring his soul about his feelings for me, bringing me a rose and chocolate. Now he apparently had feelings for someone else. I wanted to pretend that it didn’t bother me but the bundle of coils in my stomach made that impossible.
Noticing Daniela studying me carefully, I decided to break the silence.“I don’t know if I can eat,” I said.
She nodded but stayed silent. I stared at my food thinking about how stupid I was for feeling jealous that Hunter was flirting with another girl. I’d told him my feelings for him were strictly based on friendship but it was becoming increasingly clear to me that I wasn’t being entirely honest.
Finally Daniela spoke. “Do you know who she is?”
I shook my head. This was so humiliating, even in front of my best friend. I wanted to turn around and curl up in bed until Spring came.
She grimaced. “Okay. We can leave if you want.”
“No, you should eat.” I gestured to her food, which was as untouched as mine was.
“I’m not leaving you here, Lorrie. If you want to leave I’m going with you.”
I felt like I was pinned flat on my back by a giant boulder. Overwhelmed, I felt tears welling up in my eyes. “Thank you,” I said, trying to smile.
“You’re welcome. I know you’d do the same for me.” She speared a forkful of chicken and broccoli. “I’ll try to eat fast,” she said, chewing. “Like a chicken broccoli bake eating contest.”
I looked down at the spread on my plate and took a fork full of food. Knowing from experience that neglecting food was just going to make me feel worse, I decided to take a few bites. The food tasted bland, but I didn’t feel like I was going to throw up, so I continued eating.
Chewing my food, I was tempted to look at Hunter. I turned and found him staring right at me. His gray eyes opened wide in surprise and then narrowed. He tapped the girl sitting next to him on the shoulder, fed her another suggestive bite of his banana then looked at me for my reaction. I glared at him for a second and then turned back to Daniela.
“This is ridiculous. He’s taunting me! I have to go,” I said, my heart racing as I stood up.
“Lorrie wait!” Daniela cried.
But I was already heading out of the dining hall. It felt like everyone in the Barnyard was staring at me as I rushed out, but I didn’t care. I wasn’t going to talk to Hunter when he was consciously trying to piss me off.
Stepping outside into the night, the cold winter air stung my bare arms. As I walked down the steps, I realized I’d forgotten my coat in the rush to get out of the cafeteria. Rather than go back in, I hugged my arms to my body and powered forward, figuring Daniela would bring it back to the dorm when she finished eating. There was no way I was going back in there and embarrassing myself even more. I hurried down the last few steps and started in the direction of Floyd Hall.
I’d gone three paces when I heard Hunter calling from the top of the steps. “Lorrie, wait!”
I continued walking, ignoring Hunter’s cries. He knew how I reacted to hearing about him getting a blowjob from those girls. Deciding to feed that girl a banana in front of me made him a huge jackass. After resolving the blowjob incident, this felt like huge betrayal of my trust.
“Wait! You forgot your coat,” he called.
Feeling the cold biting through my thin layer of clothes, I stopped and turned. “What are you doing?” I said harshly.
He held up my coat from the top of the stairs. “Apparently saving you from freezing to death—again.”
“I’ll be just fine, thanks. Leave my coat with Daniela.” I turned to walk away.
“Lorrie, what the fuck?” he yelled. “How are you mad at me? You rejected me, remember? I’m the one who should be mad at you. And frankly, I am.” He descended the steps and offered the coat as I turned to face him.
I stomped my foot. “What do you have to be mad about? I said I wasn’t ready and needed a little space, and you responded by running into the arms of another girl immediately! Who is she, anyway? One of the girls who would suck your dick even if you had a pet rock?”
“Dammit Lorrie!” he roared, nostrils flared. His anger surprised me. He looked like he was going to keep yelling but pursed his lips together and ran his free hand through his short brown hair. “No,” he said in a measured tone. “She’s an ex that I’m still friends with.”
“Ada?” I blurted.
His brows shot up in surprise, but he nodded. “Yes. Ada. So you’ve heard about her. Well, now you’ve seen her.”
“Have you been hanging out with her a lot?”
/> His mouth opened to speak but then he shook his head. “Look, Ada and I . . . are not exactly friends, it’s just . . . complicated between us.”
“You think I’m blind, Hunter?” I said angrily. “You guys sure looked friendly.”
“Things between Ada and I aren’t romantic or sexual. We still hang out every once in a while, but nowhere near as much as I hang out with you.”
Now he was changing his story. I wondered if he was just telling me what he thought I wanted to hear. “So she’s not your friend, and things aren’t sexual between you, but you still suggestively feed her bananas?”
“What do you want from me, Lorrie?” he yelled. “First you push me away because I want you, now you get jealous when I’m hanging out with another girl. This is ridiculous!”
“Ridiculous? Jumping into your ex’s arms days after saying you have feelings for me is ridiculous! I thought you would at least keep it to a quiet hookup.”
He sighed. “Listen, I’m sorry I fed Ada that banana to piss you off. That was immature, but I swear to you there was no hookup.”
“Why would you use a friend—or whatever she is— to try and get back at me when I’ve done nothing wrong?”
He scoffed. “Nothing wrong? Lorrie, you’re playing with me like a yo-yo. You push me away then get jealous and pull me in. Over and over.”
I snatched my coat from his outstretched hand and backed away. “Hunter, you can’t force me to date you, even if we did kiss. But you’re right, maybe I have been unfair. Maybe we should stay away from each other.”
“Come on, don’t say that!” He took a deep breath. “I’m sorry. What can I do to make this right?”
“I don’t know!”
I turned on my heel and hurried away, expecting him to chase after me. When I realized he wasn’t following, I put my coat on and quickened my pace toward the dorm, the crisp night air chilling my tear-stained cheeks. Goddammit. Why did things always have to turn out so horribly?
I got back to my room and checked my phone. Daniela had texted me several times asking what happened and how I was. I texted back and told her I was going to the library to study. I knew it would be hard to be productive, but I had to do something. Sitting in my dorm would drive me crazy.