There have been times in my life that I have felt as if I were about to simultaneously pass out and vomit, and this is most certainly one of them. As much as I hate the idea in theory—Rowen Garret owns my heart. He has since that first day my sleepy six-year-old eyes landed on him. There are some people you need a lifetime to love and others you give your heart to at a glance, and Rowen fell into the latter category for me.
I do a quick sweep of the vicinity in the event Braden and Becca may have accidently stumbled into this chaos. Not that they would. For the most part, Braden and Rowen have entertained a well-choreographed ballet of avoiding one another these last few years—so much so that my brother, the football aficionado, once player for the Cougars himself, hasn’t been to a game in years. Correction, he and Becca attend every game of our crosstown rivals, the Bixby Bears. As much as my brother can’t stand the sight of Rowen, he wasn’t actually going to give up his love of screaming his vocal cords into paralysis from the cheap seats.
“The Colossus, huh?” I’m stunned into submission, and that’s something that doesn’t happen too often. I’ve ridden the Colossus a time or two—the old wooden roller coaster, not the new and improved Garret version. All of that bobbing, the side to side swaying, the whiplash twists and turns, that final gravity defying loop…
I glance over to Rowen, and my panties melt on cue. “Sounds like a harrowing ride if you ask me.”
Vi waves me off with the flick of her wrist. “I’m sure he’d manscape for an old friend.” She gives a cheesy wink from over the rim of her glass.
“I said harrowing not hairy, and eww by the way. I’ll pass. I’m not one for cheap thrills. Speaking of which. There’s something else I’m glad we passed on.” I nod to the oversized, bright orange sign pinned to the wall that we’re all but holding up. The scare tactic All slots are nearly full! is printed thickly over the words Be a part of social relations history in the making and sign up now for a chance at LOVE! The Social Experiment wants and needs you today! “Just the way they capitalized the L word lets you know they’re mocking it.”
The Social Experiment is all anyone on campus has talked about since move-in day, a month before the semester ever began. Dexter Houston, a questionably esteemed member of the psychology department, is heading up what I’m guessing will pan out to be Leland’s first and last public foray into hostile dating waters. They’re in the process of recruiting guinea pigs, then penning them in with one another until they undeniably find true lust. The only thing they’ll most likely find is an incurable form of gonorrhea.
You can’t go ten feet on campus without hearing Dexter’s name whispered like some demonic chant. He’s cast some sort of delusional hex upon the entire student body, and the media is picking up on our misfortune.
Vi clicks her tongue at the desperate orange sign just begging for another fool to splatter their heart over the dotted line in hopes of landing their very own rejection. I’ve read the fine print. The entire nightmare will be filmed and aired on some no-name YouTube channel in hopes to make Dexter Houston a billionaire off the backs of unsuspecting coeds—and I do mean backs. How the university can okay this titillating travesty has me rethinking my Cougar pride.
Vi leans in and lands an arm over both Ember and me. “They’ve asked that we come in tomorrow at three to get our assignments.” Vi shrugs while Ember and I try to decode the word vomit that just gurgled from her. “The people at TSE.” She nods. “That’s what the minions that actually man the fort at the Social Experiment call themselves—TSE. I signed the three of us up just before the game.”
“What?” Ember and I balk in unison, only my balk is more of a cackle because there is no way in hell I’ll be front and center, ready and willing, to see what the TSE dating gods have in store for me. Rumor has it, every chess club on campus, every frat house gamer, and every beer pong champion alike have signed up for a chance at free hickeys. No thank you. I’d rather have a beer bong enema than be forced to speed date the entire campus geek squad. Not that I have anything against a single member of the aforementioned groups—it’s just that my level of perfection has been slightly skewed by a boy who has traded in his good name for something akin to a ride at an amusement park.
“I’m not kidding,” Vi insists. “They offered a fifty percent off one item in the student store for every two friends you referred. And seeing that you two were the only two friends I have, you fit the bill.”
A waitress breezes by with a heaping plate of everything under the sun nachos, and Ember grunts as if she’s about to upchuck a plate of everything under the sun herself.
Em forces a smile. “What, pray tell, did you purchase with the blood money, Violet?”
“That cute little floral cardinal and gold paisley scarf I’ve had my eye on. It reduced the price from fifty-nine ninety-nine to a flat thirty bucks—a totally doable price. And I’ve already decided we can share it. You’re welcome.”
“You’re kidding.” I’m still laughing, but truthfully, this entire conversation has gone from hilarity to horror. “There’s no way I’m hocking my heart so a bunch of faceless people in white robes can document their findings. It’s ridiculous. No one finds love under normal circumstances, let alone herded in groups like a bunch of laboratory sexed-up rats. You of all people should know that.” Okay, that was a low blow, but after being sold out for a paisley scarf—that I’m only half-convinced she’ll be willing to part with on the rare occasion, it felt rather justified.
“You’re right.” Vi’s eyes glitter with moisture, and now I feel like a grade A ass. She gives a few steady blinks. “If anyone has learned that love is nothing but a joke, it’s me, but that’s sort of why I did it.” She ducks a little. “I thought maybe I should get back out there. And if anything, this will force me to do just that.”
“God—yes.” I’m quick to wrap an arm around her. It’s clear poor Vi is just trying to get over that monster that stomped all over her heart. I don’t have all the details that went into the breakup, but I’ve known Vi just long enough to surmise she’s the kindest, nicest girl on the planet, and anyone who hurts her has to be an egotistical asshole. All I know for sure is that his name is Lane Cooper, and that’s only because she’s used his proper name once. Every other time she’s referenced him as Lame, which is totally fitting. In my opinion, if you ever come across someone whose name rhymes with something that can be construed as ridiculously idiotic, I’d take it as a red flag and run the hell away.
I clear my throat and offer a solemn nod to Violet. “We’re in total support of you doing something so creative to get back out there. We’ll be your biggest cheerleaders. We’ll even help you plan outfits and be your glam squad on game day.” There. Violet has two built-in cheerleaders, ready and willing to support her from the safety of the sidelines. What more could she ask for?
Ember spikes a well-manicured finger in the air. “Coffee is on me after your first experiment.”
The only clue that Dexter and his small army of clinicians have offered is that the experiments won’t be conventional, and they won’t be the same for everybody. Not only is your mystery date the equivalent of playing testosterone Russian roulette, but what you might be doing with them—to them, is just as much in the perverted air. Which derives a big fat no thank you from me. I’m plenty happy curling up with a good—read dirty—romance novel on what’s panning out to be a typical Friday night.
Vi shakes her head so fast her earrings ring like chimes. “I can’t do it alone. That’s why I need the two of you. There’s no way I would ever do something so scary, so out there and off-putting all by my lonesome.” She hooks her arm through mine and her other through Ember’s until we form a shorthand version of a chorus line. “You’re my new best friends. You’re all I’ve got at this overpriced, oversized university. Besides, by the time we graduate, we’ll practically be sisters. And what do sisters do best? They stick together!” She ends her quasi-cheer with a kick, and I’m quick to groan at her
pep rally tactics.
Ember coos as if Vi just produced a puppy dressed in a suit—there actually was a puppy stuffed into a makeshift tuxedo as a part of Alpha Nu’s recruitment strategy in the quad this afternoon, and swear to God, it was the cutest damn thing I have ever laid eyes on, but I digress.
“No,” I cut Ember off before she coos her way into submission and lands us both in hot sexual waters tomorrow afternoon.
“Yes.” Ember knocks my knee out with a gentle nudge from her own, and I’m forced to do a quick curtsey. “We will gladly help our friend in need. Besides, she’s already spent the fifty percent off coupon. You wouldn’t want the student store employees to come after her with a Cougar emblazoned baseball bat, would you?” Ember’s navy lashes blink like rabid birds. “What’s one little date going to hurt if it means helping a friend out?”
“Yeah, Soph.” Vi gives my arm a sharp tug and pulls me in close until I’m getting high off the toxic scent of her sugary perfume. “What’s one little dating experiment going to hurt? Who knows? One of us might actually find true love.”
“True love!” Ember is quick to toast the oxymoron before knocking back the rest of her drink. And I’m starting to feel like a moron myself because I can’t seem to fight the urge to resist the madness.
“True love.” I glance across the room at that crowd of coeds surrounding Rowen Garret and his colossal manhood. The sea of sorority girls parts just enough, and his eyes magically latch onto mine. My body catches fire as every muscle in me paralyzes with fear, and just like that, the carnal crowd closes in on him again, but his searing gaze is still set my way. Something about that soulful glance has incinerated me right down to the marrow. This tiny physical cue is the most communication we’ve shared in years. And for the life of me, I cannot guess what he’s trying to say. Does he even recognize me anymore?
“Well?” Vi hops up and down, inadvertently breaking my trance, and I’m thankful for it.
Something in me burns all right—with anger this time. Who does Rowen think he is looking at me that way? Acting like the carnal class clown? Giving his attention to every girl on campus while gifting my brother and me the middle finger by way of his silence—granted, Braden would gift him the middle finger for trying to break his silence, but still.
“Oh, why the hell not,” I blurt in frustration while both Vi and Ember squeal and gyrate their hips to the music blaring over the speakers.
“Tomorrow is a new beginning, girls!” Vi pulls us toward the dance floor.
“To new beginnings!” Ember shouts and laughs as if she doesn’t have a care in the world, and she doesn’t. And for the first time, I’m feeling that way, too.
“To new beginnings!” I shout just as I spot Rowen leaving with a blonde prospect for the night. And just like that, my enthusiasm fades as quick as it came. Something tells me it’s going to take more than some laboratory experimentation to get over Rowen Garret.
I accidentally gifted my heart to him all those years ago, and I have no idea how to get it back.
The entry to the psychology department is crowded with eager bodies. You would think they were giving away keys to an entire slew of brand new SUVs instead of a chance to humiliate yourself on what amounts to worldwide television.
Violet, Ember, and I stand in a line that only seems to grow longer as the minutes tick by before miraculously—and suspiciously, just at the moment I was about to hop out of this hotbed of insanity—we end up face to face with a rather bedraggled looking staffer whose name tag reads Missy. Her glasses are poetically crooked, and her hair looks as if it’s doing its best impersonation of withstanding an electrocution.
“Names?” she barks with the tenacity of a drill sergeant, and I shoot Vi a look that suggests there’s still time to duck and cover, but Vi simply leans over and gives her all the first-name-surname details the girl seems so hungry for.
Missy scans the paperbound database before her. And what the hell is that crap anyway? Isn’t the whole idea of the Social Experiment supposed to be quasi-avant guard and edgy? Why isn’t this valuable data nestled somewhere on a Google spreadsheet the way God intended rather than a phone book thick manifesto that looks straight out of the dot matrix printing era?
My right foot begins on a manic tapping spree that I’m hoping will morph into an involuntary sprint leading me very far, far away from this throwback from The Dating Game. If Braden had an inkling of what I was signing up for, my overprotective, over analytical brother would steer me to another, far more nefarious part of the psychology department to have my head examined.
“Sophie Meyers?” Missy slides her thick-framed glasses up the ridge of her slightly crooked nose.
“It’s Meyer,” I say as politely as possible without sounding like an ass. I’m not sure why I bother to correct anyone. In all honesty, my relatives probably should have tacked on an S to the end of our name once they crossed Ellis Island all those Irish immigration decades ago.
“Congratulations!” She bats her magnified Colorado blue-sky eyes up at me along with a hesitant smile. “You’ve been bumped into group A. There was a dropout at the last minute. So if you don’t mind, you can step through those doors where you’ll be briefed on the nature of your experiment before our lawyers meet with you.” She wrinkles her nose as if the mention of professional legal eagles isn’t really something to get my pretty little head worked up over. And really? It’s probably not. I mean, it’s not as if I’ll be frisked and taken in for questioning. It’s probably a cakewalk—literally. How suggestive is this Dexter dude really allowed to get on the university’s watch, anyway? It’s not like the Dean is going to allow some porn flick to piece together, involving seventy percent of the student body no less. Yes, The Cougar Report, our resident fish wrapper, actually suggests this raw data is true. Seventy percent of my peers think one mass swipe right is a very good idea.
“Actually”—I pull Vi over and place her front and center so that Missy here can feast her crooked little opticals in the right direction—“you can give my slot to my newly minted best friend. I’ll take whatever spot you were about to give her.”
“Nice move,” Em whispers from behind, and I give a slight nod, rather proud of how quickly I was able to think on my desperate-to-run-like-hell feet.
“No can do.” Missy drops the manufactured smile from her face, and in its place is the mask of fear. “Professor Houston—I’m sorry, he’s not a professor. I’m not to say that.” She takes a moment to scold herself, and by proxy scares the hell out of the three of us. “Mr. Dexter Houston is adamant that his placements are purposely directed. I can no more move your placement than I can move this building. What’s designated on this paperwork for you is written in stone. It’s destiny.”
My mouth falls open at her odd level of devotion to this love guru who has one very public breakup on his résumé as his only means of recommendation for this circus he’s commandeering.
“Yes, you can,” I assure her. “I was bumped into group A, and I can just as easily be bumped right out of it, Missy.” I couldn’t help but tag it with her name. It’s not my fault that when given the right inflection it could be misconstrued as a putdown. “It’s not written in stone. It’s not even written in binary coding. It’s written in pencil, the least reliable source of inputting information next to sand. I’m betting I can wipe my finger over that number sitting beside my name—and presto—you’d be forced to put me at the bottom of that list.”
Vi stomps down on my foot so hard with that cobbler’s hoof she insists on donning, aka wooden Swedish clog, and I bite down over my lip to keep from yodeling out in pain.
“Don’t ruin this for me, Soph.” She blinks those impossible puppy dog eyes up at me with the waterworks already going, and I’m beginning to think she has an internal faucet attached. I swear on all that is holy, I’ve never before seen a person cry on cue like Vi. It’s some sort of black magic they taught her at that pricey boarding school she was reared at.
/> “Fine.” I force a tight smile, stepping into the limelight once again, and Missy couldn’t be happier. Even her hair seems to be standing up a little straighter with pride at the fact she’s wrangled yet another sucker into the Dexter Houston dating ride from hell. “You got me.”
“Group A meets right through those doors,” Missy sings with excitement and most likely relief.
“Great. We’ll head right over as soon as my friends get punched in.” Let’s hope for Vi’s sake I won’t be tempted to do a little punching myself after this miserable day is over.
“No can do!” Missy sings, two for two with the catchphrase. I’m beginning to think everything that comes from her mouth is canned straight from the Dexter Houston script she’s been threatened to read from. “You’ll have to go it alone.”
Great.
Vi gets second round, and Ember gets the third, groups B and C respectively.
“I’m getting the feeling The Social Experiment gods believe strongly in the divide and conquer technique.” I scowl at the dark mouth of the building I’m questionably destined to walk through.
“Sorry.” Vi makes a face, and for a moment, I’m tempted to give her my name badge. Why couldn’t she be Sophie Meyers with an S? Technically, I’m not Sophie Meyers. That one extra consonant could cost their purposefully directed, paper and pencil destiny-bound registry one serious misstep. The only thing I’m destined for is one crap ride.
Vi’s shoulders sag as her watery lime-colored eyes blink back tears once again, and she’s got me.
“Don’t be sorry.” I adjust the collar under her sweater. Vi is the only girl I know who actually understands how to pull off layers as effortlessly as a department store mannequin. “I’m thrilled to do it.” And, at the moment, Vi is the only girl I know who I would voluntarily lie to just to maintain peace within our friendship—but just this once because I completely detest a liar. “I’ll meet you guys back at Canterbury with all the dirty little details. Go on, get some coffee and send some good luck vibes my way. This is all about finding true love, right?”