So I didn’t know anyone in the city—that was okay. I’d meet people, surely.
Well, I knew one person.
Will Highland. It was Will I hadn’t let myself think of on the trip from Michigan. But, honestly? That had just been a stubborn game to prove to myself that I had other reasons for coming to the city.
Will was always lingering in the back of my mind. He was a shadow in my periphery. An unopened gift that might be the thing I had most wished for, or the disappointment of that wish.
There should’ve been a term for the moments that, when you look back on them, preceded your whole life changing. There probably was one in German—some twisty compound word I didn’t know. In a movie, there would’ve at least been a musical cue. Swooping strings that suddenly gave way to velvet quiet studded with the tinkle of bells as sharp as diamonds. Something that said Pay attention: this next bit’s important.
But there hadn’t even been any kind of bodily early-warning system when I met Will—no skipped heartbeat or light-headedness to indicate that something was about to happen. Nope. I had just fallen off my skateboard when I saw him, like an idiot.
I’d only known him for a few weeks. He had been in Holiday visiting his sister and I’d met him because he was Rex’s ex. And, yes, maybe the first thing I’d noticed about him was that he was, hands-down, the most beautiful person I’d ever seen in my life. But it wasn’t just that.
He had this… presence. This way of owning every inch of space around him as if he had a right to it. It was the kind of self-possession that can make a tyrant or a prince and Will was a fucking prince. You just got the sense that he knew exactly who he was and he’d never apologize for it. And, okay, I was pretty sure I had no hope of that rubbing off on me. But being around him made me feel like everything was right in my little world. I felt alive in a way I never had. In a colors-look-brighter, food-tastes-better, every-song-is-about-him way.
Though he never would have admitted it, we had… fit together in a way I’d never fit with anyone else. It wasn’t that we were similar—we weren’t. For every ounce of confidence Will possessed, I had an equal measure of dorkiness. But somehow it just worked. I felt different with him than I had with anyone else. Everything felt different with him.
If Daniel had been a tornado that promised me there was another world out there, Will’s arrival in Michigan had been a blizzard—the cold snow and ice that snapped me back to reality, made me take a hard look at my life and what it was likely to become and feel the true terror of it. And if dreamy, distracted Daniel had offered escape, Will had been as sharply present as a pebble in my shoe, making me aware of every moment we spent together.
But that had been almost two years ago. When I’d gotten my letter of acceptance to NYU my heart had begun racing in my chest like a wild thing, as if a part of me was already surging full-speed ahead into the life I could have at an amazing college, in an amazing city.
The life I could have with Will.
I hadn’t meant to go there, but my fantasies were traitors, constructing the life we’d have together with such insidious detail that my daydreams seemed almost more real than my actual humdrum life. I’d sit behind the counter at Mr. Zoo’s, and my stupid brain would spin tales of swoony romance, corny inside jokes, easy domesticity, and, um, other stuff. Like, okay, fine: sex stuff.
It wasn’t just Will, though. It was the promise of a future that was different than anything I’d let myself imagine. Freedom. Possibilities. Hope. When a letter from the financial aid office came a few weeks later, I’d torn it open without a second thought, a rush of pure happiness shooting through me at the purple NYU logo.
The gut punch of despair hit me as soon as I processed the contents of the letter: that they were only giving me enough financial aid to cover about a third of NYU’s extremely pricey tuition. My fist tightened unconsciously, along with my stomach. I forced myself to smooth the letter out again and slide it back into the envelope, but every hope I’d let myself have was crumpled as easily as that crisp, watermarked paper.
And talking to Will was a reminder of everything I couldn’t have if I didn’t want to go into astronomical debt. Because though I felt sure that somehow Will was my destiny, there were some things that even destiny couldn’t justify. I’d missed the hell out of talking to him, but it had just been too painful. Instead, I’d thrown myself into classes at the community college, determined to do well enough that the next year I’d get a full financial aid package and could roll up in New York with everything perfect. Just the way it was meant to be.
But now I was here, and every fantasy I’d had of Will being part of my life was stirring again, the slow unfurling of dormant seeds growing up through the ground to meet the light. I thumbed through my contacts to the end of the alphabet, even though he was already one of the five numbers in my Favorites.
Will answered just when I thought the call would go to voice mail, his clear voice electrifying me.
“Hey, kid. Get mugged yet?”
“Ha. How bad would you feel if I actually had gotten mugged?”
“At least a four out of ten.”
“So, um, I’m here. Wanna hang out?”
Wow, that sounded like I was about ten. Can Will come out and play?
“I’m at work,” he said, sounding vaguely amused.
“Oh, right.” I had lost all sense of time. My stomach flipped, and I couldn’t think of anything to say. It suddenly seemed imperative that I see him.
Voices were audible on Will’s end of the conversation for a minute, and I thought I heard Will sigh. “Um, okay, do you want to meet up at my place later? Sixish?”
He gave me directions, but they got immediately jumbled in my relief and excitement about seeing Will in only a few hours. I had already failed at Resolution 3—Memorize the subway map so you don’t get lost and have to ask for directions constantly—but I had GPS on my phone so whatever.
As I lay back down and stared up at the bright blue sky, I realized I was grinning.
IDEALLY, THE first time I saw Will in New York, I would’ve breezed through the door looking… I dunno, cute. Like, irresistibly cute. Instead, the back of my hair was flattened from riding with my head against a bus seat for twenty hours, my shirt was stuck to my spine with sweat, and my hands were dirty from sitting in the grass. I was also fairly certain that I’d stepped in something unspeakable on the subway, and I’d gotten dripped on by the air-conditioning units as I approached the building.
God, why hadn’t I at least showered before coming here? My hands were so sweaty my thumb nearly slid off the button when I buzzed Will’s apartment.
“Stairs are on your right.”
Through the crackle, Will’s voice was as clear and sharp as always, like even static had no power over him.
Whenever I’d pictured Will living in the city, I’d imagined his apartment building looking like the ones on TV: as modern and shiny and stylish as he was. But the building was… well, ugly. Brown and square and kind of lurking back from the sidewalk like it was embarrassed by its ugliness. And it was bizarre that he lived behind one of these doors, each exactly like the next, when he was completely different from anyone I’d ever met. But when he opened the door, he was so vivid it was like the whole apartment building had been made ordinary to better set him off, like a jewel in a plain setting.
When I’d been around Will for multiple days in succession in Michigan last winter, the effect had worn off a little, like I’d been inoculated. Now, seeing him again, I was so struck by the lines of him that it felt like I was falling. I was staring at him in what was probably a gooberish way, but he was so damn beautiful. Beautiful in an obvious way that everyone would agree on. Beautiful like I couldn’t always concentrate on what he was saying because his words got lost somewhere around the curve of his full lower lip that dipped toward his sharp chin.
The lines of his jaw, nose, and cheekbones were clean and defined, his pale skin flawless except for a dark
beauty mark over his lip and one next to his eyebrow. His eyes were this grayish-bluish color that could look cold and remote when he was in what Daniel called scornful fashion-model mode, or deep and mischievous when he was more approachable. His hair was longish on top and short at his neck, and this improbably light blond all the way to the roots, like he was limned in frost.
“Are you gonna come in or are you going to stand there gaping? FYI, you might want to lose the whole mouth-hanging-open look before you hit the streets, unless you really do want to get mugged.” His teeth were straight, and white, and as sharp as his words, but he was smiling and his eyes sparkled. He was at least a little bit happy to see me.
“Hi,” I said and went to hug him. He felt amazing in my arms, and I couldn’t help hooking my chin over his shoulder to try and get a whiff of his hair. “Oh, wow, we’re the same height now,” I noted with my nose in his hair. I thought I heard him sigh a little, and I held on to him a beat after he tensed in my arms. “Sorry. I probably stink.” I let him go, missing the feel of him immediately.
“What the hell happened to you?” Will said as he shut the door.
“What? Oh.” The knees of my jeans were abraded where I hit the ground to avoid the car hitting me, and there was grass stuck in the creases where the fabric had rucked up above my high-tops. “This car almost hit me, man. It was ridic. Talk about defensive driving.”
Will’s eyes snapped to my face and then down to my skateboard, and he shook his head. I had almost forgotten how much he could communicate just by the way he looked at things.
“Lesson one,” he said, getting me some water and leading me over to sit on the couch. “Everything in New York is designed to kill or maim you and everyone wants something from you. It is basically the Hunger Games. Trust no one. Be ever vigilant.”
“Mix your Hunger Games and Harry Potter streams much? Nah. I met a totally nice guy in the park who I’m pretty sure wasn’t trying to kill me. He had a puppy.”
Will looked me up and down and winked. “Then he was trying to get in your pants. Puppies are sex bombs. That’s not even an advanced technique.”
“No! Puppies are not sex bombs. God, don’t say that. Puppies!”
“True story, sorry. They’re like babies. Everyone’s already agreed that they know what our reactions to them should be. Have you noticed how pissed parents get if you don’t smile at their baby? For real, they look at you like you’re the devil.”
“Um, I guess I usually smile at them?”
“Of course you do. Try it next time you’re walking. Even the sweetest-looking East Village mom straight from baby-and-me yoga will cut a bitch if you don’t smile at her baby.”
“You just go around glaring at babies?”
“I didn’t say I glared at them. I just don’t smile at them because they don’t amuse me. And, seriously, people act like you’ve broken a basic tenet of human interaction or something.”
“And you enjoy this? Terrorizing babies and antagonizing yoga moms?” I teased.
Will’s grin was mischievous. He slid down deeper into the couch. It was buttery black leather and, like so much about Will, seemed casually nice but was probably posh and expensive.
“So, did the fam give you a tearful send-off?”
I shook my head. “My mom dropped me off at the bus station in Detroit, but the bus left at like seven in the morning so everyone else was asleep. Besides….” I ran my palm absently over the soft leather of the couch. I was so aware of Will next to me, every shift of his body stirring the air between us. “They probably won’t really notice that I’m not there anymore. Not like they cared that much that I was there before.”
At Will’s sober expression, I immediately felt disloyal to my family.
“I mean, it’s not like they’re terrible or anything, just… I don’t have much in common with them. Like, Eric and my dad have their whole outdoorsy thing going on, and Janie and my mom are all into crafts and tutorials and Pinterest hacks.” Will snorted in amusement. “And Eric and Janie are both so… normal, I guess? They just… have friends or whatever. Anyway, they all have stuff they share and I just never did. And especially with the whole college thing….”
“Bad year?” Will asked.
“Oh man. It sucked. It really sucked. The whole thing—” I shook my head.
“What happened?”
I had e-mailed Will when my plans to come to NYU changed. A long and, let’s face it, whiny e-mail about how I couldn’t justify going into debt for, like, the rest of my life to come to NYU, about how sad I was that I wouldn’t get to hang out with him. And his response had been totally nice. That he agreed it wasn’t worth it. That he was sure I’d do great at community college. Et cetera, et cetera. But I hadn’t wanted him to be nice. I’d wanted him to be as devastated as I was, and he just… wasn’t.
It had been Daniel’s idea that I could take classes at Grayling rather than have to sit out a whole year, since NYU was the only place I applied to. It’s what he had done, transferring to Temple with enough credits under his belt that he only had to pay for a year’s tuition. And it was good advice. He’d had a great experience with his classes and his professors. But he’d also been in a city he loved, with friends, and a goal he was working toward.
“It just felt like high school all over again. Half of the people were people from high school, actually. And just… it was depressing,” I admitted. “I didn’t want to seem like a snob. I tried to be friendly and keep an open mind and everything. But there was an air of, like… despair. Seriously. It was grim. And my parents—ugh. My mom would be all, ‘How was school, honey?’ just like she did when I was little.”
“God, the unmitigated gall of the woman,” Will drawled.
“No, I know, it’s nice, just—ugh, I’m not explaining it well.”
I wasn’t sure how to explain it, exactly. What I’d felt was something close to humiliation. I’d never told my family about NYU, so I didn’t think they were disappointed in me or anything. Neither of my parents had been to college, so it certainly wasn’t something they expected. Eric hadn’t gone, and I didn’t think Janie was interested. No, it was more like a humiliation born of the distance between what I wanted and the life I was living.
As if I’d somehow tempted fate by thinking I was special enough to get out of Holiday and fate had smacked me down.
“I get it,” Will said. “You had an idea of what you wanted from college and that didn’t fit it. It’s almost worse to have some wack approximation of the thing you want than not to have it at all.”
“Yeah, how’d you know?”
Will shrugged and grinned at me.
“Well, now you get your chance.”
I nodded but felt the sudden terror that somehow the fantasy of NYU would blow up in my face all over again. That fate would, once again, punish me for dreaming above my station. But Will had successfully gotten out of Holiday and made a go of it here, proof it was possible.
I told Will about my roommate bailing and how big New York seemed. How unfathomable I found the scale of a city where the subway made it so you couldn’t see how things were connected. How far it seemed you could go without meeting anyone who knew you.
“At least I have you,” I said, testing the waters.
Will’s eyes were on me, but he didn’t say anything, and I started to feel awkward.
“I mean, um, well, and I’ll get a new roommate.”
“My freshman roommate was a nightmare,” Will said. “He’d been homeschooled and he was a total cliché. Awkward as all hell, showered about once a week, and did these relaxation exercises before he went to bed. He’d sit cross-legged and kind of flap his arms and legs around while breathing in through his nose and out through his mouth. Total freak show.
“But, oh man, that was nothing compared to this other girl on my hall. She had night terrors, and she’d wake up sometimes convinced that she was part of some kind of army invasion—I think her dad was in the military or so
mething—and bust out her door to forearm crawl down the hallway. Jesus, it was hilarious. And she went to bed early, so she’d wake up this way at like one in the morning and, of course, half the hall was still awake so everyone would see. Ahhh,” he sighed, laughing. “Poor Louise. I wonder if her military crawl skills ever came in handy later in life.”
I laughed with him, but now he’d gotten me even more nervous about who my roommate was going to be.
“Well, if mine’s that bad then I’ll just have to come over and crash on your couch,” I said, sliding a little closer to him.
“You’ll be fine,” he said with a careless smile. “You’ll probably forget I’m even here in a week or two. With this grin?” He chucked me under the chin. “You’ll make a ton of friends. Besides, you’ll have all your classes.”
The concept of forgetting about Will was an absurdity of the magnitude of the IC 1101 galaxy. But I was now veering into dangerous territory. Resolution 4 territory.
Resolution 4 was serious. Resolution 4 was essential. Resolution 4 was basically Daniel’s voice in my head and it went something like: Do not stalk Will like a total psycho when you get to New York in order to confess your love for him because you barely know him and haven’t seen him in almost two years and also he’s a bag of dicks. The bag of dicks part was definitely Daniel’s voice, though the rest of it wasn’t exactly untrue.
So, yeeeaaahhh. Did I mention yet that my feelings for Will were pretty… intense? I knew that I didn’t super know him, but I also knew I wasn’t wrong about the connection we had. One half of my brain repeated Resolution 4, Resolution 4, while the other half pictured Will and me tucked up together on his couch just like this every night, talking about everything. Getting to know each other the way no one else had ever known me. Going out together so Will could show me the city. We’d hold hands and—