Suffer Love (15 page)

“I didn't think you were friends with him,” she says after a long pause.

“I'm not. I mean, maybe I am. I don't know. It's weird.”

“
Eldritch
?”

“Har, har.”

“All right, fine. I'll come, but you owe me a pack of peanut butter M&M's and a Channing Tatum movie marathon.”

“Please don't make me watch
The Vow
again.”

“Are you kidding me? That one's first on the list.”

I groan. “Fine. Done.”

“Hey, maybe this will be a turning point.” Her words are muffled in a way that I can tell she's slicking on lipgloss. “If anyone can inspire you to believe in real, honest-to-God love stories again, it's William Shakespeare.”

I snort, loud and clear, before I hang up.

By the time we pick up Kat, we have thirty minutes to get to Nashville, get tickets, and get in our seats. Livy is prone to carsickness, so we let her sit in the front of Ajay's book-filled Jeep Cherokee. Because I know the idea of constantly bumping into a guy she just officially met while flying down I-65 would completely freak Kat out, I'm wedged between her and Sam in the back.

“Do you run a library out of your car?” I ask Ajay, to get my mind off Sam's warm skin pressing into my shoulder and thigh.

“What?”

“Did you not notice there are at least twenty books in here?”

He laughs as Livy pulls a book out from under her butt and waves it in his face.

“Care to sign up for a membership?” he asks, swatting her away.

“Ajay's car is his overflow space,” Sam says.

“Overflow?” Kat asks.

Sam nods. “He refuses to check books out of the library. Says he needs to own them to really experience them. His room is like one giant ream of paper.”

“The experience doesn't end when you finish a story,” Ajay says. The lilting tone to his voice that I'd gotten used to over the past couple of hours vanishes and turns serious. “The physical book is like a memento. Plus, I'm a collector.”

“So it's important to own two copies of
The Brothers Karamazov
?” I ask, holding the proof in my hands.

“New translations, my dear.”

“He has a third stuffed in his closet,” Sam says.

“Wow. You and my dad should meet. You're like his dream student.” I flip through one of the books, feeling Sam shift closer to the door.

“Sure,” Ajay finally says after a few seconds, before clearing his throat. “So, Kat, I noticed the button on your bag.”

Kat looks down at her burnt orange hobo bag. On it she's fastened a green button with a picture of a pig and the words
I DON'T EAT ANYTHING WITH A FACE
encircling its head.

“What about it?” she asks.

“Is it true?” Ajay asks. “You're a faceless eater?”

Kat laughs. “If by ‘faceless eater' you mean vegetarian, then yes.”

“Would you mind explaining your reasons?”

“Here we go,” Sam says.

“What?” I ask him.

“Ajay loves debating vegetarianism.”

“I don't debate,” Ajay says. “I discuss.”

“Right.”

“Are you a vegetarian?” Kat asks.

“Me?” Ajay says while shifting lanes. “Oh, no, no, no. I relish my saturated-fat-ridden farm friends far too much.”

“That's gross,” Livy says.

Ajay grins at her. “But my mom is and she's always trying to get my dad and me to see the light or what have you, so I respect it. I know a lot about it.”

Kat laughs again. “I don't mind sharing.”

“All right, but when he starts talking about methane and cows, I'd be ready with a subject change,” Sam says before turning toward the window.

“I just really love animals,” Kat says, shrugging. “I respect them, I guess.”

“Pigs in particular,” I say. Kat harbors a borderline obsession with pigs. “Every Christmas since I've known her, she asks her parents for a piglet. To no avail.”

Livy laughs, turning in her seat to face us. “Pigs?”

“Um . . . well . . .” Kat flushes and hems and haws and I ready myself to swoop in with a subject change. But then she catches Ajay's glance in the rearview mirror and, I swear to God, the girl melts next to me. “Yes, pigs. When I was little, I read
Charlotte's Web
the same week I went to a petting zoo. A sow had just had her piglets and . . .” She sighs wistfully. “They were so tiny and adorable and needy. I just couldn't get over it. You know, the whole slaughter-the-cute-little-piggy-for-bacon thing.”

“Mmm . . . bacon,” Sam murmurs to the window, and I choke back a laugh.

“A couple of years ago, I decided to try not eating meat.” Kat fiddles with the button. “I don't even really miss it, although my mom still tries slipping me beef every now and then. She's terrified I'm going to become anemic or develop a B12 deficiency.”

Ajay smiles and nods, sliding his gaze to hers in the mirror again.

While Kat and Ajay exchange thoughts on the ethical treatment of animals and the health benefits of Tofurky for Thanksgiving, I watch Sam watch the night fade into a deeper dark. The city outside passes by in a blur of black and muted color. Streetlights from the highway flicker over his face, illuminating his pensive expression every fifty feet or so, then throwing him back into shadow. His body is smashed against the door while one hand flicks a button on his shirt repeatedly.

I'm not exactly sure what happened back in his driveway. When I called him on his lie, I expected a laugh, a shrug, a
whatever
. Actually, that's not true. That's what I
hoped
he'd do, thus proving he's a dick who couldn't care less about messing with a girl's head. Instead, he looked confused and genuinely regretful.

Flying down the highway now, it hits me.

I'm not the one calling up a pretty blonde . . .

All his weird behavior, all his hedging. There's another girl. He's got a girlfriend back in Atlanta or wherever and here I am, batting my stupid lashes at him and inviting myself to his house and practically begging him to be friends with me.

Good God.

I feel ill.

By the time we get to the Shamblin Theater, I already want to go home, but I follow everyone inside. We file into our seats while Kat, now sporting her own pink streak, chatters up a storm with Ajay and Livy, which is totally freaking me out. When we sit down, my arm collides into Sam's on the armrest we'll share. He gives me a smile and gestures for me to take the armrest. I try not to smile back, but I fail. His simple, considerate gesture stirs up a hive of bees in my stomach.

My mind flashes to a memory of my parents. I was maybe eight or nine and Dad had placed light blue sticky notes containing clues leading to Mom's Valentine's Day present all over the house. In the coffeepot, the refrigerator, the microwave, even in the DVD drive. He always did something extravagant a few days or weeks before February 14.

“Real romance can't be scheduled by a calendar,” he had said as I watched him slide two tickets to
Wicked
in New York City for the following weekend into a copy of
The Wizard of Oz.
Mom actually cried a little when she found them. God, even my prepubescent heart fluttered.

The lights in the Shamblin blink on and off. I settle into my seat, picturing my parents at home right now. Dad, pouting over my absence, will soon shut himself in his study to edit his articles or grade papers while Mom, if she's even home, watches
Scandal
and fantasizes about replacing her husband's toothpaste with hemorrhoid cream.

That's a real, honest-to-God love story.

Throughout the play, I feel Sam's eyes drift over to my face more than once, but he never says a word. We never nudge each other and mock Benedick's and Beatrice's cynicism-turned-puddly-love or point out that the actor playing Claudio seems to have no scruples about upstaging his fellow thespians during their lines. In fact, Sam barely speaks to anyone until the five of us are squashed into a booth at Fido, a hipster coffee shop in Hillsboro Village, sharing massive slices of cheesecake with thick, foamy cappuccinos.

“I like this,” Sam says close to my ear so I can hear him above the cacophony of the busy café. He twirls my pink strand of hair between his fingers. “Very Katy Perry.”

“Damn, I was going for Gwen Stefani.”

He keeps his eyes on my hair, his thumb smoothing over the texture again and again. I want to knock his hand away, but my arms feel locked in my lap.

“Nah. Livy's Gwen. Or maybe Kat. Blond hair and all.” He drops my hair so that it falls onto his arm, the pink like a neon light against his smooth skin. “It was cool of you to let Livy color it.”

My phone buzzes against my leg in my bag. I dig through a tube of lip balm, my graphing calculator, wallet, and a copy of Rilke's
Letters to a Young Poet
I'd forgotten was even in there before my hand closes around the phone.
Dad
flashes across the screen. I tap
Ignore.

“I wasn't trying to be nice.” I look across the booth to where Livy's snapping pictures of Kat and Ajay fighting—and by fighting, I mean flirting—over the last bite of key lime cheesecake. I tilt my head and watch my best friend for a few seconds before turning back to Sam. “I just really, really like hot pink hair.”

Sam smiles and flips his fork over his knuckles, studying me with softly narrowed eyes. “You know, you never told me something unexpected about yourself.”

“I thought you said everything about me was unexpected,” I say without thinking. Warmth crawls up my neck and I take a bite of turtle cheesecake. I'm flirting with him. He has a girlfriend stashed away somewhere and I'm freaking flirting with him.

Sam makes a
whoo
shape with his mouth. “Okay, I'll rephrase. Tell me something you've never told anyone.”

“Why?”

“Because I have a narcissistic need to feel special and unique?”

“I can verify that statement's truth,” Ajay says, grinning wryly. Sam startles and sits up straight, like he forgot we weren't alone.

“I don't think that statement is true at all,” Livy says. Sam grins at her.

“Regardless.” Ajay looks at me pointedly. “I'd be interested in this rare bit of information as well.”

“Me too,” Kat says.

“You already know everything about me,” I say.

“I doubt that. We all have secrets.”

“Is that right, Kitty Kat? And what, pray tell, are your hidden demons?”

“Kitty Kat?” Ajay's eyes crinkle into a smile. “I like that. Meow.”

“Oh, God,” she says, dropping her head into her hands. “Not you too.”

He laughs and nudges her shoulder playfully. “We'll all do it. Each of us shares something we've never told anyone before.”

“Kat and Hadley just met you, Age,” Sam says. “I mean, I know you think you can charm your way into an old lady's will, but I'm not sure even you can extract that kind of information.”

“You expected Hadley to pour out her soul to you, Don Juan.” Ajay smirks at his friend and Sam smirks right back, a silent war that can only be waged between two people who've known each other longer than they haven't.

“I'll do it,” Kat says, and my mouth drops open. What parasitic life form has taken over my best friend?

“Excellent.” Ajay turns so his entire body is facing Kat. “Go.”

She fiddles with her napkin, twisting it into a cottony wreath. “All right . . . well . . . um.” Ah. There she is. “I keep a journal about . . .” She flicks her eye to me and I smile. “My dad. Actually, it's
to
my dad.”

“Your dad?” Ajay asks, eyebrows up.

She nods. “He left when I was ten and he's a complete jerk, but . . . he's still my dad, you know, and he knows nothing about me. So once a week I write to him in this journal. Just stupid stuff really. What I'm doing at school, what music I like, my best time at a swim meet.”

I tap her foot under the table. I didn't know this about Kat, but somehow it doesn't surprise me. She's always been more forgiving toward her father than I would be in her situation. When she was nine, the guy said she looked like a whore when she dressed as Catwoman for Halloween. But Kat, though damaged by him, rarely wanders beyond her usual “He's a jerk” assessments. I'm glad to know she can express herself in writing, but I can't keep my heart from shuddering. I think of my own dad's journal to me and whether or not he still writes in it.

“I like it. Subtly revealing.” Ajay holds Kat's gaze as he says, “Sam. Go.”

Sam hesitates, eyebrows cinched in thought. Finally, he chuckles. “I sucked my thumb until I was ten.”

Ajay's eyes pop and I spit a mouthful of lukewarm coffee back into my mug.

“Seriously?” I ask.

He shrugs, totally unfazed.

“It's true,” Livy says, giggling. “When he watched TV, he used to lie on the floor so that the coffee table blocked him from Mom's view on the couch and go to town. It's amazing he's not bucktoothed.”

“Wow,” Ajay says, eyes glittering. “I'm nonplussed. I'm flabbergasted. I'm humming with anticipation of future manipulation.”

“All right, pot-stirrer,” Sam says to Ajay. “Your turn.”

“Me? A magician never reveals his secrets.”

“Oh, no.” Kat pokes his arm gently with her fork. “Spill it.”

He slides the fork from her fingers and rubs his arm. “Okay, okay. No need for violence.” He grins at her. She grins back.

Ajay pushes his fingertips together and takes a deep breath. “Okay. I cried—”

“Oh, this is gonna be good,” Sam says, his leg pressing against mine under the table.

Ajay narrows his eyes at him. “I cried when I read the last scene in
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
You know, when Harry kneels down in front of his kid and calls him Albus Severus? Gah. Totally bawled.”