Envy

“I’m not jealous at all,” he said hotly. “I just don’t understand what the deal is with the two of you.”

“I told you-he cares about doing well,” Beth insisted. “He wants my help.”

“That’s not all he wants,” Adam muttered.

“What was that?” she asked sharply.

“I just think you need to ask yourself why he wants to spend so much time with you. Why are you so sure that he cares so much about the test?”

She stiffened-it infuriated her when he implied that the only thing she had to offer the world was her body. Why was he so convinced that all anyone could ever want from her was sex? Maybe because it was all he wanted? As always, she tried to suppress the fear-but these days, it never disappeared for long.

“Oh, I don’t know-maybe because when I study with Kane, he actually works hard,” she pointed out, and it was absolutely true. “He doesn’t sit there fidgeting, throwing paper airplanes, and ignoring everything I say unless it’s about football or TV Now… who does that sound like to you?”

“Fine!” he said in a loud, sulky voice, looking away. “You caught me. I don’t give a shit about this stupid test. I just wanted to spend some time with my girlfriend. Lock me up and throw away the key.”

She shushed him and glanced down the hall-her mother was trying to sleep a bit before working a night shift, and the last thing Beth needed was to wake her up. They both held still for a moment, waiting-but no sound came from the bedroom. They were safe. And in the quiet pause, Beth’s anger had seeped away. She closed her book, then reached over and closed Adam’s, too.

“Adam, listen to me. You have nothing to worry about.”

“You don’t know Kane…”

“Maybe I do, maybe I don’t. But I know myself,” she said urgently. “You know me. Whatever it is you think he’s after, he’s not going to get it.”

Adam looked down and didn’t respond.

“You trust me, right?”

“I do, of course I do, it’s just that-”

“Look. Remember last month, when you were spending all that time with Kaia?” she asked.

A wary, panicked look flashed across Adam’s face. “Yes…”

“And I was insanely jealous?”

“That’s right, you were,” he said triumphantly, vindicated.

“And you got mad, because I didn’t trust you-and you were right.”

He looked down again, deflated.

“I should have trusted you,” Beth told him, “because I know you’d never do anything to hurt me.”

“I never would,” he said urgently. “Beth, you know that. I love you.”

“And I love you.” She leaned across the table and gave him a soft kiss on the lips. “And you just have to trust that. Okay?”

“So what now?” he asked.

She laughed. “Now you get out of here and let me get my work done so that I can see you another time. Without the stupid books.”

He rolled his eyes. “Are you sure?” he asked, coming around to her side of the table and massaging her shoulders. As always, she melted beneath his warm and sure touch. “Because you might want to keep me around-I tend to come in handy.”

She swatted him with her notebook. “Don’t tempt me,” she begged. “Now come on, get out.”

He shrugged and turned to go. But he didn’t get very far.

“Okay, come back,” she cried. “ You got me-one more kiss.”

It was a long one.

Adam drove home. With the sweet taste of Beth still fresh on his lips-and the image of her in Kane’s arms still fresh on his mind. He knew Kane-the guy got anything he wanted. Anything. Anyone. Adam had to work for everything he got; but for Kane, victory came easy. And it came often.

Beth could deny it all she wanted-she could beg him to trust her a hundred times. But he couldn’t help what he knew, and what he knew was that sometimes being in love, being trustworthy just isn’t enough. Yes, he remembered back when he was spending all that time with Kaia. He’d sworn to Beth a million times that nothing would ever happen. And he’d meant it.

And it’s not like he was some horrible person, he reminded himself. Kaia had just been there-the wrong girl, in the right place at the right time. He hadn’t been able to stop himself. Sometimes he wasn’t even sure he could blame himself-it had all seemed so inevitable. Sometimes, despite the best of intentions, things just happened.

And that’s what he was afraid of.

Chapter 8

That night, it seemed like sleep would never come.

Beth lay in bed, her body drained of energy, her mind spinning in circles, refusing to slow, refusing to relax. When had her life gotten so complicated? And what did it mean that the things that should have made her happy were the ones keeping her awake?

And, as long as she was asking meaningless questions that she’d never be able to answer, if she was so in love with her boyfriend, why did she sometimes wish he was someone else?

I wish I were someone else, she thought wistfully. Someone who didn’t care so much about always doing the right thing and getting the job done, someone who wasn’t overwhelmed by commitments and responsibilities to everyone in her life. Someone who wasn’t tied down to the same guy, day in and day out, her mind whispered. To trade lives with someone, just for a day-was that so much to ask?

What would it be like, she wondered, to have Kaia’s life? Not her striking beauty, or her wealth-though at the thought of a life free of skimping, saving, and scrounging, free of bussing tables at the diner and watching her parents drag themselves home from work at three a.m., Beth often felt a sharp pang of jealousy. There were people who lived life without struggling for every dollar. She’d accepted that she wasn’t one of them-and while she didn’t care as much as she used to, she cared. A lot. But looks, money, clothes, those were just things, possessions-Beth didn’t want to have what Kaia had, she wanted, at least sometimes, secretly, late at night, to be who Kaia was. Beth often watched her out of the corner of her eye, marveling at the girl who seemed to float above the fray, skimming across the surface of life, never getting her feet dirty. It was such an alien frame of mind that Beth couldn’t imagine how the world must seem to her. But on nights like this, she longed for it.

The apathetic manner, the almost inhuman poise-Kaia, she was sure, never fought with her boyfriends. Never questioned what she “really” wanted, and whether it was right or wrong. And, Beth was sure, never worried that her life was boring, that she was boring. Kaia was just like Kane in that way-and maybe, Beth suddenly realized, that was why she was so drawn to him, in spite of herself. And she was. Drawn to him. Even though she could only admit it to herself at times like this, alone, stranded between night and day, waiting for sleep-or sunrise.

It didn’t matter, of course, because she was with Adam. Good, solid Adam. They were two peas in a pod. A perfect match. She knew that. She loved that. And yet…

He was the only boy she’d ever dated. The only boy she’d ever held. Not that she was bored. She was just… curious. And if she could, for just one day, abandon herself, if she could leave good, dutiful Beth behind, if she could borrow Kaia’s mind, Kaia’s life-then she could know what it felt like to live without consequences, without guilt, to take whatever she wanted, to have it all. Just a one-day vacation from her cookie-cutter life, from always doing the right thing. That was all she asked.

Just one wild day.

And one wild night.