Supposed it was a good thing. If Levi ever found out I was with someone else, surely he’d be pissed beyond all belief. Maybe he’d be pissed enough to forget my existence entirely. A man like him wouldn’t take his girl wandering well.
But, I had to remind myself, I wasn’t his girl.
Even when we were together, we weren’t boyfriend and girlfriend. We never used labels. So…what the hell were we? Friends with benefits? Were we friends? I didn’t think so. Maybe acquaintances with benefits, if that was a thing. Not sure it was, but, eh. At this point, it didn’t really matter.
I didn’t have Levi. I had no one, nothing.
That—that was downright depressing.
After my fingers turned to prunes, I finally decided that was long enough of a shower. I quickly dried myself off and changed into my pajamas before leaving the communal bathroom and heading down the hall. Mel was already in her pajamas by the time I got back, and she gave me a small smile as she grabbed her toothbrush and toothpaste and left for her nightly routine.
This was how the semester would continue. This was how things would go.
One day at a time, that’s how I had to take it. That was easier said than done, though.
When it came to life, everything was easier said than done.
Chapter Four – Levi
I didn’t go back to her dorm on Monday. After my little tiff with Dean, I was trying to tread lightly where I could. I didn’t want to make any more big scenes. As it was, Dean would be on the lookout for me now, so I had to press the brakes and cool off. Focusing on Kelsey would not help me cool off.
Plus, I didn’t want her to think I was some stalker or something.
I wasn’t. Not really.
I planned on giving Kelsey some space, maybe for a week or two, but that first Tuesday, that first lab after the weekend she spent away, I knew something was wrong with her. It wasn’t hard to figure out. She practically spaced out, she and her partner standing near a lab station near the windows in the back for most of the class. Though I was on the other side of the classroom with my partner, I could tell she hardly spoke. Her body was stiff, yet slumped. Her full lips were drawn in a line, and she spent most of her time staring out of the window.
It was a miserable fall day, not the kind of weather you’d want to gaze longingly at.
How the hell could I give her space when she looked so downtrodden? So depressed and sad and—fuck—lonely? I didn’t want Kelsey to ever feel those things; I wanted to make her better, to help those lips curl into a sly smile again.
It was as the period went on that I lost myself in my thoughts. What if her weekend was terrible? What if something happened to her while she was gone? I’d watched her at the Sigma Chi party, and I knew she was a girl who was comfortable at parties and drinking, even if she was by herself. What if…
No, I wouldn’t let my mind go there.
Once lab was over and everyone was packing up and leaving, trying to hurry to beat the rain that was surely going to fall, I stopped doing everything, my head turned toward the back of the class, where Kelsey still sat, staring out of the window. She and I were the only ones left in the classroom, and even though there was only fifteen feet between us, it felt like so much more.
My bag hung loosely over my shoulder as I quietly got up from my seat, slowly making my way toward her, inching closer like I was afraid she’d snap and bite me, a wild, feral animal I knew better than to trust.
Fucking stupid. If anyone shouldn’t be trusted here, it was obviously me.
I stood near her, saying, “Hey.”
My voice immediately snapped Kelsey out of whatever funk she was in; she blinked, coming back to herself, and immediately grabbed her bag, doing her damnedest to ignore me. If she wanted to pretend to not hear me, she could go right ahead. I knew those ears of hers heard me, and I knew I still affected her, one way or another.
She got up and walked out, slinging her arms through the straps on her bag. She did not walk with haste, but she didn’t exactly take her time. Kelsey was doing her best to ignore me, but that…that wasn’t what I wanted.
I walked beside her in the hall, saying darkly, “You know, common courtesy says when someone is trying to talk to you, you talk back.”
Kelsey’s feet abruptly stopped, and she turned those big, brown eyes to me. Heat crept along me; it seemed she still held power over me, even though we weren’t together. Fine by me, because I wanted her back. I needed her.
“Can we just…not do this today?” Kelsey spoke, hardly sounding like herself. She sounded so downtrodden it actually pained me to listen to her speak. It pained me because I immediately wanted to know what was wrong, how I could help make it better.
Stupid, because I never made anything better. I always made things worse.
My feet stopped, and I stood staring at her, my head tilted down. Had she always been so small? She was on the shorter side, and normally she had more than enough attitude to make up for it, but this…this didn’t feel like her.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, hoping I didn’t sound too pathetically desperate.
Me. Pathetic and desperate. That was a first for me. Kelsey was forcing me to have a whole lot of firsts—another first? Me wanting her
