Claire (Hart University Book 2) Read online

  What are YOU most afraid of?

  Several seconds ticked by, and I started to wonder if she might not answer.

  Being alone.

  That answer surprised me so much that I didn’t respond for a minute. Then:

  You’re not alone. There are so many people in your life who (my finger hovered over the L key before moving to the C) care about you.

  I know. It’s not rational. Fears aren’t, right? But that’s the reason I want to be single for a while. I don’t want to start seeing someone just so I won’t be alone. I don’t want to be afraid of being on my own. I want to conquer this fear.

  You’re on your own tonight.

  True. Or at least, I would be if you’d go back to your date. Good night, Will.

  Good night.

  I slid my phone into my pocket and leaned back in my chair.

  Becky came back a minute or two later, just as the waiter brought our main courses. It was an Italian place and we’d both ordered pasta.

  “Sorry about that,” she said as she took her seat.

  Maybe this was a chance for us to get a little more personal.

  “Is everything okay?” I asked.

  She shrugged. “More or less. My parents are divorced and they split game days. My dad was supposed to come tomorrow, but he wants to trade with my mom for next week instead. Sometimes they put me in the middle of their battles.”

  She didn’t seem upset, but the scenario she’d described didn’t sound fun.

  “That must be rough on you.”

  She shrugged again. “I don’t let it get to me. It’s not something I can control, right? So I don’t take sides and I tell them to work it out between them.”

  I was impressed. “Wow, that’s mature.”

  “You sound surprised.”

  “I guess I am. I mean, you’re my age, right? Nineteen?”

  She grinned. “Actually, I’m twenty,” she said, swirling her fork in her pasta. “So maybe that explains it.”

  “It can’t always have been easy though, right? The thing with your parents. How old were you when they divorced?”

  “Sixteen. But it’s not a big deal. Seriously.”

  She seemed serene about it all, and it occurred to me that she always seemed serene. Of course I didn’t know her very well. Maybe she got more animated the better you knew her.

  Not that there was anything wrong with being serene.

  We finished our main courses. We had dessert. I gave the waiter my card for the bill, and while we were waiting for him to come back Becky went to use the restroom.

  The moment she was gone, I pulled out my phone.

  I’m not feeling it.

  What?

  This date. Becky. I’m not feeling it. What do I tell her?

  Why do you have to tell her anything? Thank her at the end of the night and don’t go out with her again.

  But she’s expecting sex.

  Expecting sex? WTF? What do you mean?

  She told me her roommate won’t be home tonight “in case I want to stay over.”

  Whoa. What did you say?

  I mumbled something.

  Will.

  I know, I know. But she caught me by surprise. So what do I do? She’ll be back soon so type fast.

  Five seconds. Ten seconds. Then:

  I’ve only had the one boyfriend and he broke up with me so I don’t have a ton of experience with this. BUT Tamsin once told me a good way to end things with someone. You say, I had a great time with you tonight, but I don’t feel enough chemistry to take things further.

  I thought about it. Then I typed:

  That’s actually kind of brilliant. It makes it not about the person, right? And it’s true. I think she’s great, but I’m not feeling the chemistry. That’s exactly the situation.

  There you go then. Good luck.

  Thanks.

  I slid my phone back into my pocket just as Becky came back.

  “Ready to go?” she asked.

  I nodded.

  Ten minutes later we pulled up in front of her apartment building. I walked her upstairs to her door, and while she was fishing in her purse for her key, she said something about going running before breakfast tomorrow.

  I cleared my throat. “Becky.”

  She smiled at me. “Yes?”

  “I, uh, had a great time with you tonight. I’d love to go running with you tomorrow or anytime. But I don’t feel enough chemistry to, uh, take things further.”

  What had sounded so sensible in Claire’s text and in my head now sounded too formal. But it was out there, and all I could do was wait for her response.

  Her eyebrows went up.

  I held my breath.

  “Wow,” she said. “That was really kind of… respectful.”

  I breathed out again.

  “Seriously,” she said. “I mean, a lot of guys would sleep with me first, you know? And then just not call.” She paused. “I like this better.”

  “Well, I like you.” I was feeling so relieved it made me like her even more. “And I’m serious about the jogging thing. Do you want to go running this weekend?”

  She nodded. “I’d like that. Maybe Sunday?”

  “Yeah. Sunday.”

  She stuck out her hand. “Thanks for dinner, Will.”

  We shook hands solemnly. “Anytime, Becky. Good night.”

  “Good night.”

  I called Claire the minute I was back in my car. “It worked.”

  “It did? That’s great!”

  “I know.” I paused. “It’s not that late. Do you mind if I stop by? I won’t stay long.”

  A beat went by. “Um, sure. Of course. I guess I’ll see you in a few minutes?”

  “Yeah.”

  Chapter Eleven

  I wasn’t sure exactly why I’d invited myself over like that. But when I opened Claire’s door and saw her sitting on her bed, her biology textbook beside her and her guitar in her lap, I knew why.

  Claire was the person I always wanted to see.

  “Hey,” I said.

  “Hey.”

  “I like your pajamas.”

  I really did. They were covered in Winnie-the-Pooh characters—the classic drawings, not the Disney versions.

  She set her guitar on the floor and looked down at herself. “I’ve had these forever.” She looked back up at me. “You’re a cross between Pooh and Tigger. On the Winnie-the-Pooh personality scale.”

  “I am?” I wanted to sit on the bed with her, but I grabbed her desk chair instead. “Well, you’re pure Tigger.”

  “No way. I’m Piglet. Or at least that’s how I feel most of the time.”

  “You feel like a Very Small Animal?”

  She nodded. “I’m afraid of so many things. And I’m always hoping someone will come along and protect me.”

  Let me be the one who protects you. From everything. Forever.

  “But that’s not what you really want?” I asked slowly.

  She shook her head. “I want to learn to protect myself.” She was sitting cross-legged on the bed, and now she looked down, her right index finger tracing one of the Tiggers on her pajama bottoms. “That’s why I—”

  “Made your singlehood pledge?”

  “Yes.”

  Was that her way of warning me off? Or just a friend sharing with another friend?

  Whichever way she meant it, I had to take it to heart.

  I changed the subject. “You’re not Piglet on stage, you know. It’s Tigger all the way when you’re singing.”

  She looked up again, smiling. “Really?”

  “Definitely.”

  She shifted position, wrapping her arms around her shins and resting her chin on her knees. “So here’s the chicken and egg question. Is the Tigger side of me my true essence, or is that just a costume I put on when I perform?”

  “True essence,” I said without hesitation. “But that doesn’t mean you’re not Piglet, too. People are complicated. You said I’m Tig
ger and Pooh, right? So why can’t you be Tigger and Piglet? And Piglet’s not a coward,” I added. I dug into my memory. “Remember when Pooh writes that poem to celebrate how heroic Piglet was during the storm? And Piglet isn’t sure he deserves the poem, because Pooh said that he never blinched, and in reality he did blinch. And then Pooh says, ‘You only blinched inside, and that’s the bravest way for a Very Small Animal not to blinch that there is.’”

  Claire looked at me. “You can quote from The House at Pooh Corner?”

  “My mom read Winnie-the-Pooh to me every night for years.” I paused. “Does that cost me manhood points?”

  “Are you kidding? It makes you adorable.” She shifted again, sitting back against her headboard. “Your mom raised you right. How long was she on her own? If you don’t mind me asking,” she added quickly.

  “No, I don’t mind. Brian—my biological dad—never wanted anything to do with me. My mom raised me by herself until I was fifteen. Then Alex—my stepdad—came into the picture. He’s actually Brian’s half brother,” I added.

  Claire’s eyes widened. “Really? That sounds…” She searched for the right word. “Complicated?”

  “Not really. I mean, if Brian were still in the picture it might be. But he’s not a part of my life and never has been. But Alex…” I shook my head. “He’s the best man I know. He was in love with my mom forever, since they were in high school together. He played football in college and in the NFL before he started coaching. He moved back to Weston—that’s where I live, in Ohio—to coach my high school football team.”

  “And then he and your mom fell in love?”

  I remembered what those first few months had been like and I smiled. “Not exactly. They fought all the time. Then the fire happened.”

  “When your house burned down?”

  I nodded. “Alex offered to let us stay with him while we figured things out.”

  “And that’s when they fell in love.”

  “Yep.”

  “How did Alex propose? Were you there?”

  I grinned. “My mom proposed to him, actually. I was in the hospital when they told me they were getting married.”

  “The hospital? Why were you in the hospital?”

  “I was knocked unconscious in a game. I had a concussion.”

  “Oh, wow. Isn’t that kind of serious? I mean, is there a risk with you still playing?”

  “No. I didn’t have any after effects or anything like that.”

  “Your mom and Alex seem really nice. And really happy together.”

  I remembered that Claire had met them during our season opener. “They are. Sickeningly happy, actually. But my mom deserves to be sickeningly happy for the rest of her life.”

  “That’s how I feel about my dad.”

  “When did he meet your stepmom?”

  “I was fourteen.”

  “Your parents weren’t together?”

  “They got divorced when I was three.” She hesitated. “My mom died in a car accident when I was eleven.”

  My heart squeezed in my chest.

  “I didn’t know that. I’m so sorry.”

  She nodded. “It was rough. And my dad and I had a rough time together, after that. I didn’t live with him. I lived with my grandparents. Then, when I was fourteen, I was visiting him over the summer and, well, Jenna happened.”

  “Jenna ‘happened’?”

  Claire grinned. “Yep. That’s kind of how Jenna is. She happens. She came into our lives and… I don’t know. Woke us up? I moved back in with my dad, he and Jenna fell madly in love, and they got married.”

  “And you like her? As a stepmom, I mean?”

  “I love her. She’s my role model. Whenever I think I can’t be alone—whenever I feel like I want to rush into a relationship—I think about her.”

  Another reminder that Claire didn’t want to be with me. Not right now, anyway.

  “Why do you think about her?”

  “Because she was alone for a long time, and happy. She took care of herself, you know? She started a band when she was younger than me.”

  “The Red Mollies, right? I didn’t realize they’ve been together for so long.”

  “They weren’t. I mean, they broke up for a few years. They got back together around the time Jenna married my dad.”

  “Huh. Do you ever think about being in a band? Not just on the side, but as your career?”

  Claire hugged her knees again. “Not really. I mean, I’ve wanted to be a doctor for a long time. My dad’s a heart surgeon.”

  “Is that what you want to do?”

  She shook her head. “I want to do pediatric oncology.”

  I stared at her. “Kids with cancer? That’s a really rough gig.”

  “I know. But it’s rougher for them, right?”

  A rush of feeling started in my heart and spread to every part of me. “You’re going to be an amazing doctor.”

  She looked doubtful. “Even though I have so much Piglet in me?”

  “Because you have Piglet in you. You understand what it’s like to be a Very Small Animal. To be afraid and keep going anyway.”

  She hugged her knees tighter. “That’s a really nice thing to say, Will. Thank you.”

  There was a pause. And the longer the pause went on, the more I wanted to walk over to Claire, pull her into my arms, and kiss her until she forgot everything but me.

  And yet, that’s exactly what she didn’t want. She didn’t want to lose herself in someone else.

  She wanted to be on her own.

  We spoke at the same time.

  “I should probably—”

  “It’s getting kind of—”

  We stopped.

  “I should probably go,” I said.

  “It is getting kind of late,” Claire said.

  I got up to leave.

  “Thanks again for your help tonight.”

  “Anytime. Just consider me your personal dating guru, always willing to go above and beyond.”

  That reminded me of the run with Becky.

  “Shit, I forgot about this morning. How are you feeling? Are you sore?”

  She nodded. “The next time I need to meet a prospective date of yours, can we do it over coffee or something? I took a forty-five minute shower this afternoon and my muscles still hurt.”

  I didn’t need the image of Claire standing naked under a flow of steaming hot water. For a moment I forgot what I was doing. How to form words. How to think.

  “So… good night,” Claire said after what might have been five seconds or five minutes.

  “Good night,” I said quickly. Then I got the hell out of there before the rush of blood to my crotch could become a hard-on—a raging hard-on that Claire would definitely notice.

  I’d turned down sex with Becky to spend time with the girl I burned for… and would probably never be with.

  It was looking like a night for me and my right hand.

  Chapter Twelve

  A few weeks later, the Panthers were getting ready for a game in Ohio.

  “That’s too far for me,” I said. I was hanging out at Will’s house the Wednesday before the game, sitting at the kitchen table.

  “Come on, you have to go.” That was Tony, one of Will’s housemates, who was at the stove with an old-fashioned popcorn maker. He hated microwave popcorn and refused to allow any in the house.

  “You’re our good luck charm,” Delford added as he dug into a bag of pretzels.

  He still wasn’t my favorite guy in the world, but he didn’t wear his asshole T-shirts when I was around. Andre said I was a good influence, and I hoped to use my powers, such as they were, for the greater good. If I could encourage Del to be less douche-y the public at large would benefit.

  I shook my head. “You guys don’t need me to win. You’re strong on both sides of the ball, and your cornerbacks are the fastest—”

  “Whoa.” Will was on the other side of the table working on an English essay, but now he
closed his laptop and stared at me. “When did you start talking like an NFL analyst?”

  I looked down my nose at him. “I’ve been to all your games, I pay attention when you guys talk, and ESPN is always on over here. Plus, your mom’s been giving me pointers.”

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa. You’re talking to my mom? When did that happen?”

  “We follow each other on Twitter. We tweet back and forth during your games.”

  Will covered his face with his hands. “My mother is on Twitter? My God, that’s like a sign of the apocalypse or something.”

  “Your mom’s awesome. And that’s another reason why you guys don’t need me at this game. It’s just an hour away from your house, right? Your mom and Alex will be there. That’s all the good luck you need.”

  Will opened up his laptop again, but he glanced at me before he got back to work. “It won’t be the same as having you there.”

  Tony and Delford had started a conversation about superheroes—Flash vs. Arrow, it sounded like—while Will and I had been talking about his mom. Now, when he spoke that last sentence, his voice was lower than it had been. Private.

  Intimate.

  In the next moment he was back to work, focused on his computer screen and his essay. Maybe I’d just imagined that feeling of intimacy, that look in Will’s eyes.

  I’d been getting that look from him a lot lately. Just hints of it, brief moments… but still.

  There was no question we were friends. Really good friends. I felt like I could talk to him about anything, and I knew he trusted me, too.

  But there was one thing that we didn’t talk about. A kind of unspoken tension humming below the surface.

  Except that, because we didn’t talk about it, I couldn’t really be sure it was there at all.

  Maybe it was all in my head.

  He never made an actual move or anything like that. He never did or said anything to make me uncomfortable. He knew about my singlehood pledge, and he seemed to understand why it was important to me.

  After his dinner with Becky—even though it hadn’t turned into anything—I’d figured he was going to start dating on a regular basis. But that dinner had been three weeks ago. Since then, nothing.

  Was it possible that he was… well, waiting for me?

  Every time the idea occurred to me I squashed it. How conceited was I to even think something like that? How many nineteen-year-old guys would be willing to wait for a girl?