Suit (44 Chapters #4) Page 17

  “I just realized that I’m not gonna see you when I get home, so I wanted to call, and…I don’t know…see how your day was.”

  “Well, it was shitty,” I snapped.

  “Yeah…” Ken said. “Mine, too.”

  “Uh, listen, I gotta go. I have school in the morning,” I blurted, desperate to put our strange, forced conversation out of its misery.

  “When’s your review?”

  “Huh?”

  “For your case study.”

  “Oh. I’m meeting with my professor on Friday.”

  “Well…let me know if you need help preparing for it.”

  I wanted to scream at him. I wanted to shout, This is not how breakups work, asshole! into the phone and throw it across the room.

  But my stupid fucking hope told me not to. It whispered that maybe he was just stalling. That maybe he was calling because he’d had a change of heart. Maybe, just maybe, Ken was about to tell me that he loved me after all.

  “Night, Brooke,” Ken sighed into the phone.

  “Fuck this,” I replied and hung up on him again.

  “Okay, so Bubby is a poli-sci major. He’s in my Philosophy class, and he has great hair.” Juliet chalked the end of her cue and eyed the front door of Last Call, the pool hall across the street from Fuzzy’s.

  “I’m sorry. Did you say Bobby or Buddy?” I asked, accepting the little blue cube of chalk from her.

  “Buh-bee,” she over-pronounced, leaning over the pool table to rack the balls.

  “What the fuck is a Bubby?”

  Juliet snorted. “I asked him the same thing! He said his little sister used to call him Bubby, then the whole family started calling him Bubby, and then his friends started calling him Bubby, and now he’s sticking with it because it sounds like a good name for a politician.”

  “Only in Georgia.” I rolled my eyes.

  Juliet looked over my shoulder as she removed the plastic triangle from the cluster of balls she’d just set up. I followed her gaze and saw a guy waltz in the door, dressed like he thought we were playing golf instead of pool. His baby-blue polo shirt matched his blue-and-white plaid shorts, and his blond hair was coifed in what I assumed hairdressers referred to as a Businessman Special.

  A guy who looked like he shopped at the same store and went to the same barber glided in behind him, his dimpled chin held just as high.

  I wanted to leave immediately. Not because they were preppy or overly confident, but because they smelled rich.

  Rich people scared me.

  The Ken dolls walked over to our table with Vote for me smiles plastered on their clean-shaven faces.

  Ken Doll Number One fixed his blue eyes on me and said, “You must be BB.”

  I plastered on my best fake smile and nodded. Extending my hand, I said, “You must be Bubby.”

  He let out a hearty chuckle and wrapped an arm around my shoulders, completely ignoring my outstretched hand. “BB and Bubby, together at last!” he announced to the whole bar, squeezing me into his side.

  The competing smells of expensive cologne and aftershave and hair products all assaulted my nostrils at once. Ken didn’t use any of that shit. The only thing he ever smelled like was Irish Spring soap and fresh laundry.

  Blondie’s audacity and complete lack of boundaries made me want to stomp on the top of his foot with the heel of my combat boot. Or vomit. Or both. I felt gross, just being near him. His brunette friend didn’t seem so bad, but Bubby—I shuddered, just thinking his name—had a nasty aura of scumbag oozing out of his perfectly exfoliated pores.

  I sidestepped my way out of his embrace and quickly put the entire pool table between us. Standing next to Juliet, I mumbled, “One game, and I’m outta here.”

  Turning her back to the guys, Juliet whispered, “What’s your problem? I thought you liked preppy guys now. You dated Ken for, like, six months, and he wears a fucking tie!”

  Ken. He wasn’t preppy; he was just…Ken. He wore a tie to work because he was the manager. He wore athletic wear when he was off work because he was usually working out. He didn’t have an image, and he didn’t give a shit. He didn’t command attention when he entered a room because he didn’t want it. And he damn sure didn’t touch girls he didn’t know.

  He barely even touched the one he did know.

  “Yeah, but Ken’s not a douche bag,” I whispered back.

  Glancing over my shoulder, I saw Bubby and his sidekick clink beers and smile in our direction.

  Bleh.

  “Whatever. I can’t keep up with your taste in men. You don’t like Zach, you don’t like—”

  I swung my head back around to glare at her. “I like Zach better than this prick.”

  “Well, go talk to him, dumbass.” Juliet pointed toward the front door with the neck of her beer. “He’s working right now.”

  “But he never called me.”

  “Pssh. It’s been two days. What’s the rule in Swingers? Like, six days. Guys wait, like, six days now.”

  “You mind if I break, ladies?”

  Juliet and I both glared at the future politician as he leaned over and lined up his shot.

  Ken would have let me go first.

  I played one game, repeatedly dodging Bubby’s attempts to rub up against me with his seersucker-covered ass as he lined up his shots, and then made my exit. I was going to give some polite excuse about not feeling well, but Juliet took it upon herself to announce that I’d just started my period, and it was a “real gusher.”

  I glared at her evil, laughing face but forgave her immediately when Bubby and Bubby Jr. both took a giant step backward and let me go without so much as a hug goodbye.

  As I headed toward the door, I thought, Ken would have at least walked me to my car. It’s after eleven.

  Once I was outside, I pulled my pack of cigarettes out of my purse and lit one, stalling while I tried to decide whether or not to say hi to a certain flirty bartender across the street. Exhaling slowly, I made up my mind.

  Fuck it. Right? Why not? He’s cute. I’m single—

  I’d just taken my first step off the curb when I heard my phone begin to ring. Jogging across the two-lane road, I stopped right outside the door of Fuzzy’s and pulled the damn thing out of my bag. I glanced at the phone, then the heavy wooden door, and then back at the phone.

  Goddamn it.

  With an audible sigh, I slumped against the weathered brick wall outside and answered. “Hi, Ken,” I deadpanned.

  “Hey, Brooke.”

  Silence.

  “How was your day?” he asked. His voice soft and sincere.

  “Fine. I guess.” My tone was clipped but a little less venomous than the night before. “How was yours?”

  God, this is so stupid.

  “Uh…I don’t know.”

  “Let me guess…was it weird?”

  “Yeah.” If I didn’t know better, I’d think he sounded sad. But I did know better. I knew firsthand that feelings like sadness, anger, happiness, and especially love were completely beyond Ken’s robotic parameters.

  “Tell me, Ken”—I flicked my ash onto the sidewalk—“why was your day so weird?”

  “Where are you? It sounds like you’re outside.”

  Of course. Change the subject as soon as I ask about your feelings. Typical.

  “In Athens.”

  “Athens? Jesus. Why are you all the way out there?”

  “I had a date.”

  More silence.

  “Ken?”

  “Yeah.”

  I could hear the sound of his garage door opening and closing in the background. Ken was at home.

  And I wasn’t there, waiting for him.

  “Who was your date with?”

  His keys hit the kitchen counter with a metallic jingle. I pictured him walking around in his big, dark house all alone, and I smiled.

  “Just this guy Juliet goes to school with. And this other guy who works down here. I’m meeting him now. Gotta maximize
my time when I drive this far, you know?”

  Silence.

  “Ken?”

  He coughed. “Yeah.”

  “You gonna talk to me, or should I go inside?”

  “For your second date?”

  “Yeah. I don’t wanna keep him waiting.”

  I was being cruel, but I didn’t care. I was going to yank a feeling out of that motherfucker if it was the last thing I did.

  “Are you gonna be okay to drive later? Do you need me to come get you?”

  Oh my God! Are you fucking serious? Why aren’t you jealous, asshole? I hate you!

  “No. I’ll be fine!”

  “Brooke, just let me come get you. I don’t want you to end up like Jason.”

  “We’re not talking about Jason right now! We’re talking about the fact that you don’t even care that I have a date! Two dates! I have two dates tonight, and you don’t give a shit!” I blurted.

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “Just like you didn’t say that you love me or that you miss me or that I’m fucking pretty or anything! Ever! That’s why we broke up in the first place, Ken! Because you never…say…anything!”

  I was officially yelling into my phone with large hand gestures on the sidewalk in the middle of the night. That’s what Kenneth Easton did to me. He frustrated me to the point of lunacy.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “What? What was that?” I snapped.

  “I’m sorry.” His voice was a faraway murmur. “I’m sorry I’m such a shitty boyfriend. I don’t…I can’t…” he rambled, grasping for words and feelings that were beyond his reach. “I mean, I wish I could—”

  “Ugh! You know what? Why don’t you figure out whatever the fuck it is you want to say to me, write that shit down, and then tomorrow night, when you call me again, for no fucking reason, maybe you’ll have something to talk about?”

  I mashed the End button on my phone, shoved it into my bag, and marched my needy ass right into Fuzzy’s Bar & Grill.

  Doodle-oodle-oodle-oo!

  “Uggggggh.” I whacked my alarm clock with the back of my hand, trying to silence the cheerful digital noises assaulting my brain.

  Doodle-oodle-oodle-oo!

  “Fuck you,” I mumbled, swatting at the other assorted bullshit on my nightstand until I finally found my cell phone.

  Doodle-oodle-oodle—

  “Hello?” My voice sounded like I’d been up all night, smoking cigarettes and drinking whiskey, which was one hundred percent accurate.

  “Scooter? Are you okay?”

  “Um…” I tried to figure out how to answer his question. Was I okay? I had a wicked hangover and wasn’t too thrilled about being woken up by the sound of my overly perky ringtone, but as far as I could tell, I wasn’t bleeding out or anything. “Yeah. I think so. Why?”

  “You were in a car accident!”

  Okay, that got my attention.

  I sat up and reached for my cigarettes on the nightstand. “No, I wasn’t.”

  “Yes, you were! I just left for work, and the side of your car is all dented in.”

  “What?” I jumped up—unlit Camel Light between my teeth, Pixies T-shirt I’d worn the night before twisted around my emaciated body, one sock on and one half off—and darted over to the window.

  Getting up that fast gave me the spins. I grasped the window frame to steady myself and yanked open the blinds. There, in the driveway below, was my beloved black Mustang hatchback.

  With a dent the size of a trash can lid smashed into the driver’s side door.

  Holy shit!

  My dad repeated himself, “You got in a wreck last night. Are you okay?”

  “No, I didn’t,” I insisted, horror-stricken and racking my foggy brain for details from the night before.

  Did I? I can’t fucking remember! Shit! Think, BB! I don’t feel like I got in a wreck. I was with Juliet. Then, I was with Zach. And now, I’m here. Not exactly sure how I got here, but—

  “Scooter!”

  “Huh? Dad, I didn’t get in a wreck. I swear! I…I parked on the street outside of Juliet’s work last night, so maybe somebody hit my car while I was inside? That has to be it. It was dark when I left, so I must not have noticed.”

  You mean, you were too drunk to notice.

  “Well, thank God you’re okay. I’m already running late for work. The last thing I need is something else to worry about.”

  Work! I spun around and looked at the clock. Nine thirty-five? Fuck! I was supposed to be there five minutes ago!

  “Gotta-go-love-you-bye!” I sputtered, tossing my phone into my purse and throwing all the clothes I’d peeled off myself a few hours before back on.

  I didn’t pee. I didn’t brush my teeth. I didn’t look in a fucking mirror. I bolted out the door, untied bootlaces flapping behind me in the breeze, and dived behind the wheel of my newly busted-up car.

  As I pulled onto the highway, I went to light the cigarette between my teeth, hoping it would quell my impending panic attack, and realized that I still had my retainer in my mouth. It wasn’t lost on me that my priorities were officially fucked. I’d come home so drunk that I hadn’t noticed a giant dent in my car door, yet I’d made sure to remove my makeup, moisturize, and wear my retainer to bed to keep from getting acne or crooked teeth.

  I was a horrible, horrible human being.

  That’s not true. A horrible, horrible human being would have gone ahead and fucked Zach last night even though she still had feelings for Ken.

  Whatever. I do not.

  Then why did you turn your head away when he tried to kiss you?

  I could still feel Zach’s lips where they’d collided with my cheek. The spot flushed pink with residual embarrassment.

  I just…I don’t know. Shut up!

  Is it because you’re in love with someone else? Hmm…

  No. It’s because Zach hasn’t called me. No call, no kiss.

  I swapped my retainer for a piece of spearmint gum, then lit my cigarette.

  You wouldn’t turn your head if Ken tried to kiss you.

  Well, Ken never tries to kiss me, so…I guess we’ll never know.

  That shut my inner bitch up. Because it was true. Ken never kissed me. I’d kissed him. I’d chased him. I had given him my number, and I’d made him date me. I’d moved my shit into his house, and I’d weaseled my way into his life, and the whole time, he’d just…let me.

  And my dumb ass called that love.

  Glancing down the long, wide aisle that bisected the first floor of Macy’s, I hoped against hope that I’d see Ken walking toward me with his perfect posture and his perma-smirk. He used to surprise me sometimes and show up on my lunch break. He’d always appear at twelve o’clock sharp. I didn’t have to look at a clock to know that noon had come and gone. My growling, gnawing, empty stomach let me and anyone within earshot know loud and clear.

  With a heavy sigh, I trudged to the cash stand. Grabbing my purse, I clocked out and headed toward the parking lot. Maybe I’d buy a toothbrush while I was on break. And some Advil. And a bottle of Jameson to wash it down.

  “Hey, BB!” Freddy from Men’s Fragrance chirped, leaning against a display case in all his metrosexual Latin glory. “You going to lunch? You mind if I—”

  “Sure, Freddy,” I sighed. “Come on.”

  “Are you ready for your case study review tomorrow?”

  “I guess so.”

  I shoved all of Ken’s test scores and social/emotional questionnaires into my notebook and closed the cover. I’d been staring at them, all spread out on my bed, for way too long anyway.

  “Does that mean you’ve figured out what’s wrong with me?” Ken laughed flatly. He was trying to sound sarcastic, but I could hear an echo of worry behind his words.

  “No,” I admitted. “As far as I can tell, you’re just a really smart asshole.”

  Ken didn’t respond.

  “Who was raised in a house without couches.”

  Ken ch
uckled.

  “And never had anyone try to cuddle with him or tell him they loved him until he was in his mid-twenties.”

  Silence. As usual.

  “But I could be wrong,” I continued, swallowing the lump in my throat for the sake of civility.

  Ken was trying to be friends. Maybe I could try, too.

  “My professor’s gonna go over your scores and give me his official diagnosis when we’re done.”

  “So, I’m not even a little bit autistic?”

  “Nope, just an asshole,” I teased.

  Ken didn’t laugh. “Hey, I’m off tomorrow, so if you guys have any questions during your meeting, you can just call me.”

  “Why are you off? You always work on Fridays.”

  “I’m gonna help somebody move.”

  “God, you’re so nice. I’d be trying to work as an excuse not to help somebody move.”

  “So…”

  I could tell just from his tone what was coming next.

  “I swear to God, if you ask me how my day was, I’m gonna fucking scream.”

  I heard Ken’s soft laughter on the other end of the line, followed by the sound of his keys hitting the kitchen counter.

  “It’s not funny! This is the fourth day in a row you’ve called just to ask how my day was. What the fuck are we even doing, Ken?”

  “We’re talking.”

  “So…you’re just gonna call me every day for the rest of your life to ask me how my day was?”

  “It’s looking that way.”

  An unexpected laugh burst out of me. “Ugh!” I groaned, mad at myself for letting him wear me down. “I hate you!”

  I heard rustling sounds that I knew were from him changing out of his work clothes, and a pang of longing sliced through my heart. I could almost feel the heat radiating off his hard body. Notes of soap hung in the air just beyond my grasp. I knew, in a few minutes, he would climb into bed and curl up around his pillow, and I wanted nothing more than to climb in and curl up around him.

  “Ken?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I didn’t mean that. I don’t hate you.”

  “I don’t hate you either.”