3
I woke up with a start and sat up in bed, breathing hard. My entire body was covered in a thin sheen of sweat, even though it was a chilly winter morning. I kicked the covers to the foot of the bed and lay back down, covering my face with my hands. I’d been having a dream about Lucas. And not just any dream. A sexy dream. An incredibly hot and sexy dream that had left my body aching and entirely frustrated. I groaned and buried my face in my pillow. Only I could manage to be embarrassed even when nobody else was watching. I was actually blushing over a dream, in my empty bedroom, with windows so frosted over no one could see in.
I was hopeless.
Staring at the delicate patterns of frost swirling over my windowpane, I debated the matter. So I was attracted to Lucas. It wasn’t a big deal. I was nineteen years old, after all. These feelings were totally natural. Like Em had said, it wasn’t like I was the only one. He was a gorgeous guy and I was just having a normal reaction, that was all. No problem.
Except it was a huge problem.
I’d been attracted to guys before, obviously: celebrities, handsome strangers, unattainable classmates I’d never actually spoken to. But my attraction had never reached this kind of intensity—how could it when I barely knew the guys? I’d only ever felt like this once before, and the memories that came flowing in when I thought about that time, that guy, were ones I wanted to forget. Because that time my feelings had led me so far astray I’d barely found my way back. In fact, I wasn’t entirely sure I had, though I’d been trying to for six years.
Brandon Tomko. The boy who’d ruined my life and the lives of so many others. The boy I hadn’t seen face-to-face in years. The boy I was trying so hard not to think about, especially now as the date came creeping steadily closer. My eyes drifted to the calendar hanging on my wall. I hadn’t circled the date but it still jumped out at me as though it was in 3D. March twentieth. Just a little less than a month away.
Now was the time for keeping a low profile, slipping under the radar, staying safe. Now was the time for survival. Now was not the time for Lucas Matthews.
I sat up and swung my feet over the edge of the bed, feeling irritated with myself. I’d spent years making sure I didn’t find myself in this exact situation, and yet here I was, and at the worst possible time. I kept to myself for a reason. I avoided making friends for a reason. And boyfriends? Not on your life. I knew what I could handle and what I couldn’t. I knew what I was good at and what I’d failed at so miserably that I should never try it again. Ever.
Tying my thick hair up into a bun, I walked into the bathroom and turned on the shower. Steam filled up the room, fogging up the mirror so I couldn’t make out my own face. I stared at my wobbly, indistinct reflection. Who was I kidding, anyway? This was Lucas Matthews I was talking about. The guy every girl on campus was mooning over and dreaming of. The basketball player. The Lothario of Queen's University. What made me think he didn’t already have a girlfriend? Of course he did. With dimples like that, how could he not?
As I climbed into the shower and began soaping up my skin—a little more roughly than usual—I realized how I’d been completely blowing this situation out of proportion. Just because I was having sexy dreams about Lucas did not mean he was having sexy dreams about me. Just looking down at my body confirmed this. I was no model, that was for sure. Emily was the stereotypical image of perfection, the prom queen type, the hot one. I was the one who ate ice cream for dinner three times a week and whose face was round like the moon. Okay, my boobs weren’t terrible, and everybody always complimented my light caramel skin tone—being mixed race had its perks—but my black hair was always frizzing and flying every which way, my thighs I didn’t even want to talk about, and then there were the glasses that made my already big brown eyes look frighteningly enormous. I wore contacts whenever I could, but they irritated my eyes.
Getting out of the shower, I stepped back into my room, towel in hand, and stood in front of the full-length mirror.
Was this the girl Lucas Matthews fantasized about?
I didn’t think so.
Then I thought about the disastrous outfit I’d been wearing the night I met him.
I didn’t have a chance in hell.
It was funny—and a little depressing—how much this cheered me up.
I resolved to put Lucas out of my mind and to concentrate on doing my work and getting through the winter. I didn’t think it would be that hard. I’d been avoiding him pretty successfully for the last week—avoiding eye contact in class, making a beeline for the door as soon as the lesson was over, and staying off campus as much as possible. It wasn’t really that different from my usual routine. Forgetting about Lucas was going to be a snap.
After wolfing down a quick breakfast of leftover pepperoni pizza and trying unsuccessfully to coax the cat out from under my dresser—he’d abandoned the couch for this better hiding place a couple of days ago—I got ready to face the frosty day. I didn’t have a class until modern American lit at eleven thirty, but I was eager to get to the studio and do some painting. A little more than eager, maybe. More like desperate. Nothing calmed me the way painting did, and I was in dire need of some calming down. I glanced up at the canvases covering my living room wall.
I favoured landscapes, darkness, and obscured faces. Every painting was a variation of the same theme, the same subject. All grouped together like this, my paintings could be overwhelming and a little disturbing—that was why I didn’t like to let anyone into my apartment—but I didn’t see them that way. These paintings were me. I poured myself onto the canvas every time. I knew the feeling that had caused every single brush stroke and I was glad to have them out of me. Better on the canvas than inside my heart.
I was pulling my door closed while rifling through my bag to find my keys when I heard my name and reluctantly turned around. My neighbor, Mariella, stood at her own front door carrying a Thomas the Train backpack, a yellow toy truck, a purse, and some kind of animal costume. She was also eating an apple and texting on her phone.
“Hey, girl!” she said in that enthusiastic way she had, as though you were the most interesting person she’d ever known. “I’m so late, you have no idea. And did you see the snow coming down? I’m never going to get him to school on time. Ethan, come on!”
From inside her apartment I heard a little voice cry out, “I found one boot but I can’t find the other one!”
“The Wizard of Oz,” Mariella said, shaking the costume at me with a gag-me expression on her face. “Since when do they have them doing plays before they know how to read? It’s like they want to punish me! Ethan, I swear to God!” She gave out an exaggerated sigh. “So how’s it going? I haven’t seen you in weeks.” She looked at me expectantly as she took another bite of her apple.
I bit my lip and tried to give her my most genuine smile. “I’ve been good,” I said. “Just busy with school, you know.” Without actually looking, I thought longingly of the stairs that would lead me outside and away from this conversation.
Mariella was one of the nicest people I’d ever met. She was only three years older than me and had a five-year-old son, whom she was raising on her own because his father was a “douchecanoe.” Ever since I’d moved in, she’d been on a mission to make me her best friend—inviting me over for dinner and movie nights, offering to quiz me for tests, complimenting my outfits. She’d even forced homemade lasagna on me during finals week last year when she knew I’d been subsisting entirely on microwave meals and Kraft Dinner. Considering how much she had going on—she worked two jobs and was caring for another human being—I should have been grateful and flattered by her attention. Instead I was always trying to avoid her. I couldn’t help but feel uneasy around her, and as I stood in the hallway trying to think of an excuse to run away, the reason for my uneasiness walked out of her apartment.
“Mummy, there’s a knot in the lace,” Ethan said, hopping on one foot so he could hold the other up to his mother.
“Katie,” Mariella said as she dumped everything in her arms onto the floor and bent down to deal with Ethan’s bootlace, “when you have kids, don’t ever get them lace-up boots. Go Velcro all the way. I don’t know what I was thinking!”
Ethan grinned up at me with his adorable two-teeth-missing smile. He was a beautiful boy, half-Jamaican—that was Mariella—half-Caucasian—that was the douchecanoe—with skin just a little darker than mine and astounding blue eyes with lashes so thick you could brush them.
Looking into those eyes only reminded me that I had no intention of ever having kids. But I didn’t say this to Mariella.
“Well, I’d better get to class,” I said as I tried to edge past Mariella’s enormous pile of stuff.
“Not so fast!” she said, pointing an accusing finger my way. “You’re not going anywhere until you explain the beautiful man I saw leaving your apartment the other night. Don’t even try to deny it.”
I gaped at her. How did she always know everything?
“I saw him coming down the stairs,” she continued, giving me a knowing look. “I want all the details. That man was far too delectable for you to leave out any details.”
“How do you know he was coming from my place?” I protested. “It could have been—”
“We’re on the top floor, ours are the only two apartments up here, and he was coming down our staircase,” Ethan piped up.
I looked from Ethan to Mariella, who shrugged.
“Who else do I have to talk to?” she said.
“Nothing happened. I barely know him,” I said as I began to back away. “I really have to go.”
“Don’t you dare think this conversation is over. I know where you live!” Mariella cried as I finally made it to the stairs and began to bound down them like a jackrabbit on speed.
Once I reached the street I let out a long breath and slowed my pace. I couldn’t be friends with Mariella, no matter how much she wanted to be, not when just looking at her son broke my heart.
There was only so much a person could stand.
As I approached the third floor art studio, the smell of oil paint greeted me like an old friend. The studio, which also served as a classroom for my daily art course, was only about a quarter full of students working intently on their projects. Still, it was pretty loud, as usual, as people fought over what music to play and commented on each other’s work. I walked inside and made straight for the back corner, speaking to no one, which was surprisingly acceptable. I loved that about the art studio. With so many artistic types crammed into one space, no one batted an eye if you concentrated on your painting silently for six hours straight; they just assumed you were lost in your artistic genius. It really should have been printed on the art school brochures: “Want to be ignored? Art school is the place for you!” This room was the only one on campus I felt completely comfortable in, even when it was filled with people. It was a lovely thing to ignore and be ignored.
I approached my easel, smiling contentedly, until my gaze fell on the guy standing at the back of the room by the windows. Suddenly, all the comforting feelings that had been percolating inside me vanished and I swore under my breath.
So much for putting Lucas out of my mind.
The sunlight streaming through the window was falling directly onto his shoulders, lighting him up like a beacon. There might as well have been a huge arrow above his head, pointing him out to me. And, of course, my easel was just beside his.
Great.
As I approached his side, I couldn’t help but take in his tousled dark hair and the worn plaid shirt he wore open over a gray t-shirt that fit him snugly across the chest. He was frowning, his honey-coloured eyes searching the canvas as though they might find some precious secret hidden there. Even frowning he was drop-dead gorgeous. I silently cursed myself for thinking this. His concentration was so complete that he didn’t notice me at all, even when I was almost directly behind him. Looking over his shoulder, I saw that his canvas was completely blank.
I understood the intimidation of the blank canvas—I think every artist does. A part of me wanted to give him some tips to get through it, but another part of me warned vehemently against it. This was exactly what I’d vowed not to do less than an hour ago. In the end, my clumsiness made the decision for me when I knocked over a jar full of brushes, sending them scattering across the floor, including right under Lucas’s easel.
“Oh, sorry!” I mumbled as I fell to my knees and began frantically collecting the brushes. I heard Lucas chuckle and then he crouched down beside me to give me a hand.
“I was just thinking about you,” Lucas said as he handed me a bunch of brushes smiling broadly. His fingers grazed mine as I took the brushes from him, causing me to yank my hand away and nearly drop them all over again.
“I hope that’s not true, considering how hard you were frowning at your canvas,” I said shakily.
We both stood up and I busied myself with shoving all the brushes back into the jar as he looked over at his canvas again.
Calm down, I told myself. He was probably just thinking about what a crazy spaz you are.
“I was just thinking how easy the assignments must be for you, with all your talent.”
I gave him a puzzled—and maybe a little resentful—look, feeling my hackles rising. I really wasn’t good with compliments.
“I’ve been in the class since the beginning of the semester, Katie,” he said gently. “You’re an amazing artist. I’ve always thought so.”
“Did you realize we were in the same class when we met last week?” I demanded, crossing my arms. I might have been overreacting, mainly because I felt bad. He’d noticed me before last week, but I hadn’t noticed him at all.
“It took me a few minutes to place you,” he said. “But I figured it out. Your paint-spattered fingers reminded me.”
I glanced down at my hands, rubbing at the red paint on my index finger. Emily was always chiding me about it. When I looked up at Lucas, his eyes were also focused on my hands. He took his time raising them back to my face, his gaze leaving a slow trail of heat up my body. I shivered involuntarily.
Now my hackles were up for real.
“What are you doing taking introductory fine art, anyway?” I said, my words taking on the tone of an interrogation. “You’re not an art student, are you?”
Surprisingly, Lucas didn’t seem the least offended. He shrugged lightly. “I convinced them to make an exception for me,” he said. “I wanted to try something new.”
I couldn’t exactly fault him for that. I cast around for some other way to chastise him, but couldn’t come up with anything, especially not while he was watching me so closely, the beginnings of a smirk at the corner of his lips.
“So what’s the problem with the assignment?” I said instead, pointing at his canvas, drawing his gaze away. We were restricted to using a limited colour palette, and, as always, we had to paint from a photo. The painting itself could be of anything.
“I just can’t decide what to paint. I’ve been going through my photos for over an hour but…I can’t settle on one,” he said, and there was disappointment in his voice. He sighed as he looked down at the photographs in his hands. For some reason this block was really bothering him.
“That happens to me sometimes,” I admitted. “Usually when there’s something on my mind, something I could paint but I don’t want to.”
The look he gave me was full of recognition before it drifted back to the canvas in front of him.
I wondered what it was he was trying to avoid.
Settling myself in front of the easel next to his, I said, “You’ll get better at getting past blocks like this as you paint more. Just keep telling yourself to pick the photo that matters to you, the one that makes you feel something.”
“You mean I should paint what I love?” he asked, and was I imagining it, or did his eyes linger on my lips as he said it?
I cleared my throat. “I mean paint from the gut,” I said. “The best artists always do.”
“Is that what you do?” he asked.
This time I avoided his eyes. “No,” I said. “I paint the past.”
Then I put in my ear buds, turned on my iPod, and tuned him out. It was easier than I’d expected. Within moments I’d slipped into what I liked to call my “artist trance,” losing myself in the act of painting and letting the rest of the world just fade away. Sometimes when I did this the painting sitting on the easel when I was done looked entirely foreign to me and I had no memory of creating it at all. Those paintings were often the most abstract, full of dark, angry strokes and spatters of paint. I never showed them in class or hung them on my wall. Truthfully, they frightened me.
A little more than an hour later I turned my music off. My painting was by no means finished, but I’d made a good start. I wasn’t working from a photograph, which I knew would get me into trouble, but I didn’t have much choice. Even if I could go back to that place and take a picture, I knew I never would. Luckily, I didn’t need a photograph to paint the scene. It was seared into my brain.
Today I’d worked on the sky, which didn’t pose much of a challenge for me. I’d become an expert at painting the fading light of day, the lingering blue, the peeking stars. I’d painted that sky a hundred times. No matter what I did, even if I painted a daytime scene, there was always that sky hanging over it, scattered with darkening clouds.
I could never escape that sky.
Looking around, I noticed Lucas wasn’t at his easel. Instead, he was leaning against the counter behind me. As I turned around, I caught him looking at my painting and a wave of panic shot through me. How long had he been watching? Had he seen me in my artist trance? I had no idea what I looked like when I was in that state—probably like I was high or a little mad. To cover my embarrassment, I jumped from my seat.
“Let’s see yours!” I said, stepping over to his easel.
“It’s not finished,” Lucas said hesitantly, and he was right; it wasn’t. The right-hand side of the painting was mostly blank. But he’d recreated the trees in his photo with surprising skill. I was impressed by the way he’d managed to make it seem as though the sun was shining through the branches. His style was more realistic than mine, but far more advanced than I’d expected. I couldn’t quite believe it.
I turned to him and he raised his eyebrows at me. He actually looked anxious to hear what I thought. I’d never seen him look anything but relaxed before.
“It’s really good,” I said with a genuine smile and he seemed to let out a breath he was holding. “I love your use of light here.” I pointed at the branches. “I can’t wait to see it when it’s finished. I had no idea…” I shook my head.
“No idea what?” he asked.
“You surprise me,” I said simply.
My certainty that the attraction I was feeling was entirely one-sided crumbled in an instant as Lucas stared into my eyes, making my stomach flip. He looked at me like he’d never seen anything like me before, like I was the only girl in the world, like I was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.
Nobody had ever looked at me that way in my entire life.
“Go out for coffee with me,” Lucas said, his eyes locked to mine.
I didn’t even take a second to think about it.
“Okay,” I said.