An Evil Mind

“My roommate’s being gross so I live here now,” I say as I push past him.

“You can’t,” he points out.

“They said that to Columbus too, and look what happened there.” I flop on his bed. I know it’s his because it’s perfectly made, covers just a little wrinkly from sleep. His roommate’s bed is a mercifully empty nest of messy blankets. Jack pulls a shirt on and yawns, sitting beside me.

“You’ve got sleep boogers,” I point at his eyes. He rubs them vigorously.

“You can stay here if you want,” He says, still rubbing one eye. It is a drastically human, vulnerable motion I’ve never seen him do before. “But I’m leaving in fifteen minutes.”

“You look like a little kid,” I laugh. “With eye problems.”

“Shut up,” He growls, and rubs harder. His cheeks are sleep-flushed and his hair sticks up every which way.

“Still got a duck’s butt for a hairstyle, huh?”

“Still got the most infantile insults for a defense mechanism, huh?”

“At least it is not an animal’s backside.”

“The sounds are similar.”

I flip him off with both hands and he retorts by leaning against the wall and closing his eyes. The dusk-rose sky looms outside the window, sunset slanting in and painting the white walls peach-striped.

“What do you want to know first?” Jack asks finally.

A thousand questions erupt, but I pick the least confrontational one. “Where are you going in fifteen minutes?”

“A friend invited my roommate to a barbeque. He’s dragging me along.”

“Who’s your roommate?”

“Charlie. An idiot, but a passionate idiot. I’ve heard that counts for something.”

“Uh, you are looking at living proof of that right here,” I point at my chest. Jack smirks and cracks his eyes open to look at me, the ice-blue of them melted to faint purple by the red sun.

“You’re not an idiot, Isis.”

“I know. Duh.”

“You’re a moron,” He corrects, and closes his eyes again, falling to lie on his side. I debate the merits of pulling his fingers off one by one and decide they are much too pretty to be removed. For now.

I hug my knees and try to remember how to breathe right, like normal people do. People who aren’t chased by ghosts. Or in this case, chased by sadistic ex-boyfriends. And just as I start to spiral down into the darkness, where the monster lives and breathes and gnaws, Jack reaches up and pulls me down, and I squeak, and we’re lying on his soft bed, him behind me, me as the little spoon. His heat and weight presses against the contours of my spine, the smell of mint and honey surrounding me like a blanket. It’s the smell I longed for in the darkest nights alone, thinking about the war, and his hands, and what it would be like to kiss him, hard and for real and maybe more because maybe, just maybe, he’s the one person in the world who might kiss my stretch marks instead of calling them ugly -

“Stop,” He mumbles into my hair.

“Stop what?”

“Stop looking so sad all the time.”

I scrunch my face up, and he nuzzles into my neck further. My heart suddenly decides it’s an astronaut and attempts to do forty backflips in what feels like zero-G.

“W-Why go here for school?” I ask. Jack exhales.

“Work.”

The zero-G cuts out, replaced with molasses and lead and spikes.

“Obviously. Of course, it’s so obvious, frat boys just don’t cut it, college girls need a suave and experienced undertaker of the vajayjay to relieve stress, because everyone in the world is obsessed with sex, apparently –”

“I’m not an escort,” He says patiently. “I work for someone else now. Doing other things.”

“Wow. That’s so specific. I feel like I’ve gleaned a lot of valuable and specific information from this conversation.”

“Remember the guys who were in that forest? The guy in a tweed suit? The ones who chased you?”

“Yeah, but –”

The door opens just then. Jack and I sit up hastily. In walks Tinyballs Mcsuitypants, he of the running-after-me-in-a-dark-Ohio-forest-because-his-boss-told-him-to. His black hair’s in spikes, skin amber. He freezes, dark eyes catching on me.

“You!” He squawks, and points.

“YOU!” I shout. “How are you still alive? I FIFA’d your balls!”

“What the hell is she doing here?” He snarls at Jack. Jack sighs.

“Isis Blake, meet Charlie Moriyama.”

“Already have,” Charlie and I say at the same time. I glare. He narrows his narrow eyes even further.

“Look, we don’t have time for this shit,” Charlie looks to Jack. “We were supposed to be there five minutes ago. Let’s not f*cking blow this, okay?”

Jack sighs and hefts off the bed, looking at me. “I’ll be back later. We’ll talk more then.”

“Sure, yeah, just work with the bad guys. See if I care.”

“Isis –”

“We’re GOING,” Charlie shouts, grabbing a towel off the end of his bed and slamming the door behind him. Jack frowns, and follows reluctantly.

And I do the same. From at least five meters and two cars away. Charlie drives a white Nissan with a broken taillight. My mind runs circles around itself as they lead me down the highway and away from school. Why has Jack shacked up with Tweed-jerk and Small Balls? Tweed talked about wanting to hire him, but I still don’t know for what. I guess he succeeded. Let’s be real though - Jack let him succeed. Everything that happens to Jack is exactly because Jack lets it happen. Except me. But that’s a different story, full of illegality and joy.

Jack said he’s working, which means, what? He’s at school, but on a job for Tweed? What job, stealing good grades for the poor-grade people? What could Tweed’s company possibly do for money, other than stand there and look dumb? It doesn’t make any sense and it makes less sense when Charlie pulls into a huge, white-stone plaza surrounded by a posh apartment building. A security booth lets cars in and out of the massive parking garage. Charlie’s Nissan disappears, and I pull up next. The security guard is a tan guy with a neat beard.

“Hey there, who are you here to see?” He asks.

“Um,” My brain scrabbles for a reason, and like all good brains, makes me blurt the first thing that comes to mind instead. “Jesus….? Christ.”

He squints, and just when I’m convinced he’ll launch a row of spikes under my car and into my tires, he smiles.

“Ah, yeah, you must be here for the North Presbyterian dinner.”

“Yeah! That’s right. Praise the lord!”

He nods. “Go on in, visitor parking is on the left.”

Either the rest of the world is exceedingly dumb today, or I’ve gotten smarter. Thanks, college. Wait, who am I kidding? College hasn’t taught me anything yet except how to have panic attacks and not pay attention to professors at all. Correction: thanks, National Geographic.

I park and walk slowly behind Jack and Charlie, who are waiting outside a fenced door that leads to the elevators. After minutes of silent agony in which I almost twist my ankle trying to hide behind a pillar when Charlie looked behind him, a red-head with a black bikini on opens the door for them. She bats her eyelashes at Jack and I pretend I did not see, the same way I pretended not to see the end of the Titanic. Then again she has titties up to her eyes and she has a wonderful smile and if Jack’s taste in women has changed then he should by all means bed her, because she looks fairly fun and also cute and who am I to get in the way of true love? Nobody. Nobody should get in the way of true love. Not even well-meaning Italian arch-nemesis families.