"First for what? A three-legged foot race? Because I'll have you know I only have one really good leg, the other is kind of unshaved and unsexy -"
"First to spill your life story. Where are you from?"
"Uh, Ohio. Or I mean, no. Florida! Yeah, that's the one. I grew up there then moved here in senior year. What about you? Oooh, let me guess - hell. You're from Hell."
"I am definitely from Hell. Hell, Kansas."
"I like uncooked ramen noodles and driving like a maniac," I continue.
"I hate everything except bacon and pickles. And I don't drive."
"One time in third grade I stuck candy up my nose to impress a boy. Spoiler: he was not impressed."
Yvette looks impressed, then looks out the window.
"I started smoking because it's the first year of college and I already know I'm going to drop out."
And it's her honesty that kills me. It's the way she says it - all frank, undramatic, modest honesty. Something I never had. Something I should've had. Something that, if I had, would have saved someone's life, maybe.
"My friend killed herself," I say. Yvette looks over at me for a second, a minute that stretches into what feels like an hour and I never want it to end, because she's seeing me instead of looking through me like everyone else in this place. Yvette opens the door and we walk in, and she gestures to her bed.
"This is my half. That's your half."
I nod, and she smiles, pink hair lit from behind by the sunlight.
"Let's get some f*cking food."
***
Fact: College is great.
I know this primarily because they serve clam chowder next to pizza and gyoza next to burritos and there is dessert every. Single. Night. If you so choose. And I hella so choose. My Hagrid bed is pretty shitty, comfort wise, but the terrifying thought of rolling off the five-foot drop at night keeps me securely in the middle and under the covers always. Yvette snores and blasts Metallica when she does her homework, but otherwise we've been getting along fine. Better than fine. She's snarkier than me, sometimes, which is worthy of at least four Nobel Prizes, and she's smart. She isn't Jack smart, or anything, but she's not Jack dumb, either. She's always hard and a little angry, but she laughs louder and gets angrier faster than anyone I've ever known, except maybe Kayla when I tell her she's pretty. But Yvette's openness is a refreshing change from last year's secrets and passive-aggressiveness. She doesn't bring up Sophia's suicide, even though I told her about it the first day to break the ice. She's not the type to pry, and I adore her for it. She smokes on the fire escape sometimes and sometimes I go up there with her and try to smoke but it usually ends up with me puking so we stop that right quick.
I'll tell her about Sophia, in my own time. Or maybe I won't. Maybe I'll just keep it inside, like I kept Nameless. But I won't let it fester, this time. I won't let it hurt me. I won't hold on to the hurt like a ball of shattered glass ever again. Some shitbaby jerk taught me better than that.
My classes are great but sort of easy, in that weird beginning-of-semester way. I mean, four teachers assigned ten page essays due next week, but forty pages is a febreeze for me. I used to write twenty pages in my radical-yet-whiny pubescent diary on the daily. The only thing that's really hard is focusing, because the classrooms are huge auditoriums sort of, which could easily be converted into gladiator rings if we moved the teacher's desk and got rid of the chairs and really, the bland walls would look so much better with swathes of blood across them and also the lights are so bright, do they shine the lightbulbs? How do you shine a lightbulb so high up? Can their janitor fly?
Next to me in our seats in the very back, Yvette informs me janitors cannot fly. Vampires, however, can.
"Vampires are gross," I determine.
"Have you even read Twilight?"
"I've read so many things that are not that."
"It was the best. The vampires were the best. The make-outs were the best."
I shudder. Yvette, in her flaming skull t-shirt and ripped jeans, sighs like a fancy princess dreaming of boys.
“Imagine having sex with a vampire.”
“Imagine going to church and praying to your lord and savior," I offer.
She laughs and goes back to facebook on her laptop. The best part about college, I've decided, is the professors don't give a shit whether you pay attention or not. Short of dropping an f-bomb super loud out of nowhere, they ignore all the internet surfing and texting that goes on. We're paying to be here, not the other way around. It'll be different when labs come around, but right now it's Shangri-La and please do not talk to me about labs because the thought of me around combustible chemicals is so exhilarating I have to fight to not pee myself constantly in anticipation. Long live science. Long live explodey things.
Mom calls every night, because that's what Moms do. That, and like, sighing. But Mom's always sighed a lot, because she's sad mostly, but also because having a borderline insane daughter like me would be trying on any mortal human's soul. Except, like, Beyonce, but we all know she isn't mortal at all and also she has Blue Ivy who I HATE because it's so unfair because Beyonce was supposed to be my mom.
"Beyonce's music is terrible," Yvette offers as we walk to dinner.
“Ah yes,” I say. “Let me just mark that down on this neat little list I keep entitled ‘The 25 Reasons Why You’ll Be Joining Me in the Eternally Agonizing Lava Pit Portion of Beelzebub’s Kingdom’.”
"You talk to yourself so much. Is it like, a birth defect?"
"It's a side effect of the radioactive waste my mother bathed in while pregnant with me, yes."
Yvette opens her mouth to say something else, then closes it and turns the color of a ketchup sandwich - white on the edges, red in the middle. I follow her gaze to a group of girls, but before I can pinpoint which fly lady has her attention, Yvette snaps out of it, clearing her throat and grabbing a bowl for soup.
"Anyway,” she says with much difficulty. “There's a music showcase down at Emel Hall. It's mostly sweaty dudes dicking around with drums and Alice in Chains covers. You should come, and educate yourself on the merits of true music."
"Wait, whoa, are we just gonna ignore the fact you -"
Yvette suddenly repurposes a vast amount of soup as floor cleaner. “That I what?” She snaps.
"Uh, nothing. Nevermind. Yeah, I'll come. Is there a cover fee, or?"
She relaxes visibly. "It's free. I'll see you at seven, then?"
I answer with a mean air-guitar rift, and she smirks and leaves. I take my pizza slice out onto the balcony, where the dying sun paints everything in pale golds and silvers. The tree shadows grow long, tangling in the shadows of passerbys and untangling again.
And that’s when I see him.
I try hard not to see him. I really do. My brain gives a sputter, and I forget how to swallow. My skin crawls, hot at first, then so terribly cold I might as well be in Alaska. I start sweating, and my eyes dart around looking for all the exits off the terrace – the stairs, the back stairs, through the cafeteria and out the door. I don’t even think about it, I just do it. I’m reacting instead of thinking as I pick up my plate and dump it in a whirling flash, two seconds is all it takes, two seconds and the terror has a complete and total hold over me as I dash inside the cafeteria and watch him approach through the window.
Curly, dark brown hair falls into his eyes. Steel-colored eyes, a blue so dark you can’t see the light through them. The color of swords and the ocean, both terrifying, both sharp, both can kill you. He killed a little part of me. His eyebrows are thick and his mouth pleasant, and if you squint he could be in a British boy-band, maybe, possibly. The freckles on his nose are still there, the freckles I’d written stupid poetry about. He’s taller than I remember – taller than most of the boys here and his biceps are huge, he’s been lifting and it’d make any girl swoon but it just makes me want to barf. All I want to do is puke, right here, all over the potted plant I’m hiding behind. But above the panic-static that’s currently turning my brain to mush, another part of me screams wordlessly.