“Oh,” he says. “He hasn’t mentioned it. I can check with him if you want.”
I swallow. “Sure. That would be great.” I don’t have Crosbie’s number, and I’ve never given him mine. I don’t know his class schedule, either, so short of skulking around outside the frat house, I have no way to run into him. I know I’m being contrary. It was my plan to forget him, but now that he’s the one who seems to have forgotten me, I can’t seem to think about much else besides getting him to notice me again.
“Want to watch this with me?” Kellan asks, nodding at the TV. “It just started. I can rewind it if you want.”
“No.” I shake my head. “Thanks, but I have to—”
“Study,” he finishes for me, giving me a big thumbs up. “Got it.”
I take my plate to the kitchen. I’m glad I ate most of the spaghetti before our conversation, because my appetite seems to have fled. I rinse the plate and stick it in the dishwasher, then head into my room to grab my jacket and bag.
“See you later,” I call, heading outside.
“Have fun at the library.”
I don’t respond, shivering as the foggy night air greets me. It’s dark and quiet, the air so dense it’s impossible to see more than ten feet in front. I climb on my bike and pedal in the direction of the library, though for once that’s not my destination. Despite my determination to be smarter this year, it has taken me way too long to figure out how to learn what Crosbie Lucas has been up to: I will quite literally read the writing on the wall.
It’s an antiquated and distasteful tradition and the school puts up a token protest and paints them every couple of years, but the fourth floor bathrooms in the Student Union building are notorious for listing frat house hookups. The more popular the guy, the longer the list. The lists appear in both the men and women’s bathrooms, and for some it’s about the bragging rights, while for others it’s just plain embarrassing. Last year I’d come up here daily in the week after my hookup with Kellan to see if my name appeared on his very lengthy list, but it never had. At the time I’d been a confusing mix of relieved and disappointed; now I’m just relieved.
At six o’clock on a Wednesday, the building is relatively quiet. I pass a few people as I approach the elevator, but ride up to the fourth floor alone. There’s a girl coming out of the bathroom as I enter, and then it’s just me. I take a breath and study the long row of stalls. If I recall correctly, the third one is dedicated to the Alpha Sigma Phi guys. I’d seen Crosbie’s name on there last year when I checked Kellan’s list, but I hadn’t paid it any attention. Now it’s the only one I’m interested in.
The stalls are the standard cramped metal affairs with chipped gray paint. The lists are written mostly in black marker, with the guy’s name at the top and his conquests scrawled beneath. A lot of them are dated, too, like a time stamp. It’s a mix of handwriting, some neat, some sloppy, updated by random people with random intel. Out of curiosity, I check out Kellan’s list. There’s a whopping sixty-two names listed on it, dating back to last September when he first started at Burnham. I can’t help it: my jaw drops. I know he’s…prolific, but that’s more than I expected. I had sex with five guys last year and I thought that was a lot.
I frown as I scan his list. It’s numbered, and there are a couple of gaps on it: numbers four, nine, twenty-two, forty-one, forty-two, and fifty are blank. I don’t know where I fall in, but I take sick satisfaction in learning I’m not the only girl he forgot.
I tuck my hair behind my ears and study the rest of the stall. There are about twelve guys’ purported hookups documented in here, and the lists range in length from six to sixty-two, which I guess makes Kellan the “winner.”
I spot Crosbie on the opposite side of the stall. His list has twenty-five names on it, and I feel each one like a jealous little kick to the heart. I know it’s stupid, but I read the names in case I recognize them, so I can see what kind of girls Crosbie Lucas likes. What kind he suddenly starts avoiding. But I don’t recognize any of the “Crosbabes,” and when I get to the bottom of the list, I frown. The final entry is dated June second of this year. He wasn’t on campus all summer, but if he’s the Crosbie Lucas I thought I knew—the one with twenty-five Crosbabes notched into his bedpost—surely he’s messed around with someone since the new school year started. What about the girl in the library? Just to be sure, I check the other lists, and most have entries for September and October. Kellan alone has ten since Labor Day.