Love Her Madly Read online

  We were still purely friends who flirted, and I would say out of the two of us, he seemed more interested in Cyn. He was always, always talking her ear off, trying to make her laugh. He made up endless variations of these convoluted stories about her, in which she went to India to find a lost ruby, or some other nonsense. She would just sit there and listen, occasionally shaking her head at his silly jokes, smiling this mysterious smile. He never made up stories about me.

  But anyway, we were sitting opposite each other, very chastely, when I kicked off my sneakers and put my feet up on the little coffee table that divided us. He did the same, and soon enough, we were playing footsie. I shoved his feet off the table, then he shoved off mine. Soon enough, our battle escalated, and he snatched my book away. Trying not to laugh too loudly, I crawled on top of him to get it back. I was straddling him, and even though I was ostensibly trying to retrieve my book, I knew we were both transfixed by the sensation of our bodies touching. He dropped the book, and with that pretense gone, I was just sitting on his lap. So, I kissed him. And he held me there and we kept kissing. I don’t know how long it lasted.

  I hadn’t told Cyn about it, even though we hung out for a few hours after the fact, and I was worried I might spring an ulcer overnight from the guilt and the stress. At the same time, I felt like I was literally pulsing with lust and joy. He had picked me! I really didn’t know what would happen when I told Cyn, and I was too scared to ask Raj what he thought we should do. I was the happiest and most terrified I’d ever been.

  We’d made plans to meet again that evening, and I was hoping we would pick up where we left off. I had raced through dinner alone and was rushing around, trying to collect the books that I would hopefully not be opening that night. I couldn’t get ready fast enough. Then my door creaked open, and standing there was Tim, holding a bunch of daisies. He said they were for me.

  I told him thanks and poured some water into a coffee mug to use as a vase, meanwhile explaining that Cyn loved daisies (an improvised fiction), so we’d both enjoy them, and that also, I was in a hurry to get to the library.

  Could he walk me? No thanks, I’d be fine.

  At this point, as I was grabbing my keys, he cleared his throat and said, “Gloria, I would very much like to take our friendship to the next level.”

  Oh no. Had I felt anything for him, that “next level” line would have made me reconsider. It perfectly encapsulated the awkward formality with which Tim always treated me, and which I still hadn’t figured out a good way to casually deflect. I looked up to see his face darkening in response to whatever he was reading on mine.

  “Tim, that’s so sweet. But I think we work better as friends,” I responded, the second hand in my head ticking away. I thought of Raj’s smell, like pine needles and warm bread. Wonderful warm pine bread, if there were such a thing.

  “Oh,” he said. Clearly, he had not anticipated that I would say anything but yes.

  “Look, I’m sorry, I’ve got to run.” He blinked and then moved out of my way so I could close the door. As I locked it, I felt him looming behind me, quiet as death.

  I stepped down the first two steps, then quickly delivered a smile and a cheerful “see ya later” to my erstwhile suitor. The last thing I wanted was this to become a big thing between us, so I figured the more lightly I handled it, the better. This was probably not the best plan. Tim’s face just remained frozen, his huge hands twitching uselessly at his sides. Not knowing what else to do, I turned and hurried to the library.

  I found Raj waiting for me in our corner. I dropped my bag and sat on the table in front of him.

  “What took you so long?” he asked, with a soft smile. Then, he pulled me close.

  We eventually wandered back to my room. Our fingers occasionally brushed as we walked, but neither of us took the other’s hand. I took that to mean that we were not yet ready to go public. Cyn had just gotten back, and we were going to watch Hellraiser together. It was on the tip of my tongue to say something to Cyn, but with Raj having a cigarette right outside the door, I just couldn’t. Part of me was hoping that he would say something, but what was there to say, other than that we’d shared two steamy make-out sessions behind the foreign literature racks?

  Before we got the movie started, and before I saw the daisies and remembered the other piece of news that I wanted to share with Cyn, Tim was downstairs, bellowing like a wounded grizzly. He was clutching a three-quarters-empty bottle of bourbon, a bad sign, since he was terribly sensitive to liquor and rarely drank. Max had seen him stagger through the quad, six and a half feet of pure inebriation being hard to miss, and followed him, trying to get Tim’s attention. Tim ignored him. When Max attempted to slow him down via a brotherly tug on the shoulder, Tim paused long enough to shove him to the ground. The scene was very “drunken Frankenstein’s monster on campus rampage,” according to Max’s description. We got the full picture a few minutes later when he showed up at our steps.

  Raj heard Tim coming before anyone saw him.

  “Glo-ri-a, I think I’ve got your num-ber.” He was shouting that old pop song that I loathed, over and over, his huge basso echoing around the quad as he lumbered our way. That I didn’t hear him in the room can only be explained by my ace ability to block out songs that I hate. He stopped short when he saw Raj and stood there, swaying slightly, glaring with an intensity that would have melted glass.

  “You!” he roared at Raj. “What gives you the right?”

  “Tim?” Raj was mystified. “What’s the matter, dude? Are you drunk?”

  “Fuck you!” Tim hollered.

  The shout startled us. I froze like a prairie dog sensing a hawk passing overhead. Cyn went to the door and peeked out just as I registered the stupid mug of daisies by her elbow.

  “Stay inside,” Raj murmured to us, his eyes never leaving Tim. Through the crack, I glimpsed Tim, rage pulling his features into unfamiliar planes.

  “Tim, go home,” I called from the doorway. “We can all forget about this.”

  Tim laughed. He pointed at me unsteadily, as if his finger would help his eyes to focus.

  “Tim, please.” Cyn had stepped in front of me onto the landing.

  “I wanna talk to you, Glo-ria,” he demanded.

  “We’re done talking, Tim. Go home! Go to sleep! You’re acting like a jackass.” My voice sounded weak and tremulous, and I realized I was legitimately freaked out. Not just for myself, but also for Raj, who was standing there, so calm and collected, like a goddamn sentry. I felt myself flushing furiously, my whole body burning hot, and I started to really hate Tim.

  “Tim, buddy, why don’t you let me walk you back to your room,” Raj suggested.

  Tim looked at Raj and unscrewed his bottle, slowly drinking a few slugs before clumsily recapping it. The action seemed to take forever. I hoped it might calm him down.

  He looked up at Raj. “Why should you get them both?”

  Raj paled, dismayed. Students were stepping out of their rooms to watch.

  “Who the fuck are you anyway?” he roared, swinging the bottle recklessly.

  Tall Tim waited for an answer, his jaw grinding away furiously. Raj didn’t blink. I wanted to drag him into our room and lock the door before Tim weaponized his bottle, but I found myself glued to Cyn, barely breathing.

  “She was supposed to be mine,” he snarled. “Not yours! You’ve got the stripper-er,” he slurred. In the moment that followed, no one spoke, and Tim’s words seemed to echo against every wall. Max appeared from around the corner, followed by a spry cadre of other male students, clearly prepared to intervene. Tim regarded them warily and lifted his elbows in a gesture of harmlessness. He turned and half jogged away, the liquor inside his bottle splashing to and fro with each lurching step.

  Wordlessly, the three of us rushed inside to the window and saw him careening through the quad. He suddenly spun and faced us,
where we must have all been clearly visible in our brightly lit room. He saluted us with a vigorous “up yours” gesture, then added two well-articulated birds as a coda.

  “I think I’m gonna lock the door,” Raj said.

  “Yeah, let’s do that,” I murmured.

  I ducked into the bathroom, feeling Cyn’s eyes on me as the door swung shut. My hands were shaking as I sat on the edge of the tub, trying to collect my thoughts. The spectacle of Tim self-immolating on the dorm steps—and destroying our friendships in the process—was minor compared with what might follow with Cyn when I opened the door. She had to know something was up, and I had no idea how she would react.

  Feeling dizzy with fear, I rose, preparing myself for the worst. But instead of facing Cyn’s recriminations, I encountered only the back of her head, haloed in the glow of the television we’d picked up from the Salvation Army. She and Raj were sitting quietly, engaged in a game of Tetris. She was kicking his ass.

  We spent the rest of the night watching movies. Raj suggested we begin with Dawn of the Dead, a fitting selection for the “us against the world” feeling that had settled in the room once we locked the door. We pulled Cyn’s mattress to the ground and put it on the floor by my bed, then stacked pillows behind us to make a couch that could fit three. We all cuddled pretty close that night, me on one side of Raj, Cyn on the other. It felt so nice to be next to him that it didn’t matter to me that Cyn was there. We all fell asleep on the couch. When I awoke, Cyn and I were on the mattress on the floor, and Raj had made himself comfortable in my bed. I stared at him for a long time, wrapped in my sheets with an arm flung around my pillow. I wanted to keep him there, in my bed, permanently.

  We didn’t talk about the things that Tim had shouted at us, but the rest of the campus did. Even Max, who was always the first to gleefully venture into uncomfortable topics, didn’t say a word. He had spoken with Tim, who was embarrassed but unapologetic about his crazy bender. He told Max he was over our little clique, and he seemed to be. He never showed up to hang out again, and whenever we passed each other on campus, he ignored me.

  It wasn’t until Lila stopped by the room two days later that I began to understand the nature of the rumors surrounding us.

  “Everyone says that you guys are perpetrating some sort of threesome,” she said, staring at me coolly between sips of Diet Coke.

  When I laughed, she raised her eyebrows. “So it’s not true? You’re the only one sleeping with Raj?”

  “What? No, I’m not sleeping with Raj! He stays over here sometimes, but that’s because he’s an astronaut. He sleeps on the floor.”

  “Oh. Okay. But I heard that you two were making out in the library. Max heard it from Tim.”

  It all flashed into focus. Tim had seen us. He had probably followed me there and discovered us together. I felt a small pang of sympathy for Tim, the poor bastard. I had inadvertently stomped him when he was down.

  I decided against trying to deny it. I wasn’t a good enough actress, and Lila was too shrewd.

  “So it’s true.”

  “We’ve kissed a few times, yeah. But we aren’t sleeping together.”

  “What about Cyn?”

  “Cyn’s not sleeping with him either. We’re all just good friends.” Lila had this sarcastic look on her face, like I was shoveling lies down her throat. “Jesus, Lila, it’s the truth! Just because you ended up hooking up with Max doesn’t mean we’re all screwing.”

  She seemed to be coming around. Then she lobbed a grenade at me, hard. “I’ve got a friend at Hubble who says Cyn’s car is outside his place pretty often. Did you know that?”

  I felt my gag reflex engage as my whole being recoiled at the idea. “So? They’re friends. Friends hang out,” I managed.

  Lila leaned forward, practically licking her prosecutorial chops. “So it wouldn’t bother you if they were sleeping together behind your back?”

  I forced a sarcastic smile. “It might, if it were true.”

  She stood up. “Look, I’m just telling you what I heard. It sounds like you guys all need to have a little chat before shit goes crazier than Tim after a bottle of hooch.”

  “Thanks for your concern.” I wanted her gone so I could freak out in peace. As if hearing my unspoken wish, she gave a cheery little wave and left me to wallow in doubt and misery.

  I’m not particularly proud of what went down next.

  First I paced around, wondering what to do. Cyn was in class, and I was supposed to be at Spanish Lit in a few hours. If I hurried, I would have time to get to the Hubble and see Raj, and back to the main campus in time for class. I put on my sneakers, and like a stupid cliché movie heroine, ran my ass over to his room.

  The Hubble existed as a fleabag motel for drifters until Tiny U bought it, painted it yellow, and rechristened it as a single-­occupancy dorm. Raj lived on the second floor. He had a tiny balcony that faced the freeway, and beyond it, the small local airport. I arrived in the parking lot, red-faced and drenched in sweat from my run.

  I knocked on the door, and Raj opened it. His eyebrows shot up in surprise, and he swung the door wide.

  “Can I use your shower?” I blurted, cursing the lack of forethought that had brought me to his door, stinking like steaming hot roadkill.

  He grinned. “Sure. Is yours broken?”

  I slipped past him into the bathroom and closed the door. I turned the water on cool, and wondered what the hell I was going to say when I got out. I rinsed my hair with his blue, alpine soap. The clothes that I’d come in were soaked with sweat, so I rinsed them, too, and hung them up to dry. I turned the shower off and wrapped myself in his striped towel.

  In the mirror, I saw that the cold rinse had drained the crimson from my face, leaving only a flattering flush across my cheeks. I thought I looked pretty enough to do something terrifying. I opened the door.

  Raj was on the balcony, having a cigarette. He turned around, saw me standing in his towel, and came back inside, sliding the glass door shut behind him.

  “Better?” he asked, an amused grin spreading across his face.

  “Yeah,” I said awkwardly.

  I hadn’t spent much time in Raj’s room. Cyn and I had stopped by together once or twice, but I hadn’t ever been there alone. It was a typical college-guy man cave. Books everywhere. A futon propped against the wall. The single bed harbored a laptop and a pile of slightly dirty clothing.

  “Are you sleeping with Cyn?” The words fell out without ceremony.

  He blinked. “No. Who told you that?”

  I sensed he was telling the truth. I sat on his bed, my hair dripping down my back. “Ever since Tim-ageddon, we’ve been at the epicenter of rumor central. According to the rest of campus, we’re all three of us sleeping together.”

  He sat down next to me and rubbed his forehead. “Does that bother you?”

  I shrugged. A few seconds ticked by as I continued to drip, just as I had that first day we met. “I haven’t slept with anyone. Ever.”

  He put a hand on my shoulder and pulled my hair away from my neck. Then he kissed me right below my hairline. His lips felt hot against my cool, damp skin.

  “Do you want to?” he whispered, his voice husky. “Is that why you came here?”

  I wanted to say yes. I wanted to say of course, I want to be yours and I want you to be mine, forever and ever. But I didn’t say that. I just used one hand to open the towel.

  His mouth dropped open and he quickly tossed the towel to the floor and hastily cleared a spot on the bed to lay me back on. Then he just looked at me, one hand tracing my nipples and belly button, all the way up to the shallow basin at the base of my throat and back down between my thighs.

  I was struck dumb. His brown eyes traced my body with what felt like reverence. As he explored me, he glanced back at my face and smiled slightly, his dark eyes dilated with de
sire. He flipped me over and performed the same tender inspection on my back, stopping to gently kiss the more pronounced of my freckles near my shoulders. When I couldn’t stand any more, I righted myself and pulled him close for a long, deep kiss. I took his shirt off. He took off the rest. I didn’t have time to investigate his holdings right away, as he was soon on top of me.

  It hurt, but I didn’t care. It made sense that it should hurt. Seeing the discomfort on my face, he murmured an apology and quickly finished, his face pressed close into my neck, his breath hot and ragged.

  He rolled off me, his eyes closed, breathing heavily. I closed my eyes and searched myself to see how I’d changed. I felt happy, because Raj and I were undeniably closer, but that good feeling was almost instantly tempered by a huge wave of doubt.

  “Are you okay?” I opened my eyes to find him leaning on one arm, gazing at me languidly.

  “I’m great.” I couldn’t help but smile. “That was unexpected.”

  He laughed. “So, that’s not what you came here for?”

  “I came here for you,” I admitted.

  “I’m glad.” We began to kiss.

  We stayed there together on his narrow bed all afternoon. The sky became overcast with storm clouds, and Spanish Lit came and went without me there. As I watched the changing light alter the color of Raj’s naked back as he slept, I wondered what Cyn would think when I didn’t appear for class. I wondered if she would worry about me.

  At dusk, I went into the bathroom to check on my clothes. Everything but my nylon shorts were still sopping wet. I pulled on the shorts and picked up a green T-shirt of Raj’s. It had an image of a broken lightbulb on it, and I knew that Cyn would instantly recognize it. It would be a great conversation starter, I thought grimly as I pulled it over my head.

  “Is it cool if I borrow this?” I asked, emerging from the bathroom.