Текст книги "Thief"

Автор книги: Tarryn Fisher

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Nice

What did you think of Jess?

O: Same stupid slut

I crack up. The other patrons of the café turn to see what I’m laughing at.

I gather up my things to leave. She always did get right to the point. I am almost to my car when my phone pings again.

O: Don’t fall in love with her

I stare at that message for a long time. One minute – three. What does she want from me? I don’t respond. I feel like she’s punched me.

And that’s it. I don’t hear from her for another year.

The first time I saw her – my God – it was like I’d never seen another woman in all my life. It was the way she walked that caught my eye. She moved like water: fluid, determined. Everything else blended together in a blur and all I saw was her. The only solid in all that color. I smiled when she stopped under this grotesque, twisted-looking tree and gave it the single dirtiest look I had ever seen. I’d never even noticed the tree before, though it was one of those things that when you see it, you wonder how you’d ever missed it. One of my friends punched me on the arm to get my attention. We’d been talking about basketball. The coach put half the team on suspension for smoking pot, and now we had to get through the last few games with our best players benched for the rest of the season. But the conversation had ended for me the minute I saw her. They followed my eyes, gave each other knowing looks. I had somewhat of a reputation in regards to women. They were still calling out remarks when I stepped under the tree. Her back was to me. She had the type of hair you wanted to wrap your hands in – dark and wild, all the way to her tiny waist. My first words to her should have been: Will you marry me? Instead, I went with: “Why are you angry with this tree?”

She spun on me so fast I drew back. She set me on my axis, wobbling and unsure. These were all feelings I was not well acquainted with. The rest of our exchange pockmarked my ego.

“Just a question, Sunshine, don’t attack.” Holy shit, she was hostile.

“Can I help you with something?” she snapped.

“I was interested in finding out why this tree made you frown.” It was lame, but what the hell else was I supposed to say? She’d either had a really bad day, or she was always like this, and either way I was compelled to stand in the shade and talk to her.

Suddenly, she looked tired. “Are you trying to flirt with me?”

Damn. This had turned into one of the strangest female encounters I’d ever had. So, I told her my name.

“I’m sorry, what?”

“My name…” I offered her my hand. I just wanted to touch her. She was ice cold. It was like her personality seeped out of her skin. She pulled her little hand away too quickly.

“Yes, I was trying to flirt with you, until you shot me down, that is.” I don’t think in all the days I’d been alive and breathing, I’d ever shaken hands with a girl I wanted. It was awkward. For her too. Her brow creased, and she looked around the parking lot like she wanted someone to come save her.

“Listen, I’d love to stand around and feed into your ego with chit-chattery, but I have to go.”

Chit-chattery. She just made up a word and used it in a sentence to insult me. God. Who the hell was this woman? And if I could get her to stop being hostile, what would she taste like? She had already started walking away. I had to do something or say something that would at least make her remember me. So, I decided to insult her back.

“If you were born an animal – you’d be a llama,” I called after her. It was true. I happened to really like llamas. They were reserved and they always gave you the stink eye. When you pissed them off, they spat at you. I’d seen it happen to my brother at a petting zoo once. That’s when they became my favorite animal. But, she didn’t know that. She just knew I was comparing her to an animal. And it pissed her off.

“I’ll see you around,” I said, before turning away. And I would. I was going to chase this chilly, abrasive woman. I’d chase her all the way to her fucking ice palace and melt it down if I had to. I was used to women wanting me; she wanted nothing to do with me – wouldn’t even tell me her name. As I watched her walk away I knew two things: I wanted her, and it was going to be a lot of work.

No one knew who she was. I was completely baffled by it. The girl was so high above anything I’d ever seen, I thought every guy on campus would respond to my description – wicked dark hair, seething eyes, a waist small enough to wrap your hands around. I had to use my connections in the admissions office with a girl I’d dated in high school who still had a thing for me.

“Caleb, I’m not allowed to do this,” she said, leaning over the counter. I ignored her attempt at getting me to look at her cleavage.

“Just this once, Rey.” That’s all it took.

“Okay, building?”

I’d seen her walking into Conner’s.

“There are over five hundred girls in Conner’s. You’re going to have to be more specific.”

“Sophomore,” I said, guessing.

She typed something into her keyboard. “Great, now we have two hundred.”

I racked my brain for something else. Blue jeans, white shirt, black fingernail polish. I could take a guess at her major.

“Try pre-law or philosophy,” I said. She had one of those combative personalities that lawyers specialized in. But, she was staring up at a tree, deep in thought…

Rey looked around and then quickly spun the monitor toward me. I glanced through the column of photographs. There were about thirty to a page. She scrolled and my eyes searched.

“Hurry up, Casanova. I could get in trouble for this, you know.”

“She’s not there,” I said after a few seconds. I tried to look nonchalant. “Oh well, guess I’m out of luck this time. Thanks anyway.”

Rey opened her mouth to say something, but I gave her a quick wave and jogged out. Her picture had been there, third from the top. I hadn’t wanted to put her on Rey’s radar – she had the bad habit of spreading rumors about the girls I liked.

Olivia Kaspen. Aivilo What a perfect little name, for a perfect little snob. I smiled all the way back to the dorms.

I looked for her everywhere. She didn’t go to the gym. She was never in the cafeteria or at any of our home games. I went back to the spot I first saw her and hung out outside of her dorm. Nothing. She was either a first class hermit or I’d imagined the whole thing. Olivia Kaspen. A cross between Snow White and The Evil Queen. I had to find her.

I wasn’t smiling a week later. I’d spotted her in the stands at one of our last games of the season. We’d made it to the playoffs and were leading the game by ten points. The minute I saw her, I was distracted. I kept glancing up into the stands where she was sitting, clutching a Styrofoam cup between her hands. One thing was clear – she wasn’t looking at me. I don’t know what possessed me to believe that I could impress her with my game play, but I tried. The visiting team went on a ten-nothing run. The game was tied. I stood at the free throw line, and to this day I don’t know what possessed me to pull the little stunt that cost us the game. I jogged over to my coach. Normally a stunt like that would have gotten me kicked off the team, but I happened to be the BMOC and it helped that he was a family friend.

“I can’t focus. I have to take care of something,” I told him.

“Caleb, you have to be fucking with me right now.”

“Coach,” I said quietly. “Give me two minutes.”

He narrowed his eyes and stared at me over his glasses. “Is this about that girl?”

My blood ran cold. My coach was an insightful guy, but-

“The one who’s missing?” he finished.

I stared at him blankly. Laura? We’d dated, but not seriously. I wondered if my parents had said something to him. My mother was friends with her mother. She had been enthusiastic when we’d started dating, but Laura was all looks and no personality. We had fizzled out almost immediately. Before I could correct him, he said, “Go. Hurry up.”

He called a time out and put the team in a huddle.

I took the stairs two at a time. The closer I got, the paler she got, and she was already pretty pale. When I crouched down next to her, her eyes were wide and she looked ready to bolt.

“Olivia,” I said. “Olivia Kaspen.”

She looked momentarily shocked. She composed herself quickly. Her eyes danced around my face before she leaned toward me and said, “Bravo, you found out my name.” Then in a lower voice, “What the hell are you doing?”

“You’re quite the mystery on campus,” I said, tracing the outline of her lips with my eyes. I’d never seen such sensual lips in all my life. How had it taken me this long to find those lips?

“Are you going to be making a point any time soon, or are you holding up the game to brag about your detective skills?”

Oh my god. How could I not laugh at that? I wanted to tell her right then and there that she was going to marry me, but I was pretty sure she’d slap me if I did. I decided to turn on the charm. It would have worked with any other girl. But, damn if she shot me down.

“If I make this shot, will you go out with me?”

She all but rolled her eyes. The look on her pretty little face was of absolute disgust. Then she stole my line and called me a peacock.

“It took you all week to think up that one, didn’t it?” I said, smirking. I was fairly certain at that point she was playing hard to get.

“Sure,” she said, shrugging.

“So then, it’s fair to say that you were thinking about me all week?”

When I was a kid I watched a helluva lot of Looney Tunes. Smoke was always coming out of the character’s noses when they were angry. Usually, it lifted them right off the ground. The expression on Olivia’s face was that of smoke coming out of her nose.

“No … and … no, I will not go out with you.” She wasn’t looking at me anymore. I wanted to grab her chin and steer her face back to mine.

“Why not?” My first inclination was to say: Why the hell not?

“Because I am a llama and you are a bird and WE are not compatible.”

“Okay,” I breathed. “Then what will it take?” I was completely out of my element. Begging a girl to go on a date with me. This was fucked up.

“Miss it.”

I stared into her cold, blue eyes and knew I’d just met the kind of girl books are written about. There was no one like her.

“Miss it,” she said again, “and I’ll go out with you.”

I didn’t say another word. I was in shock. I jogged back to the court, my mind so stuffed with opposing thoughts I figured I’d die of a brain explosion before I got to make the shot. I wasn’t going to do it. It was crazy. She was crazy. Fuck. That. Shit.

But, when I stood at the free throw line, ball in hand, I had a couple seconds of deep thought. I was angry. I should have done what came naturally, which was to win the game, but I kept seeing her face. The way she looked down her nose at me and said, “Miss it.” There had been something in her eyes that I couldn’t shake. She asked me to do the impossible. She set the bar high and she expected me to fail.

I raised the ball, my palms curved around it like it was an extension of my body. How many hours did I spend playing basketball each week? Twenty … thirty? It was nothing for me to make this basket – I could do it with my eyes closed. But, something about the look on her face tied an invisible string around my wrist, making me clutch the ball harder than I normally would. I could see the sad victory on her face, like she had resigned herself to all men being disappointments. She was wrong if she thought that she could predict what I was going to do. If I wanted her…

I wanted her.

I missed the shot.

I was in way over my head.

I missed a shot. People looked at me like I’d gunned down a gym full of people instead of shooting an air ball. My mother was always teasing me, telling me that I didn’t take anything seriously. It was a joke in my family – my lack of dedication to anything. I was good at most everything I did, but I didn’t love any of it. Not basketball or finance, or boating, or the money that came so easily to my family. It all made me feel empty. My friends – the ones I’d grown up with – spent their time and money getting box seats or floor seats at baseball games and football games and basketball games. I’d go to the goddamn games and enjoy them, but at the end of the day, there wasn’t a damn thing that filled me. I started reading books about philosophy. I even took a couple classes my sophomore year. I liked it. Philosophy gave me something to believe in. But, Olivia Kaspen stepped into my life, and for the first time, I was dedicated to something. Her philosophy. Her emotional makeup. I was taking her seriously. All five feet, two inches of her. She was mouthy and condescending and she never smiled, but I liked her. I wanted to give her something. So I missed the shot.

“Is it true?”

I looked up from my plate of pancakes. Desiree, one of the cheerleaders, slid into the seat opposite me. She was wearing her makeup from the night before and my buddy, Kiel’s jersey. Why did girls want to wear a guy’s jersey? Eerised

“Is what true?”

“You missed the shot for a girl?”

“Where did you hear that?” I pushed my plate away and took a sip of tea.

“Everyone is talking about it.” She smirked at me and ripped off a piece of my pancake, sliding it between her teeth.

I looked at her through narrowed eyes. I was having a hard time pulling off this charming act when my palms were sweating. “Who are they saying I did it for?” If people found out it was Olivia I’d missed the shot for, things would get very uncomfortable for her.

Desiree sucked the syrup from her fingers. “Oh, there are rumors. Who knows if they’re true? You know how people can be.”

I shrugged, trying to be nonchalant, but my shoulders were tense.

“Humor me, Des.”

She pursed her lips and leaned forward. “A pre-law major. No one really knows who she is. Some people say they saw you talking to her before you missed the shot.”

“Maybe my game was just off,” I said, setting my mug down and standing up.

Desiree smiled up at me. “Maybe. But, your game has never been off before. If you ask me, it’s kind of romantic.”

“Romantic?” I repeated.

“Yeah. She must be pretty hot.”

I leaned down until both of my hands were flat on the table, and Desiree and I were on eye level.

“Does that really sound like something I would do, Des?”

She looked at me for a long minute before shaking her head.

“No, actually.”

“Well, there you have your answer.”

I left, wiping my palms on my pant legs. How many people had seen me speaking to Olivia? It was stupid … careless, but then I could have never anticipated her challenge. If things had gone my way, she would have agreed to a date for making the shot. Everyone would have walked away a winner, aka I would have walked away the winner.

I couldn’t help but smile as I jogged down the stairs in front of the dining hall. Forget it. Girls rarely surprised me. I would have missed that shot five hundred times for a date with her.

I’d never felt anything like her.

Olivia burned. When she walked into a room you could feel her fire. It rolled off of her in waves. She was angry and passionate and fearless. She burned hot enough to keep everyone away. It was a good trick, except I played with fire.

Bang, bang, she shot me down.

“I just don’t think we’re compatible.”

She was afraid of me. I knew it the moment we locked eyes that first day, under the tree. She might not have known her type, but I knew it.

I almost laughed. She delivered those words in her clipped, matter of fact voice, her eyes dancing everywhere but my face. We’d been on our first date the week before. I’d practically conned her into it, sending the very basketball that I’d used to procure the date, to her dorm room with a note to meet me in the library. The library had gone well. She wore this long sleeve, black lace shirt that was so tight, I could see every curve, not to mention her ivory skin peeking through all of the eyelets in the lace. I wanted to kiss her, right there, in the stacks. I would have pushed her up against the Dickens’ section if I hadn’t thought it would scare her away. Reluctantly, she agreed to the date. I took her to Jaxson’s, my favorite ice cream place. At the start of the evening, she’d been standoffish, but then she opened up and told me things about her past. I thought things had gone great. Until…

I just don’t think we’re compatible.

“That’s not how it feels to me,” I said. Our chemistry was palatable. She was either in denial or lying her ass off. I’d bet anything it was the latter.

She blinked at me – fast little blinks, like bird wings.

“Um, well I’m sorry. I guess we are just on two different wavelengths.” She dragged out wavelengths, as if she wasn’t sure that was the right word to use. We were actually on the same wavelength – I wanted her and she wanted me, but I wasn’t going to be the one to point that out. Olivia didn’t know she wanted me yet.

“No, that’s not what I meant. I know you like me, just as much as I like you. But, it’s your choice, and I am a gentleman. You want me to back off? Okay. Goodbye, Olivia.”

Before I could grab her, before I could shake sense into her, I walked away.

Don’t walk away! Fight her on this!

That’s what I was thinking. But, the last thing I wanted to do was chase after someone who didn’t want me … or didn’t know they wanted me.

I went back to my dorm room and drank warm beer. Rejected for the first time, it wasn’t pretty. It was pretty fucked up, actually. Or at least that’s what I thought then. I’d done everything she’d asked me to do. My teammates were barely talking to me, my coach had put me on suspension, and my heart was hurting. Hurting. How could I be feeling this way over someone I’d just met?

I took a sip of my beer, pulled out my Statistics textbook and stared at the page for thirty minutes without ever seeing anything. No, that’s not true. I was seeing Olivia Kaspen.

I saw her everywhere. I pretended not to. I pretended that she was just another girl, not the girl I wanted. My friends thought I’d lost it. I wanted her because I couldn’t have her – that was the consensus. Maybe it was true. They had taken to slapping me on the back and pointing out random girls on campus who would sleep with me. Sex therapy, they called it. I tried it once or twice, but it was ineffective. I was benched, rejected and drunk on a girl I’d only kissed once. When someone mentioned that she was probably a lesbian, I pounced on the idea. Then, just months after she told me that we weren’t compatible, she started seeing the biggest load of douchebags I had ever laid eyes on. I fucking hated them. So, I moved on. She wasn’t what I thought she was.

Then I met Jessica. The first thing she ever said to me was, “Damn, I don’t know if I want to lick you or marry you.”

I’d said, “How about both?” And that was it. We were together. Jessica Alexander was sexy and kind and ditzy – my type exactly. She was smart too, but you’d never know it from the way she babbled on and on about insignificant things like clothes and movies. I liked being with her. I liked having sex with her. She took away the constant edge I felt. Olivia gradually receded to the back of my mind. I could joke about it after a while. In retrospect, it seemed funny that I’d become so obsessed with a girl I barely knew. Then right when everything was going my way, I found out that Jessica was pregnant and had an abortion behind my back. She wasn’t the one to tell me. That’s what killed me. She made the decision without me. That was my baby – mine. I wanted that baby. I would have taken the baby even if Jessica didn’t want it. I punched a tree, sprained my wrist and went into dating hibernation.

After my parents divorced, my mother wanted to move to America. She was born in Michigan. Her father – my grandfather – met my grandmother at Cambridge where he was studying abroad. When they got married, they moved back to the States for a while and had my mother. But, when my grandmother was homesick, my grandfather sold their land and house, and moved back to England for her. My parents ran in the same social circles and they happened to happen. She nixed the “Sams and Alfreds and Charlies” and gave my brother and me American-sounding names. When she caught him cheating for the third time, she packed us up and moved us to America. I took it way harder than my brother. I blamed my mother for a while, until I flew to England for my dad’s fourth marriage. When I saw him taking vows for the fourth time, I got it. I wasn’t even sure what this wife’s name was. Elizabeth? Victoria? I was pretty sure it was a Queen of England. But, I knew I didn’t believe in divorce. You couldn’t make vows and just break them. If I married a woman, I was going to stay married. I wouldn’t treat marriage like a lease. Ever.

I wanted to marry Jessica. I mean, it’s not like I bought her a ring, but I saw her fitting into my world. My mother liked her; Jessica loved me. It was so easy. But, when I found out she had an abortion and didn’t even bother telling me she was pregnant, I lost it. I at least wanted a say with my child.

Then Olivia came back. She came back, dancing like a siren. I knew exactly what she was doing the night she came to my frat house and cocked her finger at me from the dance floor. If she hadn’t come to me, I would have gone to her. Forget all you know – I said to myself. This is the one you belong with. I don’t know how I knew that. Maybe our souls touched underneath that tree. Maybe I decided to love her. Maybe love wasn’t our choice. But when I looked at that woman, I saw myself differently. And it wasn’t in a good light. Not a thing would keep me from her. And that could make a person do things they never thought themselves capable of. What I felt for her scared the hell out of me. It was a consuming obsession.

In truth, I’d barely touched on the obsession. That was still coming.