Highly Suspicious and Unfairly Cute(64)

So’s Celine, and you fucked that right up.

Yes, thank you, brain. I appreciate the reminder.

Here’s the problem: if I believed she had zero feelings for me, maybe I could get a grip, but I don’t believe that. She told me she likes me, and, God, the way she looks at me…I know I should leave this alone, but I can’t. I—care about her too much.

“You don’t trust me, do you?”

What if she did?

Several brooding thoughts and a few pristine angles later, I switch off the engine and call Jordan back.

“Hey, man,” he says, “what’s good?”

Literally nothing. Except the way my mouth is still tingling with the memory of Celine’s, but even that’s bittersweet. “Just got home. You?”

“Whooooa. What is that?”

I frown at my house. Lights are on. Everyone’s home. “What’s what?”

“That voice, bruh. Who killed your cat?”

“I don’t have a cat.” They play with dead animals, and I really don’t need that energy in my life.

“Meeting didn’t go too well, huh?”

Actually, I didn’t mention this to Cel, but my meeting did go well. It went very well. My score for the practice expedition was 4.79. If I work as hard in Glen Finglas, and take my weakest trait into account—commitment, apparently, probably because I couldn’t stop messing about with Raj or staring at Celine—I could be one of the top three Explorers. I could win. “I think…I have a real chance at the scholarship,” I admit, the words rushing out on a sigh.

“Uh. Did I miss something? Is that…bad?”

“No. No, it’s good,” except no it’s not because oh my God, I don’t even care right now. I don’t feel the slightest spark of excitement, and it’s not only because I’m upset about Celine. When I check in with my feelings, I find a mountain of dread at the idea that I’m one step closer to making this law degree happen because—

I know what it feels like to want something so badly, it eats at you. I know how greedy I really am, how much I need. And now I know how it feels to go without.

I tap the handbrake, just to make sure it’s on, and say, “I don’t want to study law. It would be fine. But that’s not enough.” As soon as the words are released, it’s like a too-tight belt around my waist loosens by a single notch. I breathe a little deeper and stare at my house. I can see the back of Dad’s head through the living room window. The belt cinches tight again.

“Damn,” Jordan says. “Okay.”

We sit in silence for a moment.

“What do you want to do instead?”

“Um.” I’ve never admitted this to anyone else—but no, I told Celine, and she didn’t laugh or produce any of the other cruel and unlikely reactions my brain was convinced I would get. She just…supported me. She told me I could do anything. So before I can second-guess it, I tell Jordan, “I’ve been trying to write a book.”

“With the amount you read, that makes perfect sense.”

Hold on. “I spill my tortured forbidden guts and all you can say is it makes sense?”

Jordan bursts out laughing. “Writing a book is your most tortured and forbidden secret? I love you, man. Don’t ever change.”

“It’s ridiculous. Do you know how many copies the average book sells a year? It’s in the low hundreds, Jordan. Depressingly low.” I’m trying to avoid specificity for the sake of my nerves, but the number flashes in my brain anyway, so—

“Buddy. We talked about this. Stop memorizing sad statistics.”

I ignore him. “Do you know how many authors actually make a living writing? Thirteen point seven percent. And I’m supposed to believe I’ll be part of that thirteen point seven percent when I can’t even finish a book?”

“Well, yeah,” Jordan says, like it’s obvious. “You’re Brad Graeme.”

“Why do people keep saying that?”

“Because it’s true. But I’m sensing a little aggression here, so let’s move on.”

A laugh bubbles out of me, leeching frustration with it, and I rub a hand over my face. “Sorry.”

“That’s okay. Show me the book, and I’ll forgive you.”

I shudder. “No. It’s terrible.”

“Somehow, I don’t believe you.”

This time, my laughter is bitter. “Mate. You know I always back myself. I’m not being modest here.” This is not, for once, an attack of self-consciousness. “I know what a good book is. I’ve read about seventy-five million of them. And my book? Is not a good book. It’s not even a finished book, which seems like the absolute bare minimum.”

“Okay, yeah, fair enough.” Jordan snorts. “But it’ll be good eventually, right?”

I exercise my right to remain silent.

Jordan keeps going like he’s persuading a toddler out of a tantrum. Which is starting to feel annoyingly accurate. “And at least now you know what you should be studying, right?”

“Wrong.”

“Come on, man. You want to write? Study English. Was that so hard?”

“My dad—” I want to say he’ll flip, except that’s not true. No, he’ll just be devastated and disappointed and lots of other D words I don’t like, and then there’ll be all this added pressure because if I don’t succeed, if I don’t finish the book and make it a bestseller and then somehow trap that particular lightning in a bottle all over again for the rest of my life, I’ll only be proving his disappointment right.