Make a voodoo doll of West and stab it to death?
“Another this or that nineties quiz?” I asked in fake eagerness. She popped her eyes open, shooting me a skeptical look. I wasn’t known for my enthusiasm.
“Duh, but we always do that. We should go to one of West’s fights. Next Friday. It’s Mom and Victor’s shift, anyway. It would be nice to hang out. We never do that anymore.”
We didn’t. Karlie was wrapped up in her schoolwork and internships, and I was either working or spending time with Grams. But going to see West in action was the worst possible thing we could do together.
“Hard pass.” I shoved ice cream into my mouth without tasting it. The whole night was tarnished by images of West screwing Melanie Bush against an elevator bank, and I didn’t even know what she looked like. “Fight clubs aren’t really my scene.”
“Hot shirtless men thrashing each other is, though, right? Unless you’re asexual. Or a lesbian.”
“Guess I’m asexual.”
Women really didn’t do it for me.
“Come on. I knew you prior to you-know-what, and you were boy crazy just like the rest of us. Tucker, anyone?”
Eh, yes. Tucker. One of the very reasons I’d sworn off men in the first place. The way he’d discarded me the minute I’d lost my beauty still burned long after the fire wounds had healed.
Karlie and I established I would use a hammer as a Q-tip to clean my earwax before attending an underground fight. My friend went back home, which was right across the street from me.
I slipped under the covers, shoving the house keys beneath the mattress—like stupid West had suggested the night at the diner—so Grams couldn’t wander off while I slept. So far, it had worked.
The last thing I thought about when my head hit the pillow was a fighter who had given up on himself.
West
On Sunday, I cashed in on one of the million favors Texas owed me and came in late to my shift. There had been a party on frat row the previous night. Parties were my idea of hell, but every now and again I tagged along when East rode my ass for being antisocial. He had the incorrect notion I would spiral into depression like my mother had. Sometimes I thought he also knew I was toying with the idea of gunning my bike straight into a tree or flinging myself off the water tower. I kept to myself throughout the night, cradling a bottle of moonshine and offering my I’d-rather-drink-straight-from-the-toilet face whenever people tried to strike up a conversation. The lowest point of the evening was being called out by some chick for asking her who she was when she approached me in one of the frat houses.
Apparently, we’d had sex on Friday.
And apparently, she found it fitting to tell everyone, short of the president, that we’d hooked up.
“Melanie!” she’d screamed. “My name is Melanie. You’d remember if you let me introduce myself properly in the first place.”
Melanie whined about how she didn’t think she was that forgettable. It surprised me, since I made a point of not asking girls for their names.
“And another thing, I’m not even from Texas, like you said. I’m from Oklahoma!”
What could I say? Chicks were an endless river of mystery I didn’t want to dip my fucking toe into.
I ignored her, hitting the pool table with a few guys, talking NFL over her whining. At some point, Tess marched toward us and pulled Melanie (or was it Melody?) to the side, consoling her for the premature death of what was obviously a once-in-a-lifetime love story between us.
On Sunday, Texas was surprisingly silent and curt, considering Saturday had been spent spilling our guts out on the food truck’s floor. I was way too hungover to find out what got her jeans in a jerk this time. She seemed to always find a reason to hate me. We hadn’t exchanged more than five sentences, and that was fine by me. Her hot and cold games were getting on my last nerve.
By Monday, however, my patience with the universe wore off, and the urge to punch anyone within sight was overwhelming.
Not only did East wake up in the morning to find the seventeen unanswered letters my mother had sent me jammed in the bottom of our trashcan (“What in the name, dude? Answer your mother!”), but everyone still seemed to ride the weekend alcohol wave and showed up on campus hammered. The frat parties bled into Sunday and Monday, which meant half the students were in togas and J-Lo sandals.
They looked like Greek gods, if they came from Jersey Shore and carried extra pounds from an all-you-can-eat vacay on Olympus. It was all bullshit, anyway. Half those fuckers wouldn’t find Greece on the map if it were highlighted with five different Sharpies. I made my way to my first lecture, determined not to kill anyone today.