No Strings Read online

  Yes, this was the night that I was having.

  “My what?”

  Brody chuckled a bit, shrugging like what he was saying wasn’t a big deal in the slightest. “Not that it’s a problem or anything, but look”—he turned his head to glance out at the water—“you’re saying you want to know what it’s like and I’m saying I can show you.”

  “What do you—?”

  He turned back to look at me, and I was mildly stunned by the fervency I saw in his eyes. “Catrina, sex isn’t… everyone makes it into this big deal—having it, not having it, how often you have it, who you have it with—whatever. I think it’s awesome and it feels, well, insanely good. But the circumstances of it, that’s not such a big deal, not really, so long as there’s trust, and if you, you know, want to know what it’s like, I’m saying I can help educate you.”

  I needed to clarify, to be sure I was hearing exactly what I thought I was hearing. “How would you... educate me?”

  He smirked. “Well, we learn best by doing, don’t we?”

  I couldn’t help but scoff. “So, what, you fancy yourself a—a public servant, willing to sleep with anyone who wants it, as a favor to them? As some kind of philanthropic act, or what?”

  Brody grinned. “I’m not saying it would be entirely selfless.”

  My eyes met his and I nearly gasped when I did, feeling a rush of heated blood pulse through me suddenly.

  In the span of about a second, things had taken a turn.

  The way he was looking at me… no one had ever looked at me like that before. He was looking at me like he was trying to see under my clothes, like he could. His gray eyes somehow seemed darker, almost seductive. And it made me feel like I had never felt before. It caused a thrumming rush in my veins, an almost painful tingling in my limbs, but more than that it made me feel sexy, wanted.

  Alive.

  And good God did I want to chase that feeling.

  But.

  But this was crazy.

  Right?

  This conversation, what he was suggesting, the way he was looking at me, it was all… just… crazy.

  “But you don’t even know me,” I blurted, not sure why I said that, of all things, but also not sure what else I could possibly say.

  He gaped mockingly at me, the scorching look fading almost as quickly as it had appeared while I was already missing it terribly. “Of course I do!” he said, feigning offense. “You love grapes but you hate anything grape flavored, especially popsicles. You say your favorite band is the Alabama Shakes, and I know you love them, but your actual favorite band is definitely Outkast. Talia Emery is your best friend. You root for the Pats because they’re your dad’s favorite team but your favorite is secretly the Cowboys for some fucked up reason. You eat the same thing for breakfast every morning—two boiled eggs, half a turkey sausage patty, and orange juice. You hate when anyone but your family and really close friends call you Cat, and your favorite movie is Pride and Prejudice—the Keira Knightley version, controversially.”

  I stared at him, stunned, not even sure how to react to the news that Brody had noticed me over the years when I had been convinced he didn’t know I existed other than to be Gabe’s cousin that sometimes came around.

  “How do you—?”

  “You listened to Outkast constantly from summer of ’09 to winter of 2012, and you owned all their albums.”

  “Oh, my God, I was not going to ask about that, even though that’s totally—”

  “I notice things,” he shrugged. “I know you, Catrina. Of course I do.” The mocking and joking was gone, and the look that remained was so intense that it made me shiver.

  I kept my eyes locked with Brody’s, unable to look away, gazing at him like I was seeing him for the first time, feeling somewhat like I was floating above the scene but also feeling so painfully inside the situation that it made my skin feel prickly. My heart was thundering so hard in my chest that I was certain he would be able to hear it, especially because he was moving closer, scooting next to me so that our hips were almost touching. And he was angled toward me, one elbow on his knees, his other hand in the grass as he moved.

  My breath caught as he inched closer, looking at me just as intently as I was looking at him.

  “I’m not saying you have to take me up on the offer,” he said quietly, his voice near a whisper, almost making me quake at the sensual, low sound. “I’m just saying if you really want to know what it’s like and you don’t want to wait anymore, wait for the perfect guy to come around or whatever… I could help you. No judgments, no strings. Just one night for you to find what you’re looking for.”

  He made it seem so logical. He was right, I said I wanted to know what it was like and I didn’t want to wait anymore because the perfect guy, that perfect first time, was never going to come along. At least not right now, not now when I was just so damn tired of waiting.

  And Brody was sitting there, next to me, so close, his eyes searching mine for any sign, and he was offering. He was so fucking hot, and he wanted to help me. Maybe he even just wanted me, I couldn’t really tell. It was like the devil himself was tempting me into something I knew I wanted, in general, and yeah, maybe I possibly wanted it with Brody.

  And maybe he did know me, at least better than I thought. And I possibly knew him. I knew the sound of his laugh like it was my own, I knew everyone thought he wanted to play professional soccer and probably could, and his parents wanted him to go to law school, but what he really wanted was to be a writer. But no one knew except Gabe. Well, and I knew because I had overheard them talking summer after freshman year after he had submitted a short story of his for a contest and won. After I’d heard about that, I had searched the internet frantically for it until I found it. It was a beautiful story about a little boy with an imaginary friend, and it had amazed me that he was able to write such moving prose. I knew he loved chocolate muffins because he always ate the ones I brought over to the Keatons, never knowing that they were mine.

  We had known each other for over fourteen years, since he’d started at West Concord Elementary, and I had seen him. Maybe I had even watched him sometimes. And he was sitting here when no one else was. And he was looking at me and he smelled so good and, God, I wanted to say yes.

  It was almost as if we were frozen there, just looking at each other, but then he reached up and brushed his fingers along the side of my face as he tucked a piece of my long hair behind my ear. I exhaled in a huff, stomach flipping, releasing the breath I didn’t know I had been holding, and he was leaning in a bit and I could swear that he was going to kiss me and in that moment it was all I wanted. I was craving it, my body practically trembling with the need to throw myself at him.

  And then a branch fell from a tree that was over us and splashed into the reservoir, making a bit of water spritz across the sides of our faces, jolting me out from whatever spell I had been under.

  I stood up abruptly, a bit laboriously, and stumbled a little as I said, “I have to go.”

  Brody stood up as well, frowning at me. “Catrina, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—”

  “No it’s, um,” I swallowed, brushing grass off of my jeans and backing away. “It’s okay, um, thanks for—well, thanks for coming down here and—”

  “Catrina—”

  “And thanks for the offer.” I laughed nervously, humorlessly. “But, um, I have to go. Sorry.” I glanced at him, seeing the confusion and concern all over his beautiful face. “Sorry,” I said once more before I turned and fled up the path that led back to campus, trying as hard as I could to put as much distance between me and Brody Galen as quickly as I possibly could.

  Chapter THREE

  Last night had to have been a dream.

  I was laying in my bed in my on-campus apartment, staring at the ceiling of my tiny bedroom, replaying the previous evening over and over in my head.

  It was a dream, I thought. It had to be.

  Because there was no way Brody had loo
ked at me like that and there was no way he had kind of, maybe, possibly, I wasn’t sure, almost kissed me. And there was no way he had suggested the things he had suggested and there was just no way that any of it had happened so it had to have been a dream.

  But it wasn’t.

  Because I was still in the clothes from last night, and I could smell the heavily cologned scent of the soccer house and the grass I’d sat on and maybe even him. I could see the way his eyes shown, the way he glowed, the way he smiled.

  I could get lost in those memories, lost forever in a world of Brody’s eyes, eyes I had never known were so beautiful before, eyes I had never looked into before, not really, never appreciated, and all I wanted was to—

  “Enough,” I hissed at myself. I threw the bed covers off and sat up in bed. I was going to take a shower and wash the memories off and I was going to get dressed and go out to breakfast with my friends like we’d planned and not think about Brody or anything that had happened last night ever again. I wasn’t going to think about Holly or what had happened after. I was going to get up, move on, and live my life the exact way I had been living it twenty-four hours earlier.

  After I showered and got dressed, I went into Talia and my small living room so I could pack up the books I needed for studying in the library later before we headed out to breakfast. When I got into the living room, I looked across the island that separated our living room from our kitchen, which really couldn’t be called a kitchen. It was just a refrigerator, a microwave, an oven, a five by two strip of tile, and about a foot and a half of counter space. In the kitchen, I saw Talia standing there pouring a cup of coffee.

  “Morning, sunshine,” Talia said after pouring another cup and handing it to me.

  “Good morning. Thank you,” I added before taking a huge swig of coffee. I hadn’t realized how badly I needed it until that exact moment.

  Talia walked to the living room and plopped onto the couch. Her black bob was perfectly in place, her makeup done—her signature winged liner done to perfection as always—and she was wearing a bright yellow sundress that made her skin glow. I, of course, looked like a sack compared to her in skinny jeans and an oversized Pats t-shirt, my hair piled on top of my head.

  “You got home late,” she said. When I looked at her, I noticed her eyes looked wary.

  “Yeah, you were out cold. I peaked in your room.”

  Talia looked down into her coffee and went quiet, which was so unlike her that I knew something was up. My stomach dropped.

  How the hell did she already know what happened?

  “Catrina,” Talia started, a pitying look on her face that I hated the instant I saw it.

  “How do you know?”

  Without answering, Talia reached for her laptop that was sitting on the coffee table. She opened it and typed in a few things before turning it in my direction. I walked over and took it from her hands, realizing immediately that Talia was on Holly’s Facebook page.

  “Holly’s a bitch,” she said.

  “Hang on.” I scrolled through and saw what Talia obviously wanted me to see.

  “I told you not to go to that party,” she said.

  “Thanks, Tal.” I said absently as my eyes found the post.

  “OMG CUH-RAZY night last night. SECRETS REVEALED. POLL TIME: how many of u would totally want to DIE if u hadn’t, u know, GOTTEN SOME after going through almost all of college?! Talk about a DRYYYYY spell! C.O.D.: lack of O! if u r feeling this way, just know that u are definitely not alone… It was confirmed for me last night… I’m totally free to be ur wingwoman, girl! U know who u are! #dryspell #wingwoman #virginproblems #thankgoditsnotme #DEATH

  My hands were shaking as I set Talia’s computer on the coffee table. That post had 106 likes and reactions and over forty comments.

  “Are you all right?” she asked slowly.

  I sat down on the couch next to her. “At least she didn’t use my fucking name,” I said hoarsely.

  “Look, it’s not that bad, Kitty Cat,” Talia said, shutting the laptop and turning toward me, her legs crossed underneath her. “I only knew it was about you because I knew you went to that party and I know that you’re… that you haven’t had sex before.”

  “Oh, my God,” I groaned, putting my face in my hands.

  “You know what will cheer you up?” Talia said, putting a hand on my leg.

  I looked up at her. “Leaving the country and never coming back?”

  Talia laughed. “A mimosa.”

  I gave her a weak smile. A mimosa did sound pretty great right now. Or ten.

  “Callum and Carver are meeting us at 10, so we better get going anyway.”

  “Talia.”

  Talia had jumped up from the couch and was slipping her feet into her thigh-high, tan suede, heeled boots. She looked up at me.

  “Do you think she told anyone else that that post was about me?”

  She gave me a sympathetic look. “I don’t know, Kitty Cat, but I’ll rip her fucking wig off if she did.”

  ◆◆◆

  When we got to The Chicken Coop, a popular breakfast spot just off campus, one look at Callum’s and Carver’s faces told me they had either guessed that post was about me or Talia had texted them with a heads up.

  “Holly’s a bitch,” Carver said immediately, echoing Talia’s sentiment and making me smile. Carver Hicks and I had met my freshman year, his sophomore year when we were both in the chorus for the spring musical, along with Talia. He was tall and thin with dark skin—his father was Haitian and his mother was Puerto Rican—and currently had his hair cut incredibly short and dyed a very light blonde on top. He was sweet and hilarious and fun, and he had the best stories to tell about his family, which was huge and loud. He occasionally did drag shows on the weekends to supplement his income, which Talia and I loved because the shows were incredible and the most fun I ever had.

  “Are you okay?” Callum Jeffries, my closest friend in the world besides Talia, asked me, his eyes soft and worried as he frowned at me across the table.

  I gave him a small smile as Talia launched into a rant, sprinkled with phrases like, “fucking dicks, all of them,” “never should have gone,” “we have plenty of fun on our own,” and “lousy bitch Holly Goldsmith.”

  Callum was the first friend I had ever made at Klein, other than Gabe of course, and maybe Brody if he could be considered a friend. I had met him on the first day, and even now I remembered the image vividly. I had been trying to shove my way into one of the back doors of the dorm with a box in my hand, and I was so hot and tired and trying to hold back tears and pretend I wasn’t scared of college even though I would only be about a half hour from home when he rushed up to help me open the door. He had been much too tall, awkward, skinny, and obviously not quite sure what to do with his long limbs, but he’d had such a genuine smile on his face that I had been able to choke back my tears that were threatening to fall.

  I remembered liking him instantly, being drawn to the way his caramel-colored eyes crinkled when he smiled at me and opened the door, the way his curly mop of golden brown hair seemed to have a life of its own. My grandparents were dentists so I immediately approved of the straight white teeth he flashed when he smiled, and when he said “you must be moving in today?” I hadn’t been annoyed like I had started to be that day when everyone pointed out that I was a freshman when I was trying to blend in as much as possible. But when Callum had said it, he had said it so kindly and curiously, and he had been smiling like he was genuinely pleased to be meeting me that it didn’t even bother me in the slightest.

  Sure, maybe I had developed a small crush on him over the years, especially since he was a year older, but he was my best friend first. The crush certainly wasn’t helped by the fact that he had grown into his gangly, long limbs over the past three and a half years, and his shoulders had broadened, his muscles had formed large and corded and strong after he started working out every day, and his mop of hair was now basically hot bed head. H
is voice had gotten deeper, as if he had waited until college to hit puberty, and every woman he met was constantly throwing herself at him like he was Ryan Gosling or something.

  “I’m fine,” I told him, and when he looked skeptical I laughed a bit. “No, I am, really. I had some time to think out at the reservoir. You’ll never believe who came down to see if I was all right.”

  “Who?”

  “Brody Galen.”

  Callum’s frown deepened. I knew that Callum had never liked Brody, and the few times I had seen him when we went out and Callum was with me, Callum had always commented on what a jerk he thought Brody was. “Really?”

  “Yeah,” I said, chuckling a bit to cover up the way I feared I looked when I remembered last night. “He was really nice and he made feel a lot better,” I said, forcing myself to sound casual.

  But in the daylight hours, surrounded by my best friends, the conversation with Brody didn’t seem so horrifying, so scary, so surreal. I could almost forget about the… other stuff we’d talked about and focus on just the fact that he had been there for me, that he had made me feel better, that he had been kind and attentive and earnest. He had listened and just been there, and if he had made me feel more wanted and more alive than I ever had, I would just forget about that and focus on the other things.

  “I’m glad,” Callum said, although the look on his face said the opposite, so I cleared my throat and asked him about something else, not wanting Callum’s issues with Brody to ruin the good things Brody had said. I just wanted what remained to be a fond memory, tainted by nothing. So instead we talked about his plans for the day and the papers he had to critique for the Intro to English Literature class he was T.A.’ing while he continued his Masters program. Talia and Carver were scrolling through Holly’s social media, making snide comments about her makeup or outfit choices, making me smile to myself at how they hated her for me.

  We ordered our food and a round of mimosas, and we had just toasted to Carver getting his first real big boy job at the local public radio station when I glanced up at the group of people that was being seated by the hostess at a set of tables that had been pushed together.