Fourth Comings_ A Jessica Darling Novel - Megan McCafferty [3]
Dude’s eyes glazed over, and not with booze. How could I ever expect this future titan of industry to understand?
“I’m in publishing.”
It took a moment for Dude to realize that I wasn’t speaking in faux first person anymore and that I had just informed him that I, Jenn-with-Two-N’s, work in publishing.
“Oh. Like books?” Dude asked.
“A magazine.”
“What magazine?”
“Well, it’s really more of a journal than a magazine,” I said. “I’m sure you’ve never heard of it.”
“What? You think I don’t read? You think I’m illiterate? I do go to Princeton, you know.”
“I had no idea,” I said dryly.
I also had no idea why I was still talking to Dude in this manner. Maybe it was because Dude was encouraging my antics by nodding his head vigorously, as if this whole conversation made perfect sense. Drunk is the universal language, the dipsomaniacal Esperanto, so he totally, totally got everything I was saying.
“So listen,” Dude said, all business, all pleasure, all the time. “Since you’re not waiting for anyone, maybe you’d like to join us.”
“I don’t think so,” I announced as I stood up, smoothing out the wrinkles in my butter-colored Bermuda shorts with my palms. “I have to go break up with my boyfriend now.”
Dude laughed harder than all his other laughs combined. He slapped his forehead in laughter, which sent his sunglasses falling to the floor. More laughter rang out from the corner table.
“Why are you laughing?”
“The way you said it,” he replied as he not-so-stealthily gave my legs a once-over. “‘I have to go break up with my boyfriend now.’”
“I didn’t think I was going to say it,” I said, almost to myself. “It just came out.”
“I have that devastating impact on the ladies,” Dude boasted, pretending to mock his own sexiness.
I really hadn’t intended for Dude to be the first to know. It only took a nanosecond for my mind to catch up to my mouth, but it was a nanosecond too late. It was a relief, in a way. Putting feelings into words makes them so. Once words are spoken (or written…) they take on a greater significance. With this slip, I suddenly felt that readiness I’d been missing all morning. It wasn’t liquid courage, it was the real thing: I’m here to break up with Marcus. That’s why I’m here.
I considered what could have happened next, if I wanted to.
I thought about lifting myself up on my tiptoes and leaning into Dude’s face. I thought about breathing in his sweet-and-sour scent of citrus shaving cream and perspiration. I thought about his mouth opening to say something unnecessary and mine clamping over his to shut him up. I thought about a mushy kiss with a mealy banana mouthfeel.
Making out with Dude could’ve been a harbinger of all the horrible hook-ups to come. It could’ve proven that I wasn’t looking to get involved with someone else right now, I was just looking to get out of the involvement I was already in. But I didn’t need to kiss Dude to confirm this truth. Kissing Dude is something I might have done when I was in college (okay, something I did do in college), but I knew better now. So instead of making out with Dude, I made my exit.
“Wait! Where are you going? Can I get your number?” His cell was out and ready.
I walked away to the sound of Dude’s halfhearted protests, leaving him behind to pay up for one piece of ass he shouldn’t have wagered on.
two
I teetered out of the dimly lit bar and was assaulted by the sunlight.
It should be dark right now, I thought. It should be midnight and not…1:39 P.M. Your first meeting had ended at one P.M. You had another meeting at three-thirty. I had one hour and fifty-one minutes left.
Official Orientation begins next week, and classes another week after that. But you were so eager to get everything you could out of your Princeton experience, you arrived early for the Frosh Trip, one week of hiking, kayaking, tent-pupping, and bonding with hundreds of other first-year students in the wilds of the tri-state area. You assured me that Outdoor Action is a very popular program, and I still can’t help but wonder if