Slowly We Trust (Fall and Rise #3)(11)
Author: Chelsea M. Cameron

A voice interrupted my perusal of my English syllabus.

“Hitting the books already? God, Aud, it’s only the first day of class.” Will flopped down into a chair across from me, his hair falling into his eyes. I wanted to cut it, but I also liked the way it fell into his eyes, and the careless way he pushed it away.

“You know me,” I said.

“No, actually I don’t know you that well, because we’ve just met, remember?” I’d forgotten.

“Sorry. Starting over should be easier, shouldn’t it?” I closed my book, knowing I wasn’t going to get anything done with him sitting across from me.

“Maybe,” he said, glancing around the room at the shelves of books. You’d think he’d be at home here, since his mother was a librarian.

“So, do you want to have lunch? I have a little time before my tennis class.” Will’s classes sometimes amazed me.

“You’re taking tennis?”

He put his hands behind his head and leaned back in his chair, almost to the point of tipping over.

“I might have left signing up for classes until the last minute and that was the only one left,” he said with one of those sheepish smiles that he used to get away with things.

“Even with all the reminders Lottie gave you?”

“It’s gotten to the point where she sends me so many reminders they all kinda blur together and I just ignore them.” He waved his hand dismissively. I was pretty sure he was lying, but I didn’t know why.

“So back to my original question, before you got us off track, how about lunch?” I looked at the clock.

“Oh, um, I’m actually meeting your sister in a little while.” I thought she might have told him about that. They shared everything, whether they meant to or not.

“Really?” Will said, pulling out his phone.

“Don’t say anything to her, please. I don’t want to cause tension.” Will put the phone down on the table and folded his hands.

“Okay, I won’t say anything. As a friend to you. Because we’re friends.”

“That’s right.”

5

I had never worked so hard at being friends with someone before. Being friends with a girl who wasn’t my sister, and who I was also crazy attracted to, was about as much fun as sticking my tongue to a flagpole in January.

But I did it. I kept my hands to myself and kept my mouth shut and worked on not staring at her ass, and when it was time to go to bed each night, I was exhausted.

Lottie tried to be a support system, but it was hard for her to choose whose side she was going to take, so I tended to avoid any situation where she might have to. I knew she’d choose me, as her twin, which left Audrey out in the cold, and I couldn’t have that.

My classes actually served to keep my brain occupied, since I had finally moved onto some of my more advanced science and math classes. Lottie had to take them too, with her marine bio major, but we weren’t able to get in any of the same classes, due to my procrastination when signing up for them. So for the first time in my entire life, I had zero classes with my sister.

Aud and I were still on shaky friendship ground, but I thought things were going better until one day when I was walking across campus and I spotted her laughing with some guy. Granted, he was a head shorter than her, but I couldn’t help the flash of jealousy that struck me when I saw her laughing with someone else.

It was so irrational, and so stupid, that I turned away and walked down a path that would take me the long way to my class, but would avoid walking by them.

If she was talking with a girl and laughing, I wondered if I’d be as jealous, but I knew the answer to that. I wouldn’t have been. I shook my head at myself and kept walking.

“Am I a caveman?” I asked Simon that night as we were getting ready for bed.

“Okay, William, I’m going to need some context,” he said as he changed his shirt.

“So I saw Aud today talking to this guy and she was laughing and felt this overwhelming urge to beat the shit out of him. I didn’t do anything, obviously, but I wanted to walk right up to this guy I’ve never met and nail him. Just for talking to her.” The more I talked about it, the more ridiculous I sounded.

“Jealousy is a normal human emotion, Will. You can’t stop yourself from feeling it. The only thing you can control is your reaction to it, and you did the right thing by not punching him. Good job.” He held his fist out, and I bumped it with mine. I didn’t feel like I should be congratulated.

“Good grief, I have not seen you this wound about a girl, uhhhh, ever. Not that she’s not great, but I don’t think you can keep going like this. It’s not healthy.”

I knew he was right. The problem was, what could I do about it?

“So what am I supposed to do about it? I want to be with her, she just wants to be friends, and I risk putting Lottie in the middle if I decide we can’t see each other altogether. Three shitty options.”

Simon nodded and thought about it for a minute. Other than Lottie, I trusted his opinion the most.

“Honestly, I don’t know, Will. I’m not going to tell you what to do.”

“Why not? You tell me what to do all the time.”

Simon laughed.

“You’re right, but in this instance, I think you need to make this decision on your own. You know, because it effects you the most. I mean, it also affects me, seeing as how I have to live with your mopey bum, but still. I’m not going to interfere. Nope. Not going to do it.” To show his resolve, he crossed his arms and closed his mouth.

I couldn’t figure out why Simon would be so quick to give me advice on every single facet of my life, but not this. It was frustrating.

“You are a completely useless friend right now.” I rolled over in bed, turning my back to him.

“Sorry, Will.” I hoped he would say something else, but his bed creaked and then there was silence.

I kept my mouth shut about running into Will when I met up with Lottie for lunch. We chatted about our new classes instead, my room and how she was adjusting to living with Zan.

“It’s weird. I feel like an adult, you know, because we have to pay rent and everything, but then I feel like someone is going to realize that I’m not old enough to be an adult and revoke my membership. Not to mention he’s around all the time. Seriously, you don’t know someone until you share a living space with them. And I’m sure he feels the same way about me.”