Chapter 7

As I had anticipated, the roomie woke me up around 8:30 with all his banging and cursing.

"You know," I said sleepily, "with you around, who needs an alarm clock?"

"Sorry, Rooms," Jake laughed. "I know I'm a pain in the ass in the morning. Used to drive my little brother nuts back when we shared a room."

"That's OK. I don't want to sleep all day anyhow."

"How'd the date go?" he asked.

"Really well, actually."

"Told ya!"

"Yes, you did," I grinned. "We went for sushi. I'd never had it. I liked it."

"Give me a bratwurst any day."

"Yep, you're from Milwaukee, all right," I laughed. "Then we went to the movies."

"So, did Mr. Inexperienced kiss her goodnight?" he laughed.

"Didn't have a chance. She kissed me before I even finished agonizing about whether or not to try," I grinned.

"Good for her!"

Just then there was a knock on the door. "Must be someone from the team," Jake said, and went to answer the door.

"Nope, you're not on the football team," I heard him laugh.

I heard a familiar giggle from the other side of the door. "Hi, I was looking for Brendan."

"You must be Sheila," Jake said.

"And you must be Jake."

"In the flesh. Come on in," and he opened the door.

"Jesus, Rooms, I'm not dressed!" I said from-thankfully-under the covers.

"Is that my hello?" Sheila giggled.

"Hello. Do you mind if I get dressed?" I smirked.

"You really do embarrass easily," she laughed. "Are you completely naked?" she said with a twinkle in her eye.

"Well, boxer shorts."

"Then, who cares?" she grinned. "You've seen me in a swimsuit. Anyway, do you have any plans today?"

"Well, this afternoon, I was going over to the stadium to see Rooms over there decapitate UCLA's quarterback."

"Jake Atkinson, number 58, at your service. Quarterback demolition a specialty."

Sheila giggled. "That sounds like fun. Would you mind company?"

"Not at all," I said, flabbergasted.

"Good. First, the reason I'm here so early is I was looking for someone to eat with."

"OK. That sounds good," I said. "I was thinking about brunch myself."

"And his usual eating partner has to go eat at the training table," Jake grinned.

"Good, then that's settled," Sheila said.

"Great. Uh, but, would you please mind going out of the room so I can get dressed?"

"Damn. I wanted to see," she giggled. "OK, fine, I'll step out for a minute. Hurry up!"

"Yes, ma'am," I said as she slipped out the door.

I got out of bed and found some clothes. Jake came over to me and said, softly, "Man, Brendan, this girl really likes you! And she's cute as all hell."

"That, Rooms, is scarier than UCLA's offensive line."

"I'm not scared of UCLA's offensive line," he said. "I can handle 'em. And you know what, Bren? You can handle this. She's making it easy for you. Most girls play the game. She's not-probably because she's figured out you don't know the rules. Go out for a date, and then show up at the guy's door at 9 the next morning? This does not happen! She's making it easy. I'll bet you wouldn't have called her today, left to your own devices. You probably would've stared at the phone all day, wanting to call, but not do it."

"You know me too well," I laughed.

"And I'm sure she knew the same thing."

"You're right, she is making it easy."

"She is. Go with it, you understand me?"

"I'll do my best."

"You decent?"

"Yeah," I said.

"Good." He stepped out of the door. "He's all yours," he grinned to Sheila.

"Hit 'em hard, Rooms," I called after him.

"Always do." With that, he headed down the hall.

She came back in, smiling. I took a good look at her. It was still warm in Palo Alto-in fact, we were in a spell of a few days in the mid-eighties. Not what I was used to in mid-October in Chicago, that's for sure! And she was dressed for the weather. Shorts. A blue spaghetti-strap belly shirt. Sandals. She even had her toenails painted bright red. It was very sexy-the sexiest I had ever seen her dress, not counting the swimsuit of course. I wondered if it was deliberate. Jesus, that was a frightening thought!

"Are you all set, Mr. Shy?" she smirked. I just nodded. "Good. Then let's go! I'm starving." She grinned and grabbed my wrist, giving it a little playful tug. I panicked and tried to pull my wrist out of her hand. She noticed the panic-and then she noticed my wrist.

Fuck. My deep dark secret.

"What's this?" she said, turning my wrist over to look.

"Accident," I lied lamely.

"Brendan, my mother's an emergency room nurse, and I'm pre-med... I know a few things. You don't get scars like this on your wrist from an accident. They're too straight and even." I didn't say anything. "When?" she asked.

"A couple of summers ago," I admitted. "About three weeks before junior year began."

"Why?" she asked.

"I don't like to talk about it," I said.

She looked at me, confused, then sat down on my bed. "Bren, come here and sit," she said. I did. "Look, I just don't get it. Why? Why would you do something like that? Someone who has so much going for them? Jesus, you're the smartest person I know!"

"Yep," I agreed bitterly. "You want another word for 'smartest person you know'? I have one for you. That word is freak. I'm a goddamn fucking freak, and that's how I've been treated most of my life. Faced with the reality of going back to the torture chamber called high school, I snapped."

"Was it that bad?"

"Let's see," I said, "there was the broken wrist in ninth grade. The concussion from having my head slammed into a brick wall in tenth grade. We'll just gloss over the minor bumps and bruises. And I haven't even got into the verbal abuse. And let's just say that the first person I've ever considered a real friend is Jake, and I met him all of a month and a half ago. Look, first of all, I wrecked the curve in every class I was in, for twelve years of school. Plus I'm skinny and weak-after watching you swim, I have no doubt you could kick my ass. Add to the fact that I'm socially inept-well, I spent twelve years with a target on my back. I do not fit into the world I live in-so I made an attempt to leave it."

"What happened?"

"My mother came home unexpectedly. She thinks she had a vague premonition. That part I do regret, because my parents were never the problem and I put them through hell."

"I knew you had a bad time in high school, but I didn't know it was this bad." She took a breath. "You regret failing, don't you?"

"I did then, for a long time. Of course, word got around, and I was treated like more of a freak. Funnily enough, I was picked on less. People steered clear of me, because then I was 'the crazy person' in addition to the rest of my defects. Being invisible isn't fun, but it's better than being beaten."

"Well, I need to say something. Two things, actually." She took a breath again. "I am so happy that you failed, I can't tell you." I looked up at that one, startled. "Second of all-look, I'm not going to argue with what you were feeling. Only you live in your head. However, I need to tell you something. You're not socially inept. You may have been then-or you may have been when you were younger, those things tend to linger when you go through school with a lot of the same people for years." I nodded. "But you're not now. You need to know that."

"Well, you see it. I don't know if anyone else does."

"I get the feeling that Jake does," she smiled.

"You're right. He does," I admitted. "You guys make it easy. Both of you. I don't know how much of it is me."

"More than you think," she said. "Hey, let's go eat, all right?"

"Yeah," I smiled.

"I'm glad you told me," she said.

"You didn't give me much of a choice," I grinned.

"I'm very good at that," she grinned back. We headed off to the dining hall. We had a nice chat-thankfully, the topic of my suicide attempt was dropped-and then she told me, as we finished eating, "Hey, I have to swim. I still want to go to the game with you, but I need to get an hour in. Come with?"

"Sure, I don't mind watching you," I said.

"Actually, it's free swim time right now. You have a swimsuit?"

" Me? Swim with you? I'd be too embarrassed."

"Hey, I wasn't too embarrassed to do calculus with you, was I?"

"Hmm. Good point. OK, my swimsuit's in my room."

"That's the spirit." We went and got my swimsuit, and went to the aquatic center. We changed, and I met her on the pool deck.

"And you didn't want me to see you in boxer shorts," she smirked at me in just my swimsuit. I blushed from head to toe.

We found side-by-side lanes, and jumped in. I started swimming, just a basic freestyle stroke. She hung back for a minute, and then started backstroking. It was a 25-meter pool. I was 10 meters down before she even started. She caught me at 20 meters. Whoooooosh! I was not even halfway back before she passed me doing her second lap. I thought she was fast watching her from the stands. Right next to her? It was like walking alongside a freight train.

After a few more laps-it was my third, and about her fifth or sixth-she waited for me at the end of the pool.

"Now you're going to tell me you're just getting warmed up, right?" I said.

"Of course," she grinned. "Don't forget for a second that I'm a world-class competitive swimmer, OK?"

"I'm not. It's fine. But, boy, being this close... I feel like I keep getting caught in the wake of a speedboat."

She giggled. "You know what? You're a good swimmer-for an amateur. Nothing to be ashamed of." She looked at me. "It's a pity you're too old to take it up seriously. You have the body for it."

"Excuse me?" I laughed. "You have more muscles in your big toe than I have on my entire body."

"Well, if you were doing it competitively, you'd weight train, silly," she laughed. "Anyhow, though, I'm a backstroker. What you have the body for is the butterfly. Even when butterfliers put on muscle, they're all long and lean."

"Butterfly?"

"I'll teach you," she grinned. "Even for recreational swimming, for someone with your bodytype, you'll find it's more efficient." She taught me the basics of the butterfly, and had me work on it some while she went back to her power backstroking. She was right, though, I did find it easier. And I told her so.

"You picked that up quicker than I picked up calculus," she giggled.

"I'll have to get used to it, though-it's a shoulder movement I'm not used to. They're a bit sore."