The Absence of Olivia Read online

  He shrugged. “I’m not sure yet. I’ve still got another year to figure it out.” He gave her a wink with his answer, which made me smile, but didn’t amuse her.

  “See, that’s why I like Devon. He already has a plan. Business major then on to his master’s in business. His track is all laid out for him. None of this uncertainty you seem to thrive on.”

  It had become obvious to me as I watched Liv fall for Devon, that his ambition and direction in life was something she latched on to, something she admired. His strong current down the river of his life pulled her right along with him. They balanced each other out in that way. She had been a free bird. She did what she wanted, when she wanted – not to mention whom she wanted. Now, she was his free bird and she followed him around. As long as she was with him, she felt like she had direction.

  “I’ll figure it out eventually,” Elliot said, not unkindly. In fact, he’d never taken an annoyed or angry tone with Liv. Not even when she’d been completely out of line. That was one thing I really liked about him. “How about you, Evie?” His eyes found mine, his smile still friendly. “How did your finals go?”

  I opened my mouth to answer, but Liv’s voice rang out before I had a chance.

  “Evie’s finals were a piece of cake because she was taking mostly art courses where all the answers are subjective. How do you feel about this painting? What did this sculpture make you feel?” Her voice was exaggerated and haughty, making a show out of impersonating my professors. She wasn’t far from the mark, I had found my finals kind of easy, but they were intro classes and hadn’t been too difficult to begin with.

  I laughed but then answered when she was finished.

  “I think I did all right.”

  “Well then, let’s get you a congratulatory drink.” He held his hand out to me and offered me his ridiculously cute smile and I found myself putting my hand in his before I gave it a second thought. He immediately palmed my hand and then twined our fingers together as he pulled me through the crowd gathered in front of the bar. As we got closer to the liquor, the crowd grew thicker, and I pulled myself closer to him, my front pressed up against his arm. It felt nice to have my body pressed up against a man.

  He made it right up to the counter and I saw his brothers nod at him in recognition. “Just get me a beer,” he said, and then turned back to me. “What’ll it be?” he asked, his lips moving closer to my ear. The movement of his breath on my skin sent prickles down my spine and I couldn’t ignore how much I liked the feeling of them.

  “Can I just have a vodka cranberry?”

  “You can have anything you want.” His eyes sparkled as he spoke, and I found myself smiling at him, feeling particularly punchy even without any alcohol in my system yet. He gave me a wink and then told the bartender my order. After a moment or two, and a much shorter wait than anyone else in the room had, we were handed our drinks. Elliot nodded toward the sliding doors, indicating he wanted to go outside, and I nodded in agreement. He then led me through the throngs of people, like fish swimming upstream, until we were finally outside.

  I thought, since we weren’t surrounded by people, he’d want to let go of my hand, but when I started to release his, he strengthened his grip and pulled me closer. It was impossible to hide the smile that stretched over my face. We walked to a bench overlooking their house’s underwhelming yard – a large patch of grass with one sad, sagging volleyball net stretched across it, drooping in the middle. I sat first and then inwardly warmed when he sat down right next to me, even though it left plenty of empty bench on the other side of him.

  “So,” he said before sipping his beer. “You know all about my lack of ambition, tell me about your plans. You’re a sophomore next year, right?”

  I nodded. “Yeah, and I might be even more unmotivated than you.”

  “Well, now there’s a challenge I will gladly accept. What makes you so unmotivated?”

  “I don’t know.” I shrugged. “I guess I just don’t really have the urge to find the career that will make me the most money.”

  “Ah, I see. You’re not motivated by greed. Satan would be very disappointed in you.”

  “No,” I laughed, “I suppose I’m not. And I make my lack of greed up to Satan by being really good at gluttony.”

  I watched as Elliot’s eyes floated down over my body. He tried to hide it by bringing his red cup up to his lips and taking a drink, but there was no use, the heat his gaze caused followed the trail of his eyes. When they met back up with mine, and it was obvious he’d been caught ogling me, he simply smiled.

  “Gluttony looks good on you.” His comment floated in the air between us, both of us smiling like fools. “But seriously,” he finally said, breaking the electric silence between us, “what is it you want to do after college?”

  “Honestly?”

  “Of course honestly. I never want you to lie to me.”

  I ignored the flip of my stomach at his use of the word never, as if we’d have an always. “I want to be a photographer.”

  “That’s pretty ambitious,” he said, his tone argumentative.

  “You think so? I don’t know. I think it sounds kind of lazy.”

  “I mean, I totally get why you feel that way, but when I think of people who do photography for a living, or art in general, I think of people relying on inspiration for their next paycheck. It’s easy to show up for a desk job and get your monthly check, but a photographer’s got to actually work for their money.”

  “I guess that’s true,” I replied, feeling a little better about the quiet dream I’d never really shared with anyone. “So, what are you really going to do with your sociology degree?”

  “That’s a good question. You’ll be the first person I tell when I decide.”

  We sat on that bench for the majority of the evening, only leaving after we’d both downed multiple drinks and were feeling a little fuzzy. He asked me to dance and I had not one reason not to. Also, I was hoping I could feel my body pressed up against his again.

  It was with my front pressed to his, my hands wrapped around his neck, his thigh between my knees, that I found a place in my mind where nothing else seemed to exist. I was just drunk enough to feel happy, slightly weightless, and loose, but not drunk enough to be stumbly or obnoxious. His hands were moving up and down my back, each downward swipe coming closer and closer to my backside. On each pass, I silently begged for him to graze his hands over my ass, to show me in some physical way he wanted me, wanted to do more than sit on a bench and drink with me.

  “You’re killing me here, Evie,” he said in my ear, sending shivers throughout my body. He must have felt me tremble because his arms squeezed me gently. I took his admission as a clue that he needed me to move us forward, needed me to give him permission. I leaned away from him, feeling the scruff that had grown on his face throughout the day scrape against my cheek. My hands slid from the back of his neck to his shoulders, and I pulled him toward me, angling my face up to his.

  The kiss, our first, was hesitant, soft, and mostly sweet. His lips brushed over mine, their lushness a surprise to me. They were plump and made it almost impossible not to kiss him a little harder, to use them to their capacity. We both inhaled, simultaneously pulling each other closer with the breath. His hand came up to grip the back of my neck and then his tongue was gently teasing. I opened, thankful he’d made the move and not waited for me, and I lost a little bit of myself in that kiss.

  His tongue traced mine, and I let out a whimper. I couldn’t find it in myself to be embarrassed by my sounds and, in fact, he seemed to like them. He responded with a low growl, which only made everything that was already burning up in my body liquefy. I forgot I was at a frat party, forgot I was on a dance floor surrounded by people, forgot about everything except Elliot and that kiss.

  When he pulled away it was with a gasp, as if he’d forgotten to breathe while worshipping my lips, but then his mouth found my neck and slowly slid down, leaving a trail of wetness as h
is tongue darted out. I dropped my forehead to his shoulder, just trying to stay upright as his mouth assaulted me.

  “I’ve wanted to kiss you for weeks, Evie.”

  Something about his words, the idea that he’d been thinking about me, wanting me, sent me over some proverbial line. Suddenly, I was desperate for his mouth. Hearing his need for me was more of an aphrodisiac than I’d ever experienced. My lips found his, and I kissed him with renewed vigor, my hands taking more liberties with his body, running down his chest, over his ribs, around his waist. He seemed to be enjoying the new enthusiasm with which I was kissing him, and before I was finished, he’d pulled away and grabbed my hand, leading me across the dance floor.

  I followed him into the house and we made it to the staircase before he stopped and pushed me up against the wall, his hands spanning the sides of my hips, his tongue brushing up against mine again.

  “I want to take you to my room,” he rasped, his mouth against my neck again. I arched my back, pressing my breasts into his chest, aching for some sort of contact.

  “Um, all right…” I responded.

  “We don’t have to have sex.”

  “Um, all right.” He pulled away at my response.

  “If you don’t want to go upstairs, just tell me. Honestly, I just want to be alone with you, kiss you in an empty room, instead of being surrounded by a bunch of other people.”

  “Um, all right,” I said, that time smiling. Luckily, he smiled in return. He grabbed my hand and led me further up the stairs to the second floor, then up to the third. We walked down a corridor of closed doors and I wondered how many of those doors had people behind them, and what state of undress they were in.

  We stopped at a door and I watched as he pulled keys out of his pocket and unlocked it. He swung the door open and then motioned for me to enter first. I was pleasantly surprised that the room wasn’t a disaster and it didn’t smell. I’d been on the boy’s floor of my dorm before and was appalled at how smelly boys could be when their mothers were no longer cleaning up after them. Elliot’s room was neat, organized, and odor-free.

  All thoughts of his room were pushed from my brain when his arms wrapped around me from behind and his luscious lips made contact with the skin just below my ear.

  “I can’t believe I’ve finally got you in my room,” he said, his words breathed against my overheated skin. My hand gripped the overly long hair at the nape of his neck, my back arched pushing my backside right against the erection I felt there. “Every time I see you here, you’re attached to Devon and Liv by the hip, and I always got the feeling I wasn’t supposed to try to get with you.”

  All the heat disappeared at his words, and I was left cold. The sheen of sweat I’d built from the kissing was now a layer of cold wetness that blanketed me, causing me to shiver.

  “What?” I asked, my hands paused in his hair, my back straightening, and hair on my arms prickling and standing up. He must have noticed the change in me, must have felt the shift in my arousal, and his hands stopped moving over me. “What do you mean?”

  “Nothing, really. It just kind of always seemed like you were off limits.”

  I pulled away and turned to look at him, trying to find the real answer in his face. “Off limits? Why would I be off limits?”

  “Evie, I’m not trying to upset you. It just always seemed like if I tried to talk to you or anything, Devon would have been upset about it.”

  “He’s with Liv.”

  “I know. That’s kind of why I always thought it was weird.” His eyes never left mine, but they were filled with question and honesty. “Did you guys date before or something?”

  I shook my head. “We’ve never dated. He’s just my roommate’s boyfriend.” It was the truth, but for some reason, it felt like a lie.

  “I don’t want to step on anyone’s toes, but I really like you, and I’ve wanted to kiss you ever since I first saw you.” His hands came up to frame my face and my eyelids fluttered at his touch. “I don’t like to share, Evie. So if you’re with someone, let me know.”

  I shook my head slightly, my gaze darting back and forth between his lips and his big brown eyes. “I’m not with anyone. I want to be here with you.”

  “I’m going to kiss you now, but that’s all tonight, okay? I just want to kiss you.”

  A big part of me was irritated that he was vowing only to kiss me, but a bigger part of me remembered his kisses and wanted them badly. “Okay.”

  He walked me backward slowly until my calves hit his mattress, and I landed on my butt with a bounce and a small laugh. He stood over me, his legs straddling my knees, which I was forcefully pressing together in an effort to relieve the pressure building between my legs. His hands came back to my face as he bent down and pressed his lips to mine.

  He kissed me and I slowly fell backward on the bed, loving the delicious pressure of the mattress at my back and his body on my front. The noise from the party downstairs faded away and all I could hear were his breaths and low groans, which slipped out of him every once in a while. He kept to his word of just kissing, although his hands roamed over my clothed body.

  He made me feel special. Wanted. Like he really had been wanting to kiss me forever and was so grateful finally to have me under him, to be able to kiss me however he wanted.

  When a loud knock came at the door, he paused, almost as if he was waiting to see if the person knocking would go away. They didn’t. The knocking came again along with a loud groan from Elliot.

  “What do you want?” he yelled at the door.

  “Elliot, is Evie in there with you?” Devon’s voice sounded concerned from the other side of the door, and we both sat up, surprised to hear him.

  “Shit,” Elliot muttered as he stood and walked to the door. I sat up and watched him, using my fingers to straighten out my hair. When he opened the door, it was obvious he was irritated. I watched as he flung the door back and nearly barked, “What do you want?”

  Devon looked surprised by Elliot’s anger, but blinked it away, his eyes moving past Elliot to find me sitting on the bed. He looked me up and down, which embarrassed me as he was obviously looking for some evidence as to what we were doing on the bed. “I need Evie.”

  “For what?” Elliot growled before I could even respond.

  “For Olivia.”

  Elliot scoffed, and then ran his hand over his chin. “Sure, man. Whatever.”

  Devon stared at Elliot for a few moments, neither one of them backing down. Finally, unable to stand the tension any longer, I stood and walked to the door.

  “Where is she?”

  “In the bathroom. She’s drunk and wants to go home. Wouldn’t let me take her myself.”

  I nodded, understanding. Sometimes, Liv wasn’t a happy drunk. In fact, she was usually angry. And that anger was usually aimed at the male sex. “Give me a minute. I’ll meet you down there.”

  Devon’s eyes bounced between Elliot and me, looking uncomfortable with leaving me alone with him again. But after a few awkward moments, he walked away toward the stairs. I turned to Elliot, took his hand off the doorknob, and closed it slowly.

  “It’s not his fault,” I said softly, hoping he’d calmed down a bit. “Olivia isn’t a great person to be around when she’s been drinking.” I tentatively reached out my hand and wrapped it around his forearm, hoping he wouldn’t pull away. I wanted to go back to five minutes ago when all I could feel were his hands on me and his mouth kissing me senseless. He let out a sigh at my touch, as though he was releasing some of the tension I could feel coiled in his muscled arms. When I slid my hand lower to his palm, he linked his fingers with mine and tugged me closer. It was my turn to sigh when he ran the back of his free hand over my cheek.

  “You’re oblivious and I can’t tell if it’s cute or irritating.”

  “I’m not oblivious,” I whispered, even though I had no idea what he was referring to.

  Elliot didn’t respond, just ran his thumb over the line of my j
aw, then up and over my bottom lip. He slowly leaned forward and kissed me without urgency or need. It was soft and warm. When he pulled away, I wasn’t ready for his mouth to be gone, so I bit my lip to keep from frowning.

  “When are you leaving to go home for the summer?” I was glad to hear all the anger had left his voice and he was back to the calm and gentle Elliot he’d been all night.

  “Day after tomorrow.”

  “Can I take you to breakfast in the morning?”

  I nodded.

  “I’ll pick you up at ten, okay?”

  I nodded again. He leaned forward and pressed a kiss to my forehead.

  “I’ll see you then.”

  “Okay.” He squeezed my hand just before he let it go, and then I opened the door and left to find my friend.

  When I found Olivia, she was sitting on the floor of the communal bathroom down the hall from Devon’s room. I cringed, thinking of how filthy the bathroom was and how her hands were lying flat on the nasty tiled floor. She was leaning up against the wall, head hanging low, her hair creating a veil over her face. One of her flip-flops had come off, and her purse was three feet away from her, splayed on the gross tiles.

  “Okay, Livy, time to go.” I knelt down and tried lifting her under her arms, not wanting to touch her hands. She didn’t budge much, but she did grumble at me about wanting to go back to sleep. “Liv, seriously, get up off the floor. You’re going to catch chlamydia down there.” I tried to lift her again, but it was no use.

  “Do you want some help?” Devon appeared in the doorway, arms crossed over his chest, watching me struggle.

  “Would you mind?”

  He didn’t answer, but he walked to her, bent down, and with one arm around her back, the other behind her knees, he lifted her as if she weighed nothing. He moved to the door and I picked up her loose flip-flop and her purse, following behind.

  “You can’t carry her all the way home. Let’s call a cab.”

  “Evie, it’s not that far. I can make it.” He punctuated his words by adjusting Liv in his arms, her body jumping but falling back closer to his. She was out. I’d never seen her that drunk before.