All Played Out (Rusk University #3)(29)

“Why can’t I cook for them?”

“Because then they’ll always want you to cook. And this . . .” He circles his fork over his plate. “This is mine.”

I smile and shake my head. “So selfish.”

“With you? Hell yes.”

“With my food, you mean.”

He suddenly looks serious. “With you. No more calling that ginger dude to help you with your list. I don’t like him.”

“You don’t know him.”

“Sure, I do. Matty something or other. He came to a few parties earlier this year with Dylan. And what kind of name is Matty anyway?”

“Selfish and jealous. You’re not doing so hot tonight.” I lift my eyebrows in mock disapproval. “Anyway, Matty is just a friend. And it’s not like you have to do everything on the list with me.”

“It is like that.”

“No, Mateo. It isn’t. Besides, you’re busy. You have practice and games and classes. You might not always be around. School is out in about a month, and then . . .”

“ And then what?”

“And then I graduate.”

When a stunned silence follows, I realize I maybe should have broached that particular topic with a bit more finesse. Until now, he’d been continually shoving pasta into his mouth and still managing to hold up his end of the conversation. Now he does neither.

“You’re twenty,” he says finally. “You can’t be graduating.”

“I am. I came in with all my requirements pretty much out of the way. And since I don’t have a job, I petitioned to take more than eighteen hours each semester.”

“So that’s what the list is. One last hurrah. And then what?” He fiddles with the napkin beside his plate for a second, and then continues: “You leave?”

Am I imagining the tension around his mouth and his shoulders?

“Not immediately. None of the graduate programs I’m applying to allow me to start in the spring semester, so I got a job as a research assistant for one of my professors. That will last me through the end of the school year. I’ve applied for a few summer internships, and hopefully one of them will work out, and then after that, theoretically, graduate school.”

“Damn. You never stop, do you? It’s one thing after another. Now I get why . . .”

He trails off, and all my worst fears are coming true. We’ve barely been at the table for ten minutes and the differences between us are already abundantly clear. We do fine when we’re just joking or flirting or kissing, but beyond that? What do we have?

“Now you get why I need a list just to have a life?” I finish for him. “I did warn you that I’m usually pretty boring.”

“No, that’s not it at all. And you’re not boring. Stop saying that.” He places his fork down on the table forcefully enough to make a thud. After a pause, he continues, “I was going to say that now I get why you’re . . . starving.”

I squint at him and shake my head in confusion. “I’m starving?”

“Yeah. For adventure. For connection. I saw your face when you were sitting up on the Rusk statue. It was such a little thing, but your expression was like you were on top of a mountain, like you were taking a break and opening your eyes for the very first time in your life. I get it now. I understand. That list? I don’t think you’re doing it to have a life. I think you’re doing it as a last resort, like those shock paddles they use at hospitals. I think you’re trying to wake yourself up. Before it’s too late.”

It’s as if he’s just reached into my chest and handed my heart to me, and all I can think is . . . touché. I tore him down when we first met, pinpointed his flaws, so I suppose turnabout is fair play.

“You’re giving me too much credit. You’re right . . . I have missed out on a lot, and it has made me eager to make up for what I’ve lost. But that list is just a list. It’s a challenge to myself to explore a different side of life. Not a cry for help.”

“You’re a smart girl, Nell. You don’t think it’s possible that you latched on to that list as a lifeline because a part of you needed it? Otherwise, if it was just about having a little fun before you graduated, why step so far outside of your comfort zone? You could have just made more of an effort to hang out with Dylan and stupid-name Matty. You could have done things you already know you enjoy. There’s a middle ground here, and you jumped right over it into the deep end. No one does that unless they’re already drowning in some other way.”

I think a tiny piece of me falls in love with him then. Because despite how different we are, despite the fact that he’s known me just two weeks (two crazy and overwhelming weeks), he’s managed to put words to the choking feeling that had me crying to my mother not long ago. My life has always been about forward motion. From the first time I walked into a cafeteria alone and realized I didn’t have anywhere to sit. In elementary school, we were seated in alphabetical order, according to our last names. It didn’t even occur to me that middle school would be different until I stood there, tray in hand, and realized that there was no one I wanted to sit with, and no one who wanted to sit with me. So lunch became a time to focus. To study. Then it was that way after school, too, while I waited for the bus. Then it was Saturday nights. As long as I stayed busy, I didn’t have to acknowledge that I had no other options. It was work and study or . . . nothing. That was all I had.

I only function when my mind is focused on a goal, and I’m driving toward it. And yet, for the past few weeks, I keep getting sidetracked. And maybe he’s right. Maybe that list is my way of putting on the brakes. I’d thought as long as my schedule was overflowing with assignments and commitments and projects, it meant that I was full. That there were no holes in me. But all those goals are just temporary distractions. Sand through a sieve. The minute the sand has passed, the holes are visible again.

“I like my major,” I tell him, my tone defensive not because of anything he’s said, but because of the way I can feel my thoughts pulling back to that place I try to avoid. “I like the idea of being on the edge of the future. There are so many possibilities in biomech. One of the summer internships I applied for involves biomedical research with NASA that could completely revolutionize space travel. NASA. I think that’s so cool, and it sounds right up my alley. Most of the time, I’m eager to get started.”

“And the rest of the time?”

I take a deep breath, brace myself, and say, “The rest of the time I doubt everything.”

He pushes his plate aside and scoots his chair a little closer to mine. His hands slide halfway across the table toward mine before stopping.

“You know, yesterday my coach said he thinks I stand a chance at going pro. I can’t tell you how long I’ve been waiting to hear someone besides me say that. It’s all I’ve ever wanted. When I figured out I was good at football . . . it gave me an identity. It gave me definition. I have sisters, have I mentioned that? Six of them actually. I was the only guy in this huge family of women.”

“That explains why you’re so comfortable around them.”

He reaches one hand out then and snags mine, pressing my knuckles on the table and drawing his fingers over my palm.

“It’s hard to live in a house with that many people. I was smack-dab in the middle. Not the oldest. Not the youngest. And for a long time, I felt like just one in a crowd. I had my sister Victoria’s eyes, and Sofia’s nose, and my personality was mixed and matched and patched together from other people in my family. And I just kind of . . . was. Until I found football. It was something that was mine. I didn’t have to share it with any of my siblings. And Fridays were the one night a week when my big family got to revolve around me. It gave me confidence. Pride. Purpose. Football gave me everything.”

He hesitates, drawing his fingers from my palm, closing them over my own, and then folding my hand into a fist. “But that was then. I was just a kid, and now I’m not. And over the years, I’ve given up so much for football. Things that I can never get back, things that have changed me as a person. And I can’t help but wonder what else I’ll have to give up before all is said and done. And as amazing as it was to hear someone else bring up going pro, a part of me wishes Coach hadn’t said anything. Because it’s a lot easier to be certain from afar, but when things get real, when they’re within your grasp . . . it’s a totally different story.”

“That’s it exactly. I’ve always been so sure. I’ve never wavered. I decided what I wanted to do, and I put my head down, and I got to work. But now . . .”

“It’s real.”

I nod. “It’s real.”

And so I went searching for something that wasn’t. Something that was so completely different from my life that it might balance the scales and stave off reality.

I look at Mateo then, his big body folded onto our measly kitchen chairs. His eyes are so warm and open and understanding. And it occurs to me that I went searching for something artificial with my list and found far more truth than I know what to do with.