Read My Lips(25)

The smile returns to my face. Today is just the best day ever.

The sun beams on me as I cross the campus later, heading for the University Center for a bit of lunch. Since Victoria forgot about our plans, I opt to eat by myself. I’m far too happy to feel bad. It’s not my fault I got cast and she didn’t. If I could give my part to Victoria, I totally would, but what would I have, then? The whole point of attending this university is to get a normal college experience and hone my craft. I’m sure Victoria will understand; she just needs time. Hell, maybe in a few days’ time, she’ll even help me with my lines. Victoria’s a good, kindhearted person.

After I pay for my turkey sub sandwich, which comes with a bag of baked potato chips and a soda I didn’t want but accept anyway, I search for an empty table. Noon is just the worst time to eat; this place is so packed, I can’t even hear my own thoughts.

When I come around the corner, I spot a booth with a familiar face. Sam, my roommate, is eating all by herself. Or, rather, she’s not eating at all. She’s seated there with a textbook spread out in front of her, looking bored as ever. Those ugly thick-rimmed black glasses swallowing half her forehead, she looks up, her beady black eyes finding mine. Her lips stretch into a long line, which I think is her trademarked version of a smile.

I plop down across from her. “Hey there, Sam!”

“Hi.” Her eyes drop down to my sandwich.

It doesn’t go unnoticed. “What’re you studying?” I ask, opening the crinkly wrapping to my turkey sub.

“Theory.”

Since my sub’s cut in two pieces, I lift the first half to my mouth and take a bite. “It’s so freaking busy in here,” I whine through a full mouth. “And so loud!”

“Yeah.” She swallows, staring at my hands.

“Have you eaten already?” I ask her.

“Yeah. I had … breakfast.”

I don’t know how, but I suddenly suspect that my roommate skips meals and saves every penny she’s got. Maybe her parents’ weekly-or-monthly allowance is regrettably meager at best. Maybe she didn’t eat.

“Y’know, I’m not gonna be able to finish all this,” I confess. “Want the other half of my sub?”

“Oh.” Sam shifts in her seat. “No, it’s … it’s okay. I’m not that hungry.”

“Well, guess that second half’s gonna go to waste.”

She stares at it dubiously. I nudge the remaining half of the sub I was totally planning on eating toward her. After a moment of hesitation, she picks it up and takes a bite. From the way she eats, it’s clear how very hungry she was indeed.

Not to say the sight of her scarfing down the sub is the prettiest thing I’ve ever seen. I suffer staring at a speck of mayonnaise on her chin for a solid five minutes before she wipes it and licks it off her finger.

Just before I put the last bite past my lips, I see Clayton through the mess of people in the cafeteria.

Fuck. He’s here.

I never see him anywhere on campus except for the theater.

My insides seize up. The last delicious bite of my lunch is left on the table, forgotten. My eyes zero in and the only thing that exists in the world is his muscular frame as it slowly strolls by in the distance. Just at the sight of him, my legs squeeze together.

I can’t explain that last reaction.

“What’s wrong?” asks Sam flatly.

“I’ll be right back.”

I ditch the booth and cut through the masses, my feet flying as if there were no floor beneath them.

I maneuver around all the annoying tables that stand in between Clayton and I. My feet nearly catch the strap of some guy’s backpack that rests by his feet. My elbow knocks into some girl who shouts a protest at my back that I don’t hear.

I find Clayton standing near the double glass doors at the entrance to the cafeteria, the sunlight cutting through and painting his face in shades of white and yellow, making his dark demeanor glow like some beautiful, otherworldly being. He stares down at his phone, his biceps bulging from holding the screen to his face. The plain black shirt he wears hugs every contour of his body, tapering down to meet his sexy jeans, which are torn at the knees.

He is sex in the shape of a man. God …

He looks up, and when his eyes meet mine, there is electricity there. Kill me now. His face changes, and his heavy-lidded, dark stare penetrates me. All that bright confidence I had a moment ago is sucked into my throat, rendering me unable to breathe. He’s so sexy. He’s got that distinct, bad-boy handsomeness, his cheeks dusted with a five o’clock shadow and his eyes catching the light from outside, making them appear like two shimmering chips of glass.