Undeclared(89)

Lana was silent for a minute, and when she spoke, I could tell she was choosing her words carefully. “I thought you’d fall apart if you and Noah broke up. But even though you’ve been a mess emotionally, it’s nothing like you were when he wrote you and said he didn’t want to meet you.”

I was stronger, emotionally and mentally, than I was two years ago. Even though I had been torn up inside about Noah being with another girl in Vegas, I was still functioning. I could be alone and survive, even though I was happier with Noah. He might have slept with a girl in Vegas. He might have done two dozen of them. But Noah had written to me faithfully for four years. He had come to Central College, thousands of miles away from his base in San Diego. Josh was right. Everyone’s life had uncertainty. But my future wasn’t completely unknowable.

I had my camera. My family. And, if all went my way, Noah.

He had no one in his life but Bo. And me. He could have me if he wanted me.

I pulled up the bus schedule on my laptop. The bus service was nowhere near The Woodlands but it did go to the Spartan gym. I had showered and shaved every part of my body.

I pulled out the shirt Lana had bought for me the first night I saw Noah at the fraternity party. It wasn’t gym appropriate, but I knew Noah had liked it. He told me once that he had wanted to untie those bows with his teeth.

I considered putting on the silicone cups that Lana had given me to wear with this top but decided I would go without. It was an overtly sexual message, but I wanted there to be no misunderstandings.

It was cold out, and I threw on a pair of skinny jeans and a cashmere shawl. I flatironed my brown hair so it hung like a silk curtain down my bare back.

I inserted a pair of wide hoop earrings in my ears and carefully applied some mascara and eyeliner. I didn’t try too much because I knew I wasn’t the artist that Lana was with the makeup. I outlined my lips in rose and ran a tinted lip gloss over the top, making my lips look bee stung and wet.

Popping two mints in my mouth, I stuck my ID and debit card in my pocket along with my lip gloss. I slid my wedges on and double checked the bus route I stored on my phone. I’d need to make one stop and get a transfer and the second bus should take me within three blocks of the Spartan gym. Lana had wanted to drive me, but I wanted to do this all on my own, no safety net.

Both buses were sparsely populated. When the driver stopped at my destination, he warned me, “This isn’t a night club, girlie.”

“I know. My boyfriend is a fighter.”

“You best hustle inside, then, else he’ll be using those fists of his.”

Thanking him, I hopped off. It wasn’t just cold; it was freezing. I hurried the three blocks west of the bus stop to the Spartan gym. The lights above the gym were dimmed, and for a moment I had this terrible thought that the place was closed. I checked my phone. It was 7:30 and the gym didn’t close until 10:00. I pulled at the door, and it opened easily, a bell like sound occurring when the door opened. The sickly sweet smell of antiseptic and sweat assailed me, and I took a moment to acclimate myself.

There were the sounds of metal against metal as burly guys lifted bars heavy with weights. Another person was watching himself do curls in front of the mirrors. No one stopped me, although it seemed like everyone was looking.

I took a few more steps inside the gym, clutching the shawl around me. For a moment I wondered what the hell I was doing here at this nearly all-male enclave of muscle and sweat.

“You lost?” I heard a familiar voice call out to me, and I spun to my left and saw Bo standing there. He was shirtless, and he was unwrapping a long cloth from his hand.

“No,” I answered, straightening my shoulders. “I know exactly where I am.”

We stood there for a minute as he weighed my response against his own love for Noah. I must have passed, because he jerked his head toward the back room that held the boxing ring. “He’s back there.”

“Thanks.”

As I was walking toward the back room, I brushed by him and heard him say, “Don’t make me regret it.”

I saw Noah almost immediately, sitting on a bench against the wall. His elbows rested on his knees and his shoulders were hunched forward. Noah had always appeared solid and in charge, but in this moment he looked burdened by the weight of something.

My cork wedged heels made almost no sound as I walked toward him on the rubber mat floor that covered the expanse of the gym. It wasn’t until my feet were nearly under his nose that he even noticed another person was in the room with him.

“Not interested, babe,” he said without raising his head.

“You haven’t heard what I’m offering,” I said. His head jerked up and for a moment I saw a strong emotion blaze in his eyes. Relief? Love? I knelt down in front of him and placed my hands on his.