I’m here for me tonight, so I’m not going to allow the thoughts of others into my headspace.
So, I accept his offer, falling in line beside him, and we keep toward the farthest point of the back yard.
At the fence’s edge, he drops down onto the grass, so I follow, and slowly my eyes adjust to the darkness around us.
Tobias takes a slow drink from the bottle in his hand, and his shoulders seem to fall. It’s as if he too has a lot on his mind, but his way of forgetting his problems for a while is to focus on mine. He studies me. “So, you came here to forget something, but you’re stone cold sober.”
I scoff, looking off. “Trust me, I wish I weren’t.”
“Let’s hear why.”
My head snaps toward his and he lifts his brows expectantly.
“I’m drunk, you’re sober. I’m hot, you’re gorgeous. Clearly you should tell me some dirt.”
“That makes no sense.”
“Not much does in college.” His lips curve.
Okay, fair enough. “You first.”
“Pshh.” He shifts so he can lean his elbows on his bent knees. “What’s there to tell? All my dirt is right there for all to see.” His eyes find mine. “Media loves trouble.”
“How much trouble can a guy who hangs out outside of parties really get into?” I tease.
His grin tells me I was right to have sensed his sarcasm, to understand it for what it was.
“Exactly.” He gives a hard jerk of his chin. “I like you.”
“You don’t know me.”
“Don’t need to.” He shakes his head. “Thinkin’ I want to, yeah, but I already like you regardless.”
“Yeah?” I lean toward him. “And what is it you like exactly?”
I expect him to have to think, to search for something good to say that won’t sound made up on the spot, but he doesn’t take a moment to think.
The man speaks without a single second’s hesitation.
“I like that you ignored me instead of coming to me. I like that you knew I was watching and didn’t do a damn thing to make sure I kept on. I like that you tried to escape me, and I like that you didn’t want to walk with me.” His grin comes out again then. “I mean, I like it more that you did, but ...” He laughs, and I bite my inner lip to keep from grinning. “I like that you walked around all night on your own, that you didn’t need a gang of girls to stand beside to make you feel better or secure, and I like that you’re the only girl here in a hoodie and jeans.”
I roll my eyes playfully. “I doubt that.”
“Don’t.” He laughs, but then his features morph into something a little deeper, more thrilling. “But most of all, I like that you asked me to tell you something.”
My throat begins to itch and I’m forced to clear it. “Yet you told me nothing.”
“I was still deciding if you were playing games or not.”
“And now?”
“Now I know you aren’t.”
“All because I wanted to talk?”
“Most girls have no interest in talking to me.” He stares me dead in the eye, and I stare right back.
It’s odd, his words of choice lead me to assume they’re spoken from a place of conceit, as if he’s bragging about his escapades, but his tone doesn’t quite match.
It’s almost as if he disapproves of them and their choices.
In himself and his choices.
Call it a hunch, I guess.
Or naïve thinking.
“Tell me your name,” he says then.
My smile is small. “Meyer.”
“Meyer. I like it.”
“Of course, you do, you’re drunk,” I tease.
“Maybe. Still like it though.” He nods and then looks out over the yard. “So why you here tonight, Meyer?”
I take a deep breath, and when I open my mouth, a dejected laugh comes out. “To forget,” I say before I rethink it. “I came here tonight to forget.”
He looks to me again and I’m not sure what I expected, but what he does say isn’t it.
“Don’t we all in some way?” He squints at the bottle in his hands. “To forget the shitty week we had or the test that’s coming up, the argument with our friends or ... shitty home visit with our family.”
“The craptastic reality we somehow found ourselves in.”
He grins and looks to me. “Exactly. We can bust our asses, but at the end of the day we’re what the world makes of us. Expectation is a bitch, huh?”
“I’d drink to that.”
He offers me the bottle, but I laugh it off with a shake of my head.
“What if I don’t want to be what’s expected?” I ask, more to myself but looking to him. “What if I want to blow statistics out of the water and become more? What if I want to be the success story?”
Tobias gauges me for a long moment. Maybe even a full minute before he nods his head.