Chapter Five: I Hate Delilah

"You're a lot of pretend, Sophie," Delilah once told me. I couldn't bring myself to care.

Delilah was our roommate last year. She was the only one of our roommates who didn't leave the apartment in a huff, she simply left to go to graduate school in Europe. If she hadn't left, would we still want her around?

Absolutely not.

I never liked her, I guess it's because I find it hard to like anyone who has bangs.

She came from a wealthy family but resented her parents for some reason and saw herself as adventurous, artistic and fun. She looked like the girl next door, cute, small, brunette — but she had a massive rack that would literally make Shawn's eyes pop out of his head whenever she'd parade around with it all squeezed up out of the front of her V-neck shirts. It looked like just a lot of baby fat and somehow no bra could hold that amount of boob in a good way so anything she wore that wasn't a V-neck instantly resulted in a uni-boob.

Delilah was as much of a slut as Shawn and I, but she would have sex the loudest and according to her, it was always amazing, every night was the best night. I sometimes contemplated getting a hand-me-down man from her just to see if I was judging her too harshly.

I actually didn't mind the noise. Occasionally it was exactly what I needed to get the mood going with some of the dudes I hooked up with. Shawn and I became accustomed to Delilah's loud love-making. We would be sitting, studying quietly in my room or in his when suddenly it would start. At first we would both look at each other, thoughts of sex flashing through our heads, but later on it didn't even make us pause.

I was getting an apple from the kitchen late one night a few days before winter break of Junior year when Delilah started up again. I bit into my apple, walking across the living room towards my room when I noticed that her door was wide open and no one was inside. I turned my head towards Shawn's closed door, from which Delilah's pleasured screams and moans were rising.

It had only been a question of time.

I don't feel jealous when Shawn sleeps with another girl, it's only sex.

It's like I'd feel jealous if Shawn watched porn, or whenever he jerked off. After you do it enough, sex can be just as meaningless as using your own hands. He always remains detached and unaffected. Girls can't stand his lack of warmth for long. They try to change him, but trying to change Shawn is like beating your head against a sheer wall of ice.

The next day, I was surprised to find that there wasn't even an ounce of awkwardness between Delilah and Shawn. She sat with us at breakfast, like she sometimes did if she managed to wake up early enough. She and Shawn were talking about something and apparently, it was hilarious.

I didn't know what they were laughing about so early in the morning. "There's no limit to your imagination, baby," Delilah said to Shawn.

"Will you stop that, already?" he replied with mock annoyance. "I was half asleep."

Delilah hollered with laughter, holding her stomach. "Every man has his excuses."

I munched my cereal in stoic silence.

"It's not an excuse!" Shawn cried defensively. "Really, I speak gibberish when I'm half asleep. Ask Fee."

Delilah dutifully turned to me. "Sophie, how many eyes does a frog have?"

"No! Don't ask her that!" Shawn exclaimed.

What the hell was going on? I suddenly felt like I was having breakfast with them.

It took me a while to understand that this was going to be an exclusive thing.

That's how it started, Shawn's first real girlfriend after he and I dated in high school. He looked at Delilah differently than how he looked at other girls, he talked to her almost in the same way that he talked to me. She spent every night in his room, she hung around him like a fly hangs around poop.

There were no more quiet Shawn and Sophie evenings.

Delilah had taken my place.

Great, I thought to myself. I was done depending on him. I may have forgotten a little what being me, alone, was all about — but it was time I remembered.

***

"Is this seat taken?"

One day, Sam Flynn sat next to me in Chemistry. I noticed him before because he had blond wavy hair that reminded me a lot of Landon. That day he wasn't wearing his glasses and his eyes, I noticed, were green. I can't say Sam was attractive just because of his hair, eyes and his boyish face. It was because he always looked cocky and was sarcastic whenever he had an opportunity. Aside from that he was a bit on the geeky side, and not extremely athletic. I could somehow tell that his beauty would wear off by the time he reached his mid-thirties.

But for now he would do.

I gave him a once over and then shrugged one shoulder. "That's up to you," I said.

It took him a moment to gather my meaning and the smirk he wore was a cute attempt to look cool. He settled down, pulling out his computer. When he was done, he bumped his shoulder against mine. "Want some gum, Sophie?"

"I'm good," I said. I hate gum.

"How did we never talk before?"

I sighed. "Is that really how you're going to start this conversation?"

"No good? Can I try again?"

I took a moment to think it over. "Go for it." I turned my face back to the front of the class. The professor wasn't in yet.

Sam tapped my arm with his finger. I cocked an eyebrow at him.

"I've been meaning to ask you," he began, "is that your natural hair colour?"

Ah. That was better. I could then tell that he wasn't the sort of guy who'd be taken aback by a bold girl. "Well, Sam," I said in a low voice, leaning towards him and letting my hand fall to his thigh. "Why don't you find out for yourself?"

He was pleasantly surprised. The professor came in just then and my hand went higher. I smirked, showing him how a badass smirk was done. He gasped quietly as my hand found its mark and the rest of the class was spent preparing for what was to come.

***

"Turn over onto your stomach," he commanded, yanking back my hair. It ached a little to the point of almost hurting — but it didn't hurt. Sam was a monster, a sadist. He took control of my whole body, bossing me around with juicy aggression. He was nothing like the person he outwardly projected. He was rough and vulgar in bed and so confident it was inspiring.

I approved! My God, I enjoyed it. It was refreshing to finally find a guy who knew what he was doing and how he wanted it.

"Fuck, Sophie," he said afterwards, when we were lying naked, side by side, on my bed. "If I'd have known you were such a dirty —"

I pulled a hair out of his chest. "Sam, the less talking, the better."

"Amazing," he said in the tone of someone who has just been enlightened by a new discovery. "Can I just ask you for one thing?"

I turned my body towards him and replied with silence.

"Can I have your number?"

"On one condition," I said.

He raised his eyebrows.

"You only call me when you want to fuck my brains out."

Sam became a regular. Sleeping with the same guy over and over does make for better sex, but that wasn't why I was keeping Sam around.

I didn't know why I invited him over that second time, or even the fourth. I didn't know until I saw how Shawn reacted to this.

"I've been seeing that guy here a lot," he casually said one morning after Sam left. Delilah was sleeping in. It had already been several weeks since she and Shawn had started and she had reverted back to her night-owl habits, leaving Shawn to have breakfast with me sometimes.

I shrugged in reply, quietly munching my toast. There was really nothing I could say. By then the Sam thing happened three or four times a week.

"Where'd you meet him?"

"In class."

There. Something about Shawn's expression changed. "I thought you didn't date people you study with."

"It's junior year," I explained, but didn't elaborate beyond that. Shawn would understand well enough how my mind worked to know what I meant by that.

"You know, Fee, he kind of looks like a wimpy version of Landon."

This may sound strange, but while Shawn and Landon both wanted me at the same time, they actually ended up getting along. If things were different, or if Landon didn't end up being the biggest bastard the world has seen, they would've been friends, I'm sure of it.

"I guess that's my type," I said, goading him.

And it worked. "I thought I was your type."

I rolled my eyes at his comment. "In your dreams."

A shadow fell across his face. I knew Shawn's hidden buttons, knew what made him tick and how to hold him at the end of my rope. I got up without a word, putting my plate in the sink and picking up my school bag.

"Where are you going so early?" he asked.

"I promised Sam we'd have coffee together before class," I said. "See ya."

He said nothing. I left without looking back. Knowing him, he knew exactly what I was doing.

Knowing him — it still worked.

There could be a new girlfriend, new emotional connections. There could be someone who will replace me in many places in his life. But I'm the only person on this planet who could get to him, manipulate him, giving voice to the darkness in his soul. No matter what happens, or what happened back then, Shawn's mine.

My monster.

With a few simple game moves, and few well placed words, I had started a process that would bring him back to me. I had reinstated my power over him.

But then Delilah went and ruined it.