^^Chapter title credit: Song by Talk Talk.^^

{Raina}

He's staring at me again. I can feel it. Now that Ellen — or El, what she insisted I call her from the beginning — my roommate and so far my only friend, has pointed it out, it's hard to not notice.

"You know he's a Cromwell, right?" she says when we move up further in line, out of his line of sight.

"A what?" That doesn't even sound vaguely familiar.

"A Cromwell," El says, emphasizing it even more. "His dad owns, like, half of Ithaca."

"So he's rich, then?" He hadn't acted like he came from money, when we'd met.

"Of course." El gives me her classic inner-city-girl eye roll. No wonder, because she's from Manhattan, and her parents together own more than a hundred properties all over the city. They're like modern-day Astors or something. "Duh. Why else do you think he's even here?"

"Scholarship?" I shrug. That's how I got here, anyway. Even though it's not what I tell anyone, when they're telling me all about how wealthy their parents are.

"Listen, Rains, Cromwells don't come here on scholarship, okay? His daddy probably bought him a spot." She casts a somewhat envious look his way, even though we're almost to the front of the line.

"Yeah, probably," I say, but it just drives home the point that this really is a school for the rich. I was accepted only because I had stellar grades, test scores, aced the entrance exam, and I was a first-generation student. Not to mention I had to scrape together my own money even to apply, not a cheap fee.

"I don't mean to be so bitchy about it," El says through a sigh, something she does so I won't be able to tell if she's lying or not. Usually, I see right through it. "You're just a—"

"You can say it, El. I'm an anomaly." If anyone knew, it'd make me stick out like a sore thumb. I wasn't from New England, but a small town outside Cedar Rapids, Iowa. The town wasn't poor, but my family was, living on what my mom and I made since my dad was arrested and sent to prison my sophomore year of high school.

"No, Rains, you're just special." She shakes my arm. "A brilliant mind trapped in the flatlands of the Midwest."

"I don't know how, but you somehow made it sound worse." I pick up two trays, handing one to her.

She sighs again. "Hey, I'm happy for you. I can only wish that a Cromwell would stare at me."

≈

The guys are gone by the time we get our food and find a spot to sit. I try not to dwell on the fact that I'd probably only met Geoff by chance, and the fact that he'd been staring at me also another mere coincidence. Unwanted attention from guys was a norm in my life, starting with Dad, who'd been touching me inappropriately since I was eight. Then there was a string of bad relationships in junior high and high school, compounded by the fact that my dad erased anything those boys ever did.

That wasn't helped along at all by the fact that the guys got scared off when they tried to get intimate. Once they lifted up my shirt, they were usually gone pretty quick. Because, as carefully as I'd tried to hide it, they always found my torso spotted with cigarette burns one way or another. Dad's punishment, for trying to give any part of myself to anyone but him. A threatening voice in my ear, a searing pain against my skin, a hand plunging into my shirt and pinching me, sometimes so hard I found bruises.

I don't tell anyone, obviously. That's why I get dressed in the bathroom, so I don't have to explain it all to El. I haven't told anyone, not even Mom, why I was so scared of Dad. She found out he'd been sleeping with another woman, and kicked him out. I was relieved, but couldn't even get up the courage then.

I don't see Geoff again for the rest of the first week, and maybe that's better. Even though my most recent burn is three years old, I still shudder to think of what would happen if Dad was still in my life when I noticed the way Geoff looked at me.

Except I do see the other guy that was with him, the one with the glasses. He approaches me after the class we have together that Thursday afternoon, while I'm still packing up.

"Hey...so...Raina, right?" he says, stretching my name out into Rayyyna.

"Yeah." I push my hair out of my face and look up at him. His hair is tipped with blond, which on any other guy might look fine. But on this one, it makes him look like he's trying too hard. "Why?"

"Ridley Green," he says, trying for a lopsided smile but on him it's a grimace. "I...uh...I was wonderin' if you'd like to come to the barbecue tomorrow night with me."

"I was planning on going with my friend, actually." El had persuaded me with a you-absolutely-have-to speech, so not to appear so square, I agreed. "But I'll probably see you there."

"Yeah, probably." He actually seems a little disappointed, although I can't imagine why he'd suddenly ask me out of the blue. Unless it has something to do with Geoff. Which, judging by the way he's looking at me right now, it probably does.

"I'll see you around, Ridley, okay?" I try for subtlety to get him out of my way, but he's still blocking my path.

"Hold on a second," he says, his hand suddenly rounding over my hip and touching a circle of scar tissue. Billy Vincent, Christmas 1985. "Leaving so soon? How 'bout I walk y'all to your next class?"

"Don't touch me, Ridley." I push his hand away, trying to slip past him in the small space. "And I was going back to my room anyway. With my friend."

"Look, Raina." He's too fast for me, catching my shoulder and spinning me around. "You won't get far with a guy like Geoff. Thinks he's all that, you know."

"Actually, I'd say that more about you." I duck out from under his hand. "See you later, Ridley."

Then I turn on my heel and walk out without looking back.

≈

"What're you worried about, Rains? It's just a barbecue," El says to me the following afternoon, sitting at the foot of her bed and watching me pace, raking my hands through my hair over and over.

"Just a barbecue?" Something between a laugh and a scoff comes out. "You should've seen this Ridley Green guy, El. You'd have thought he was asking me to marry him, he was being so serious."

"Look, I'm sure he's just desperate. Guys have this weird thing where if they don't have a girlfriend by a certain point in their life, they feel the need to hunt one down as soon as possible." She rolls her eyes. "Personally I think it's pathetic, but what can we do?"

"Not indulge him is what we can do." I can't believe he touched me without permission, like he thought somehow that would make me give in. Eight years of that, day in and day out, was enough to make me lose trust in any guy.

"Rains, really. Guys get handsy all the time. When they do it, they think they have some sort of power over you or something. Green's probably not any different."

I know she's just trying to help. I'm lucky to have found an ally so soon, really. But she hasn't had to endure her father molesting her, burning her with lit cigarettes, threatening to violate her when he sees another boy so much as look at her. And she can't tell anyone about it, because she's afraid her own father will threaten her with more.

"Just stop, El." I dig the heels of my hands into my eyes, and then into my hair. "Please."

"Okay, okay, fine." Instead of getting offended though, she backs down and changes the subject. "Hey, so, I know you said you didn't have anything to wear tonight. Want to have a look at something of mine? It'd probably fit you."

"Sure." I'm glad for the change. Any more talk about that and I'd probably slip into flashbacks. I'd been having them for years.

After fifteen minutes of holding different pieces of clothing against me and looking at it in the mirror, I finally decide on a yellow knee-length sundress with red flowers on it. It's long enough that it'll hide the scars on my thighs — because when Dad ran out of space on my torso, he just moved on to my legs — and isn't too plunging or revealing on top. El gives me a once-over when I've come back from changing into it, one corner of her mouth pulled up.

"Hate to admit it, Rains, but I think that fits you better than it fits me."

I smile back, running one hand over it. "Thanks, I guess?"

"That is a compliment, you know." She pulls me into her side, taller than me in the heels she wears on a daily basis. "It's cute on you."

While she gets changed, I take a crack at the hair straightener. Most of the time mine was just too curly to be manageable, but tonight it seems to cooperate a little more, and I'm able to get the curls to smooth out into waves. Mom told me once that it made me look older, which I don't know if I believe. Nothing I did ever made me feel that way, let alone pretty or beautiful. Sometimes I still feel trapped in my eight-year-old body, the first time my dad slid his hand up my shorts.

"Hey, you ready?" El breaks me out of my thoughts, and I'll always be grateful for her distractions. That's one thing she's great for.

"I guess." I set the straightener down and pull the plug.

"Wait a sec," she says, rummaging around in her makeup case. "One more thing."

Carefully, she brushes some mascara onto my lashes, and then hands me a tube of lip gloss. "El, it's a barbecue, not a dinner party."

"One thing you'll learn while you're here," she says, leaning back to inspect her handiwork, "is that every occasion is a reason for people to judge you. So you might as well put your best self forward."

The barbecue's in the main quad, a big rectangular courtyard with a rounded end and guarded by stately old trees. El lends me one of her cardigans to pull on over my dress. I can feel the chill in the breeze against my bare legs.

As we get closer, I hear the sound of voices, and the smell of meat grilling comes to me. My stomach growls, and I realize it's been a long time since I've had anything as good and wholesome as barbecue. I manage to beat El there by a few seconds, even, to get in line.

"You were hungry, weren't you?" she says, slightly breathless, when she catches up.

"One thing you should know about me is that I never kid about food." I smile at her over my shoulder.

"Oh, I definitely think that's been established."

While we wait, I let my eyes travel around the quad. I see some of the same groups of students from orientation week, socializing with each other tentatively. While I agree that everything's new around here, it's better than being stuck in a one-horse town. It feels like such a long way from home that I can forget about it, almost.

That's when I see him, leaning against the base of the statue with one foot propped on it. Next to him is the same guy I saw with him in the cafeteria, so broad and tall he dwarfs everyone near him. He's holding a red plastic cup and looks a little bored.

When I finally have my food, I let El know I'll be back in a second and make my way towards him. I need to tell him about Ridley. Something about him says I can trust him with it.

He looks up when I get closer, his eyebrows going up. He says something to the tall guy next to him and meets me nearly in the middle.

"Hey," he says, a tad nervously. "Raina?"

"Hi, Geoff." I smile, just a little, and he visibly softens.

"So...uh...good barbecue?" He nods at the paper tray in my hand. I'd settled on a cheeseburger, because Mom only let me have those as a treat. And a side of fries, drizzled with ketchup.

"I was just about to see." I pick up a fry and take a bite. It's crunchy, salty, and sweet all at the same time, and I roll my eyes up. "Wow."

"Good?" He grins.

"Yeah. Really good."

We find a relatively quiet patch of grass, and sit down across from each other. He swirls his drink around and stares at the ground, while I work on the cheeseburger. I feel the same kind of calm settling over me that I felt the first time I met him. He has a sort of closed-off-ness about him that I like. A guy with boundaries, finally.

"So you never told me you were a Cromwell," I say after I've finished, picking at what's left of my fries.

I see his shoulders tense. "It's not something I like to spread around."

"How is it that everybody just knows?" El seems to think so, at least. "I'd never even heard of you."

"Well, everybody from Bar Harbor to Stamford evidently has," he says, his sigh exhausted. "How about you? How is it that I've never heard of Raina..."

"Hardy," I supplement when he trails off. It's not my real last name, but as soon as I'd been legally old enough to change it, I did. I wanted to distance myself from my father as much as possible.

"Raina Hardy," he says, nodding. "Has a good ring to it. Like the writer."

I almost say I thought so too, but that'd bring up a lot of questions I'm not willing to answer. Instead, I just say, "Thanks."

He smiles a little. "So...uh...who is this mysterious Raina Hardy?"

"Just a girl from a small town in Iowa." I bite down on my lip and look away. "Nothing exciting."

"I see. The Wild West."

"It's about as not wild as you can get, actually." Still, I feel my ears get hot. Not because I'm talking to this boy that I've only known for a week, but already feel comfortable around, or even because I've managed to make some light-hearted banter with him. No, it's because he treats me like a human being. He's content with just talking to me, or at least that's what it seems like anyway. "It's more like the Tame West."

"Doesn't sound as exciting, though," he says, and when I flick my eyes up, I see him grinning. His teeth are so straight and white.

"Can I ask you something about Ridley?" I say after a while. I haven't seen him tonight yet, but maybe that's a good thing.

His brow furrows. "What about him?"

I rehash quickly what happened yesterday, and I see his eyes darken. By the time I get around to asking the question, he seems to have shut down completely. "Is he always like that?"

"Your guess is as good as mine," he says finally. "I hardly know him. He just kinda came along and inserted himself in with us."

"That answers my question, though." He seemed the type to insert himself anywhere, and then just drag the whole thing down. As intent as he'd been in trying to get me to come with him, I now understood what El meant. Maybe he is just really desperate, for more than just a friend group or a girlfriend.

Then suddenly, Geoff grunts in pain and I see his face contort.

"Geoff?" Alarm shoots through me. "You okay?"

He presses a palm to his forehead and nods, sweat beading on his skin.

"Geoff, say something." I push myself up on my knees, shuffling on them towards him. "What's wrong?"

"Don't." He raises his other hand to stop me, his voice rough and ragged. "Don't come any closer."

"Do we need to call 911, or...?"

"I gotta go," he says, suddenly straightening. "Sorry. I'll explain later."

Then he's gone, leaving his spilled drink behind. That's when El finds me, staring after him in puzzlement.

"Something wrong, Rains?"

I shake my head, disappointment boiling in my stomach. It's sharp and hot. "No, I...Geoff just seemed like he remembered something important he had to do and then just rushed off."

She sighs. "Don't they always."

"Can we go?" I stand up, brushing grass off my dress. "Like now, maybe?"

"Yeah." Her face registers understanding. "Sure we can."

I don't tell her, as we walk back, about how it'd looked like he was in pain before he ran off. It's something that, no doubt, will be explained later.