Chapter Fourteen | Cold/Mess

♫ cold/mess by Prateek Kuhad

I'm convinced that I don't know how to be. I could be sitting in class, listening to the lecturer, and then completely tense up all of a sudden. My shoulderblades will feel like they're pricking into the backrest of the seat and I'll forget how to relax my lips, so I'll roll them in and chew on them and purse them and think about how weird I must look to everyone as I'm doing it.

I'm overly aware of what I do: the things I do and don't control, the way my muscles tense and stretch and then get stuck in every inch of my body, until my toes feel uncomfortable in my shoes and my bones feel uncomfortable in my skin. It feels like a curse.

I think maybe it wouldn't bother me so much if I wasn't ever made to be so aware of it growing up. Now, wherever I am, I'm fighting the urge to duck and hide. To be safe and protected by invisibility. Maybe that was always part of New York's charm for me: nobody cares (not as much as they did back home) because nobody sees.

As the day of the gala nears, I find myself growing more and more afraid. I can't even enter a quiet classroom or throw the core of my apple away when everyone else is seated, and yet I've accepted an invitation to an event that'll inevitably strip me of my invisibility and put me in the limelight. The things I do will be seen and looked at, the things I say will be heard.

For now, though, it's just a late Thursday afternoon. I suggested getting some work done at the Elmer Holmes Bobst library with Logan earlier, since I wanted to make up for flaking on him on Monday. We're both quite busy with our normal courses and with Halloween and Thanksgiving around the corner, neither of us expect to get much done in the middle of the holidays. The only way I figured we can at least spend some time together, is if we combine it with studying.

I peek over the top of my laptop. Logan's sitting across from me, elbows on the tabletop and hands in his hair as he reads from a textbook.

"Are you ready for the presentation?"

Logan looks up at me, frowning deeply. "What presentation?" He asks. "We have a presentation?"

"Yeah, for Writing 101. Next week."

"Shit," he curses, dropping his hands and shoving the textbook aside so his laptop can take its place.

I watch him closely as he seems to grow more and more agitated. I've never seen him like this before. This unbalanced, this chaotic, this stressed. Logan's always kind of been the calm one, because he never had anything to worry about. Nothing school-related, anyway, it's always been easy for him.

Up until now.

I take my empty tumbler from my bookbag and stand up from my seat, hovering beside the table. "I'm gonna get some hot chocolate. Do you want some? I'll help you put together your presentation when I'm back."

He glances up at me, the knot between his eyebrows dissolving. "Yes. Do you want to help? Aren't you busy?"

"I only have a few slides left, it's fine. I'll help."

He nods resolutely. "Thanks, Nova. That'd be great. And I'll take a hot chocolate, too." He turns back to his laptop, this time visibly more relaxed.

I tap my fingers (more like a claw thanks to the tension in my muscles and joints) on the table. "Do you have a bottle or a tumbler I can put it into?" I ask.

"They don't have cups at the machine?" He responds, without looking up from his screen.

"They do, but it's paper, so I can't—"

"Never mind, then."

I frown at him, but he doesn't even notice. My muscles tense in my hands and my knees, and I bend and stretch them for a bit before I leave, passing table after table of students quietly reading and working before I finally make it to the coffeemaker.

It's hard taking steps when my muscles feel like this. Sometimes it almost feels as though the tension makes them heavier, and it's more of a weight I'm fighting against than a part of my body that's supposed to aid me. I'm hoping that getting a hot drink will have some sort of healing power, or a calming effect, at least.

My hands tremble as I struggle to wrap one around the cup and the other around the top, squeezing just enough to twist it off. I decide to just get my cup on the little roster first and then slide it back with a finger, so that I get to ball my hands into fists and handle it all that way to suppress the shaking. I hate days like this.

Behind me, a pair of girls line up, chatting about a book they're both reading. It makes me nervous that they're waiting for me, but then I've always had that. A feeling swirling in the pit of my stomach that tells me I'm constantly, always an inconvenience to the people around me.

I fumble with my debit card before I scan it and then wait, trying to block out the girls' voices and instead zoning in on the machine that fills up my tumbler. I hold the top in my two hands, my fingers pressing into the metal with such force that it hurts, but I physically can't relax them.

Usually my body feels like this when I'm nervous. I know that I'm nervous about the gala tomorrow, but I didn't expect it to start this early. My joints are starting to ache from all the pressure inside of me.

The coffee machine resets to its starting screen, signaling that my tumbler's filled. I notice the girls behind me take a step forward, waiting for me to take hold of the cup and go, but my hand has trouble unfolding itself. I need to let go of the top part I'm still holding, reach forward and pull my cup closer, screw the top back on as I hold onto it, then lift it and go.

I feel the aching start in my neck, a little spasm that shoots to my shoulder so it twitches, down the length of my arm. I frown as I reach forward through it all, my hand still balled into a fist, when another spasm moves from my shoulder to my fingers, that knock against the cup until it nearly tumbles over.

Someone's hand shoots out and takes it before it can. I look up.

Logan wordlessly takes the top part from me and screws it on as he moves us out of the way.

"I'm sorry," I whisper, shoving my hands into the pockets of my sweatshirt and swallowing.

He looks at me. "For what?"

I shake my head, not knowing. Sorry he had to save me. Sorry I couldn't get him anything.

"I'm the one who's sorry," he says. He makes sure the tumbler is properly screwed shut by lifting it to his eye-level and twisting it in front of his eyes, then hands it back to me. "I was being rude just now."

I find myself avoiding his eye. We start down the library again, back past the rows of tables and to our seats. "Are you okay?" I ask him as we sit.

He shrugs and once again pulls his laptop closer. "I'm... getting by, I guess," he sighs. "You?"

I mimic him. The hot chocolate is still steaming and I can't drink it anyway, so for now I put it at the end of the table, away from our electronics. "Me, too."

"You seem good. You have so many friends."

I look up at him. Logan's smiling softly at me, but there's something to it I can't quite put my finger on. Maybe jealousy, or maybe sadness. Maybe he liked how it was just us in high school. Things are different now.

"I just see a lot of people regularly. I don't think many of them are actually friendships. Not like us. I mean, not in the way that you and I are friends," I tell him.

"What way is that?"

"We seek each other out. We text." I shrug and look down at my hands, still balled into fists in my lap. I want to relax them, stretch my fingers and go back to my coursework, but they insist on holding onto the tension, pulling it all the way from my shoulderblades to my neck to my shoulders to my elbows to my hands. A constant flow of tension pulling at my muscles, locking me into place. It hurts, physically, but I stay quiet about it and wait for it to pass.

I refocus on Logan. "What about you? Have you really been this busy with your courses the past two weeks, or did you hang out with people?"

He shrugs, picking at his fingers. "I spent some time with the guys from the team. But I don't have the kind of friendship with my roommate you have with yours. You know how rare that is, right?"

"My relationship with Olivia?"

He nods in response. "You guys were friends from the start. Most people don't have that."

"I think that's just because I involved her," I say. "When Milo invited me to that party, I could've just told her I'd see her later, in hindsight. But I just figured, we're both new here, so I'll treat her the way I'd want to be treated. You can still do that, you know."

"Invite Wesley places?"

"Mhm."

"I think it's too late for that. We've kind of grown past each other these last few weeks. And, he's a third-year already. I don't think there's anything I can do with him he hasn't already done in his time here."

"Then, reverse the roles. Ask him if he knows a cool spot in the city."

Logan tilts his head sideways, squinting his eyes. "Would you ask your roommate that if you never talked to them before?" But he already knows the answer to that.

"No."

"My point exactly." He lifts his head. "You and I, we're not so different."

I don't say anything to that. We are different, polar opposites even, but I don't feel like disagreeing with him.

"Have you had any contact with your family?" I change the subject. Logan and I are both family-oriented and spent a lot of time at each other's houses back home. It seems to me that if he's been having a hard time, his family is who he'll turn to first.

But he shakes his head. "Barely. My mom called a few times, and I see what Elle's doing on Instagram, but I haven't really had conversations with them. You?"

"Me, neither."

My parents called every night during the introduction week, but we quickly realized that it was getting a little excessive. Besides, I was doing fine. It's only when they stopped calling that I figured, maybe they were the reason I was doing fine. By then I managed to find some comfort in Hyde's talk group and as classes started, I was able to indulge myself in the joys of studying like I'm used to.

"Maybe that's our problem," Logan suggests. He offers me a small smile and places two flat hands on the table. "I have to pee. Be right back."

I take a few minutes to watch him go, wondering if he feels the tension I'm experiencing in his own body. I know him well, but I don't know how his fear manifests itself. If it's a physical kind of pressure, pushing at his insides, making him nauseous, or if it's a mental kind, chipping away at his confidence, tiring him out.

I wish he'd tell me about it. But I don't tell him about mine, either.

I look down at my hands that are laying in my lap, shielded underneath the table. My left is battered and ugly: a fresh, red cut runs from my wrist to the knuckle of my ring finger. I accidentally scratched myself this morning, when I went to push my duvet aside and jerked out of nowhere from a spasm that originated from my shoulder blade. I haven't been able to sit comfortably or relax since.

I'm not sure if I've ever talked to anyone about it. My old physician and I only ever discussed my legs, and Claire and I only ever discussed my social skills, and I never wanted to upset my family by telling them how much I was actually struggling, and how often I actually experience this pain. I always just figured that it wasn't the time or place to talk about it. And if that wasn't an excuse I could use, I told myself no-one wanted to hear it. There's nothing they could— can, do about it, anyway. I'd be telling people just to tell them.

I lift a heavy arm to shut my laptop with a fist, about to reach for my phone when a loud ringtone blares through the silence of the library, coming from Logan's bag. I stand and reach over the table, ignoring people's dirty looks, to pull his bag to me and silence his phone. Who's calling is not my business, and I'm not going to pick up on his behalf.

I drop his phone back into his bookbag when something catches my eye. The corner of a little plastic bag sticks out of the pages of a textbook, just barely revealing a thin red line along its edge. I furrow my eyebrows as my curiosity gets the best of me. For the first time today, my fingers finally work with me as I tug it out.

The plastic bag is filled with a bunch of little, white pills. Some have been crushed underneath the weight of the textbook's pages, it seems, and have crumbled to a white powder. I would've given Logan the benefit of the doubt, had there not been a small note peeking out from underneath the pills. 'Do better', it says. The realization hits me like a truck: these aren't medicine.

They're steroids.

It shouldn't surprise me. He's obviously been struggling, and I know he has. He even told me about it on our first day, expressed that he felt like the team was bonding over their annoyance of him.

Could it be that they've given him these pills? That they've scribbled 'do better' on a note, shoved it in, and pressured him into taking them? He just started out, and he was so excited about it. I never saw him as the type to give in under the pressure.

We've had conversations about this, even, back in high school. There'd been a whole health class dedicated to drug abuse and we'd met at the beach after. It was shocking to both of us how misuse of anabolic steroids could lead to depression, heart attacks, strokes and even suicide. I made him promise me he'd never do it.

"I won't, Nova," he'd said, flashing me a smile that was both vibrant and calming. "You and I both know I don't need it, anyway."

He did seem less confident in his abilities after that camp he went on with the athletic department in the introduction week. He wouldn't tell me what happened, then, and I let it slide. I let a lot of it slide. Maybe, him not contacting me the past few weeks should've worried me, not angered me.

How could I have missed this? I'm his best friend.

I blink a few times, not knowing what to do. At last, I scramble for my phone, take a few moments to hold it right, and snap a few pictures before I put the pills back where I found them.

I can figure out how to approach him about this, or tell someone soon, but while I decide how to navigate it all, I at least have proof.

I sit back in my seat, heart racing. He didn't win this scholarship by slacking off— I should've known when he didn't even realize we have that stupid presentation next week. Am I actually that blind?

"Should we get started then?"

I look up.

Logan's approaching the table, wiping his hands on his sweatshirt. "Let's head to a café, though. If we work together on this presentation, we'll disturb everyone here." He doesn't await my reaction but instead starts shoving his stuff back into his book bag, not knowing I held it in my hands just moments before. "Don't forget your hot chocolate." He smiles at me the same way he did on the beach that day, but it's not vibrant nor calming this time.

I nod warily, collecting my own books and laptop, clutching my tumbler in my two tensed hands. I'm not sure how I'll relax now. I have a lot more to be worried about than just tomorrow's gala.

☼

I swipe my Metro Card and move through the turnstile, holding my phone close to my chest as I zoom into the map. Elle's apartment is somewhere in Williamsburg. I got the address off of Flynn, who spends almost every weekend there and is there today.

It'll be nice to see my brother again, but most of all, I want to tell Elle what I suspect is happening with Logan. She's older than us and his sister, she'll know how to navigate it. It's not something I think I can handle on my own— and I'm not so stupid as to keep this to myself and watch Logan destroy himself.

It's the first time I've been to Williamsburg, and the first time I've taken the subway on my own. It's something I've been putting off, because the idea of traveling on my own has scared me away, but now it's in the name of a greater good. In the name of being a good friend.

I drop my Metro Card in the pocket of my coat (I finally washed the chalk off a few days ago) as I turn onto Metropolitan Ave. Flynn gave me a description of Elle's building: grey bricks, black stairs, with a brown soffit and a bare tree in front of it. I locate it across the street.

Flynn's waiting for me by the front door of Elle's apartment. It hits me just how much I've actually missed him when I lay eyes on him, his slanted eyes and the mole underneath his right eye, his long hair, how tall he is.

It was weird when he moved out. I think I got used to him (and Sofia) being so far away. I just knew that they were at college, but had no idea what that looked like. Now, I know it. He looks like a grown man, not the boy a room over at home that always complained about how long his sisters took in the bathroom.

I disregard his hatred of hugs and walk up to him, throwing my arms around him.

"Nova..." he draws out with a grunt, obviously irritated. But he doesn't push me away, which must mean he missed me, too. I'm actually sure he did.

"You're like an old man," I say, taking a step back with a fond smile.

Flynn gives me a deadpan look. "Seriously?" He shakes his head, turning and pushing the door to Elle's apartment open with his foot. "You say that every time we see each other after a while of being apart."

"That's because I'm not used to adult-Flynn," I respond with a short laugh. "I'm used to kid-brother Flynn."

He doesn't reply to that, but instead knocks on a door we pass in the hall. "Elle, finish your business, Nova's here."

"Hey, Nova! I'll be right out!" Elle calls. The echo in her voice tells me she's in the bathroom.

"Okay!" I call back, continuing to follow Flynn further into the apartment as I unwind my scarf from my neck.

Doing so reminds me of being at Atlas' place. There's such a contrast between his penthouse and Elle's apartment: his is darker, overall, grey walls and dark sleek furniture and hardwood floors. Elle's apartment feels more lived in, it's full of clothes strewn over furniture, a pile of unread mail by the front door, a dent in her sofa, open textbooks and newspapers and a laptop on her dinner table.

I understand why Flynn spends so much time here. It's a home. It feels a million times warmer than a dorm. It almost looks too perfect, even, like the set of a sitcom where everything just makes sense.

"She has food poisoning from some sushi we had last night," says Flynn as he wordlessly pours me a cup of lemonade. "Normal people throw up when they get food poisoning, but Elle gets excessive diarrhea."

"Why would you tell me that?" I scrunch up my nose and take the cup from him. He's filled it halfway, and used a mug instead of a glass so I can hold it easier. It's a small gesture, one only my family ever does effortlessly, and I realize in that moment how much I've missed it.

"Flynn Carter, I swear to God, stop telling people I have excessive diarrhea." Elle Peterson enters the kitchen, her face thunderous but embarrassed. Her hair, a dirty blonde, is in a high messy ponytail. Like her brother, Elle's one of the smartest people I know, and even in her 'messy' looks she's put together and stunning. She turns to me and extends her arms. "Here, let me take your coat. How've you been, Nov?"

"I've been well." I smile at her and follow her back into the living room with my water, where she places my coat on the backrest of a chair and invites me onto the sofa. I sink right into the dent someone's butt made, but surprisingly it's actually really comfortable. It reminds me of sitting in Isla's wheelchair. It's comforting to know that someone lives on (or, in) this sofa. "Thanks for having me over."

"Are you kidding? Of course! You should sleep over sometime, too, just us girls. If Sofia's ever in New York, we should hang out," says Elle. "I've been trying to get Logan to come by, too, since we're finally in the same state again, but you know how brothers are."

Flynn scoffs from where he's taken a seat at the dining table. The laptop turned out to be his. He's typing up an essay, it seems. "I'm right here."

"I know you are, babe," Elle replies without turning to look at him. She continues, unbothered. "Anyway. I'll text you guys about that sometime."

"That sounds really nice," I tell her. I feel myself sink further into the sofa cushions and shift so I'm facing her more head-on, tightening and softening my grip on the mug. At least the comfortability of being around my family again, in a house as homely as this one, helps me feel safer. I still don't seem to have the ability to relax, but the stress of being in a public place and feeling like I should appear more put-together and normal than I actually am doesn't exist here.

I glance down at my water, unsure about how to say it. "Have you spoken to Logan recently?" I decide to ask.

"Hmm..." Elle trails off. "We haven't really talked. I just text him from time to time and he'll give me really dry answers, but that's nothing out of the ordinary. Why? Is something going on?"

I lean forward to place my cup of water on the coffee table and reach for my phone. I look at the pictures for a few moments before I pass the phone to Elle.

"I found these pills in his bag... I think they're steroids."

This catches Flynn's attention. He raises his head, frowning, and stands to come and look over Elle's shoulder.

"I wouldn't think much of it, but I'm worried about him. Ever since he went on that camping trip, he hasn't been the same. He expressed feeling like he wasn't good enough, feeling left out, and now he's losing track of his schoolwork. He even had a small injury a few weeks ago. I mean, he complained of a pain in his leg, but he hasn't had that before." I point to the bag of pills in the photo, specifically the note inside of it. "It says 'do better'. That's not something a doctor would put with his medicine and it's not his own handwriting. I just thought... I just thought you should know. I think something's going on."

Elle remains quiet. She seems confused as she looks at the picture, then hands my phone back to me. "Can you send me those pictures?" She asks, and I nod. Her hand finds Flynn's, that's resting on her shoulder, and she looks at me. "Thank you for coming to me with this, Nova. Logan doesn't take any medicine, never has, and if you believe something's up, I trust that. You know him better than anyone."

"What now?" I ask, my voice barely a whisper.

"I don't know yet. I'll confront him first, I think, and I won't lie to him when he asks where I got the idea or the pictures from."

I shake my head. "No, of course not, I'd never ask that of you."

She cracks a smile. "I know. But listen, I don't want you to carry this with you. Let me and my family handle this, okay? He'll be fine, we just need to help him before anything bad happens. We're not even sure if these are actually steroids."

"They are," Flynn states. "They're anabolic steroids."

Neither Elle nor I ask him how he knows that. I chew on my lip and shove my phone back into my pocket.

"Don't worry," Elle says resolutely. I'm not sure if she's talking to me or to herself. "We caught him early. He'll be fine."

My hands shake as I reach for my water and take a large sip. I hope he will.

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