Random Acts of Hope (13 page)

“Window? That’s a little Romeo and Juliet, isn’t it?”

“I’m not fourteen and I have no plans to die over you.”

“I’m worth dying for.”

“Liam!”

I h
el
d my hands up in protest. “Al
l
right, al
l
right. But coffee. You and me and coffee. In Northampton at that little place right by the bicycle—”

She interrupt
ed
with the name
of the coffee shop
, then eye
d
me warily. “How do you know about that place?”

“Just meet me there
the
Tuesday
after next,
at 3 p.m. You working?”
I named the date.
 

“Not then. No class, either.”

I open
ed
her living room window and look
ed
out. Easy jump. Lots of bushes. This w
ould
be a breeze.

“Charlotte, she’s tracking the puke up the stairs, and it was pizza gyros and sangria—” The voice outside the door
wa
s increasingly desperate.

Char
lot
te laugh
ed
softly and shoo
ed
me out. With an easy swing of the legs I
was
on the ground, and she shut the screen.

“You realize I mean it abo
u
t coffee, right?”

Her eyes narrow
ed
to twin triangles, lips pulled into a killer pout that ma
de
me regret the distance. “You realize I meant it about missing you.”

And then she shut the fucking window, ma
de
a sweeping motion with her hands as if she
was
done with me, and open
ed
the door to handle the disaster that
had
just
unfurled in one of her staircases
.

I g
o
t to my car,
a dark blue Honda that had air conditioning that stopped working the year I got pubic hair,
and just as I
was
opening the driver’s-side door, an enormous squeal of a group of chicks fill
ed
the morning air. It
was
barely past
10
a.m., for fuck’s sake, and it
was
a university. What kind of freak
wa
s up at this hour? Other than me.

“Oh, my GOD, Anna, it’s, like, Liam McCarthy!” I was seconds away, and now
they were whipping out their phones,
pointed at me like a Spanish inquisitor’s version of the torture rack.

A bunch of bleary-eyed, smeared-makeup chicks who look
ed
like they
we
re all underage (and therefore dangerous) surround
ed
me, hands on my shoulders and forearms, taking selfies. The entire group smell
ed
like rancid wine coolers, way too much
Victoria’s Secret PINK, and Coconut Lime Verbena body lotion
.

The scent of beer goggles and booty texts.

“I’m just heading home,” I sa
id
, taking my time, inch by inch, to get out from their clutches. A few weeks ago I’d have picked the oldest-looking one, made sure she was eighteen, and had some fun with her, but now her touch—all their gropes—fel
t
so wrong. Weird. Gross.

Like getting
felt up
at work minus the money.

Windows beg
a
n to fly open as some of the girls scream
ed
out to friends; others ha
d
furiously flying fingers on their phones and
we
re texting friends, and someone sa
id
she
wa
s “first!” and got my pic on Snapchat already.

I look
ed
over at the door and s
aw
Charlotte in the silhouette, her face a mask. But she
was
shaking her head slowly. Some chick in Disney pajamas jostle
d
her as she fl
ew
down the stairs to my little band of groupies, then turn
ed
back and shout
ed
to Charlotte.

“Hey, Charlotte! This is Liam McCarthy! You know, from RAOC!”

RAOC? We ha
d
an a
c
ronym? Who knew?

Charlotte nod
ded
up and down,
n
ice and slow. “Really? Is that the military program?”

One of the chicks taking selfie after selfie with me stop
ped,
a sneer curling her lip up. She snort
ed.
“
That’s ROTC.
Stupid RD. Like she’d know anything about a hot band. She never goes anywhere. That woman’s a nun. Wrote me up for giving my boyfriend a BJ in the men’s room.”

She eye
d
me like that
was
something to brag about,
then asked:
“
You
want to get written up?”

Charlotte

I
couldn’t
believe the scene in front of me, and yet—I kind of called it.

I
totally
called it.

A friendly nudge from someone who cut through the doorway made me smile, because she didn’t keep going. She stopped and let out a long, slow sigh of disgust and amusement.

“Well, well, well. Liam McCarthy.” It
wa
s Maggie, her hair in knots, green and crazy like a bunch of fake asparagus ha
d
landed on her head. “I
sn’t
he that famous singer from that new band?” She
was
playing dumb and it ma
de
me bark with laughter.

Jordan, the
overeager
resident assistant, c
ame
running over, duty clipboard in hand. “What am I missing? It’s after seven now, so I’m not technically on duty, but there’s a crowd of people out here, like there was a fire alarm? A medical emergency? Should I call campus EMS?”

“Slow down there, hon,” Maggie said with her hand clapping Jordan’s shoulder. The gesture
wa
s nice but also a bit of a warning. A reining in. “It’s just a local rock star with a bunch of groupies around him.”

“Rock star?” Jordan look
ed
confused. “We don’t have rock stars here in western Massachusetts.
Other than that old guy, Jon Bon Jovi.
”

“
W
e do now.” Maggie wink
ed
at me and I cross
ed
my arms over my chest, pretending to ignore her.

Liam pick
ed
that exact moment to wink at me, too. Apparently I
was
winkable. Who knew? Half my mouth c
ouldn
’t help but smile as I watch
ed
an alarmingly large crowd form around him, now about twenty giggly, half-drunk, half-asleep women who
we
re barely out of high school trying to get a little piece of Liam.

On their hands, in their phones, via their eyes—whatever it
took
.

“So what should I do?” Jordan
wa
s on the verge of panic, her voice high and frustrated. I put on my professional cap and g
a
ve her some advice. She need
ed
to be talked down.

“Sometimes, you just watch.” I pull
ed
her close and sp
oke
quietly into her ear. “
You’re not
even on duty now.”
 

“Neither are you,” Maggie said to me with a grin.

Treating
Jordan
like a fellow profes
s
ional
wa
s key, and this
wa
s true with younger women like her, I’
d
learned. She want
ed
desperately to be in charge, to be considered important because of her skills and knowledge. Honoring that
wa
s the best way to help give her the platform for launching into the professional world, but she also need
ed
to be tempered.

Just because an institution gives you authority doesn’t mean you gain any respect—not one ounce—from the people you’re supposed to manage.

Quite the opposite. Jordan need
ed
to be taught that sometimes the best way to handle crowd control is to let them burn themselves out. Feel the feelings. Behave in ways that take them to the edge, and then let them come back from the line all by themselves.

This
groupie scene wa
s harmless. It wo
uldn
’t get out of control. Frankly, Random Acts of Crazy
wa
sn’t that big. That special. That mind-blowingly popular.

Yet
.

“They’re just excited to see some guy from a local band here right now,” I explain
ed
. “Let them have their fun. If they step out of line, then you act. Just watch, for now.”

“But why is he here? Did he sneak in the residence hall and spend the night?” She stiffen
ed
. “That’s a policy violation, and maybe we need to find the woman who had him as an overnight guest and write her up.”

Maggie g
ave
me a knowing look and I stifle
d
a laugh. “
Remember what we said during training? Don’t go looking for policy violations. Let them come to you. The residents will generate more than enough of them. You don’t need to go on the hunt.” Besides, knowing
I
was the prey made this dicier.
 

“But then that’s not fair to the people who follow the rules!” she wailed.
Oh, Jordan
, I thought. I know that feeling so well. She’s a mini-me. I was just like her my first year of college.

Until.

I looked at Liam and couldn’t even see his face. He was
that
buried in long hair and pushed-up
boobs
and flailing arms with iPhones and
Android
phones and every phone you could imagine. Some of the women were actually
talking
on their phones now, which—for this age group—was akin to a massive emergency.

Maybe Jordan was on to something.

“You’re right that it’s not fair. But if you go
i
nto that crowd right now and interrogate them and ask Liam where he spent the night last night, what do you think will happen?”

Jordan’s eyes fl
ew
wide open. “They’d destroy me,” she hissed.

“They’d lose respect for you and the other R
A
s.” I pat
ted
her on the back sympathetically. “We aren’t here to control every person’s life. We’re here to make this a safe community. If the rock star s
p
ent the night in someone’s apartment—er, room—”

Maggie choked on her laughter. I kicked her ankle.
She got quiet.
 

“—then at this point we can’t do anything about it. Maybe send a reminder about overnight guests.”

That perked Jordan right up. “I’ll do a text blast right now!” She skittered off and back into the building.

Maggie groaned. “Overeager new RA.
She’s not even on duty!
”

“
They’re all overeager until they key into a room where there’s an orgy. Or remember last
year, after ComicCon, the Harry Potter cosplay thing?” I tried to scrub the image from my mind. Nothing like walking in on Harry Potter and Snape in the middle of some wild sex.
 

“Or the RA who insisted that 413 in Entenmen was growing pot plants on the windowsill, and ate a bunch to prove his point.” Maggie shook her head sadly. “Turned out to be some half-poisonous plant and he had to have his stomach pumped.”

“Power corrupts,” I said with a chuckle, eyes on the crowd.

“And tiny amounts of power seem to make the battles so much bigger,” she
adde
d.

Liam waved to me, and the entire crowd turned as one monolithic group of faces, agog and shrewd, watching carefully.

“Excuse me,
m
iss? Are you in charge here?” he asked.

Maggie turned away, laughing too hard.

“Why yes,
s
ir, I am. Technically, though, my friend Maggie Pritchard is the resident director on duty.”

Maggie
froze
suddenly, her face serious. “You need help?” she called out to Liam.

“I need a shovel.” Nervous laughter from the crowd. “Any way you can help me to…” He wave
d
his arms toward the crowd, the women still touching his arms and back. He took a few steps back and they moved with him. “I need to get in my car and go home.”

The crowd peppered him with questions and comments and requests.

“Where were you last night? Which room?”

“No! Don’t leave! My friend Heather is on her way and she wants to get a picture!”

“You just got here—where’s the rest of the band?”

“Is Trevor here?”

He shrugged and tried not to laugh.

Just as I was about to call them all off, a piercing scream filled the air. And not the kind you hear from an excited groupie.

“OMIGOD GET AWAY GET AWAY!” one of the girls yelled, and en masse the chunk of fused human flesh that had simply become Liam’s harem parted, leaving him in front of an empty driver’s-side door.

The screams escalated.
The back of my neck started to tingle, because there’s one thing you learn when you live with hundreds of women for years on end, and that’s how to distinguish a good scream from a bad scream.
 

“Thanks,
l
adies,” Liam said, grabbing his chance to leave. Instinct made me rocket down the dorm’s entrance stairs in bare feet, shooting past the gape-mouthed women as he climbed in. His car door slammed shut just as I reached the passenger side door, the women’s screams filling my ears.

And then I saw it, just as
L
iam began shouting, “WHAT THE FUCK!” and scrambled to get back out of the car as fast as he could. The women stood on the periphery, recording every moment. Some tiny sliver of awareness in the back of my mind made a note to check Twitter, Facebook, and Snapchat periodically throughout the day. And YouTube.