The Year We Fell Down (19 page)

“I just hope the next one treats you better. You deserve it.”

His words just hung there. They were nice words, but somehow they sounded like a dismissal. “Thanks,” my voice was quiet. “I’m sure it will be better. Yours too.”

“You never know,” he said. His voice sounded lost, somehow. “Look at the clock, Callahan. Happy New Year.”

I looked at the time on our cable box just as it rolled over from 11:59 to 12:00. “Happy New Year, Hartley,” I swallowed. And then I couldn’t stop myself from saying the thing that popped into my head next. “Don’t you have someone you need to go and kiss?”

He chuckled. “You Midwesterner, you. My New Year’s was an hour ago.”

Hell and damn. My little time zone blunder made me feel low. Because I was Hartley’s afterthought, the person he called when the real event was over. “I’d better go.”

“Take care of yourself, Callahan. I’ll see you next week.”

Ugh. Even those two minutes on the phone with Hartley worked their way under my skin. Even though I knew it was foolish, I spent the next day analyzing what I should or shouldn’t have said, and what I might have done differently.

Damien flew back to New York, and so I didn’t even have him around to distract me. I needed to stop thinking about Hartley, but my brain would not quit conjuring up his dimpled smile.

In my daydreams, Hartley snuck into my bedroom at night, pulling back the covers and slipping into my bed. There were very few words between us in my fantasies. In fact, there were only two. “I’m sorry,” Hartley whispered. And after that, there was only kissing and the hasty removal of clothing. And then…

Hell and damn.

Everything that happened in my dreams was something he did with Stacia and not with me. And when I tried to make sense of why, my heart broke into ever-smaller pieces.

The math just didn’t add up for me, because she was so awful. Beautiful and awful. It wasn’t that I didn’t understand why he’d want to undress the equivalent of a swimsuit model. But the investment seemed strange. Even during our brief New Year’s call he’d confessed to being at a very boring party with her. Why do that? The only logical conclusion was that the allure of her gorgeous body more than made up for the pain of spending time with her.

I just couldn’t wrap my head around it. Hartley was hot. But it wasn’t just his body that I wanted. We had fun together — lots of it. We sparred and we joked. I knew he enjoyed my company. There wasn’t any doubt in my mind.

But obviously it wasn’t enough.
I
wasn’t enough. And I couldn’t help blaming my disability. A
whole
Corey Callahan — with two working legs, and none of the baggage that comes with being broken — might have been enough to shift me from the kind of girl that he wanted for a friend, into the sort of girl he wanted in his bed.

But I was stuck this way. He was with her, and I was alone. Very, very alone. I needed to get a life, and I needed to do it fast. All the time I’d spent hanging out with Hartley had been wonderful, but it meant that I didn’t have other friends.

And now that felt like a big error.

When I’d departed for Harkness in September, I’d left the Student Activity Guidebook on my desk. Last summer, I’d only found the listings depressing. Nothing could replace hockey in my life, and I hadn’t imagined that anything else in that book was worth considering.

But now I read it avidly. I needed a new hobby, and a new set of faces in my life. It was the only way to get over Hartley. There would be no more Friday nights spent smiling across the sofa at him. Instead, Stacia would march him around to dances and parties, and he’d let her. Soon enough his leg would be completely healed, and he wouldn’t even have to ask which floor the party was on. He wouldn’t be a gimp anymore, not even a little. Even that little link between us would be severed.

It depressed the living hell out of me.

As I searched for my new passion, my copy of the student activities booklet became as dog-eared as an old lady’s bible. Needless to say, things like the debate club and student politics held no appeal. Music wasn’t my thing, and those groups were already formed. Drama? Right. The next big production at the student theater was going to be
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
. It was hard to imagine Titania or the fairies on crutches.

I almost didn’t bother to read the Intramural Sports section. At Harkness, the houses competed against one another, accumulating points. It was just like in
Harry Potter
. Instead of Quidditch, there were the usual muggle offerings: soccer, basketball, and squash. There was nothing for me there. I paused on “billiards,” but my chair wouldn’t really sit up high enough for me to reach the table. And anyway, I sucked at billiards, even as a whole person.

When I finally spotted it at the bottom of the last page, I laughed. There it was — a sport for me. It wasn’t perfect. In fact, it was a little bit ridiculous. But I thought it might be a winner.

“Mom?” I found her in the laundry room, folding my father’s underwear.

“Yes, honey?”

“I will do those sessions in the therapy pool. Not the gym.”

Her face brightened. “Great! Let’s find your bathing suit.”

“Do you think I could start tomorrow?”

She ran for the telephone.

The pool therapist was a blond Amazon named Heather. She was a few years older than me, and almost certainly a favorite among the male rehab patients. They must be lining up for sessions with Heather and her bright red one-piece.

After a half an hour with her, I was clinging to the side of the pool, panting. As it turns out, swimming with only your arms is exhausting.

“Really, Corey,” Heather said. “Most patients use the float belt, at least at the beginning. It doesn’t make you a wimp.”

“But we don’t have a lot of time,” I said.

“What, exactly, are your training goals for our sessions together?” Heather asked, tipping her perfect chin towards me.

“Swimming as hard as I can. And one extra thing. I need to figure out how to climb into an inner tube, with my butt in the center.”

“Because you want to…go river tubing?” she guessed.

“Not exactly,” I said.

When I told her my plan, she laughed. “I’ll find an inner tube, then. This will be fun.”

Chapter Sixteen:
It's What I Do

—
Corey

I didn’t see Hartley at all the night I got back. Sticking to my new plan, I ate dinner with Dana and one of her singing group buddies in the Trindle House dining hall. When we came home, his door was dark underneath.
This is going to be fine
, I told myself. Hartley would probably divide his time between his own room and wherever Stacia lived — probably in Beaumont House. I would get a little distance from him, and work on moving on.

Operation Forget About Hartley was underway. O.F.A.H., for short.

From my bedroom I made an important phone call. There were two students listed as contacts for the intramural team that I wanted to join: the team captain, and a manager. The manager’s name sounded friendlier, so I looked up her number in the campus directory, dialing before I could lose my nerve. Allison Li answered on the first ring.

“Hi, Allison?” I said, my voice barely shaking. “I’m Corey, a First Year, and I was reading over break about the co-ed inner tube water polo team?”

“Hi Corey!” she said. “We’d love to have you. And you have good timing. We’re having a practice tomorrow night.”

“Well…” I squeaked. “I need to make sure that you’re serious when you say that there’s no experience necessary.”

“Corey, if I can be blunt, anyone with a
pulse
is welcome. Especially girls. The rules are that we have to have three women in the water at all times. Last year we had to forfeit a couple of games because we couldn’t fill out our team. There are a total of eleven games — one against each house.”

That sounded promising.

“Great,” I said. “My next question is something you probably don’t hear too often. Do you happen to know if the practice pool is wheelchair accessible?” Crutches on a slippery pool deck sounded like a bad idea.

To her credit, she paused only slightly. “I think so. Yeah — sure it is. I’ve seen therapy sessions in there.”

“Allison,” I said. “I promise I swim a lot better than I walk.”

She laughed, which made me happy. “Okay, Corey. I’ll see you tomorrow night? We start at seven.”

“I’ll be there.”

I hung up feeling all kinds of victorious.

“Callahan.”

I woke up slowly to the sound of someone whispering in my ear.

“Callahan, check it out.”

My eyes opened, and then I jerked awake. Because Hartley was standing over my bed in shorts and a T-shirt. And my heart seized up at the sight of him. Those brown eyes and that lopsided smile were even more affecting than I’d remembered.

Get a grip
, I ordered myself.

“Look.” He grinned down at me, pointing at his leg.

And then I saw what he meant. Hartley was standing there with no cast on his leg, and no air boot. Not even a brace. “Wow,” I said. I raised myself onto my elbows, in preparation for sitting up. Then I raised myself all the way, holding up a hand for a high five. “Nice going.”

He smacked it. “Thanks. I’ll see you in economics.” He walked out, limping a bit, and leaning on a cane I’d never seen before.

When the door shut on him, I let out a breath of air. Operation Forget About Hartley was going to be tough. But I would fight the good fight.

After my first lecture of the new semester — a Renaissance art history course — I made my way to Economics 102, reversing my chair against the wall as I always did. A minute later, Hartley came walking in. I felt him more than saw him. He slid his cane under his seat and folded into the chair next to me.

“S’up?” he asked, his voice warm.

I looked up, and was instantly trapped in his brown-eyed gaze. My stomach lurched, and I felt my neck begin to heat. My heart rate kicked up.

Hell and damn.

He was still waiting for me to say something. “Not much,” I finally stammered. Why was this suddenly so hard?

Tell him about water polo!
My hope fairy was back, circling my head like a quivering halo.

No.

I was not going to tell him. The old me would have blurted out how anxious it made me — how fearful I was of embarrassing myself. If I did, Hartley would listen. He’d stare into my eyes and say just the right thing. But I was done confiding in him. Because it only led to heartbreak.

“So, the professor for econ 102 is supposed to be more fun,” Hartley said. “But I’ve heard the material is drier.”

With a deep breath, I opened my notebook on my lap. “It does sound pretty dry,” I agreed. “Trade balances and currency exchange? I can’t say I’m very excited about it.”

Just then, the professor came in, tapping the microphone on the lectern. And I was saved. I fixed my attention up front. Soon, I was drifting on the professor’s words as he began to explain the concept of deficit spending.

Why was I even here? At this very moment, Dana was sitting in another lecture hall, listening to the first lecture of a Shakespeare course. She’d invited me to take it with her, but I’d said no. Now I realized that Econ 102 was a feeble attempt to hold on to one little part of Hartley, and to our time together. With a class that I didn’t even like.

It was pathetic, truly.

After class, Hartley and I left the room, heading for Commons, as always.

“How’s Dana?” Hartley asked. “I haven’t seen her.”

“She bought herself a half-pound of chocolate covered espresso beans as a jet lag remedy. Apparently vacation was just long enough to put her back on Japanese time. And then she had to fly back here again.”

“Brutal,” Hartley sympathized.

And that’s when I spotted Stacia. “Hey!” she called. Her wave from across the street could have been said to include me or not, depending on your perspective.

When we crossed to her side, the first thing she did was to lip-lock Hartley. It was no quick peck, either. She stepped into him, put her hands on those sculpted shoulders and gave it to him. For a long minute I stopped there, awkwardly wondering what I was supposed to do while they kissed.

Just when I was sure I’d combust with discomfort, she said, “Let’s go to Katie’s Deli for lunch.”

“What?” Hartley asked, lifting his sore leg off the sidewalk, like a flamingo. “That’s an extra two blocks. Besides, Callahan and I always go to Commons after econ. Not only is it nearby, it’s already paid for.”

“But…” she whined, “I’ve been pining for an eggplant wrap for four months.”

I held up a hand. “Actually, you two can duke it out. I need to try to make it to the dean’s office between classes. So I’ll catch you guys later.” I pointed my wheels down College Street, back towards Beaumont. As I began to roll away, I looked over my shoulder and waved.

Hartley actually gave me a bit of a dirty look, and somehow it made me feel giddy. O.F.A.H. was back on track.