Cora Carmack: All Lined Up

“We are so doing that!” Stella cries out over the thumping music.

Note to self: stay far, far away from the beer guns.

Knowing my luck, I’d take a shot to the eye.

A guy runs past us in a tutu and a deep red wig, hollering something unintelligible at the top of his lungs. Stella grins at me, her eyes shooting to my own red hair. “I found your long-lost twin. Tutu and all.”

“What a coincidence! I found your twin, too.” I cast my eyes in the direction of two girls carrying a third friend between them toward the door. “Messy drunk and all.”

“You take that back! I am not a messy drunk.”

“And I’m not a giant dude with probable back hair and an identity crisis.”

She throws up her hands. “You’re right. Sorry. ” Cue her mischievous smile. “He had way bigger boobs.”

I thump her hard, but we’re both laughing. And it feels as easy as the parties we attended in high school, easier really, because Stella was right. No one here gives a damn about me.

“Big D! Heard you were on campus. I’m surprised to see you here, though.”

And . . . I spoke too soon.

There’s only one thing in the world I despise more than football, and he’s making his way down the stairs toward me.

My eyes flit around me like I’m scanning a battlefield instead of a blowout: fraternity banners, litter of red Solo cups, and a freshman pledge dragging around a trash bag playing reluctant maid. Part of me wants to keep doing that, to pretend like I didn’t hear him.

But I can’t. If I ignore him, it will only prove to him that he still bothers me.

I face him as he steps off the last stair, crossing his arms over his broad chest and grinning at me. Levi. My ex.

He leans his hip against the banister of the grand staircase, and I spy not one but two girls sitting halfway up the stairs, obviously upset that they’ve lost his attention.

Behind me I hear someone shout, “Ready. Aim. Fire!” and I know the beer guns are back in play.

“Alcohol and bad decisions, Levi? Can’t say I’m surprised to find you smack-dab in the middle of that.”

He kicks off from the banister, swaggering a few steps closer. His dark hair and eyes are as striking as always. I’d fallen for him so hard my freshman year of high school: doodling our names together in my spiral, watching him play from the bleachers, wearing that monstrous mum he gave me for homecoming, beaming on his elbow at his junior prom.

The memory of all that just makes me nauseated now. But as Stella always says, hindsight is a pretentious, know-it-all bitch.

“You come here to make some bad decisions?” He moves closer, his voice pitching lower. Intimate. His gaze drifts down my body with an arrogant familiarity. “Because you know I can help you with that.”

Levi Abrams has been the cause of enough bad decisions for a lifetime.

Stella steps in, her voice colder than I’ve ever heard it. “I’m fairly certain she’d rather sandpaper her own skin off.”

I nod and plaster on the fakest smile in my arsenal. “And then take a bath in lemon juice.”

Levi smiles back, and I’m pretty sure the bastard is enjoying this.

He’s bigger than when I last saw him. Bulked up. I guess that’s the difference between high school and college ball. But it’s not just muscles . . . he reaches out a hand like he’s going to touch my hair, and as I jerk back, even his hands seem bigger than I remember. A man’s hands, rather than those of the boy I knew. Or maybe his head got so big that his inflated ego overflowed to other parts of his body. Also a possibility.

I knew Levi was here when I chose Rusk University—hard not to when he’s the starting quarterback—but I didn’t think I’d ever have to see him. Since Dad wouldn’t let me leave Texas, and only a handful of universities here actually have a true dance major, Rusk was the best option out of the schools to which I was allowed to apply.

Levi lets his hand fall away and turns to leave, but then stops to say over his shoulder, “You don’t have to pretend to hate me so much, you know. I’m here. You’re here. We could start fresh, D.”

Why does no one get that it’s impossible to have a fresh start when nothing has really changed? God, I knew that better than anybody because no matter how many new coaching jobs Dad took, every school ended up the same.

Levi is still a douche-bag who only cares about himself.

Dad still approaches parenting like I’m a member of his team.

And I . . . I’m still stuck. In my father’s shadow. In Texas. In this lame state school with a joke of a dance program.

And now I’m stuck at my first frat party with the ex who broke my heart.

Yay college.

AS SOON AS Levi is out of sight, I bolt for the door. Stella wraps her arms around my waist to stop me, but she’s a foot shorter than me, and her idea of a workout is marathoning Project Runway . She clings to me, her feet slipping and sliding as I drag her forward like she weighs barely anything.

In an exasperated voice she yells, “Stamp of approval!” I hesitate, slowing, but not stopping my attempt at escape. “I said stamp. Of. Approval. Skank.”

I sigh. Crap.

We have this rule, something that’s helped us stay friends despite how completely polar opposite our personalities are. It’s a system of give and take, wherein I temper her crazy side and she forces me to live a little.

When Stella showed up to take the SATs drunk, she got the Dallas Cole Don’t-Be-A-Douche Stamp of Disapproval. It was my non-nagging way of telling her that she’d gone too far. And though there wasn’t much to do about it that Saturday, Stella signed up to take the test again, and when the next testing day rolled around, she was sober and serious and pulled off a decent score.

Alternately, there is the Stella Santos Suck-It-Up-You-Prude Stamp of Approval. That stamp has gotten me into more trouble than I care to list, including Stella’s brilliant idea to wrap a house with toilet paper and stick maxi pads to the glass front door. What her plan didn’t include was the knowledge that said house belonged to a policeman, who was not keen on being an advertisement for Kotex.

There is one and only one rule when it comes to the stamps. You have to listen.

I spin, and Stella narrowly misses getting laid out by my flailing elbow. Her exotic eyes narrow on me, and I know she’s not backing down.

“ Fine . I’ll stay. But remember those stamps work both ways, sister.”

She moves closer so that she can speak quietly, pushing her short dark hair out of her eyes. “Listen, I’m sorry. I didn’t think douche-badger would be here. I heard that athletes don’t usually come to the frat stuff, so I thought we’d be in the clear. But this place is huge.” A stream of people exit out of a nearby door that I guess leads to a basement, as if to illustrate her point. “There’s nothing that says you can’t stay and have fun.”

We have different ideas of nothing . My brain has already pinpointed at least seventeen reasons to leave.

Some idiot with a backward hat lurches toward a trash can just outside the kitchen, and a jet of disgusting pours out of his mouth.

Make that eighteen reasons.

“Right. Well, I’m officially sucking it up.” And trying not to copy backward-hat’s display of stomach pyrotechnics. “What’s up, first?”

“I want you to actually enjoy this. Try to look like you’re not dying inside.” I attempt a smile. “A little less Freddy Krueger, a little more person who actually has a soul.” I flash her more teeth, more menace than mirth, but I’m mostly teasing.