Fearless (The Story of Samantha Smith #1) (37 page)

“Look, I agreed to model for Professor Childress weeks ago. I seriously didn’t think you’d mind. I mean, you are so much hotter than Genesis anyway.”

“I am?”

He shook his head. “Didn’t I tell you that the hottest women are the most insecure? You probably look in a mirror and imagine it does funhouse mirror tricks that make you look like the elephant woman.”

I was afraid to answer lest I incriminate myself.

“See! I was so right! You do think that way!”

“Hey.” I felt like he was making fun of me.

“Let it go,
agápi mou
. You mean so much more to me than looks anyway.” He kissed me gently on the corner of the mouth.

“You mean it?” I pouted.

“Yes. I love you. No one else. If it really bothers you, I can decline the couples posing, or even solo posing. It’s not like it’s my job. It’s up to you.”

I shrugged my shoulders. “Can I get back to you on that?”
 

He ruffled my hair. “Yes,
agápi mou.
Now you better go, or you’re going to be late for class.”

Why was it that now that I had Christos, all I could think about was losing him? That wasn’t very fearless of me. I’d heard about self-fulfilling prophecies, and thought I might want to work on my insecurity. Otherwise, I might ruin things myself. “I love you, Christos.”

“I love you too, Samantha.” He leaned over and kissed me deeply, tongue and all, before getting out of my VW.

He waved when I started the engine.

“Bye!” I waved as I drove off.

I forgot all about Christos posing naked with Genesis on the way to campus.

Because all I could think about was the nasty things Christos’ tongue made me feel between my legs every time he slipped it in my mouth.

I joined Madison for Fundamentals of Accounting, again without coffee. After class, we walked to the Student Center to buy coffee at Toasted Roast.

We got in line, I groaned when I noticed Tiffany Kingston-Whitehouse and two of her Delta Pi Delta cronies ahead of us. I did my best to ignore them while I chatted with Madison.

When Tiffany and Company had bought their coffee and were on the way out, they passed right by me and Madison.

“Oh,” Tiffany said when she saw me, as if discovering dog shit on her shoe. “It’s
you
.”

“Why are you talking to the riff-raff, Tiff?” the brunette Delta Pi Delta asked. “You might catch a social disease.”

The other crony cackled.

“Oh, you know,” Tiffany said. “It’s impossible to look away from a freak show.”

“You’re just mad because Christos came to his senses and booted your ass to the curb for someone better than you!” Madison said defiantly.

Tiffany glared at Madison as if she had just uttered a beheadable offense to the queen. “Better than me?” Tiffany scoffed. “Your
friend
is so nothing, I will not even address her directly,” Tiffany said to Madison, without looking at me.

Wow, Tiffany and Damian would be perfect for each other. Maybe he could beat some sense into her.
Did I just think that? Oops.

“Who’s Christos?” the brunette crony asked.

Tiffany rolled her eyes with bitchy perfection. “She’s talking about Adonis, dimwit.”

“Oh,” Brunette said, chastised.

“Don’t worry, Whatever Your Name Is,” Tiffany said, addressing Madison. “
Christos
will come to his senses soon enough. He’s not going to waste his time with a Plain Jane like your nobody
friend
forever.” She tilted her nose up and stalked off, but not without jerking a slosh of coffee out the top of her cup that came dangerously close to splashing all over my long-sleeve white sweater.

“Hey!” I shouted.

“You missed, bitch!” Madison hollered.

Tiffany walked away, hips cocking from side to side in exaggerated runway model fashion. Her perfect blond hair swayed perfectly. She threw her arm over her head and flipped us off without looking back, her many bracelets jingling around her wrist.

Her two cronies fell into step on either side of her and turned to give me and Madison a pair of glaring stink eyes and fisted middle-finger bird flips.

“Total bitches,” Madison said.

“Groan,” I said.

“Is douche the appropriate term for female douches? Or is that just for dudes?” Madison pondered.

“Houches?” I suggested, saying it like “hooshes.”

She giggled. “Sounds too much like Hoochies. I would go with Couches. Sounds more like the C-word.”

“Couches it is.”

“Couches!” Madison hollered after them, even though they were long gone.

That night after classes, Christos and I ordered take out Thai Food and ate dinner at my apartment.

We sat on the carpet around my coffee table, doing crayon paintings with the box of Crayolas Christos had given me as a present. Opened boxes of thai food and half empty plates surrounded us as we worked.

I was filling in a teal blue ring on the corner of our joint picture. “You owe me a story about why you haven’t used the word love in such a long time.”

“That’s right,” he said quietly. He nodded his head while scribbling down a blur of fuchsia crayon on his side of the page. “But first, I’m pretty sure you can’t do crayons right without ice cream. Don’t you think?”

I winced. My stupid Costco-sized supply of ice cream still taunted me every time I opened my freezer. I hadn’t replenished it in awhile, but I was loathe to just throw it out. “I, uh, guess?”

He went to the kitchen. “I’ll spoon some out.” He clattered around in the silverware drawer, then returned with two modest bowls of Mint Chocolate Chocolate Chip.

I could do that without guilt or disgust.

As we ate our ice cream, Christos told me about the new paintings he was preparing for his next show. I think he was dodging the story he owed me, but he was so enthusiastic about his current project, I didn’t want to stop him. I also realized I was completely enjoying my ice cream like a normal person and not someone in love/hate with junk food.
 

How did Christos manage to set me so at ease?

I set my empty ice cream dish down and leaned back against the foot of the couch. “It sounds like you’re going to be super busy painting and with your graduate studies. How are you going to find time for me?”

“I’ll find time. If I have to take a quarter off from school, no one’s going to care.”

“That’s crazy! You can’t take time off from college for a girl, Christos.” I sounded like my mom. Why was I being Ms. Sensible all of a sudden? Probably the latent affects of responsible parenting.

“I just had a sell-out gallery show. I made a ton of cash. And that’s good for SDU’s reputation. They’ll work with me.” He spooned ice cream into his mouth.

“You sound so confident.”

“Well, considering all that my grandfather and dad have done for the university, they basically owe us.”

“Really? How?”

“Oh, my grandfather helped found the art program. That’s how he knows Professor Childress so well. And my dad donated so much money to keep the program cutting-edge, it’s not even funny.”

For a minute, he sounded vaguely like Damian. I didn’t like that at all. Like his family’s money bought him privilege. Was I disgusted, or perhaps jealous? I wasn’t sure. But I did know that Christos was very, very different from Damian. Unless he was a master at deception.
 

Damian wasn’t much for disguises. He was too angry to hide it. Maybe Christos was somehow worse, and I couldn’t see it yet? He
had
managed to dodge my question to him about not using the word “love” twice now.

I didn’t want to think about it, so I grabbed at the most available thing to say. “Wow, your family is really involved with the university. I think my dad sends a hundred dollars to his alma mater every year, but that’s about it.”

Christos was coloring again. “When my dad’s art career exploded, he had money coming out his ears. Money doesn’t solve everything but it sure helps.”

“What do you mean?” I asked, picking up a tangerine crayon.

“My dad is an abstract painter. Shapes, colors, textures. He wanted to do realistic art, like my grandfather. But my grandfather had the market locked up at the beginning of my dad’s career. Everyone compared Dad’s landscapes to my grandfather’s. At the time, no one was buying much in the way of figurative art, you know, with people in it, other than portraits. My dad didn’t want to do that either. Sure, painting famous people pays pretty good, and you gain a certain notoriety from it. But it’s still essentially a job.
 

“So he looked at what was selling, and it was the abstract stuff. My dad understood that abstract art was fundamentally about emotional expression through pure composition, without the use of narrative.”

“I don’t get it,” I interjected, feeling somewhat ignorant.

“Narrative art is recognizable things: people, buildings, landscapes, historical events, etc. Abstract uses none of those elements. Remember what I said about Kandinsky way back at the museum on campus?”

“Uh…”

Christos smiled indulgently. “Abstract art is about exploring pure emotion. Things like, ‘This shape makes me angry. This color makes me sad. What happens if I put the two together? How do I feel when I look at the painting?’ That kind of thing.”

“Oh, I see.”
I guess.

“Anyway, my dad totally got it, and went nuts, cranking out canvas after canvas. And guess what? They sold. Worldwide. Any serious collector has one or more of my dad’s paintings in their private collections. It was really ridiculous for awhile. My Dad became an art celebrity. He could shit on a canvas and sell it for a million at his peak.” Christos set down his crayon and picked up his bowl of ice cream.

“What about now?” I asked, dumbfounded. I’d never known anyone first or second hand that was remotely as wildly successful as Christos’ father. It was like listening to a story about some heroic greek god that was recorded on stone tablets and passed down from generation to generation to wow the crap out of people. People who would never ever meet the fabled hero of the story. Like it was only make-believe, to inspire them. But this story was real. I’d seen enough proof to know.

“My dad still sells. When he bothers to paint. But he drinks too fucking much.” Christos set his ice cream bowl down with a disgusted look on his face. I could tell it wasn’t the ice cream that was bothering him.

“Why would your dad drink if he was so successful? I don’t get it.”

“Because he hated what he was doing. Deep down, he didn’t give a shit about abstract art.”

“But why? If it paid so well and made him famous?”

 
Christos looked completely miserable. It didn’t make sense to me. “Wait till you’re as successful as he is, then you’ll find out,” he grimaced.

“I’ll never be that successful,” I scoffed. “
You
might, Christos. I’m just hoping to keep a roof over my head and have a car that runs.”

“You have to dream bigger than that, Samantha. Look at my situation. I’m already making money. You could too.”

“I don’t think so. You have so much more skill than me. Maybe in twenty years. If I stick to it.” My voice dropped into a muddled, depressed tone. I couldn’t hide my true feelings on this topic.

“Why do you think I wanted to keep mentoring you?” he asked, as if the answer was obvious.

“I don’t know. Because you love me?”

“No. Because I believe in you.” He put a reassuring hand on my shoulder. “I believed in you long before I knew I loved you. I saw your raw talent.” He cracked a dimpled grin. “And I knew you were fucking hot. Why
wouldn’t
I want to mentor you?”

That was way too many compliments in a row. Something spun in my chest and butterflied my stomach. How could he be so sure about me when I had so many doubts about myself?

Heat raced through my body. My eyelids fluttered and I think I moaned when I simply meant to exhale. How did he do this to me, every time?

Crap, he was distracting me again. I clamped down my lust and drilled him with my gaze. “Christos, you still haven’t told me about why you haven’t said the word ‘love’ in so long. I told you about Damian. You have to uphold your end.”

“I was getting to that.” He stood up and took a deep breath. Then he started pacing my living room, like he was running away from the truth, but he had nowhere to go except to let it out.

“The last woman I told I loved them was my mom. I told her pretty much every day, right up until the day she left my dad.

“I remember my dad begging her over and over not to leave because he loved her. I can hear his voice in my head, pleading ‘I love you, Vesile, I love you. Don’t go, my love. I need you.’ My mom ignored him and walked out the front door of our house.

“I hated her so much for leaving, I swore I would never make the mistake of telling a woman I loved her. Not even my mom.”

Christos looked like he was reliving the moment. I wanted to touch him, to comfort him, but I felt like he needed space. I sat on the couch, elbows on my knees, clasping my fingers in front of my face.

“After that,” he said, “I tended not to trust any women. I avoided them. But when puberty hit, I had to make some sort of peace with women, because I felt that need for them, that yearning I couldn’t ignore.
 

“I made a vow that I wouldn’t let a woman get close to me like my dad had with my mom. It was too dangerous. I saw firsthand how it destroyed him, and the hurt my mom left with
me
was devastating. I wasn’t going to invite more pain in by loving someone like my dad had loved my mom.

“So every time one of the girls I was seeing mentioned love, I shut down, or played it off so we could hook up. I felt like shit, but I didn’t care. I wanted release, and they wanted it too. But it’s all I could give them. It was an escape from my pain.
 

“My broken heart never healed. I saw love as a prison, a place you willingly entered and shut the bars on yourself. A place where you risked being beaten without warning by the cruel people who trapped you inside.”

Christos exhaled deeply, slumping over.

The way he said it sounded so awful. I couldn’t wrap my head around it. “Do you still talk to your mom?”