The Ivy: Rivals (25 page)

Both boys were shouting, but it was difficult to decipher the words over the sounds of Alessandra’s and Alexis’s screams, rising above a chorus of other taunts and cries:

“Hit him again!”

“Should we call the cops?”

“Somebody get the hose!”

“GET HIM OUT OF HERE!” a man who looked like the manager—or was perhaps Vick himself—ordered Matt and OK. Quickly they hustled Gregory to the door.

“Wait!” Callie and Vanessa heard Alessandra scream as she rushed past them to intercept Gregory. They could no longer hear her by the time she caught up with him just outside the door, but they could see her continuing to gesticulate wildly, tilting her head toward Clint—and then Callie, her full lips moving rapidly all the while.

Guiltily Callie turned away.

Clint had sat in a chair at one of the small tables, his hand still clutching his face while Tyler hovered over him. Slowly, from across the room, his unobstructed eye locked on Callie. It was impossible to tell what he was thinking—if he blamed her for what had just happened, or felt remorseful, or guilty, or none of the above. Personally, she felt torn between the urge to ask if he was okay, or to march over and inform him that he had gotten what he deserved, to turn on her heel and leave, or demand an explanation about what exactly was going on—and
had been
going on—between him and Lexi . . .

Speak of the devil, there she was: materializing by his side with a cloth full of ice, which she pressed against his eye, kneeling next to him. The expression on her face registered more
calm
than
concerned
, like a person who knew herself to be in complete control of a situation.

Clint broke away from Callie’s gaze and smiled down at Lexi, his hand wrapped around her pale wrist as she continued nursing his eye.

A white hot surge of rage rippled through Callie, following shortly by a sweeping sadness. Confused, she stood rooted to the spot, unresponsive to whatever Vanessa had been saying.

Suddenly Tyler stood in front of them. “Callie,” he started. “I’m so sorry, but I don’t think now is the best time—”

“To what?” Vanessa interjected. “We’re just standing here! It’s a free country, you know.”

“I was simply going to suggest that we all give this some space to blow over,” Tyler protested, shifting uncomfortably. “And that maybe—”

“Who’s ‘we’?” Vanessa demanded. “
We
,” she said, gesturing between she and Callie, “didn’t do anything wrong.
They
, on the other hand,” she continued, pointing at Lexi and Clint, “are a different story.”

“Vanessa,” Callie murmured quietly, “I’m gonna . . .” she gestured toward the door.

“Hang on just a sec, I’ll leave with you,” Vanessa said before turning back to Tyler. “Now, exactly whose side are you on?”

“I’m not on any side here except Clint’s!” Tyler said. “And I’m going to support him with whatever he decides to do!”

“Oh!” Vanessa retorted, her voice rising, “Sure, pick your scumbag friend over your
girlfriend
, that’s just great—typical! So. Typical!”

Completely forgotten, Callie slipped away unnoticed as Tyler moved within inches of Vanessa’s face. “I don’t know what girlfriend you’re talking about since mine broke up with me on the way to the airport!”

“Well, I suppose you’d rather be off making out with the first person you happen to see just like your roommate over there—”

Callie almost laughed as the crowd closed around the former (?) couple and their voices faded abruptly. Almost.

In a few short minutes she had made it down the stairs, across the beach, up the stone path winding around the pool, and back to Villa Whale. Without bothering to turn on the light or remove her cotton dress, she stepped out of her shoes and crawled between the cool white sheets of the bed in the room she shared with Vanessa. Pulling the covers all the way over her head, she closed her eyes and prayed that somehow, miraculously, by the time she awoke the break would be over and the nightmare finally at an end.

“Bluuughhhhhh . . .” Callie moaned, rolling over in bed. The room was still pitch-black; the clock on the wicker nightstand read 4:04
A.M.
Bleary-eyed, she glanced at Vanessa’s bed: empty. Hmm . . . That’s odd. . . .

Suddenly she shot straight up.

A light rapping had just sounded from the other end of the room, near the sliding glass doors that led, like the pair in the living room, outside to the swimming pool.

Rap, rap, rap
—the noise came again, louder this time.

Was Vanessa locked out?

Or had Gregory come to explain why he’d gone all Chuck Norris on Clint’s face?

Jumping out from under the covers, she tiptoed over to the doors and threw back the light blue curtains.

Clint stood outside. His hands were jammed in his pockets, his black eye now in full bloom.

“Could we talk?”
he mouthed through the glass.

Callie glared at him, her lips pressed together.

He held up five fingers and mouthed,
“Five minutes? Please?”

Shaking her head, Callie unlatched the door and pushed it open.

“What do you want?” she whispered.

“Can we talk?” he repeated.

“It’s four in the morning.” She folded her arms.

“I wanted to explain and, uh . . .” He looked at the ground. “To apologize.”

She stared at him for a moment, deciding.

“All right,” she said finally, stepping outside. This ought to be good.

They walked in silence, stopping at the edge of the pool. The moon had long since departed, but yellow lights shone from under the water, and in little lanterns dotting the paths, walkways, and small footbridges over the narrower sections of the swimming pool. The air felt warm, and Callie plopped onto the ground without invitation, dangling her still bare feet in the water. Clint followed her lead, sitting down beside her and sliding off his loafers.

Under different circumstances it might have been terribly romantic.

As it was, Callie sat silently, skimming her toes on the surface of the water and waiting.

Clint eventually sighed. “I’m sorry . . . about what you saw tonight.”

Callie said nothing.

“I know it’s only technically been about twenty-four hours since we broke up, though the problems really started several weeks ago. But still . . . I know you must be feeling that after everything that’s been said I’ve acted somewhat hypocritically. . . .”

Callie waited until his rambling petered off and he gave up walking the fine, infuriating line between justification and apology. Staring off into the distance at the dark mass that was the ocean, she said, “I may be young, and I may be naive, and maybe you were even right when you said I lack the maturity necessary for a serious relationship. . . . But one thing I’m
not
is stupid.” She turned to face him. “I know.”

“You know what?” he said, feigning innocent confusion.

“I know that you and Lexi didn’t rekindle things starting tonight. I know it goes back a lot longer. Maybe even to your freshman year—maybe it was never really over.” She knew that now
she
was rambling. Frowning, she curled her feet, causing a small splash in the water below.

“I really did think it was over,” Clint said, tugging a hand through his hair. “I truly, sincerely believed that it would never . . . that we would never . . .”

“The funny thing is,” Callie continued disjointedly as if she hadn’t heard him, “that if you had been more creative in your choice of gifts, I never would have known that you lied to me. That she
was
in your room that night. That she was there long enough, and with reason enough, to take off her necklace—and who knows what else—and leave it on your bedside table where I later thought that maybe it was mine . . . until I realized mine had been in my room the entire time.” All this she said matter-of-factly and devoid of emotion, as if she were merely relaying the steps to solving a particularly uninteresting equation in economics section.

“You’re right,” Clint murmured. “And I’m sorry. She did come over to my room that night—to talk. . . .”

“Not about Vanessa,” Callie remarked flatly.

“Not about Vanessa,” he echoed. “About what happened . . .” He sighed again, dragging his feet through the water. “About what happened at Gatsby.”

Callie nodded slowly, gazing vacantly over the edge of the pool.

“The thing you should know first of all is that during our—
my
—sophomore year, Gatsby was a real high point in the relationship with Lexi. We both have really fond memories of that night, and it was one of the first times that— Well, never mind, the point is that when you suddenly left, the memories sort of overtook me and we—she and I—well, we got sort of swept up in the moment. Now, I could sit here and tell you that I’d had too much to drink and that I felt responsible for keeping her company because Bolton had mysteriously vanished, too. . . .” He shook himself, as if to expel the sudden bitterness that had crept into his tone. “And none of that would be a lie, but the real truth is that when we were alone, I remembered how it used to be back when things were really good, before all the games and manipulation and constant fighting . . . back when I used to believe that we belonged together and that we would be together for . . . well, I guess, forever. And so . . . we kissed.”

Callie continued staring straight ahead, forcing her face to stay slack.

“I felt terrible the next day, and confused, but I knew the first thing I needed to do was talk to her and tell her that we—that
I
had made a huge mistake. And that if I
was
confused about my feelings that I needed to, at the very least, sort through them and figure out where we—I mean
you and I
—stood before anything else happened.”

Callie nodded again.

“When she came over, I told her that I still wanted to be with you, and that furthermore I wanted someone like you where things didn’t always feel so complicated and like I was constantly searching for a hidden agenda because the other person might not have my best interests at heart. I expected her to argue and to tell me that I didn’t know what I wanted, and that I was only kidding myself—like she’d done before, when we were in Vermont—but instead . . . she agreed with me. She said she finally understood and that in our time apart she had really thought about everything that had happened and knew what she’d done wrong. She claimed that she had changed now and that she wanted only what was best for me. . . .

“And then, I don’t know: it’s like one minute we were on the verge of fighting and then the next minute . . .”

Stopping for a second, he sighed.

“In the morning I felt horrible. Honestly, worse than I’ve ever felt. She could tell and we immediately agreed that it was a mistake and that we should go back to being friends and pretend that nothing had ever happened.”

Callie closed her eyes, thinking of the flash of silver on the bedside table and trying not to picture what had happened the night before. Lexi had probably left the necklace behind on purpose and had probably also planned the entire interaction ahead of time down to the minute, executing it flawlessly. Callie almost felt sorry for Clint, who clearly still failed to see, even after two years, how manipulative Lexi really was.

“The next day we decided to keep our study date and proceed as we otherwise would have when everything was normal. But I kept it from you because I felt so guilty. And then in the library when she told me about you and Gregory, I snapped—I was sure she’d made it up and that everything she’d said about changing was also bullshit . . . so I left, certain she’d been trying to sabotage our relationship the entire time.”

A derisive snort escaped Callie’s lips.

“It was true about Gregory, though, wasn’t it?” he said quietly.

Callie leaned back, propped up on her arms. “So you’re back together.”

“I don’t know what we are. I do know that staying apart was harder than I thought it would be. But I’m still not sure if I believe people can really change. . . . Although maybe they can, if Bolton is any indication.” He chuckled ruefully. “All it took was the right girl—though granted she’s a total sweetheart and basically looks like a supermodel—and now he’s essentially whipped. A full one-eighty . . .”

Callie was barely listening.

Instead her thoughts kept returning to the necklace. How she might never have known who Clint really was if she hadn’t noticed Lexi wearing the same one. How he had clearly never known who she, Callie, really was, or else he might have chosen a different gift; rather than something fancy and expensive—i.e., perfect for Lexi—he might have picked something more thoughtful and personal, like tickets to hear one of her favorite authors do a reading. . . .

Quickly she shoved the thought from her mind. Clint was still saying something, but after yawning pointedly, she interrupted.

“So: were you really just going to let me walk away from this thinking it was mostly my fault for going crazy on you?” she asked. “Although I wasn’t
really
crazy, was I?” she added before he could answer. “I was right to be suspicious. There
was
something going on.”

“You were right,” he agreed. “Though maybe also a little crazy.” He turned to her with the faintest hint of a smile, but seeing that she was not amused, he continued: “Once I knew that it was over between us anyway, I figured there was no point to hurting you any more than necessary. I suppose I just figured that what you didn’t know couldn’t hurt you.”

Oh yes. She’d heard that one before. That’s exactly what Evan had said about secretly filming them while having sex. No need to draw the comparison out loud. Instead she said, “So you figured that it would hurt less to see you publicly making out in front of all of my friends?”