I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised when you see Joy tomorrow.”
Ollie didn’t like the sound of that. Maybe I should just kick him out of my life right now. Then again, would he actually go?
“Now that things have started to come out into the open a little more,” Sparks said, “I bet you can see why I wouldn’t tell you why Joy was being so distant.”
“Yeah. Then again, if you had told me before why Joy was so upset, I might not have spent the weekend with Lynn. You should have told me if you didn’t want this to happen. That’s your fault.”
“You’re not gonna pin that on me, are you? All this time and you still don’t think anything that happens to you is because you asked for it?”
“Whatever. So… now what?” Ollie knew what Sparks was going to say before he said it.
“You tell me, Bomber.”
“Come on, now,” he chuckled nervously. “You clearly don’t want me making the decisions. I’m heading off in a different direction than you want me to. Remember?”
“Ollie, Ollie, Ollie. I know you better than you think I do. You’ll see tomorrow. This whole mess will iron itself out. All you gotta do is show up.”
“Please tell me that means you’ll be out of my life for good after tomorrow. You’re driving me crazy, ya know?”
“I know.”
“So, are you? Gone? The only reason I haven’t told you to take a hike is because I need to keep you around… just in case I need to throw you a beating after all this is done.”
“Does that sound like the type of thing I’d tell you?” Sparks laughed.
“Not at all. It was worth a shot, though.”
***
Ollie lay in his bed, kept company every few minutes by the orange glow of the room. The numbers on the clock talked to him, helping him sort things out as he pondered. He felt horrible about how he’d left things off with Lynn, and felt just as bad about how messed up things were with Joy. There was really only one thing he could shoot for, and that was to take things a step at a time. Nothing could be done until morning, when he walked her to class. She had been straightforward with him today. He should do the same for her.
He discussed everything with the clock and they decided together what time he would get up in the morning. He’d get up in plenty of time to get her to class even though he didn’t have class until nine.
***
Ollie had indeed discussed the time with the clock on the wall, but he’d forgotten to tell the clock on his desk— the one that usually beeped him awake in the morning. By pure luck though, the clock inside Ollie’s head had been eavesdropping the night before and was successful in getting through enough to wake him, although late. When his tired eyes saw what time it was, he sprang out of bed and grabbed his stuff. It was already almost eight.
***
“I’m sorry,” her roommate said. “You just missed her.”
He was angry at himself. As he slowly began to turn away from the door, he couldn’t help but ask, “How did she seem? I mean, was she upset? Happy?”
She hesitated for a moment. “Both. I think she was in a great mood when she woke up, but she seemed kind of… stressed when she left.”
“All right. Do me a favor? If you see her before I do, tell her I stopped by this morning to walk her to class, but I missed my alarm and that made me late and—”
“Okay, okay. I’ll tell her.” She smiled.
His first class wasn’t going to start for another hour, but he rushed to campus as quickly as his legs would carry him. He was hoping that the words “just missed her” meant that he’d be able to catch up to her before her little legs got her to class. He was wrong. Peeking through the small pane of glass on the classroom door, he spotted her familiar curly brown hair. It was too late. He pulled the hood of his sweatshirt back up over his head and headed back out into the cold. No amount of attempted telepathy would ever get her to turn around to see him wave, and a glance at his watch told him that, even though he only needed a minute to go in and talk to her, her class had begun seven minutes before he’d had a chance.
***
“You’re up