I pul off my necklace and insert my key into the lock. He waits behind me. My hand shakes as I open the door.
Chapter twenty
St. Clair is sitting on my floor. He tosses his boots across my room, and they hit my door with a loud smack. It’s the first noise either of us has made since coming in here.
“Sorry.” He’s embarrassed. “Where shal I put those?”
But before I can reply, he’s blabbering. “El ie thinks I ought to go to San Francisco. I’ve almost bought the plane ticket loads of times, but it’s not what Mum would want. If my father doesn’t want it, she doesn’t want it. It’d put too much additional stress on the situation.”
I’m startled by the outburst.
“Sometimes I wonder if she—El ie—if she, you know ...” His voice grows quiet. “Wants me gone.”
He never talks about his girlfriend. Why now? I can’t believe I have to defend her. I line his boots beside my door to avoid looking at him. “She’s probably just tired of seeing you miserable. Like we all are,” I add. “I’m sure . . . I’m sure she’s as crazy about you as ever.”
“Hmm.” He watches me put away my own shoes and empty the contents of my pockets. “What about you?” he asks, after a minute.
“What about me?”
St. Clair examines his watch. “Sideburns. You’l be seeing him next month.”
He’s reestablishing . . . what? The boundary line? That he’s taken, and I’m spoken for? Except I’m not. Not real y.
But I can’t bear to say this now that he’s mentioned El ie. “Yeah, I can’t wait to see him again. He’s a funny guy, you’d like him. I’m gonna see his band play at Christmas. Toph’s a great guy, you’d real y like him. Oh. I already said that, didn’t I? But you would. He’s real y . . . funny.”
Shut up, Anna. Shut. Up.
St. Clair unbuckles and rebuckles and unbuckles his watchband.
“I’m beat,” I say.And it’s the truth.As always, our conversation has exhausted me. I crawl into bed and wonder what he’l do. Lie on my floor? Go back to his room? But he places his watch on my desk and climbs onto my bed. He slides up next to me. He’s on top of the covers, and I’m underneath. We’re stil
ful y dressed, minus our shoes, and the whole situation is beyond awkward.
He hops up. I’m sure he’s about to leave, and I don’t know whether to be relieved or disappointed, but . . . he flips off my light. My room is pitch-black.
He shuffles back toward my bed and smacks into it.
“Oof,” he says.
“Hey, there’s a bed there.”
“Thanks for the warning.”
“No problem.”
“It’s freezing in here. Do you have a fan on or something?”
“It’s the wind. My window won’t shut all the way. I have a towel stuffed under it, but it doesn’t real y help.”
He pats his way around the bed and slides back in. “Ow,” he says.
“Yes?”
“My belt. Would it be weird ...”
I’m thankful he can’t see me blush. “Of course not.” And I listen to the slap of leather as he pul s it out of his belt loops. He lays it gently on my hardwood floor.
“Um,” he says. “Would it be weird—”