Hate You Still by Lyssa Lemire

CHAPTER SIX

KNOX

With the window closed tightly and the plug connected to the outlet, I press the button on the newly installed AC and the oppressive mugginess in the room starts to freshen and cool.

“I can’t believe you went a week with a broken AC in this weather, Mrs. Davis,” I say, stretching my back. “You should have told me earlier.”

“First of all, I didn’t want to bother you any more than I already do. Second, you young whippersnapper, how many times do I have to tell you? It’s Clare, not Mrs. Davis. You make me sound old.”

I laugh. “Calling me a whippersnapper is what makes you sound old.”

“Oh, don’t you start.” She walks into her kitchen, and I hear a clanging of plates. “You want some cake? I made it this morning.”

“No thanks, Mrs– Clare. I had a big lunch and should be heading home.”

“What are you saying? Of course you want some cake. What growing boy doesn’t want a nice piece of cake? Get your keister in here.”

I chuckle, knowing that any further resistance would be futile. “Yes, ma’am,” I concede, walking over to face the confection that’s going to have me in a sugar coma all evening.

Mrs. Davis is like the grandmother I never had. She lives in an old row-house close to campus. Back when I was a freshman, I noticed her struggling with groceries one day. I offered to help, and though she tried to turn me down (she can be the most stubborn old woman you’ll ever meet, out of her sense of pride), when I saw her drop a carton of eggs, I decided not to take no for an answer.

After about the fourth time of me insisting on helping her carry something into her house over her objections, she finally stopped protesting. Now I always “happen to be walking by” around three o’clock in the afternoon on Tuesdays and Fridays, which is when she comes back from her shopping.

If I didn’t “happen to be in the neighborhood,” I know she’d never bring herself to actually ask for help. And then she’d keep dropping cartons of eggs. And then I wouldn’t have freshly made cakes to stuff myself silly with.

Her husband used to be a professor here at Alton. He passed away about fifteen years ago. No children, no siblings, so she’s pretty much all by herself.

A lot like me, I guess.

I’m glad our paths crossed.

I dig into the cake. I did have a big lunch, and I am stuffed, but as soon as that moist, sweet treat hits my tastebuds I know I’m not going to regret taking her up on her offer. Damn, can Mrs. Davis bake.

“You’re such a God-send,” she says to me while she sets about tidying up her kitchen.

I laugh ironically. “A God-send? I don’t think there’s anyone else around here who would describe me as that. Plenty of people would say I was sent by the other guy.”

She doesn’t laugh at my joke, instead shaking her head and clicking her tongue disapprovingly. “If that’s true, then they just don’t know the real you.”

I smile at her. “Maybe you’re the one who doesn’t know the real me.”

“Nonsense.” She flashes me a supportive smile, which for a split second makes me feel like maybe she’s right. “Finish your cake.”

I scarf down the rest of my big slice. She tries to offer me another, but I refuse. If I had anymore, I really might burst at the seams.

“At least let me pack you up some to take home,” she says.

“If I objected, would you even listen?”

“Of course not.”

I laugh again as she gets some Tupperware and packs me two way too big pieces. “Make sure you share some with your roommate, you hear?”

“I’ll try. Now, make sure you let me know if anything else breaks around here, rather than me having to find out a week later. If anything happened to you, I’d have to go back to buying my cakes from the grocery store.”

Her eyes widen in horror. “We can’t let that happen!”

“That’s right. So you need to start telling me if you need something. It’s not healthy to be in this heat without a working air conditioner!”

“I’m not as fragile as you think, young man.”

I chuckle. “Maybe not. But, still. Alright, I gotta go.”

She leans over for a hug. I tentatively reciprocate. I’m still sometimes at a loss for how to react to genuine physical affection. It’s not something I grew up being used to, to say the least.

High-fives after a big victory? Fine. Sorority girls saucily grinding up against me while I’m drunk at a house party? Ditto.

A genuine, heart-felt hug from someone who cares for me? That can feel awkward.

I sling my bookbag over my shoulder, grab my portions of cake, and head back home.

Walking up to our place, I smile at how clean our lawn in.

I don’t know how those underclassmen do it. After a party, no matter how disastrous the scene is out front, they’re able to make it look pristine as the landscaping at a five-star country club.

As I get closer to the walkway to our front door, I notice the door open. Then I notice Gavin walking outside of it, seeming to need to high-step to get outside like he’s walking out of the ocean. The strangeness of the scene makes me cock my eyebrow.

“What the fuck happened?” Gavin exclaims angrily.

“What do you mean?” I ask, stepping up to our porch. When I do, a foul stench suddenly assaults my nose. A stench coming from inside our house.

“Look in there!” Gavin yells.

Holy fuck. When I peek my head inside our front door, I see all the trash that was out on our lawn this morning piled up inside our house. “What the fuck? Was it like this when you got here?”

“Yeah!” Gavin exclaims, looking suspiciously around outside for any hint of what might explain this.

I step inside, feeling a bottle crack under my feet. “Shit!” I exclaim.

God damn, it’s a fucking disaster in here. And with all the pizza grease and beer leaking out of their contains onto the linoleum, and even onto the living room carpet, it’s going to be a fucking nightmare cleaning up this mess compared to when it was outside on the grass and sidewalk.

“How long have you been home?” I ask Gavin.

“I got here like three minutes before you did just now.”

I pull out my phone and call up Brad, one of the freshmen we get to clean the place up for us. I can’t imagine he would pull a stunt like this, especially since they all accept this cleanup duty to be able to have an in to the hottest parties on campus: something no freshman frat pledge would dare put at risk for a meaningless prank.

Could someone else with some clout on campus have put them up to it? Lars, maybe? I wouldn’t put it past the big son of a bitch.

I get Brad on the phone and immediately start berating him. To my surprise, he sounds genuinely dumbfounded over what I’m talking about. He says that when he and the other guys showed up, the place was already spotless outside.

Brad’s sat in on some of our strip poker games at parties before, and I know for a fact that he’s got no poker face and can’t fib to save his life. I end the call, with the mystery no closer to being solved.

I step outside onto the lawn and put my hands on my hips, surveying the scene. It really is spotless out here. Shit, whoever did this did a better job of cleaning out here than the freshmen usually do. There’s not a speck of trash left on the lawn, on our porch, on the sidewalk.

It’s almost as if whoever did this did it to make a point. Not just to fuck with Gavin and me. A half-assed job would have been enough for a prank.

No, this was something more than just a silly prank. This was something personal.

“Nice looking lawn!” My eyes follow to the source of the voice. But before I see her, I already know. There’s no other voice I know that sounds so sweet.

Emma Willows is standing next door, beaming from ear to ear, looking happy as a clam at my plight.

“Nice and clean! Someone must have done a great job cleaning up after that party last night.” And after shooting me the most taunting of winks, she walks inside and shuts the door loudly behind her.

Holy shit. Emma Willows put one over on me.

A strange fusion of emotions surges through me. On one hand, I’m pissed off. Pissed off that I still have a giant pile of trash in my house, and pissed off that Emma, after acting so stuck up to me the other night, was the one to do it.

But at the same time, I’m impressed. And intrigued.

The Emma I remember was the kind of girl who had to be convinced that skipping a class wouldn’t land her a ten-year stint in prison. She was a far cry from the kind of girl who could dish out frat prank hijinks with the best of them, which she apparently can do now.

Too bad for her, I don’t think she knows exactly who she’s getting tangled up with. She thinks this is going to end here, that I’m not going to retaliate?

She must really not remember Knox Delton.

Two can play at this game. And I can play it a lot better than her.

In fact, I’ve already got a plan brewing that’s going to make her rue the day she decided to try and play on my turf.