Daddies Brat

Harper

When I got home from class, I found Avery and Leslie together. They were sitting on the couch, a respectful foot of space between them, watching a nature documentary on TV. Leslie smiled over at me in greeting, and Avery raised a hand toward me.

I wasn’t stupid. I wasn’t oblivious to the things going on around me. In my opinion, it was incredibly difficult for members of the opposite sex to just remain friends. Especially when they were all young, attractive, and single.

Avery liked Leslie. So did Riley. This was extremely predictable since they had hit on her at the party before learning that she was our roommate, and it was one of my major concerns when we realized who she was. I had been skeptical that the other guys could remain strictly platonic with her.

And as time went on, they were all spending more time together. They hadn’t crossed any lines that I could see, but I got the impression that was slowly changing.

No, I wasn’t stupid. I could see it slowly playing out before me.

But I was unsure of what to do about it. Or if I even should do something about it.

“You coming out to the party with us tonight?” I asked while fixing myself a glass of water.

“Already invited her,” Avery replied. “She’s staying in.” “On a Friday night?” I replied.

Leslie twisted around on the couch and folded her arms underneath her chin on the back of the cushions. “I need to study.”

“I know I’m repeating myself, but… on a Friday night?” I said.

“She failed an exam,” Avery blurted out.

Leslie back-handed him on the arm. “Dude!”

“What? I didn’t know it was a secret. It’s not a big deal. Everyone bombs a test every now and then.”

Leslie glanced at me. It seemed like she didn’t want me to know she had failed. Why not?

“It wasn’t even one of the classes for my major,” she explained. “It was a science gen-ed requirement.”

“I have a good science background,” I said. “I could help you study, if you want.”

“That’s okay,” she said with a thankful smile. “I should be good. But if that changes, I’ll definitely let you know.”

Riley, Avery, and I left for the party together that evening. It was only two blocks away, at a big house a bunch of baseball players were renting together. Most of the guys there were friends of Riley, but over the years they had become mine and Avery’s friends too. All things considered, they were a good group of guys. Better than most fraternities, in my experience.

Avery and Riley played beer pong while I watched from the side. There was an old Greek aphorism: gnothi seauton. It meant know thyself. I had many talents, but hand-eye coordination was not one I was gifted with. I preferred to watch.

“It sucks Leslie wouldn’t come out,” Riley said between shots. “She was bragging about how good she is at beer pong.”

I glanced at Avery. “Did you tell him why?” “She failed an exam,” Avery explained.

Riley whistled. “No shit? She seems like the kind of person who rarely fails something. It was one of her psychology classes?”

“Nah, a gen-ed that doesn’t matter,” Avery replied. “Astronomy.”

I gave a start. “The class was astronomy?”

“Yeah. Why?”

So that was why she didn’t want me to know. Because I was an astronomy major. She knew I would feel obligated to help her.

“She’ll probably be all right,” Avery said, pausing to take a shot. His ball bounced off the rim of a cup. “She doesn’t need an A in that class. She just needs to pass.”

“But she must be taking it hard if she’s staying in on a Friday,” Riley said.

Avery shrugged. “I guess so.”

Riley sank the next shot with a cheer, ending the game with them victorious. As they prepared for a second game-the winners got to play again-I told them I was going to wander around the party and catch up with them later.

The line for the keg was twenty people long. The liquor bar was less crowded, but I didn’t feel like a stronger drink. I gazed into my beer cup, downed the dregs at the bottom, and then went outside.

I think I intended to just get some fresh air, but soon my feet were carrying me away from the house and up the street. I passed a row of fraternity and sorority houses, music blaring from each one while partiers hung out of windows and open, inviting doorways. Going out and drinking on a Friday was what you did as a college student. It was the default. Since this was our last year at school before we graduated, my roommates and I had the mindset that we should be soaking it all in.

But tonight, I wasn’t in the mood.Têxt belongs to NôvelDrama.Org.

Leslie was sitting at the kitchen table, a thick textbook and her laptop open in front of her. She blinked at me in surprise as I closed the door behind me.

“Have I been studying that long?” she asked, glancing at her watch.

“I wasn’t feeling the vibe of the party,” I said, going to the fridge and getting myself a beer.

“Oh, okay,” she replied.

I suspected that Leslie didn’t want to be a burden. That if I helped her study, she would feel guilty about it. So I had to be tactical with my next move.

“I’m going to make some brownies,” I said, getting a box of brownie mix out of the pantry. “That won’t distract you, will it?”

“The smell might,” she said with a weary smile. “Give me a brownie and we’ll call it even.”

“Make it two, and you’ve got a deal.”

For a few minutes, we occupied the space together without talking. She buried her head in her textbook while I mixed the ingredients in a bowl, then poured them into a pan. After popping the pan into the oven, I set a timer.

“What are you studying?” I asked casually.

She quickly waved a hand dismissively. “Nothing important. Don’t worry about it.”

“I don’t have anything to do until the brownies are done. Is that astronomy?”

Leslie hesitated, then said, “Yes. Introductory level.”

“Well,” I said while pulling up a chair, “I happen to be majoring in Astronomy. This stuff is easy for me.”

“I don’t want to trouble you,” she said. “It’s a Friday night. I’m sure you don’t want to be helping me study.”

“You’re right,” I lied. “But I can help you for a little bit. Just until the brownies are ready.” I leaned closer so I could read the page. “Ah, the planetary bodies and their moons. This is my bread and butter. Which part are you on now?”

“I finished the inner planets and am starting the section on the gas giants,” she replied.

“Can you list the inner planets in order?” I asked.

“Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars,” she said with a satisfied smile. “I learned a mnemonic to remember them.”

“Yeah?”

Suddenly her cheeks turned red. “It’s stupid.”

“Oh, come on. Tell me! It can’t be that bad.”

Looking down at her textbook, Leslie quietly muttered, “My vagina eats marzipan.”

I snickered in surprise. “That’s actually a really good trick. The dirtier the memory device, the more likely you are to remember it.”

She brightened at that. “Really?”

“Absolutely. I struggled with an art history class two years ago. Our old roommate helped me study, and she taught me that little trick. I won’t repeat the filthy phrases I memorized in order to remember the names of all the Dutch masters.”

“Was that Jess?” she asked.

The name was like a grenade going off in my head. I gave a start, then quickly tried to act like everything was fine.

“Yeah, Jess.”

“Avery told me a little bit about her,” she explained.

“How much did he say?” I asked. I tried to sound casual about it, but I knew I came across as insistent.

“Not much,” she replied. “He said you had a thing for her, and it ended poorly.”

That was the truth, but it was a very watered-down version of what had happened between me, Jess, Avery, and Riley. But I didn’t want to talk about it. So I only nodded.

“That’s the gist of it.”

Leslie smiled at me, but it was one of pity. That stung as much as the memory of our former roommate and girlfriend. It was like she was suddenly there in the room, grabbing my arms and dragging me down through the floor, a cumbersome weight…

“Is the asteroid belt on your next exam?” I asked.

“No. That’s covered after the planets, in the section on dwarf planets.”

“Good. Then let’s talk about Jupiter’s moons,” I went on. “Jupiter’s four largest satellites are called the Galilean moons, because they were discovered by…?” I trailed off so she could answer.

“Oh, that’s easy,” she answered. “They were discovered by Miley Cyrus.” I gawked at her. She suddenly burst into a huge grin.

“Sorry. It was worth it to see that expression on your face! Galileo discovered the moons.”

I laughed at how ridiculous the joke was. “That’s right. Although Galileo made such a splash in the world of astronomy that you might say he came in like a wrecking ball.”

Leslie almost spit out her glass of water. “That was bad.”

“I know.”

“But it was so bad, it came back around and became funny again,” she said.

I like making her laugh, I realized. It made something blossom inside me, warm and bright.

“There are four Galilean moons. In order of their orbit, they are Io, Europa, Ganymede…”

“And Callisto!” she answered.

“Very good,” I said, nodding. “Now, can you list them in order of size? Smallest to largest?”

Her face twisted adorably as she concentrated. “Um. Europa, then Io…” While the brownies baked in the oven, we hunkered down and studied.