It all made sense in my head. It wasn’t until I straightened and turned around—which made me dizzy again, I guess because I’d been bent over too far, peering into his car like some kind of peep-show freak—that I realized it hadn’t made any sense to him. His eyebrows were all knit together.

“From the cans. With the dents,” I said.

No change in the eyebrows.

“Anaerobic bacteria? Gruesome, painful death?”

He shook his head slowly back and forth, and then he did the worst thing.

He grinned.

It was like a nuclear attack.

“You’re a weird one, aren’t you?” he asked.

I’m not the guy with condoms and beef stew in my car.

I didn’t say it, though. I was too busy smiling like a complete idiot.

West’s grin has that effect on me. He doesn’t deploy it often, but when he does, I go brain dead.

Also, the world had gotten kind of fuzzy and sideways at the edges. My hip hit something hard, which upon further investigation turned out to be his car door, and then I was sinking down, resting my forehead against the hot front tire and saying, “It’s because they don’t have helper monkeys.”

I don’t even know what I meant. I was all addled and sleepy suddenly, and he was really close, reaching for me. I felt his breath on my neck, heard him mumble something about get inside and you.

I liked the sound of that.

A heavy weight on my shoulders turned out to be his arm coming around me, easing me down onto my back. For one slow, perfect beat of my heart, he was poised on his elbows above me, his hips pressing into mine. He smelled good. Warm and rich, like something amazing to eat that would melt on my tongue.

Then he shifted away, and we were lying side by side on the ground. I wondered vaguely if my desire for him to climb back on top of me made me a bad girlfriend. Did it count as cheating? Because I liked his hands on me. I liked the smell of him.

I closed my eyes and breathed in West Leavitt and green grass and warm earth.

I’m pretty sure I was still smiling when I lost consciousness.

Bridget hails me from beside the glass-paned doors that mark the entry to the dining hall.

She’s beaming the whole time I cross the lobby, right up until I get close enough for her to see my face.

“What happened to your nose?”

“It collided with an elbow.”

“You’re going to have to explain that.”

“Yeah, I know. But give me a second.”

We go through the doors, grab trays, and wait for the handful of students in front of us to make their way down the line before I dive in. “You know the fight? West and Nate? I kind of got caught in the crossfire.”

“Nate hit you? Oh my gosh! That’s terrible. Did you call security? Because that’s serious, Caroline. I’m not even kidding, you can’t let this keep going on like it is, or—”

I touch her arm to stop the stream of words. Bridget talks like a faucet. She’s either on or she’s off. You have to interrupt the flow if you want to get a word in edgewise. “It wasn’t Nate. West elbowed me, I think. Neither of us was too sure, actually.”

Her eyes get huge. “You talked to him?”

I know what she’s imagining—West and me huddled somewhere private and intimate, and him holding a warm compress to my forehead. That’s how I met her, in fact. I had passed out next to West’s car, and I woke up on my dorm bed with a cold paper towel on my head and Bridget leaning over me, all forehead wrinkles and concerned blue eyes, like some kind of adorable red-haired, freckle-faced angel.

“Not really,” I say. “That’s a good color on you.”

It’s the truth: Bridget looks good in blue. But mostly I tell her because she’s a jock—a long-distance runner on the track team—and I make a habit of complimenting her whenever she wears normal clothes, just to encourage the practice.

We’re making our way down the hot-food line now. “Do you have chicken without the fried stuff on?” she asks the student worker.

“No, just what you see.”

“Okay, thanks.” She’s in training, so she’s super careful about what she eats.

I take a plate of chicken-patty parmesan and two chocolate mint brownies. I have bigger things to worry about at the moment than calories.

“Don’t even think I didn’t notice you changing the subject,” Bridget says when we’ve made our way from the line to the salad bar, where she loads up on hard-boiled eggs and greens. “I need to know what he said. Like, was he still mad from fighting, or was he nice? Did you guys go somewhere quiet, or were you in a crowd? How upset was he that he hit you? Because Krishna says—”

“He didn’t say anything,” I clarify. “He had to leave so he didn’t get caught and end up expelled or whatever.”

“But you said you talked to him.”

“No, I didn’t.”

She rolls her eyes. “You implied it, lawyer girl.”

“We exchanged a few sentences. He wanted to make sure I was okay.”

We’re on to drinks now. Bridget goes for the milk. I get myself a Coke with ice. “Did he say anything about why he did it?” she asks.

“No.”

“Did you ask? Did you hear them arguing? Give me something here. Only you could act like West and Nate hitting each other and you getting whacked in the face is no biggie. Hey, where’s your sweater?”

“I had to throw it out. Blood all over it. And, no, I didn’t hear them or ask.”

“That sucks. I liked that sweater.” We swipe our cards at the checkout to put the food on our meal plans, and she starts walking toward the closest free table. Looking back at me over her shoulder, she smiles. “Want to know what I heard?”

“What?” I set my tray down on the table a little too hard.

Her smile falters. “You’re upset.”

“No.”

I’m not. I’m just … confused. Something’s going on, and these days when something’s going on, it’s rarely good. And if the something involves West and Nate, I’m very much afraid I don’t want to hear it.

We sit down. I brace myself. “Just tell me, okay?”

“I heard they were fighting about you.”

Crappity crap crap crap.

“Who told you that?”

“Somebody in their class. They’ve got Macro together.”

“Nate and West?”

“Yeah, and Sierra, you know her? She said that after class Nate made some random joke, and West got on his case, and it turned into an argument about you.”

“What did they say?”

There’s a rock in my stomach, dense and hot. I sip my Coke, closing my eyes against the doomed feeling slipping over my shoulders.

“I’m not sure.” Bridget’s tone is cautious. “Sierra didn’t catch all of it, only your name.”

I push at my chicken with my fork, but I can’t even bring myself to cut it. When I put it in my mouth, it will taste like ashes. The burned-up remains of the life I used to have.

People talk about me. Not to my face, but behind my back? All the time. I’d made Bridget promise to tell me whatever she heard, because I need to know. It’s the only way I can be sure they’re forgetting, like I want them to.

I’m nothing special—just a normal-looking college girl. I should be able to fade into the background if I keep my head down. In a year, I’m hoping that barely anyone will remember this. Caroline who?

It’s not what I had planned, exactly. I’d thought I might shoot for student-body president my junior year, senior year at the latest. But I can table that ambition if I have to. I’d rather be anonymous than notorious.

“Sierra said it was kind of romantic,” Bridget offers. “He was defending your honor.”

It’s such a preposterous idea—that I have honor. That West would defend it.

I barely know him. I’ve only talked to him one time.

West and I are not friends.

And for the past few weeks, the only people who have cared about my honor are Bridget and me. None of my old friends can look me in the eye. Nate and I came as a unit, and when they had to pick sides, I guess his side looked like more fun.