I make some of the desserts here, too. Sort of a hobby I do on the side. Gets me out of my head.”
Ethan wondered why she was inviting them to use her first name. Perhaps the younger Berkley teachers, the ones right out of college, might do this in private, but no one on the Berkley faculty who was Hannah’s age—she had to be at least thirty—would ever allow this.
She sat down on a chair at the counter, facing the boys. “Ethan Whitley…you’re new, right? Did I read some of your short stories last year that came in with your admissions packet?”
Ethan’s blush deepened. “It’s possible. I submitted a few.”
“I loved them. They were really gorgeous. The one about the mother. I hope you keep writing.”
“Thanks,” Ethan croaked.
“Anyway, have some dessert. It’s on me.” She winked at Madame Beauchamp. “What do you guys want?”
“I usually get the carrot cake,” Todd said.
“Um, blueberry cobbler?” Ethan said.
“Give them extra big pieces,” Hannah said to Laura. “They’re growing boys.” She smiled again. “I haven’t made as much of the blueberry cobbler lately. It’s hard to find good local blueberries this time of year.”
“It’s my favorite,” Ethan said. His mother used to bake it for him and his father when he was growing up. But not recently—recently she hadn’t been doing much cooking at all.
“I’d better get going,” Hannah said. “Laura, if they want it, give them seconds.”
Looking back, Todd would sometimes think it had all happened by accident. He was behind in the reading—he was always behind in the reading—and Ethan was the closest guy in the dorm who was also in Ms. Davis’s English class. Taking him to the tearoom a few days later had been partly a tactical move: Todd had discovered several weeks ago from his friend Izzy that Laura, the waitress, was selling the best weed in western Massachusetts. There were only so many times he could go to the tearoom alone; Ethan would be the perfect cover. Laura had taken some convincing, but once he assured her that he was a city kid, that he wasn’t going to get her in trouble, she agreed to sell to him. It wasn’t practical, after all, to go home each time he needed to replenish his stash, and the student he had bought from in previous years, an Upper East Side brat-turned-drug-dealer, had graduated.
Todd knew he shouldn’t be smoking—not as a member of the cross-country team, and not with college applications looming in the coming months. But he hated running. Sometimes during practice, he would will his lungs to collapse on him, pushing himself harder and harder, savoring the sharp pain his breathing cavities exerted on his body, knives cutting him inside, blades steeped in nicotine and sinsemilla. Afterward, there was no camaraderie. His fellow runners weren’t like the football players, who would shower together in the field house after practice, exchanging taunts and laughing all the way to the dining hall. His teammates were lonely creatures, climbing up the hill toward the dorms each evening, retreating to their rooms, one by one, in preparation for dinner. If he had to be alone, he wanted to be high; that was one of the few things he could do without anyone else. The weed helped him shut out the silence, the drudgery: of classes, of college applications, of feeling so alone.
The plan had gone flawlessly that evening, as Todd went inside again while they waited for their cab, saying he had forgotten something. He slipped Laura five twenties, and she handed him a small package, just out of Ethan and Madame Beauchamp’s sight.
After arriving back on campus, Ethan and Todd headed to the snack bar. Now that he was with Todd, Ethan felt confident about entering the gossipy haven that was dominated by Sixth Formers each evening from seven until ten. He hoped they would stay awhile, hang out, talk with some girls.
“I need to find Alex,” Todd said, looking around for his girlfriend, Alexandra Roth. He was suddenly in a panic, as if his future livelihood at the school depended on it. Todd could not be seen entering the snack bar with Ethan Whitley (the puzzling Ethan Whitley, a blank slate, a cipher, for some; for others, one who was suspect—a bit too well read, a bit too smug: California, after all? Who came from California?). Ethan felt a glum sensation as Todd ignored him. He imagined himself being demoted back to his place in the social strata, as if he had been given a glimpse of what it would be like to be popular, to be granted the attentions of someone like Todd Eldon, and was now being informed that actually there had been an error, that he was not meant to have been at the tearoom at all, that he had been mistaken for someone more popular, someone better-looking. He looked around the snack bar: all the usual suspects. Athletes in one corner, stoners in another, the African-American and Asian cliques at their own tables, the artsy crowd (they hadn’t embraced him, either—even the outcasts weren’t taking new admissions, though he was an artist himself) scattered in the middle. Books and papers everywhere. Empty bottles of soda and paper plates littered with the remnants of hamburgers and grilled cheese sandwiches. Todd located his friends across the room and motioned for Ethan to follow him.
He bought two Cokes at the counter and brought them to a table where Todd was sitting with Izzy Jacobsen, Miles Nolan, and Kevin Bradshaw; they were part of what Ethan had heard referred to as the “banker boys,” guys whose fathers had made their money in investments. Todd introduced Ethan to everyone and pulled out a chair for him. After he sat down, Alex appeared behind Todd and wrapped her arms around him. He squirmed uncomfortably, releasing himself from her grip.
Alex smiled at Ethan. “Hi.” Her cheeks glowed from the brisk night, a warm peach color. Ethan had noticed her before, in the hallways, near the mailboxes. The girl with the brown pageboy cut and the large eyes, the one who wore Doc Martens with Laura Ashley dresses. He felt a green pang of jealousy. Todd was that guy, the type who existed in books or movies or his imagination, who had everything a teenager wanted (everything, in fact, that Ethan wanted): friends, a girlfriend, as much money as he needed. There was so much he could learn from Todd, but what did Todd want from him?
Alex turned to Todd. “Should we go?”
Todd shrugged and got up, grabbing his fleece pullover.
Ethan felt his gut flip: nervousness, then annoyance. He wanted what Todd had, not only emotionally, but physically, in the deepest, most visceral part of him. He imagined what they would do together: a romantic walk back to the dorm, perhaps a visit to the studio to show Todd what she had been working on (now Ethan remembered her name from one of the paintings in the main hallway’s exhibition of student work). They would hold hands, and then in some dark corner, he would kiss her, pressing his body to hers, pushing his erection against her pelvis.
“I’ll catch you guys later,” Todd said to everyone, and the two left the snack bar.
“Lucky bastard,” Izzy Jacobsen said, as he scratched his crotch. “That guy gets laid more often than I jerk off.”
The following evening, Todd made a call from the pay phone on the fourth floor of Slater Dormitory. Though this arrangement afforded Berkley’s students little freedom, it was one of the few options they had to make contact with the outside world. Cell phones had been banned years ago after several students’ phones went off during class, the chimes of Beethoven’s Fifth sending them directly to the deans’ wing. The only permitted alternatives for communication were pay phones or e-mail. In this case, Todd needed to talk to his father directly.
He was about to hang up when Don Eldon picked up on the fourth ring. They hadn’t spoken in several months, and Todd hadn’t seen him in over a year. From a practical standpoint, it didn’t matter. His mother, Jackie, had plenty of money to take care of him and his brother, and their father was busy keeping his development ventures in Florida afloat (Todd had to admit that he never understood exactly what it was that his dad did each day). Jackie had never been clear with Todd or his older brother, Brian, about whether it was raising two children, her flourishing literary success in the field of romantic suspense, or a combination of the two, that had driven him away. Miraculously, she had been able to crank out a bloodcurdling best-seller every year while supervising