In Between Days Read Online Free

didn’t want to talk about it anymore. It was her last day, after all, and what he wanted to do now was make love to her, then take her out for breakfast, then drive her up to the airport in Boston. It would be a month, possibly two, before they saw each other again, and he didn’t want to spend their last day together worrying about it. She had finally relented, agreeing not to talk about it, though it was hard for her to think of anything else. When he’d made love to her, she’d cried, and then afterward, she had sat there at her window and stared out at the empty quad, at the freshly fallen snow and the purple sky above it. In the corner, Raja had dressed quietly, then come over to her and sat beside her on the bed. He had squeezed her so tightly that she was sure he’d broken a rib, or maybe something else, something that would leave a permanent trace of him.
    “I don’t want you to talk about this with your parents,” he’d said finally.
    “I already have.”
    “I know,” he said. “But I don’t want you to say anything that you haven’t already said.”
    “Why not?”
    “I just don’t,” he’d said. “It’ll be better that way.”
    “For who?”
    “For both of us.”
    She’d nodded, though it bothered her how surreptitious he’d become, how guarded. Earlier that week, he had come over to her dorm room and demanded that she show him all of her e-mails, even the personal ones from friends. Then he’d made her delete each and every one, even though she’d made a promise to him long before that she would never talk about this stuff with anyone. Deleting the e-mails from him had been the hardest. It was like erasing a part of her life, a part of her past. Suddenly, aside from the few tiny letters she’d kept hidden at the back of her desk, there was no evidence, no sign at all, that she’d ever actually known him.
    Later, on the way to the airport, they stopped at a diner for breakfast, and then afterward they’d driven the rest of the way to Boston in silence. When he dropped her off at the airport, he’d been quiet, evasive, just like he’d been on the way up. He’d helped her with her bags; then he’d stood there and hugged her tightly, though he hadn’t cried. She had wanted him to cry. She had wanted him to show some sign of remorse, some sign of contrition for what he’d dragged her into, or, at the very least, some sign that he would miss her. But that was not his style. Instead what he’d done was patted her on the head and kissed her. Then he’d said, “It’s gonna be okay.”
    “I wish I believed you.”
    “It will be,” he said. “I promise.”
    “Do you have enough money to get back home?” she’d said. “I mean, for gas?” He almost never had enough money for anything.
    He looked at her and shrugged. “I’ll manage,” he said.
    “What if I never see you again?” she said. The thought of this had never even occurred to her before that moment.
    “Then that would be a miracle,” he’d said. “Or a tragedy.” Then he’d started to laugh. “Or both.”
    Now, as she stands outside the empty baggage claim at Houston International, she wonders how long it will be before she sees him again. Howlong it will be before she hears his voice. Raja had been the first and only boy she’d ever loved. Before him, there had been Aiden Bell, and before Aiden, there had been Dustin O’Keefe, but neither of those boys had held a candle to Raja. It was only with Raja that she felt herself. It was only in his presence that she understood what women meant when they talked about love in magazines and books. There was a coolness about him, a detachment, that seemed to attract other people. He had more friends than she had ever had, and yet he never seemed to make the slightest effort to get to know them. They simply showed up at his room at all hours of the night, wanting to talk about books or politics or movies or wanting to tell him about the problems in their lives. That