Page 40 of Open Water
He looked at us. At my bruise. At Liam's clothes on my body.
"Damn, Harrington." He set the oars down. "What happened to your face?"
I didn't respond.
"You should see Marcus," Liam said.
"Marcus?" Tyler's eyes went wide. "I thought Liam was the hothead."
"He deserved it," I said.
Tyler looked at me for a second. Then at Liam. Then at the space between us where our shoulders were still touching. I could see him putting it together. The photo he'd seen on his phone last night, the bruise, the Riverside shirt, the two of us walking in together.
"Guess he did," Tyler said. Then he paused. Scratched the back of his neck. "Hey, so — if you guys wanna kiss each other or whatever, that's cool with me. Just don't do it in the boat. Remy'll steer us into a bridge."
"Fuck off, Tyler," Remy said from behind us.
"I'm being supportive!"
"You're being Tyler."
"Same thing."
He picked up the oars, gym bag strap held together with duct tape, and started whistling his way toward the dock.
I looked at Liam.
I almost smiled. The bruise made it hurt. I did it anyway.
Braden was by the erg bay. He'd been there the whole time, stretching against the wall, earbuds in, watching without watching. When I caught his eye he gave me a single nod. I wasn't sure what it meant.
The boathouse was filling. Guys from both teams filtering in, half-awake, pulling on layers, checking the whiteboard for themorning lineup. A few of them looked at me. At the bruise. At the Riverside shirt. They looked and then they looked away and the morning kept going.
Nobody said anything. The silence wasn't hostile. It was the specific quiet of people who'd heard the news and hadn't decided what it meant yet.
Me and Liam were heading for the dock when the boathouse door opened.
Two campus police officers. Kingswell uniforms with navy blue, gold trim, the university crest on the shoulder. They stood in the doorway.
"Alexander Harrington?" the first one said.
Every head in the room turned toward me. Every single one.
Cold flashed through my body, underneath the skin, dropping fast, the way the floor of an elevator drops a half-second before your stomach catches up. My heart slammed once, hard, and then started going too fast, and I had the absurd thought that everyone in the room could hear it.
I did the only thing twenty years had trained me to do. I put it away — the cold, the slamming heart, all of it — folded it down somewhere it wouldn't show, and stood up straight, and let the Harrington face come down over my whole body like a shade being drawn.
"That's me."
"We need you to come with us. Dean Patterson's office."
The words landed flat and the boathouse went silent. The sound of the river outside, lapping against the dock. The hum of the overhead lights.
Liam's hand found my arm. Gripped. His fingers pressed into the muscle above my elbow.
"It's okay," I said.
"It's not."
