No one knew who she was. I was completely baffled by it. The girl was so high above anything I’d ever seen, I thought every guy on campus would respond to my description — wicked dark hair, seething eyes, a waist small enough to wrap your hands around. I had to use my connections in the admissions office with a girl I’d dated in high school who still had a thing for me.
“Caleb, I’m not allowed to do this,” she said, leaning over the counter. I ignored her attempt at getting me to look at her cle**age.
“Just this once, Rey.” That’s all it took.
“Okay, building?”
I’d seen her walking into Conner’s.
“There are over five hundred girls in Conner’s. You’re going to have to be more specific.”
“Sophomore,” I said, guessing.
She typed something into her keyboard. “Great, now we have two hundred.”
I racked my brain for something else. Blue jeans, white shirt, black fingernail polish. I could take a guess at her major.
“Try pre-law or philosophy,” I said. She had one of those combative personalities that lawyers specialized in. But, she was staring up at a tree, deep in thought…
Rey looked around and then quickly spun the monitor toward me. I glanced through the column of photographs. There were about thirty to a page. She scrolled and my eyes searched.
“Hurry up, Casanova. I could get in trouble for this, you know.”
“She’s not there,” I said after a few seconds. I tried to look nonchalant. “Oh well, guess I’m out of luck this time. Thanks anyway.”
Rey opened her mouth to say something, but I gave her a quick wave and jogged out. Her picture had been there, third from the top. I hadn’t wanted to put her on Rey’s radar — she had the bad habit of spreading rumors about the girls I liked.
Olivia Kaspen. Aivilo What a perfect little name, for a perfect little snob. I smiled all the way back to the dorms.
I looked for her everywhere. She didn’t go to the gym. She was never in the cafeteria or at any of our home games. I went back to the spot I first saw her and hung out outside of her dorm. Nothing. She was either a first class hermit or I’d imagined the whole thing. Olivia Kaspen. A cross between Snow White and The Evil Queen. I had to find her.
I wasn’t smiling a week later. I’d spotted her in the stands at one of our last games of the season. We’d made it to the playoffs and were leading the game by ten points. The minute I saw her, I was distracted. I kept glancing up into the stands where she was sitting, clutching a Styrofoam cup between her hands. One thing was clear — she wasn’t looking at me. I don’t know what possessed me to believe that I could impress her with my game play, but I tried. The visiting team went on a ten-nothing run. The game was tied. I stood at the free throw line, and to this day I don’t know what possessed me to pull the little stunt that cost us the game. I jogged over to my coach. Normally a stunt like that would have gotten me kicked off the team, but I happened to be the BMOC and it helped that he was a family friend.
“I can’t focus. I have to take care of something,” I told him.
“Caleb, you have to be f**king with me right now.”
“Coach,” I said quietly. “Give me two minutes.”
He narrowed his eyes and stared at me over his glasses. “Is this about that girl?”
My blood ran cold. My coach was an insightful guy, but-
“The one who’s missing?” he finished.
I stared at him blankly. Laura? We’d dated, but not seriously. I wondered if my parents had said something to him. My mother was friends with her mother. She had been enthusiastic when we’d started dating, but Laura was all looks and no personality. We had fizzled out almost immediately. Before I could correct him, he said, “Go. Hurry up.”
He called a time out and put the team in a huddle.
I took the stairs two at a time. The closer I got, the paler she got, and she was already pretty pale. When I crouched down next to her, her eyes were wide and she looked ready to bolt.
“Olivia,” I said. “Olivia Kaspen.”
She looked momentarily shocked. She composed herself quickly. Her eyes danced around my face before she leaned toward me and said, “Bravo, you found out my name.” Then in a lower voice, “What the hell are you doing?”
“You’re quite the mystery on campus,” I said, tracing the outline of her lips with my eyes. I’d never seen such sensual lips in all my life. How had it taken me this long to find those lips?
“Are you going to be making a point any time soon, or are you holding up the game to brag about your detective skills?”
Oh my god. How could I not laugh at that? I wanted to tell her right then and there that she was going to marry me, but I was pretty sure she’d slap me if I did. I decided to turn on the charm. It would have worked with any other girl. But, damn if she shot me down.
“If I make this shot, will you go out with me?”
She all but rolled her eyes. The look on her pretty little face was of absolute disgust. Then she stole my line and called me a peacock.
“It took you all week to think up that one, didn’t it?” I said, smirking. I was fairly certain at that point she was playing hard to get.
“Sure,” she said, shrugging.
“So then, it’s fair to say that you were thinking about me all week?”
When I was a kid I watched a helluva lot of Looney Tunes. Smoke was always coming out of the character’s noses when they were angry. Usually, it lifted them right off the ground. The expression on Olivia’s face was that of smoke coming out of her nose.