Page 2 of Given Our History

Teddy was making his way over to the table. He didn’t seem to have registered who his girlfriend was talking to. There was a rising feeling in my chest, something burning its way up my throat like it was looking for a way out—panic, or maybe bile.

“And I was like damn, that’s real, because there was this guy that I met a couple times back in college who I was super attracted to, but I never had the balls to just go for it. But then I remembered that I added you”—she pointed at me, and it felt very accusatory, like I was a suspect in a lineup—“on Facebook, and I was like, ‘She has to have him on her friends list, they were best friends, right?’ So I looked, and there he was.” She glanced up at him warmly and he snaked an arm around her back, bending to plant a kiss on her cheek.

Bile. It was definitely bile in my throat. I gave them a close-lipped smile. “How sweet.”

At the sound of my voice, Teddy did an almost imperceptible double take, his eyes widening when he finally registered who was sitting at the table. His lips parted in surprise, but neither of us said anything. It had been three years since we last spoke, and longer still since the last time I saw him. He’d grown his hair back out, loose brown curls that looked like he’d just finished running a hand through them, and I found a small measure of satisfaction in knowing he’d taken my advice.

Not that it should matter. He wasn’t dating me. I’d made sure of that. But when I saw him now, something feral clawed at the inside of my chest. He looked … good. He was wearing a black T-shirt, just snug enough to show off his broad chest, and his olive skin had a healthy summer tan. Memories floated to the surface, unbidden.

I tore my eyes away, fixating on Professor Blanchett. This was testing her patience, no doubt. Her slender arms were folded over a herringbone blazer, the shoulder pads hunching. Beneath the table, I was pretty certain she was jiggling a loafer-clad foot.

Mindy was still talking. “—sent him a message, and the rest was history.”

Teddy cleared his throat and glanced at his girlfriend. “She’s leaving out the part where she sort of harassed me for a date,” he said. His tone was obviously meant to be light—teasing—but it came out sounding a little forced.

She rolled her eyes at him. “You loved it.”

I hazarded another glance at Teddy. Dark eyes met mine from behind black-framed glasses.

“Hi,” I said, because the longer I went without saying something to him directly, the more it felt like there was an elephant in the sandwich shop. But I didn’t know what else to say, what I could possibly tack onto that sentence without it sounding completely hollow.

“Hey,” he said quietly.

I couldn’t bear to look at him for longer than a couple seconds, so I stared at the table, the laminate curling up along the edges.

“Anyway, enough about that,” Mindy said, oblivious. “I’m gonna grab some food. You want anything?” She flung this question at me without any real warning, and my brain was still processing everything else, so for a few seconds, I gaped like a fish. “The food here is really good,” she added. “Their turkey melt panini has me in a chokehold.”

I looked up at Professor Blanchett, whose nostrils flared. Her cheesesteak was still untouched. “Actually, I’m kind of in the middle of—”

“Are you kidding? We can all eat together. Lunch is totally on us.”

Us. The word was a knife slipping between my ribs. Mindy left the table to order at the counter, but a presence hung in her wake, the third chair at our table still very much occupied. I felt a little guilty that my knee-jerk reaction was to hope someone spat in her turkey melt. Mindy hadn’t done anything wrong.

“Clara,” Teddy began, and I sprang out of my chair on autopilot. Whatever he was about to say, I didn’t think I had the heart to hear it. “I’ve been meaning to—”

“You know what,” I said, ignoring him, collecting my messenger bag off the floor. It was heavy, laden with hard copies of old essays and unofficial transcripts. Evidence that I’d meant to present to Professor Blanchett. But I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t sit around and wait for this storm to blow over. “I actually need to get going. I’m sorry,” I told her, a little frantic, “and I completely understand if this ruins my chances of getting that letter. I just—I can’t stay for lunch. I’m sorry.”

“Clara, wait—” Teddy tried to stop me, fingers closing around my arm, and I jerked back. Our eyes locked and he searched my face—quick, cursory, but enough that he came to some sort of conclusion. He released my arm with a mumbled apology, and then I was out the door, power walking down past parking meters along a shady one-way street. I glanced over my shoulder once or twice, half expecting him to come after me, to insist that I hear him out, but he didn’t.

We’d gone three whole years without speaking. But that day, the day I walked away and he chose not to follow—that was the day I finally realized that I’d lost him for good.

CHAPTER1

PRESENT

A shadow shifts behind the fogged glass and the door opens with a click. Julien’s bald head materializes in the gap. “Come in, come in,” he says, stepping aside to let me through. “You’ll have to excuse the mess.”

He shuts the door behind me. The mess in question isn’t much of a mess at all—just a couple of half-empty boxes and a desk strewn with papers. Balanced on top of a stack of manila folders is a placard that reads JULIEN ZABINI—CHAIR, HISTORY DEPARTMENT. The stench of hot tar drifts through the open window. They started the remodel on the social sciences building today and the roof tiling comes first, because it’s the only thing everyone could agree upon. Every step of the approval process has come down to a game of bureaucratic tug-of-war between university donors, the dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, and the Board of Directors. Anyone and everyone with a long enough track record and deep enough pockets.

“Have a seat,” Julien says, waving at the straight-backed wooden chair parked in front of his desk. He wanders over to the bar cart by the window, where a set of etched crystal tumblers glisten in the bronzy afternoon sun. It’s the last week of summer; the fall semester starts Monday. “Scotch?”

“No, thank you.”

“Suit yourself,” he says with an incline of his head. “So long as you don’t mind—”

“Not at all.” I’m used to this little exchange. Julien did his undergrad at University of Edinburgh, where he picked up a handful of habits—habits that, on occasion, tease the boundaries of American professionalism. I suspect he enjoys it, watching our more stuffed-shirt colleagues squirm beneath his polite offers of Ardbeg and Dalmore.

He stoops beneath the bar cart, produces a bottle of amber-colored liquor, and pours himself a glass, sans ice. A few years ago, I gifted him a set of whisky stones when I pulled his name out of the hat during the department’s Secret Santa exchange. He accepted them graciously, but he’s never once used them.