Pulse (Contemporary new adult/college romance) (Club Grit Trilogy) Read online

  I saw him going the backdoor with a girl so I knew I had to make my move before it was too late. I moved in to my target and tapped him on the shoulder as the girl made a corner.

  He turned to see me and then turned away. That was weird: most guys were stunned when they saw me, especially now that I had the proper clothes and beauty treatments to look like a pageant winner turned sorority girl. I flicked one of my long golden extensions over my tan shoulder. “Uh, excuse me?” I half asked, half ordered. I didn’t really want him to excuse me. I wanted him to notice me.

  “Yeah, you’re excused. I’m a bit busy, if you can’t tell,” and so I looked over his shoulder to see what he was doing.

  The girl he’d let out of the club to the back alley? She wasn’t a girl he was going to fuck or anything. He was holding up her hair while she puked, her butt against his crotch out of necessity as he held her up so she didn’t fall into the puddle of grossness her stomach was letting out. I wished that I was that girl, kind of, with my ass against the bouncer’s dick, but I didn’t envy the fact she didn’t know her limits. There were splatter marks on his jeans now, as well as on her discount level black bandage bodycon dress that was definitely not in line with the theme of #ThrowbackThursday. It was pretty fucking gross, but whatever.

  I ignored it. I wasn’t about to let some other girl kill my buzz, especially one that was wearing a ponytail. “Yeah, so, I was wondering if like, you wanted my number.”

  “No,” he said. This time, he didn’t even turn to talk to me. Maybe he’d misheard me over the pulsing beat of the music, the bass heavier at Club Grit than at most places, but I doubted it. Guys like him said yes to girls like me. They always did.

  “No? What do you mean, no?” Guys didn’t say no to me, ever. They asked me if I wanted it faster, or harder, but not for me to go away.

  “Listen, lady, I’m just trying to do my job. I’m a bouncer, if you want the kind of guy that’ll give you his number out of obligation, try the bartender or better yet, another club. There’s a strip club down the street, I’m sure many guys there would oblige your request.” His voice was getting firmer. I wondered if he was like that in bed, growling orders and commands. It would be like one of those hot stories that Becca had told us. Ever since BDSM had become chic, I’d always wanted a dominant lover. I didn’t want one that was rude.

  “Excuse me? I’m not that kind of girl.” I wasn’t some thirty year old single divorcee who read romance novels in the tub with a glass of cheap red wine, who had more cats than ex-boyfriends. I was a young, hot nubile woman, at the prime of my life, and he was a guy. Guys wanted to fuck. That was what they were good for.

  “You’re sure acting like it. Now please, go away. I’m trying to help a customer here,” he said, and this time, he did turn to look at me, but not to give me a once over, but to glare. That’s not how guys looked at me. They looked at me and they practically made a pool of drool at their feet. They didn’t ignore me, ever.

  “Whatever,” I said, but he had already turned away. I went back into the club, to the VIP where the girls still were. They had just got another round of drinks, a bottle of champagne poured by a sexy bottle service girl who was friends with Kim Lee while the sparklers in the cork fizzled away while emitting bright white and rainbow sparks that didn’t burn our skin or dresses.

  “You smell kinda funky, honey...did you bang him against the dumpster or something?” asked Becca as she sipped away at the slender flute, her perfectly shaped gel nails tapping against the crystal glass like a spa chime. The bubbles around the perfectly whole strawberry, as red as her lip gloss, bubbled up to those same lips.

  “Ha. Ha. No. I wasn’t even gone that long,” I said as I sat back down, but all eyes were still on me. I knew my answer wasn’t satisfactory. They wanted the juicy details, and they wanted them now.

  “Honey, you never know!” she said with a laugh. Becca was the most sexually experienced of the group. Rumor has it a pledge that was assigned to do her laundry opened the wrong drawer once and saw her collection of expensive gold plated vibrators, but of course, that was just a rumor, right? I couldn’t imagine a girl like Becca needing sex toys, given the fact she had a new frat boy on her arm at every social and sometimes, one in the coat closet too.

  “Yeah, no success,” I said and I reached for another drink.

  Kim Lee pulled it away and her thin designer bangles clinked against the glass so hard I thought the glass might shatter and break, spilling the golden deliciousness all over her vintage Lilly dress she’d borrowed from her mom. “You don’t need another drink. What you need is to get that number off that bouncer. Don’t make me look like a fool for giving you this privilege. I want you to come back to this table with his digits or you don’t get to come back with us at all. You’ll have to find your own way home. If you want another pill for confidence, that I can offer. You can wash it down with the champagne if you want.”

  I looked at her to see if she was joking, but the look on her face was the kind she had when we got cucumber gel facials at the spa. It was stoic and it was no nonsense. She’d put her faith in me and I’d failed her, so the only option was that I’d have to make it right. I didn’t want to make her look like a fool in front of everyone else.

  She held out the bag of pills in her hand. I took another tab of ecstasy and washed it down with the champagne, and headed back downstairs. I knew the girls were watching me but as I became more relaxed and the pills took hold over my body, all I wanted to do was to fuck. To dance.

  However, as I looked over the dance floor, I didn’t see bouncer boy anywhere. I did see a guy dancing by himself and texting, so I walked over to him and started to grind on him while he texted. It wasn’t ideal but it was better than just looking like a stalker. Of course, the guy noticed and wrapped an arm around my waist, pulling me in to rub me against his cock which I could feel through his pants, and he pushed me over so he could text on the small of my back. It was perfect for finding my bouncer boy.

  Until he dropped me and my knees hit the floor.

  “Hey,” I said, but the guy was already making his way across the floor to the next girl. What a jackass! I tried to get back on my feet but it was hard in heels on a floor now slippery with sweat and spilled drinks, so I gave up after a while. I reached out but nobody was there to help me back up until one person reached out: the bouncer from before, the asshole that wouldn’t just give me his number. I took his hand and got back on my feet, but slipped again, so he took one of my arms and wrapped it around his firm shoulder to steady me. His shirt was wet with sweat but I didn’t care that my bare arms were taking in its saltiness. I got to be close to him and take in his masculine musk as he lead me to the curtained VIP section and sat me down.

  “Hey, you,” I said, but I knew my words were slurred. It didn’t really matter. “Are you going to finally give me your number?”

  “No, you’ve got to go. Home. Now. Where are those girls you came with?” he asked, looking around the club for them. His voice was filled with desperation and I knew that now, in his eyes, I wasn’t some sexy girl. I was like that girl he’d taken to the back alley to spill her guts. I was a fucking mess. My heart sunk. I’d failed my task and I was sure that there was no way that I was going to get this guy’s number, but I got his name. On the front, in smaller type, I’d missed it but now I could read it, kind of. Kyle? Sky? No, it was Skylar. His name was Skylar.

  “They’re coming right back, Skylar,” I insisted but I knew that it had taken me too long to do my task. The girls had already left without me, but that’s what I got for fucking up this task. It wasn’t fair. This was the kind of challenge that I couldn’t just flash my Daddy’s girl credit card at and make disappear as fast as I could say “charge it”.

  A bottle service girl in a low cut black dress, patent platform heels, and porn star tits came up. “Her party already left half an hour ago,” she said, in a voice unlike the one I’d heard her use earlier with the table next t
o us, that squeaky flirty voice replaced by one more serious and free of the lilts I was used to hearing in the club.

  “Maybe you could take me home,” I said to Skylar, but he looked at me in a way I didn’t want any guy to look at me: with disappointment.

  But his answers surprised me. “Yeah. Maybe I can.”

  That’s when I stopped remembering. That’s when I blacked out.

  Chapter Two, #FollowFriday:

  I WOKE UP IN MY DORM ROOM AND LOOKED AT THE CLOCK. It was already eleven in the morning. I’d missed breakfast and if I’d had class, I would have been late. How did I get home though? I remember staying behind when everyone went home, and something about a bouncer...

  Samantha was downstairs with Kim when I opened the fridge and went for a yogurt. It tasted terrible in my mouth, even though it was my favorite: Greek yogurt with the strawberry in the bottom. I hated being hungover and had the pounding head to prove it. “Oh, that cute guy you were talking to, the bouncer? He got a cab and took you home but he left. He didn’t even go upstairs. Kim took you to your room but that guy escorted you home.”

  “Did you get his number?” asked Kim. She was dressed in her usual clothes now: black horn rim glasses, a cable knit cardigan light enough for spring, a tank top, and a plaid skirt with black Mary Janes. In one hand was a cup of coffee, in the other, a surprisingly plain looking clipboard: black, with a silver clip, some girls said in hushed whispers that it was custom made by Christian Louboutin himself, as the edges were the same scarlet red as the bottoms of the iconic shoes. Her father was the most famous businessman in all of Korea, renowned for his fashion empire, from small stores that every kawaii-as-fuck ulzaang girl worth their salt wore to exclusive limited batch artisan designer goods that Asian politician's wives bought out in hours upon release.

  I bit my lip as I lied. It was only a white lie, like most of the lies I told at the sorority, about people’s clothes or their nails or whether they should treat themselves to dessert. “Yeah, I’m going to call him this weekend.” Hopefully everything would blow over my Monday if I kept my head down and conveniently caught mono from a member of Beta Rho.

  Becca walked in with a bagel covered in cream cheese and lox as neon coral pink as her dress had been last night. Just the memory of last night made me sick and the smell of fish wasn’t helping either. “No, silly, why don’t we just go to the club tonight? He knows you now, so we can get in the VIP section quicker. We’ll be able to cut the line, past all the plebs and uglies, and get to partying faster.”

  “That’s such a good idea, Becca!” said Samantha, sincerely. Samantha was always too busy to date seriously and so she never kept a man around for long, preferring to use them the way that the frat boys usually used sorority chicks, but nobody would dare call her a slut, because she was in control of the situation, the one that pursued and the one that didn’t answer their calls the next evening unless she was looking for an easy booty call. You would have never guessed that beneath her cardigan and pleated skirts, there was a sex kitten that would burst free in an explosion of glitter and sequins multiple times per week. Some girls smoked to stay skinny: Samantha fucked.

  “Bitch, like I don’t know?” she giggled as they did that half-effort, easy breezy high five all the older girls did, clasping their hands before it could make a slapping sound. I still wasn’t used to the word bitch being tossed around so lightly but I laughed along with them. “You don’t look your best, though.” Becca gave me the once over as she gave me that oh so judging look I was used to her giving all the other pledges too. “We have to hit the spas. Like, now.”

  Although I’d gotten a nice golden glow in Florida, my tan was fading, so the girls and I hit the tanning salon first. Although I knew a lot of people said it was unhealthy, I didn’t care. I knew that some spray on shit couldn’t replace the glow that the light purple light of the tanning beds did at De La Sol. Plus, it was so much less messy and looked so much better. As we lay in the beds, I thought about what I’d say to Skylar that night. Was I going to approach him or wait for him to approach me? Would I go up with my friends or by myself? I decided I’d play it by ear. I thought about asking my Big for guidance but I didn’t want to bug her. Besides, if I had to have my hand held through everything, I’d be just like the other freshmen, the pledges that I was distancing myself from. Honestly, I didn’t see why they couldn’t do things on their own. Why did they need to have stuff like mixers and socials arranged for them when there was a whole world outside the sorority, a world that, as hot young women part of an elite and exclusive society, was our oyster?

  Next, we hit the actual spa, La Aqua. We sat with our feet in actual fish tanks. The fish nibbled at our feet, pulling up dead skin, while the beauticians worked on our hands first. This was the kind of spa that you only read about on Buzzfeed or heard about in rumors that you swear were made up on Tumblr. It was technically illegal, but none of the spas were busted for the practice. They could always claim somebody had PhotoShopped the tank in anyway but at the end of the day, this was a fad, albeit and expensive fad, and one that would be replaced with another in the weeks to come. In LA, where beauty was queen and the dollar was king, treatments like this were priced so only the elite could partake in them. This wasn’t the kind of place most people went to or could even afford. This wasn’t for everyone, but this was for us. This was for me.

  Kim went for her classic French mani as she’d started outgrowing her precious set of gels. All the older girls went for the gels and although I went for trendy things that I could have replaced every week at least, I wondered if as I grew older, I too would find myself drawn to the more classic instead of flashy aesthetics they went for. This was the only place Kim would put down her clipboard, the only time she actually relaxed, and the closest she ever got to being just another girl at the sorority, instead of the one always watching, always taking notes for the president who mostly worked from behind the scenes, too busy her senior year to party with us.

  Becca’s gel set was still nice but she got the small crescent moon shaped gap filled so it looked more natural. Samantha pulled up her phone and showed the manicure artist what she wanted: a turquoise nail design with metallic stripes done with striping tape instead of nail art pens, with a triangle on her accent nail to match. Of course, it came out perfectly: that’s what came with the luxury prices of La Aqua, the favored spa of the many wealthy housewives in the area. Of course, it’d be replaced by a new place (with many of the same beauticians) in the months to come but right now it was the coolest place in town.

  For me? I went for a set of nail effects. On most of my fingers, I went with a grayish brown base and silver crackle topping to look like cobblestones. On my accent finger, I had a mix of green flocking powders dabbed on top of a mix of green mini bar shaped glitters. It was supposed to look like a grassy lawn. Trust me, it looked way cooler in person. Way cooler. I took a picture and posted it to Instagram. Tons of likes from girls in the sorority. Cha-ching, popularity purchased.

  What does matter is that having nice things for the first time in my life was, well, nice. I’d always wanted to be like the preppy girls in high school, the ones who wore designer clothes even though they were still in their relatively early teens, the ones who had brand name backpacks and school supplies with cool designs. Now, those same girls were small fish, the kind that I was better than, richer than, and who I knew envied me and my family, because we hadn’t been prepared to win the lottery, so instead of setting up an LLC like a lot of winners, our names were on the state news and everybody knew we’d won five hundred million dollars, that we’d never have to work again or be for wanting. I’d never have to listen to my parents worry at the dining table as they poured over the receipts, after a bad harvest, wondering if they’d have to apply for food stamps because there was no way we could just live on corn for the entire winter. I’d never have to hear a sigh of relief when things worked out and I’d never have to hear the whispers of the girls whose
dads were in front of buying crops for companies about how, if it wasn’t for their charitable business deals, I wouldn’t even be at school, I’d be living with my grandmother in the mountains of Virginia by the coal mines.

  I’d never have to listen to anything they ever said again.

  Instead, I got to pretend my old life never happened, that I’d always been this other person, that I’d never been in need. That I’d never been weak.

  Instead, I got to get my nails done and forget, letting the massaging spa chair loosen the tension in my muscles in my back. The spa music was light, acoustic harps with chimes in the background playing current pop hits made softer, more serene. I’d never had thought Imagine Dragon’s “Radioactive” would ever have a place in a spa like this, instead of on the dance floor at Club Grit where, when the bass was dropped, nobody really knew what to do with their body except make out and writhe with the others lost in the undulating pitches of the dub step inspired song.

  I never thought that places like this, with their pristine white counters with smoky gray frosted glass accents, except for the crystal clear glass of the pedicure aquariums, would be the kind of place that I’d get to frequent, but as I inhaled a whiff of what smelled like cucumber and papaya and some sort of exotic flower like an orchid, rich and almost vanilla-like but definitely floral, I knew that I’d made the big time. I was only in college and I’d never have to worry again.

  I’d never have to worry about money, so that meant I had no more cares in the world, right?

  That everything would be perfect.

  I had people that were at my service. I had friends that were like me and liked the same things I liked, for once, instead of people I was stuck with because I’d have nobody else that way. I’d been chosen first instead of last, and in the dodge ball of life, that was what mattered. I had people that did what I asked, like changing the setting on the massage chair for me, and who asked what I liked. I had people that would never dare to make fun of the way I talked, or who would call me stupid for saying “like”.