Mistaking Thorns for Roses, My Bright Life Begins

Freshman move-in day, Reg Vance posted in the new-student group chat: Anyone from around here? Riverton native, looking for someone to team up with for check-in!

Five minutes later he messaged me privately: Don't reply. Let's keep us to ourselves for now. Being too flashy in college isn't a good look.

I said okay.

So on welcome day, he teamed up with Emily Donaldson, who volunteered.

They picked up their campus cards together, wandered the campus together, ate the first college meal together in the dining hall.

Three photos went up on his feed, all of him and Emily. I liked the post. He deleted my trace in seconds.

He grabbed Emily a spot with the most popular professor during course selection and left me the eight a.m. slot nobody wanted.

For the class icebreaker he grouped up with Emily and told me to find my own spot, not to make it obvious.

When Emily caught a cold he skipped class to bring her medicine. When I ran a fever of a hundred and two, he texted back, "Drink water, and stop coming to me all the time."

The whole class was saying Reg liked Emily.

I spent an entire semester defending him: "No way, he has a girlfriend."

But at the New Year's party, he walked onto the stage holding flowers.

"Emily, from September to today, I've thought it over for a hundred days, made up my mind a hundred times. You're the one I want to seriously like."

The whole place screamed and cheered.

Nobody noticed the girl in the front row who stopped clapping halfway through.

I stood up and cut through the cheering crowd toward the back door.

He saw me from the stage, and the flowers nearly slipped from his hand.

I didn't look back.

"You don't have to explain. Go chase her."

"What are you running for?"

Reg came out through the back door of the auditorium and grabbed my wrist.

He hadn't even caught his breath, his brows knotted tight.

"It was just a bit put on for the student council program. I lost at truth or dare."

"Emily's being hassled by her ex. I was helping cover for her."

"Can you not be such a killjoy?"

Cold wind poured down my collar.

I looked at the rose petal still pinched between his fingers.

Glaringly red.

"For a program effect you had to say you'd thought about her for a hundred days?"

My voice was very quiet.

Something impatient flickered in his eyes.

"The lines were written out in advance too."

"If I didn't say it like that, who'd believe it?"

"You're usually so reasonable. Why are you being so stubborn today?"

He let go of my hand and pulled out his phone to check it.

The screen lit up. A message from Emily.

"Let's cancel the plan to go to the field for New Year's."

He tucked the phone back into his pocket.

"Emily was nearly in tears up there just now."

"Everyone's saying we should go get barbecue to calm her nerves."

"Head back to the dorm on your own. We'll make up New Year's tomorrow."

I didn't say anything.

I just slipped my hand into my coat pocket.

My fingertips brushed the pair of matching couple's rings I'd meant to give him.

The metal was ice cold, cutting right through me.

"Let's go."

He turned and walked off, his steps quick.

The class dinner after the party was set at a barbecue place on the back street behind campus.

I hadn't wanted to go, but my roommate dragged me along to join the fun.

At the long table, Reg sat down beside Emily like it was nothing.

Emily sneezed.

"It's so cold."

She rubbed her arms, her eyes landing on Reg's jacket draped over the back of his chair.

Reg said nothing.

Emily just reached over, took the jacket, and pulled it over herself.

"Reg, let me borrow this for a bit. You don't mind, right?"

Reg was busy typing a reply on his phone and didn't look up.

"Go ahead."

A moment later, Emily frowned again.

"This juice is so sweet. It's making me sick."

She casually picked up the plain water in front of Reg and took a big gulp.

My roommate nudged my foot under the table.

I looked down at the skewer in front of me.

There was a bit of cumin stuck to the wooden stick.

"Classmates don't need to fuss over that kind of thing."

Reg finally lifted his head and tossed off the explanation.

The mood at the table caught fire instantly.

The class president stood up with his beer.

"Reg, that confession tonight was legendary."

"The best-looking guy and the best-looking girl in the department. Made for each other!"

Everyone joined in the teasing.

The guy sitting across from me suddenly turned to look at me.

"Edna Henson, you kept saying Reg had a girlfriend."

"See how off your intel was."

"Almost held up a perfectly good match."

A round of good-natured laughter broke out around us.

My fingers went slightly white around the cup.

Ripples spread out across the surface of the water, ring after ring.

I looked at Reg.

He was leaning back in his chair, head down, spinning a lighter in his hand.

The flame shot up and died out.

He didn't say a word, letting me be turned into a joke.

For a hazy moment, I thought back to those evening study sessions senior year.

To get into the same college, we'd pulled all-nighters grinding through practice sets until dawn.

He'd been so tired he could barely keep his eyes open, and he still forced himself to walk me through the hard math problems.

The hallway lights had been dim.

He'd leaned close to my ear, his voice hoarse and gentle.

"When we get to college, I'm going to let everyone know you're my girlfriend."

"I'm going to hold your hand and walk every corner of that campus."

Back then the promise landed like something solid.

Now the silence was deafening.

The dinner ended.

Everyone drifted back toward campus in twos and threes.

Reg and Emily walked side by side at the front.

The streetlights stretched their shadows out long.

Emily suddenly turned her head and gave me a sweet smile.

"Edna, thanks for covering for us."

"If you hadn't kept saying he had a girlfriend, everyone would've figured out we had a thing going way sooner."

I stopped walking.

I looked at Reg's back, not breaking his stride for a second.

I reached into my coat pocket and took out my phone.

I opened the messaging app.

I un-pinned Reg's chat.

I turned off his alert notifications.

In an instant, our chat thread sank down among the hundreds of unread messages.

The finals month of freshman year arrived right on schedule.

Seats in the library were harder to grab than a good meal in the dining hall.

I found an empty spot by a window and set down my stack of books.

My phone buzzed.

A message from Reg.

"Send me your key notes for Calculus and Microeconomics, the ones you organized."

No lead-in. No hello.

Just an order, like it was owed to him.

I looked at the screen for a moment.

Those notes were three all-nighters and countless reference books distilled into one file. Mine alone.

Before I could answer, a second message dropped in.

"Let me borrow them to copy."

"And print a set for Emily while you're at it. Her GPA's on the line this semester."

"We're all from the same hometown. Just help out."

I turned the phone face down on the desk.

Opened my book and started drilling vocabulary.

The next day at noon, I was in line at the dining hall.

My roommate held her phone up to my face.

"Edna, look at Emily's feed."

Nine perfectly edited photos filled the screen.

The one in the middle was a thick set of review notes.

Neat, delicate handwriting. My handwriting.

The caption read: "Thanks to a certain someone for the personal tutoring. This one's in the bag."

The comments were full of envy from our classmates.

"Reg is so good to you."

"These notes are incredible. Please share!"

Emily's blanket reply: "Reg put these together just for me. Not for sharing."

I calmly pushed my roommate's phone back.

"Ma'am, one order of the sweet-and-tangy glazed ribs, please."

The last assessment of the term was the group project report for our civics course.

The professor for that class was brutally strict, and participation counted for half the final grade.

Our slides and script, from topic to layout, were all me, done alone through the night.

Five minutes before the report.

Reg walked over to my seat and rapped his knuckles on the desk.

"Switch the lead presenter to Emily."

I looked up at his face, so sure of himself.

"Why?"

"On the first slide, put Emily's name where the group leader and top contributor go."

He dropped his voice, and there was no room for refusal in it.

"Your grades are great. Your participation score's already maxed out. This won't cost you anything."

"If Emily flunks, she loses her shot at the scholarship."

"Have a little perspective. Don't be so petty."

I looked at him.

At the guy who used to fight anyone who gave me the smallest hurt.

Now, for another girl, he was helping himself to my work without a shred of guilt.

"I'm not switching it."

I gripped the flash drive in my hand.

His brow knotted into a hard line.

"Edna, are you determined to make this ugly for everyone?"

"It's just a name. Is it really worth it?"

The bell rang.

The professor came in and signaled the first group to the front.

I stepped past Reg and walked straight up to the podium.

Plugged in the flash drive, opened the slides.

My name sat squarely in the top contributor's place.

The report ran fifteen minutes.

Tight logic, solid data.

The professor nodded again and again, and in the end gave it the highest score in the class.

After class, Reg blocked my way in the hallway.

His face was iron gray, anger held down beneath it.

"Happy now?"

"You're selfish. Cold-blooded. No regard for your classmates at all."

"Emily was crying at her desk just now. Feels like a real accomplishment to you, doesn't it?"

The hallway was full of people coming and going.

Plenty of classmates threw curious glances our way.

I looked at Reg, worked up and furious in front of me.

I didn't cry the way I used to.

I didn't try to explain a single word, either.

I just felt tired.

"You're right."

I looked calmly into his eyes.

"I have no regard for my classmates."

"From now on, when you form a team, leave me out of it."

I went around him and headed toward the library.

Left him standing alone in the hallway, stunned.

The spring semester of freshman year began.

Spring in the South always came with a damp chill.

I dragged my suitcase back to the dorm and unpacked everything, piece by piece.

Among my things was a journal with a brown leather cover.

It was the thing I'd treasured most in high school.

Inside were the ticket stubs from all the places Reg and I had once gone together.

And the vows we'd written down for our future.

I set it in the most visible spot on my desk, meaning to find a box to store it away.

That afternoon, the class held its first meeting of the new semester.

Emily came to our dorm to borrow some materials from a roommate.

I'd just come out of the bathroom when I heard a startled cry.

"Oh no!"

Emily was standing in front of my desk, a knocked-over bottle of ink in her hand.

The black liquid spread fast, soaking straight through the leather journal.

The pages went blotchy and black, the writing smearing into a blur.

She stood there frozen with a tissue in her hand, at a loss.

Reg happened to reach the doorway just then, and hearing the noise, he strode in.

"What happened?"

Emily's eyes went red in an instant, her voice thick with tears.

"I spilled ink on it by accident."

"Reg, she won't be angry with me, will she?"

"I really didn't mean to. I just wanted to grab a book to prop something up."

Reg glanced at the wreck on the desk, his brow creasing slightly.

He turned to me, his tone plainly taking her side.

"If it's something that important, why would you just leave it lying out on the desk?"

"Emily didn't do it on purpose."

"It's just a beat-up notebook. I'll buy you ten to make up for it, all right?"

I stood where I was, looking at the journal that held three years of my youth.

Ink dripped off the edge of the desk onto the floor.

A dull, heavy sound.

"No need."

I walked over and picked up the soaked notebook.

The black ink stained my fingers.

I went straight to the trash can and let go.

With a thud, the notebook dropped into the dark.

Reg blinked, as if he hadn't expected me to be so decisive.

Emily tugged at the hem of Reg's shirt.

"Reg, my pen just broke. I won't be able to take notes in class this afternoon."

Reg's eyes swept across my desk.

They landed on a nice pen case.

It held the matching couple's pens we'd bought when we got into college.

He simply reached out and took the one that was mine.

And handed it to Emily.

"Her pen's broken. Lend her yours for now."

"You only ever use gel pens anyway. That one's just sitting there collecting dust."

I watched him do it, like it was the most natural thing in the world.

My heart felt like it was seized hard by an invisible hand, then released all at once.

Leaving nothing but numbness.

"Put it down."

I stared at the pen in Emily's hand, my voice flat.

Emily jumped and shrank back behind Reg.

"Edna, why are you being so mean?"

Reg lost his temper completely.

"When did you turn into such a hysterical person?"

"College is a small society. With a temper like that, how are you going to get by?"

"It's just a pen. Do you really have to be this petty?"

I stepped forward and snatched the pen out of Emily's hand.

Then, right in front of them.

I slammed it hard against the concrete floor.

The nib bent instantly, ink splattering everywhere.

The snap of breaking metal was jarringly loud in the quiet dorm.

Reg stared at me, shocked, as if he didn't know me anymore.

"You're right, I have a bad temper."

I pulled out a wet wipe and cleaned the ink off my fingers, bit by bit.

"So, Reg, from now on, stay out of my business."

Reg let out a cold laugh.

"Fine. Call it me minding what isn't mine to mind."

"If you've got the nerve, don't ever come looking for me again!"

He grabbed Emily and turned to leave.

The door slammed shut behind them.

I tossed the wipe into the trash and took out my phone.

Opened my contacts.

Found that number I knew by heart.

Swiped left, deleted him as my emergency contact.

Then I opened the app and unlinked our shared couple's account.

Once it was all done, I let out a long breath.

Outside the window, the winter jasmine had bloomed.

A bright wash of yellow.

So pretty.

The campus warmed with spring.

The field was full of students, all of them bright with the season.

Reg noticed soon enough that I really had stopped coming to him.

I didn't get to class early to save him a front-row seat anymore.

On rainy days I no longer messaged him to bring an umbrella.

Even the eight a.m. sign-in he hated most.

When the professor called his name, I just turned the pages of my book, quiet, looking right past it.

Wednesday morning, the advisor posted a formal reprimand in the group chat.

Reg had skipped class three times running, and the whole department heard about it.

At noon, while I was eating in the dining hall, my phone buzzed.

Reg had sent a string of accusations.

"Why didn't you wake me today?"

"When the professor took roll, why didn't you answer for me?"

"Do you even know I got called out in front of the whole department? It's humiliating!"

I swallowed my mouthful of rice and set down my chopsticks.

I typed, unhurried.

"Am I your mother?"

"Am I supposed to get you up every single day?"

After I sent it, his end went quiet for a long time.

I figured he probably thought I was just sulking, saving up for some big blowup.

Sure I'd cave in a few days.

Because before, all it took was him going a little cold on me, and I'd be the one who went running back.

That night, my roommate dragged me out to walk the field.

We'd just reached the stands when the whole area lit up with cold sparklers.

Several drones circled in the night sky, spelling out a line of words.

"Edna Henson, be my girlfriend."

The crowd erupted.

I froze where I stood.

Matthew Stephens, the department's famous, admired senior, stood there in a white shirt, holding a bouquet of baby's breath.

My favorite.

He came through the crowd and stopped in front of me.

His eyes were sincere and warm.

"Edna, I've been watching you for a long time."

"I know how independent you are, how impressive."

"I want to go to the library with you, enter competitions with you, from here on."

The students around us started egging it on.

"Say yes! Say yes!"

Right then, a furious shout came from the edge of the crowd.

"Move!"

Reg shoved the people in front of him aside and came charging in, out of breath.

Emily trailed behind him, her face a little pale.

Reg pushed Matthew back with one hand and jabbed a finger at my face, yelling.

"What are you doing? Have you lost your mind!"

His eyes were red, his chest heaving.

"Do you even know what you're doing!"

He turned to look at Matthew, then swept his gaze over the ring of students who'd come to watch.

His voice was so loud it nearly cracked.

"She already has a boyfriend!"