Bygone Stars, Never Kept With Time

At the reunion after I came back from my exchange, the card I drew was Margery Mason.

Everyone whooped and started firing questions at me.

Mike Gilbert, tell us Margery Mason's height, weight, hobbies, cup size... and her birthmark?

I answered every one exactly.

Five foot six, a hundred fifteen pounds, piano, C.

The birthmark was onI paused, then finished evenly. "The inside of her left thigh."

Fifty questions about Margery Mason. I scored a perfect hundred.

Graham Lyons propped his chin on his hand. "You're not her boyfriend, are you?"

Someone jumped in right away.

"Has to be, right? Wasn't he the one who got jealous over the research slot in England and stormed off to do a two-year exchange out of spite?"

"And the deciding vote back then, Margery cast it for Graham!"

"Chased her for five years and didn't even get a title out of it!"

Margery leaned back into the couch, her voice flat. "No. We're just neighbors."

I took a small sip of my juice. "And we never will be, either."

Margery suddenly smiled, her tone mocking.

"What, done chasing?"

I looked at her and felt nothing at all.

Because I realized, all at once, that I hadn't lost to anyone.

I just didn't like Margery Mason anymore.

...

Halfway through the reunion, the talk kept going.

Someone asked, grinning, "Mike, two years abroad and you really didn't follow any news back home?"

"Not much," I said, mild.

"Then you don't know Margery and Graham have been together practically every day these two years?"

"Same lab, meals together, even school events together."

Someone drew the words out.

"They held the number one spot for sweetest couple on the campus forum! If that's not together, what is?"

Graham sat beside Margery, his cheeks faintly red.

"Don't make things up."

He said it, but he didn't push away the hand Margery had resting on his waist.

The private room filled with laughter.

"Just friends, with your hand on his waist?"

"Ohh, friends with lips, is that it?"

Margery didn't deny it. Her palm gave Graham's waist a light squeeze.

I lowered my eyes. My chest was calm, still as dead water.

Two years ago, one meal between them and I couldn't sleep the whole night.

I would read through Margery's chat logs over and over, trying to figure out why she went to pick Graham up herself, why she shielded him in front of everyone, and yet would never admit I was her boyfriend.

Looking at it now, it was nothing much after all.

Graham suddenly stood, carried a glass of liquor over to me.

"Mike, let me toast you. That research slot back then, I really never meant to take yours from you..."

I stared at the plain silver band on his ring finger, and thought, out of nowhere, of the summer after the SATs.

Margery had taken me to a silver jewelry shop, bent over her work for a long time, her knuckles rubbed raw.

I asked her what she was making.

She said matching couple rings.

"Who said I wanted to wear matching rings with you?"

"Fine, forget it then."

That was what she said, but when she finished, she slid one of them onto my finger.

It fit exactly.

That was the first time she took my hand of her own accord, and the first time she admitted we were together.

Later, the last time we fought, I pulled the ring off and threw it back at her.

I thought she'd toss it, or keep it.

I never thought she'd turn around and give it to Graham.

The people around us egged him on.

"Mike, drink! Graham came over to toast you himself."

"Don't tell me a trip abroad left you scared to even drink?"

I picked up my juice and tapped it lightly against his glass.

"I don't drink."

The smile on Graham's face faded a little. "Same as always, then."

He lowered his eyes and added, "Always ruining the mood."

Someone laughed out loud right away.

The next second, a glass of liquor came down hard in front of me.

"Here. To the simp."

The guy's voice was loud.

"Chased her five years, chased his way to nothing, and even waited on the man who took his one true love off his hands!"

"Mike Gilbert, you saw the whole simp routine through to the end!"

The next second, Margery lifted her glass and clinked it against his.

"Well said."

The glasses met with a crisp ring.

Watching it, I thought of the last fight before I left.

I'd asked her, "I just wanted you to admit it in front of everyone. Was that too much to ask?"

She'd said, "There's no point."

Thinking back now, those answers I chased through tears, agonized over again and again, really were pointless.

I just didn't understand it then. I had to hit the wall before I'd turn back.

When it broke up, it had started to rain outside.

Margery stood at the bottom of the steps. "I'll take you back to the dorm."

"No need."

"Mike Gilbert."

Her voice dropped. "Two years abroad out of spite, and you're still hiding from something? Afraid you can't keep the act up?"

My face gave nothing away. I raised a hand and flagged down a cab.

The window rolled slowly up, sealing that familiar face away behind the rain.

She didn't come after me.

The way she never had, all those years.

She would only stand there and wait for me to turn back on my own.

But this time, I didn't.

Eleven at night, and the acute gastroenteritis came on fast and hard.

I went to the hospital, jaw clenched, and when the nurse slid the needle into the back of my hand, I shut my eyes without thinking.

For a hazy second I was back in the campus health center at seventeen, a hand laid over my eyelids.

"If you don't look, it won't scare you."

I opened my eyes, and there she actually was. Margery Mason.

She stood a little way off, her expression tight.

Her name came out of me before I could stop it. "Margery."

The next second, my voice was drowned out.

"I'm fine, Dr. Mason, just a little cold."

Graham Lyons sat in the chair, his voice roughened by a cold.

Margery pulled off her coat at once and wrapped it around him.

"Put this on first."

She bent her head and straightened his collar, the motion easy and practiced.

And it hit me, clear all at once, that the person standing there had long since stopped being the Margery who covered my eyes at seventeen because she couldn't stand for me to hurt.

Something bitter rose in my throat, too thick to swallow, too stuck to spit out.

"Why are you here?"

Her gaze drifted over and caught on me. She frowned.

I didn't answer.

She looked at the IV bag, then at my bloodless face.

"Are you sick? Or is this another act?"

I found it almost funny.

"People come to the hospital because they're sick."

I was no longer the Mike Gilbert who'd once taken a cold shower in the dead of winter to burn himself into a fever just to make her come sit with me.

"Dr. Mason."

Graham called to her softly from behind. "I'm a little cold."

Her eyes rested on my face for a second, then she turned away.

The second was so short it could have been imagined.

As she passed, a faint trace of jasmine came with her.

Two years ago it was my favorite scent.

Now it only felt like a stranger's.

Margery waited while Graham's needle was taken out, then came over.

"Lend me your umbrella."

"Why would I?"

She lifted her eyes to me, out of patience. "Graham has a cold, he can't get rained on again. He needs this umbrella more than you do."

She stared at me for a few seconds, then simply took the umbrella out of my hand.

Hard enough that a small bead of blood welled up at the needle mark.

She opened it and walked out into the rain, shielding Graham.

I watched her back get smaller and smaller.

The same as always.

She was always so final about it.

The same as the last time we fought.

That day, the lab held the vote for the research-program slot.

The last vote belonged to Margery.

She gave it to Graham.

I waited until everyone else had gone before I asked her, "Why?"

"You know how long I prepared for this. You know I'm better than he is!"

Margery laughed.

"You're really ridiculous, Mike. The decision was mine, not yours."

I held back the tears. "Either we go public now, or we're done. Pick one."

She looked at me like I was a stranger throwing a tantrum.

"If you insist on trapping yourself in this relationship, that's your problem."

"Don't make yourself sound so wronged."

That night, Graham boarded a plane to England.

And I got the call that my father was critically ill.

I dialed Margery's number over and over. Fifty calls, every one of them cut off.

When it finally connected, it was Graham's voice that came through.

He asked softly, "Is there something you needed?"

I gripped the phone, cold all over.

There was a faint rustle of fabric on the other end, then Margery's low, hoarse voice.

"Who is it?"

"Mike."

"Hang up."

The line went dead.

That week I lost my father, and I lost Margery for good.

The sound of the rain pulled me out of the memory.

I had just stepped out of the hospital when I saw Margery holding a newly bought umbrella.

"Get in the car."

"You just finished an IV, your face looks like that, and you still want to act tough?"

I didn't move.

"Are you still upset about that slot? I gave it to him because he needed the chance more than you did."

"He lost his parents young, he had to work just to scrape together tuition. You at least still had your dad. And you had me."

I looked at her and asked quietly, "So all I wanted was for my girlfriend to stand by me, when it didn't break any principle to do it. Was that wrong?"

Margery let out a scoffing laugh.

"You always take feelings too seriously."

"And you always treat my feelings like they're worth nothing."

"Mike, there's no point."

Those same words again.

Suddenly I didn't want to argue anymore.

"Give me back the prayer beads my dad gave me."

They were the ones my father went to a temple to pray for himself, after he found out we were together.

All these years, Margery had worn them.

I'd thought they were proof she accepted me, that she accepted us.

Her face darkened.

"What? You really want to draw a clean line between us?"

I said nothing.

Margery raised her hand and yanked the beads off her wrist.

The next second, she hurled them at me.

"Mike, are you ever going to stop?!"

The beads struck my collarbone, and the pain snagged my breath.

Margery turned and walked away.

I crouched down in the rain and picked up the scattered beads, one by one.

The rain washed through the mud.

As if even the last bit of tenderness my father had left me was being washed away too.

The next day, I went to the lab.

Before I left the country I'd left a logbook in my locker, packed with experiment data and records of every failure, and the formulas Margery had corrected for me.

When I pushed the door open, Margery was leaning over a test tube in Graham's hand.

"The temperature's too low. Try again."

"How are you still this hopeless, Graham?"

Patient, gentle, every word of it.

I walked to the locker and pulled the door open.

Empty.

"Looking for this?"

Graham picked the logbook up off the table.

"Give it back."

He flipped through a couple of pages, all innocence. "I started late, there was a lot I couldn't keep up with, so Margery let me use this."

The data was circled all over in red pen, and several pages had been torn clean in half.

"What gives you the right to touch my data?"

I reached for it.

Graham stepped back, right into Margery's arms.

She steadied him by the shoulders and frowned.

"You scared him. You're going abroad anyway, you won't need it. Don't be so petty."

I looked at her. "You give my things to someone else, and you don't even need my say-so?"

"Margery, do you actually think that as long as it's Graham who wants it, I'm supposed to hand it over to him?"

I watched her, my chest tight.

She said nothing.

The silence was answer enough.

I took the logbook back and tore it out page by page.

Those first six months in the lab I couldn't do anything, chasing after her every day with this notebook, asking one question after another.

She called me hopeless to my face, but every time she took it and reworked it start to finish.

Now, though, there was no point keeping it.

Margery's face changed. "What are you doing?"

"They're mine. I get to decide whether they stay or go."

I tore the last page in two and dropped it in the trash.

Graham's eyes went red on the spot.

"Margery, did I do something wrong?"

"This has nothing to do with you." She looked at me, her voice turning fully cold.

"When did you not kneel and beg me not to leave? You never said one word back then. What's the act now?"

I stood frozen, forced the tears back down, turned, and walked out.

That night a post floated to the top of the campus forum.

The Story of a Guy at Our School Who Threw Himself at a Girl for Five Years and Never Got Made Official

The post named no one, but it spelled out my major and my year clearly.

The poster spared no venom:

This guy's been throwing himself at her since high school, followed her to apply to the same school, and still thought he was the real boyfriend.

The comments were nothing but ridicule.

Five years and still not made official. Suggest finding someone else to grovel to.

The girl's got it rough too, stuck being harassed by someone like this.

Soon one of Margery's friends replied underneath with a dog-face emoji.

Those who know, know.

Margery didn't reply. But she liked that comment.

I stared at the screen, my fingers ice-cold.

Then I traced the account that posted it. It was Graham.

I put up a screenshot. A second later, the post was deleted.

I posted again. Deleted again.

I took my phone and found Margery.

"Did you delete my post? On what grounds?"

"He's about to prep for his grad school exams. Your post would hurt his reputation and his interviews."

"Besides, I've already deleted the post he made. In a few days no one will remember."

"And my reputation? People talking about me, cornering me in the bathroom, sticking notes on my dorm door, none of that matters?"

Something flickered across her face, then quickly settled back into cold.

"No one's actually hurting you. Don't blow this up into something ugly."

Margery turned and walked off with Graham, murmuring to soothe him.

"Don't be scared. I'm here."

That line, she had never once said to me.

Not when everyone was pointing and cursing at me. Not when I lost my father, lost my home, lost her.

She never said it.

I stood there, and it hit me all at once.

It wasn't that I'd never won.

It was that not once had Margery stood on my side.

At the graduation gala, Margery and I were paired up as co-hosts.

Before it started, she came backstage to find me.

"There's something I need to tell you."

I didn't even look up. "There's nothing to say between us."

She grabbed my wrist and yanked me into the empty classroom beside us.

"Margery, what are you doing?"

The lock clicked behind me.

I wrenched at the door. It didn't budge.

"I'll let you out when the gala's over."

"Graham's wanted to be up on that stage since he was a kid. I promised him I'd help make it happen."

"You're the best at hosting anyway. Missing one chance won't hurt you."

Something in my chest went tight.

"To you, everything's a small thing!"

I pounded on the door.

"The research slot was a small thing, going public was a small thing, and me getting cursed at, getting water thrown on me, that was a small thing too!"

She didn't answer.

Only before she left, she said quietly,

"Stop making a scene."

Her footsteps faded away.

I stood alone in the dark classroom and heard the music start outside.

A few minutes later Graham's clear voice came over the speakers, followed by Margery's low, warm one falling in beside it.

The applause rolled in below the stage.

I slid down against the door and the tears came with no warning at all.

I had been waiting the whole time.

Waiting for Margery to take my hand and lead me out in front of everyone.

Waiting for her to say, "This is my boyfriend, Mike Gilbert."

What came instead was Graham.

From start to finish, everyone knew they were closer than any couple.

When the gala ended, the lock finally turned.

Margery stood outside with flowers in her hand, her eyes catching for a second on my red, swollen ones.

"Don't cry."

I stepped around her and headed out.

She caught my arm, seeming to want to say something, but her phone cut her off.

The caller ID read: Graham Lyons.

She barely hesitated before letting go of me.

"Hello?"

Her face changed at once.

"Don't cry, I'm coming right over."

After she hung up, she looked at me.

"He's not in a good place."

"I've already put in for leave. Your uncle's birthday is in a few days. I'll go back with you and celebrate it together, and then we'll go public."

"Stop sulking, okay?"

My fingertips gave a small tremble.

I had waited four whole years for that line. It only came once I no longer wanted any of it.

And now that I'd heard it, all I felt was how ridiculous it was.

"You still think I went abroad on exchange just to sulk?"

Margery stared at me, a flicker of irritation rising in her eyes.

"What else?"

I said softly,

"Forget it. My dad doesn't need you to celebrate his birthday with him anymore."

That finally set her off. Her voice shot up.

"You went abroad on your own, you disappeared on your own, you pushed me away on your own! And now you put on this victim act for whose benefit?"

"Mike Gilbert, do you even have a heart?"

The phone rang again.

This time she didn't so much as glance at me. She turned and left.

"Graham, I'll be right there."

That easy, familiar way she said his name slid quietly into my heart.

But it didn't hurt anymore.

After my defense, I packed my things and decided to go north.

Waiting at the gate, I opened the campus forum and uploaded the photos of Margery and me, one by one.

From seventeen to twenty-two.

From school uniforms to graduation gowns.

The title was a single line:

About Margery and me.

Then I sent the faculty advisor the security footage of Margery locking me in the classroom, along with the evidence that she'd quietly let the online harassment run.

A message came in from Margery:

Where did you go? I'm outside your place.

I shut off the phone and boarded the plane.