Page 8 of Tongue Tied

Hey Kai,

Don’t hold your breath. Believe me, I would LOVE to bore you about orchids, but… it’s not gonna happen.

Eden

* * *

“How about this: Wanted: one conversation coach. Can you help me speak to the guy I like? Then call this number. Serious inquiries only, please.”

There’s a long, awkward pause in our dorm room. Ambrose rolls up one shirtsleeve, pointedly refusing to comment, while Lane sits beside him on her bed, wincing.

“I just think…”

My roomie fiddles with a bright pink highlighter in her lap, clicking the lid on and off. On and off. She’s fidgety.

“I just think… an ad like that…”

“What’s wrong with it?” Gathering my legs onto my desk chair and propping my chin on my knees, I squint at my laptop screen. My half-written ad barely fills two lines. How bad can it be?

“There’s nothing wrong with it exactly,” Lane says, click-clacking the highlighter lid. Click-clack. Her boyfriend reaches over without looking and plucks it from her hands, so Lane huffs and knits her fingers together. “I just think putting your number on an ad like that will get you a lot of weird voicemails.”

“Agreed,” Ambrose says. As always, his deep, clipped voice brings an air of gravitas, and I find myself deflating, reading my ad again.

“Shit,” I say after the third read. “They’ll think it’s about dirty talk, won’t they?”

Lane nods.

“Or they’ll make it about that,” Ambrose says.

Ew. “This is pointless.”

“No!” Lane swats her boyfriend’s shoulder, and he widens his eyes at her, as though to say: What the hell do you want me to do about this? “No, of course it’s not pointless, babe. But maybe… maybe the only person you can really practice with is Kai. You know?”

For one brief, horrible moment, I imagine sending this ad to the Head Gardener. My stomach twists, and suddenly tonight’s cafeteria pizza isn’t sitting well.

“It worked for you two.” Surly muttering doesn’t look good on me, but I’m too bitter right now to care. “With your kissing lessons. This isn’t even that! This is conversation lessons. Literally just: How to be a Human 101.”

Footsteps thunder past our closed door and pound away down the hall, as shrieks of laughter seep through the walls. Dance music blasts from the bathrooms. At least someone out there is living the college dream.

“What about Jeremiah?” Lane tilts her head. “You speak to him with no problems, right? Maybe he could help you talk to guys?”

Ugh. “I just threw up in my mouth.”

“Oh, stop it.” Lane scrambles off the bed, and the mattress groans as Ambrose follows. “See, this is silly. You don’t want to talk to just some guy as practice, you want to talk to Kai! So maybe you should do that. Make sure the environmental factors are all perfect, like with your orchid thingies, and then just… chat to him.” My roomie shrugs into the jacket her boyfriend holds up, winking at me as she turns. “Take note cards with prompts on them if you need to. But do it, Eden. Start flexing that muscle. It’s the best way, I promise.”

“Have fun,” I call as they both disappear through the doorway. Then, quieter: “Be grateful for each other.”

Because I’d give anything to go to dinner like a normal girl with Kai Akana.

* * *

For the first time ever, I get to the greenhouse the next morning before Kai. I had this grand plan to get him alone; to spend at least ten minutes trying to chat with those mesmerizing green eyes before Jeremiah clatters in and throws me off. But judging by the red sun hovering barely over the horizon, I’m too much of a keen bean.

The salt breeze ruffles my hair and swishes the long clifftop grass this way and that. Leaning my back against the locked greenhouse door, I stare out to sea and let my mind go blissfully blank.

No fretting about essay due dates or obsessing over the email Kai sent me last night. No picturing the way his eyes crinkle when he smiles at me, or trying to summon his soil-and-citrus scent by memory.

Nothing but watching the pink-tinged sunshine sparkle on the waves.

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