CHAPTER THREE
As predicted, she got into a good four-year school just minutes away. Before she left, she asked her friend Gary if she could buy twenty doses of LSD to take with her.
He got it for her, but it took a month and eighty dollars. She slipped them into the jacket of one of her favorite cd’s, packed her stuff, and headed for the dorms.
Her roommate was quiet and studious. She didn’t mind. She was just as quiet and wasn’t looking for a friendship, anyway.
One day, she found herself in a strange dorm room with people she had never met before. A boy with long, shoulder-length blond hair turned to her and said, “If you know anywhere I can get acid, let me know.”
Leah perked up. “I have some,” she said quietly. That was the beginning of her relationship with Cameron.
He asked her to come to his dorm room, where he bought four of the little squares of acid. Soon, she was visiting him on a regular basis.
One day, offhand, she complained about not having enough money for weed. Cameron asked, “Did you make a profit from the acid?”
“No,” she admitted.
“You should start. That’s one way to get money.”
Leah found herself staring at him dreamily during their pot-smoking sessions, wishing that she could run her fingers through that long, wavy hair.
Cameron was an experienced guy. He had slept with many girls, and Leah was still a virgin.
One night, the two of them were alone in his room. Somehow, they started talking about sex.
Soon, they were arguing. “I don’t see how you can treat sex so casually,” Leah was saying. “It’s supposed to be a big deal. You’re supposed to really care about the person you sleep with, and I doubt you really cared about all the girls you fucked.”
Cameron, who was holding and attempting to clean a glass bong, set it down heavily on the floor and rushed to her. He grabbed her and shook her arms. “You don’t know how hard it is,” he growled.
Leah was shaken; but her opinion on the matter was not changed. She was highly aware that she was one of the only virgins on campus, and inwardly she felt very self-conscious about it.
She remembered how she’d lied to all her “friends” in high school about not being a virgin. She had even cut class one day and walked to the store with Camelia to buy a pregnancy test.
In high school, she considered her sexuality one of the most private and sacred things about her, and she didn’t think anyone else had a right to know where she’d been or what she’d been doing. But now, she no longer clung so tightly to her secret. Almost all of the kids she hung out with knew that she was inexperienced.
Leah and Cameron started having long, personal conversations. They told each other about parts of their lives that they had not shared with anyone else, but Leah still refused to tell him about Brendan.
She would not tell anyone.
One night, Cameron revealed to Leah that he had strong feelings for Justice, a mutual friend of theirs. Leah was torn. She liked Cameron, but she wasn’t yet sure if it was just physical or if it was something more.
But over the next several days, she plunged into a deep depression. She didn’t eat. She smoked two packs of cigarettes a day, and didn’t go to class. Physically, she looked and felt like a walking corpse.
Flyers went up on the bulletin boards. There was going to be a gigantic party in one of the dorm buildings. Technically, only over-twenty-ones were allowed to go, but admittance was not strictly enforced. Leah painted her face more thickly than usually, put on a dress and some boots, and proceeded to crash the party.
She didn’t see anyone she knew. Instead, she headed for the alcohol. She had two huge Solo cups of some drink she had never heard of, and soon she was dizzy and lighthearted.
Just as she was about to light a cigarette, she spotted Cameron and Justice. She merrily hopped over to them, waving profusely.
She hugged them both, lingering on Cameron. “I love you,” she told them, obviously drunk.
Even though she was heavily intoxicated, it bothered her to see the two of them together. They looked so perfect as a couple. Leah stumbled away into the blackness of the night, the sound of Bob Marley fading in the distance.
She found her way into a boys’ dorm. She didn’t know where she was headed, just somewhere where she could rest her head without having to walk all the way across campus again.
She found it. It was an abandoned suite with a sofa in the lounge. She fell onto it, exhausted and dizzy. She looked up and saw Bob Marley’s face painted on the wall. “Can’t I ever get away from you?” she slurred, as she turned over and passed out.
Some time later she woke up with an overwhelming bout of nausea. She knew she wasn’t going to be able to make it to a trash can, much less a bathroom. So right there, into the sofa, she threw up.
She woke up in a puddle of her own vomit. It smelled horrible and it was all in her hair and in her clothes. Oh, no! Her dorm was all the way across campus. How was she going to walk there in broad daylight? Everyone would see her with vomit in her hair!
But thankfully, it was early enough. She made it back undetected, then took a long, hot shower in the bathroom. Amazingly, she didn’t feel sick. She didn’t even have a headache.
Halloween came and went. She was sitting in Cameron’s room, finishing off the last remnants of a joint, when all of a sudden he broke down and started crying.
Leah looked up at him. “Cameron? What’s wrong?”
She had never seen him cry before; she had thought of him mostly as a “tough guy.”
He raised his head slightly, his hand covering his eyes, and said, “It’s Justice. She turned me down.”
Leah felt bad for him, but he knew he didn’t love her. He knew very well that he didn’t know the pain of a life-consuming love that rips you apart, thread by thread.
“I’m sorry,” she said quietly. “I didn’t know.”
He lowered his hand. “It’s just that, when I finally start to care about someone, it has to end like this.”
Leah nodded knowingly. “I’m sure you’ll find someone,” she said.
A week later, Leah was approaching his door just as he was leaving. “Where are you going?” she asked.
“To the bar,” he said.
“Why?” she said. “You have plenty of liquor in your room.”
He smiled slightly. “There’s a girl there that I want to meet. Something might happen.”
Something slammed into Leah in full force. Panic. With Justice, she had known that nothing was going to happen. But this was different; this was a real threat. The mere thought that he was about to have another one of his meaningless affairs made her feel sick to her stomach.
Desperate, she searched for words. “Well, are you sure she’s interested? You have to remember what happened with Justice. That was only a week ago.”
He patted her on the shoulder. “Oh, dear, sweet, innocent Leah,” he said. “It’s just sex.”
Before she knew it, she was crying. Cameron was standing there, stunned. “What did I say?” he implored.
He made a move to open the door. “Come inside,” he said.
He motioned for her to come and sit on the bed. The feelings had come so suddenly, and as such a surprise, that even Leah wasn’t sure where they’d come from.
“Tell me what this is all about,” he said gently. He placed a heavy arm over her shoulder as her crying quieted.
She wiped at a tear. “Cameron, I have feelings for you,” she blurted. “I tried not to let them show at the beginning, but it looks like I was unsuccessful.” She looked up hopefully into his eyes.
He seemed to be considering her confession. Removing the arm that had been around her shoulders, he took in a deep breath. “Leah, that’s big,” he commented. He wiped his face with his hands.
“Please don’t say I’m only kidding myself,” Leah implored. “I know what I feel.”
He chewed on his lower lip. “It’s just that you’re so innocent,” he said. “I don’t know if it would ever work.”
Leah felt her heart fall. “Are you planning to go to the bar?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” he admitted, palms open.
“Please don’t go,” she breathed. In despair, she fell over sideways onto the bed.
Cameron dove down after her. “Leah, Leah, Leah,” he said.
She couldn’t say anything because she was crying.
He put his face close to hers. “Can I kiss you?” he asked.
Trembling, she nodded. Their lips met in warmth. It was sweet, and soft.
“It’s just that you’ve never made a move on me,” he said.
She smiled, swallowing her tears.
Cameron and Leah became a couple. All their friends started calling them “girlfriend” and “boyfriend.” He was respectful of her virginity, but at the same time, eager to explore physicality with her.
It was only a week after they first started dating that they consummated their relationship. Cameron was careful to ask permission before each new, little move he tried. Leah always said yes.
The morning after they first made love, Leah got up quickly into the cold, morning air, completely naked. Her skin looked pale against the midnight black of her hair, and her crystal blue eyes were shining with life. Cameron pulled her back down to the bed.
“Where are you going?” he asked.
“Class, of course,” she responded.
He chuckled. “Can’t you just skip class this once? You kind of had a big night last night. You don’t have your first time very often.”
Leah gave him a quick, sincere smile. “I’d love to, but I’ve missed too much already. I can’t afford another absence.”
He smiled groggily as he rested his head against his hands. His bare skin looked creamy in the morning light. “Well, at least smoke a bowl with me before you go,” he suggested.
“If it’s a quick one,” she said.
She went to class feeling happy and hazy. She couldn’t remember a word of what the professor said, but she was flying high the whole time.
Cameron treated her well. He appeared from out of the bushes to steal a kiss between classes; they ate lunch together on the grass in the courtyard; they spent countless hours talking, laughing. Leah was enjoying one of those rare times in her life when she felt that she was truly happy.
Leah moved into his dorm room. There were rules on campus against that sort of thing, but she did so in secret, and her roommate promised not to tell anyone. One day she bundled up her clothing, carried it across campus, and emptied it in Cameron’s room. No one ever found out.
They maintained their drug habits. People were always coming in and out of the room in order to chat and smoke pot. Pretty soon, both of them were drained of funds. They decided to start selling.
Cameron was the one who dealt with the finding and bargaining. Leah merely provided a few dollars here and there when needed. Soon, they were selling not only weed, but also acid.
They gained a reputation at the school for being the biggest and the best drug dealers. Daily, customers would come to the room, purchase their wares, and sometimes smoke them right there.
It was like high school again: Leah was dizzy and intoxicated all the time, and again, waiting to graduate.
She loved Cameron. But realistically, she knew that he did not love her. They started to have fights about it. Leah thought it had something to do with the many meaningless relationships that he had had before her—that somehow, his heart had been hardened. She was bothered by it, but didn’t let it consume her thoughts. She didn’t want their relationship to be ruined by it.
They were saving their last two hits of acid for Valentine’s Day. One belonged to Cameron; the other belonged to Leah.
Justice came to her, crying one day. “I’m so fucking depressed,” she said. “My life is crap. Do you have any drugs?”
Leah started to shake her head no but then remembered the hit of acid in the freezer. “Well…there is this one little bit of acid, but we were kind of saving it for Valentine’s Day,” she said.
Justice clasped her hands together. “Oh, please?” she begged. “We can split it. I just need…something.”
Leah reluctantly agreed. Cameron was in class, so she carefully pulled out the plastic-wrapped square of blotter.
“Cameron is going to be so mad at me,” she breathed.
That night was a school dance. Leah borrowed a long, blue dress from Justice and was applying her makeup when a call came in on Justice’s phone.
“It’s Cameron,” she said, dropping the receiver to her hip. “He knows.”
Leah smiled sheepishly. “Is he mad?” she asked.
Justice said a few words into the phone, then turned back to her. “He says he feels betrayed,” she said.
Leah knew she had made a mistake. Cameron wasn’t even willing to talk to her over the phone.
But she decided to go to the school dance, anyway. As she walked in, the music was blaring, and the students were all wearing beautiful dresses and sharp outfits. “I don’t suppose Cameron will show up,” Leah mumbled to Justice.
But he did. Even though they still weren’t on speaking terms, somehow they found themselves dancing slowly in front of each other. Leah didn’t want to press the issue. She didn’t want to say anything and make him mad. By now, she was tripping heavily and she didn’t know if she could deal with a tongue lashing on top of it. She said nothing until the dance was over with, and everyone was leaving and putting on their coats.
“Do you want me to come home with you tonight?”
He looked up slowly to her.
She was having trouble expressing herself. “I mean, should I stay the night in Justice’s room or are you too mad at me, or what?” She looked down at her shoes, getting involved in a particularly deep scratch on the right one.
“I’m just mad at you, Leah. That doesn’t mean I’m going to throw you out into the street.”
Leah nodded her head slowly. “I’ll get my stuff, then,” she said. “I left it with Justice.”
Back in Cameron’s room, Leah started crying. The drug, even though she had only taken a half, was making her emotional. Cameron just watched her cry, not saying anything or making any move to comfort her.
Even though she was desperately tired, she couldn’t sleep. Her tears seemed to last forever.
By the morning, Cameron and Leah were talking. “I’m sorry I took the acid,” she said, looking into his sky blue eyes.
“And I’m sorry I yelled at you,” he said, then reached over and hugged, then kissed her.
Everything was fine until a week later. Coming back from class with her bookbag over her shoulder, she found him searching through her things.
She stopped cold. “What are you doing?” she demanded.
“What, do you have something to hide?” he jeered. He pulled something out from behind his back. “What’s this?” Glinting in the light of the afternoon sun was the shiny, metallic object that had given her such torture in years past. It was the gun. She’d brought it with her to school, afraid that someone would discover it if she left it at home.
She stammered. “Th-that’s, my protection,” she said.
He did not look impressed. “Why do you have a gun? A goddamn gun?”
She swiveled her hips and placed her fists upon them. “We’re drug dealers, aren’t we? We’ve got to make sure no one comes and steals our loot.”
Cameron wasn’t buying it. “You’ve got to start giving me some answers, and I mean now.”
Defeated, Leah clamored over to the bed. “Alright. I’ll tell you.”
She had told herself that she would never tell anyone about Brendan. Her past with him proved to be even more personal to her than her sexuality ever was, and she guarded her feelings closely and possessively. But when Cameron discovered the gun in her possession, she knew she would have to tell him the truth. She proceeded to tell him the whole story, beginning with Jeremy, but still, leaving out the all-important detail that she loved him.
Cameron was silent for a long time. Leah thought he had lost his voice or something. But when he did speak, his voice was calm and controlled. “Why didn’t you tell me about any of this sooner?” he asked.
She looked down at her palms. “I didn’t think it would matter to you,” she said.
He closed his eyes, as though containing his anger. “You didn’t think it would matter to me? Leah, we shared everything together. I told you about my life, so why didn’t you tell me about yours?”
His anger and disbelief seemed to be growing. “I thought—“
“No, Leah, you didn’t think. A gun is serious business. Planning to take someone’s life is serious business. To be honest, I don’t know what to think about all this.” He shook his head from left to right.
“I’m sorry, Cameron.” But it was too late for apologies. The next day, he turned her in to school authorities.
The police picked her up, handcuffed her, and took her to jail for a night.
While there, she told them where Cameron’s stash of drugs and paraphernalia were.
Both of them were expelled from school.