Sophie
2002
It was just a silly drinking game. She was only expected to make up an answer—to lie. So why did she immediately think of offering up her most cherished, intimate, real, memory?
The beer buzz probably had a lot to do with it.
Sitting with a group of friends in a dive bar not far from the University of Southern California campus, she surveyed the empty bottles of beer littering the small round table. The place was grungy and just lax enough that they weren’t carded for drinks.
“What’s it going to be then, Sophie?” Tobin asked and grabbed her arm, shaking her with mock eagerness.
She laughed as he obviously intended, but also noticed that when he released his grip, he let his fingers trail gently over the fine blonde hair of her forearm. He was in her Foundations of Western Art class and had been angling to get her alone rather than in a group outing like this since the semester started. She’d successfully put him off but his patience and persistence was beginning to wear her down. With sandy hair and pale blue eyes, he was cute, even if he did stare at her a little too intensely.
It was her turn in the game called “You Wouldn’t Believe . . .” in which they each had to divulge either a hard-to-believe truth or make something up and successfully defend the lie before declaring which it was.
“Okay, okay,” she said and took a deep breath. “You wouldn’t believe that . . . Gavin McManus asked me to marry him when I was sixteen years old.”
The four of them—Tobin, Rachel, Zach, and Gracelynn—watched her in silence and then as if orchestrated, they all burst out laughing at precisely the same second.
“Yeah, right!” Rachel said, pulling her long straight hair over one shoulder.
“How on earth do you think you can pull that one off?” Zach asked.
“You do know that you’re supposed to choose something at least halfway believable, right?” Gracelyn said, leaning over the table and patting her on the hand.
“It’s true, though!” she said, smiling at the memory. She had to remind herself that, to them, her declaration couldn’t be remotely true. Not when given the fact that Gavin McManus was the singer for the up-and-coming Irish rock band Rogue and she was an American college sophomore. He supposedly proposed to her? Two years ago, when she was sixteen? Nothing about that computed.
“Totally,” Rachel said. “And then there was the time that Justin Timberlake asked me to be his backup singer.”
They all laughed and the conversation escalated into how Justin supposedly serenaded Rachel with “Rock Your Body” and how he had rocked it so well that she was now expecting his baby.
Sophie watched the others distractedly as the vivid memory of the first time she ever saw Gavin came to the forefront of her mind. It was in the halls of her new school in Ireland. She had been full of dread over being the new girl.
Make that the foreign new girl.
Moving from Silicon Valley in northern California to Dublin hadn’t exactly been a well-thought-out plan. She’d mentioned the idea of doing so out of a fit of frustration and desperation after a particularly bad day at school. For reasons she could never figure out, her former tight circle of friends had turned against her and become relentless mean girls. Though she hadn’t confessed her motives for wanting to escape to another country, her parents, the workaholic founders of their own tech company, had warmed to the idea right away. They declared it a wonderful learning opportunity and quickly arranged for her to stay with a trusted employee who was helping to set up their company’s manufacturing expansion in the business-friendly country. They shipped her off with plans to visit when it aligned with progress checks on their business venture.
The family hosting her at their home on the Southside of Dublin was warm and welcoming. But once the initial excitement of exploring the tourist areas of the city wore off, she began to panic at the idea of what she had done. At sixteen, she was suddenly in a new country all on her own.
On her first day at school, a student volunteer gave her a brief tour of the essentials, and then she was left to fight the nerves that formed a knot in her stomach. What had she been thinking? Running away from home? All because of some bullies she didn’t want to face? And now she was in a place where she knew no one. What she wouldn’t give for one of those mean girls to call out to her in their sickening taunt. Because at least she wouldn’t feel so completely alone.
Knowing she had no choice in the matter now, she started toward her first class. But the hallway was blocked by a large, boisterous, group of kids. There was a ring-leader of the bunch commanding all the attention. The crowd circled around him, hanging on every word as he gestured wildly.
Inching her way closer, she watched the boy. His hair was chestnut brown, untamed and past his collar. He wore his school uniform with obvious reluctance. His gray and blue striped tie was loose around his neck, the top button of his white shirt undone, and his gray trousers were slung low on his hips. His blue eyes were incredibly expressive and he had a square jaw set off by a sensual mouth with lips that had an alluring “just kissed” redness to them. She’d never known a boy to possess such raw magnetism. As if pulled by some invisible gravitational force, she took another step closer.
“How did you know the fella wasn’t about to take his car out?” asked one of the onlookers.
“Well, I didn’t, did I?”
“You’re mental!”
“The added risk is what makes the joyride all that much better, anyway,” the ring-leader said with a grin. The crowd laughed appreciatively. “So, we went out for about an hour or so, me and Seamus did. As we’re turning the corner to get the car back, I could just make out this figure under the streetlamp looking up and down the street wondering where in bleedin’ hell his car went. I take one look at Seamus and he gets me right away, pulling the most incredible move. He threw it straight into reverse and back we went right around the corner and out of sight.”
“Didn’t the sorry bastard see you then, Gavin?”
So, this charismatic boy had a name. Gavin. Being so far away from home just got a whole lot more interesting.
Gavin hesitated, building the anticipation. “He didn’t. What’s better, though, is he goes back inside long enough for us to park the thing back where we found it so, in the end, he was none the wiser. It was magic, I tell you. Seamus is a wizard at driving, don’t you know?”
The group erupted into laughter and cheers and it soon became clear that the boy Gavin called Seamus had been among them but reluctant to take center stage. As Sophie was examining the way Seamus’ cheeks turned crimson under the attention of congratulatory slaps on the back and handshakes, she sensed she was being watched in return.
Looking back at Gavin, she saw he had his eyes fixed on her and a rush of heat filled her body. She expected him to appraise her from head to toe as most boys did, but instead, he held eye contact with her. She couldn’t have broken the connection if she tried. They stayed locked into each other’s spell, even when a teacher poked his head out from a classroom and tried to rally everyone to begin the school day. It must have lasted mere seconds but it felt like a lifetime as sound muffled and the movements of others blurred and receded.
Finally, another boy, taller and with jet-black hair and deep blue eyes, threw his arm around Gavin’s neck and pulled him from the others.
She saw Gavin mouth something with a nod of his head in her direction. But she was so overwhelmed by the intensity of their silent connection that she didn’t sort out exactly what he had said until she was seated in class, trying and failing to focus on the teacher at the whiteboard.
Gorgeous. That was what Gavin had told his friend as he motioned to her.
And with that realization, she had been a goner.
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