Read Eat Your Heart Out for Free Online Page B

won’t go to the bar to order. He wonders why she bothers asking him questions that she doesn’t want answered.
    She lifts her arm and waves it at the waitress. “Hi! Hi! Over here!”
    â€œWhat can I get you?”
    â€œOh, uhm . . . Sam, what are you drinking?”
    â€œJust beer.”
    Grace looks up and around the bar, clicking her tongue, just so everyone knows she’s thinking.
    â€œI’ll have a double vodka and soda?”
    â€œAny type of vodka?” asks the waitress.
    â€œThe cheapest,” she says and smiles.
    â€œWow, that big city has made you so sophisticated.” Sam’s never forgiven that she moved to Chicago to study philosophy and literature. He knows the move was motivated by a sense that she was close to some discovery about herself. It hasn’t come.
    â€œFuck you. How are you? What’s new? Tell me stuff!”
    â€œI’m good. Things are, you know, the same really. School’s going good—”
    â€œI don’t understand how you can do science in university. Isn’t it, like, so hard?”
    â€œYeah, kind of. It’s easy for me, though, so I like it. And Guelph is good, you know, it’s Guelph, but the boys are good.”
    â€œReally? How are they? How’s Booty?”
    Booty has been Sam’s best friend forever. No one quite knows why he is called Booty, has been since middle school, and there’s no changing it now.
    â€œFailing. Drunk a lot. The same.”
    â€œThat warms my heart. And how’s Lily?”
    Hearing her name, Sam freezes.
    â€œShe’s good, we’re good. We’re, um . . . talking about maybe going to Europe this summer.”
    â€œReally?” Grace smiles, trying to look happy. “So you and Lily are totally in love, huh?”
    â€œAh, well, I don’t know. We don’t really talk about that stuff, so . . .”
    â€œBut you love her.”
    Sam might love Lily. He thinks. Sometimes.
    â€œYeah, I mean we’ve been together for . . . ever, so . . .”
    Before Sam has to continue, the waitress brings Grace her drink. Sam’s relieved. He hates talking about Lily with Grace. As the waitress walks away, he notices that she’s not half bad. If Grace wasn’t with him, he’d take a longer look.
    Grace grabs her drink in both hands, moving it from the table to her lips without pause.
    â€œOh, thank God, I’ve had such a day,” she says.
    â€œWhat happened?”
    â€œOh, nothing really. Luke and I have just been fighting lately. He’s driving me fucking nuts.”
    Sam tries his hardest to act concerned. He knows they’d gotten serious quickly, as is often the case with Grace. She possesses an uncanny ability to commit to those who don’t want to commit to her, never fully understanding that it isn’t meant to be a one-sided bargain.
    â€œWhat’s going on?”
    â€œIt’s just, like . . . I don’t know, we’re really different. He’s so, he’s one of those people who seems really interesting at first, because he’s in a band and everything. I thought we had so much in common, and on the surface, we do but it’s not the stuff that matters. Like, I don’t think he understands me. Not really. I don’t know. You met him that one time when you came to visit me. At his show, right? What’d you think?”
    Sam thought he was a fucking idiot.
    â€œHe was cool.”
    â€œYeah, he is cool,” says Grace.
    â€œDo you like his band?” Sam asks.
    â€œHonestly?”
    â€œYes, honestly. Between us.”
    â€œI hate them!”
    They laugh so loudly that the couple next to them stares. Grace notices and starts laughing louder. They grin at each other like children who’ve agreed on something forbidden.
    â€œBut maybe I hate them because I’m not, like, really cool, in the way