SEVEN Ravi

SEVEN

Ravi

The last thing Ravi expected to do at midnight was eat french fries with his new-girl study-room competition, but Jessie had a way of surprising him.

"I've never been here," Jessie said as she bit into another truffle fry. "But then again, I haven't really eaten anywhere other than the campus cafeteria. I've been way too busy with my classes and with work." She clutched the old, faded copy of the Jane Austen novel in one hand as if afraid that once she put it down, their time in Davidson Tower would vanish like a fever dream.

"Why do you think no one found that book after so long?" Ravi asked. He took a sip of his coffee even though he would have preferred vaping. But he knew Jessie didn't like it when he smoked. "All you did was bump it, and you knew right away that something was wrong."

"I don't know," she said with a shrug. "It was obvious from the dust in that room that not many people go in there on a regular basis. Maybe when they moved that desk upstairs, the drawer got jammed? It just needed a bit of a nudge to come loose."

Ravi nodded. "My friend who works in the library—"

"The asshole with the key card that let us in?"

Ravi winced. "Yeah, that one. He said that people are skittish about going back there, but they'll have to by the end of the semester. Once renovations begin, that place will be crawling with construction crew and library staff."

Jessie wiped her hands on the napkin next to her plate, then held out the book with both hands. "There are boxes of books labeled by year. It was only a matter of time before people found the letters in the desk. I think we just got lucky."

Ravi sipped again, then snatched a fry from the plate between them. He had to stop from smiling when color flooded Jessie's cheeks at the intimate action. "Why did you take the book out of the desk? Why not let the secrets stay where they were meant to be for the librarians to discover later?"

Her eyes widened, moving from the fry between his fingers to his face. "We were obviously meant to find these letters first. We now have, I don't know, an obligation, Ravi."

This time, he couldn't hold back the smile.

"Why are you grinning at me?"

"Because I like it when you use my name." It sounded nice, he thought.

She shook her head. "As I was saying. We found this for a reason. It's fate. Who knows? I may be able to write about the letters for my final paper in that nonfiction seminar. This woman, because we now know it was a woman, deserves to be named."

Jessie didn't look at him when she spoke. He sat up straight and tilted his head. "Wait a minute. Was all that showmanship in Davidson Tower because you were hoping to find a story for a class?"

"Of course not," she said. She looked genuinely affronted by his question. "Everyone is writing about Davidson Tower already. The paper would just be a side benefit. I'm more interested in the love story. Aren't you curious to find out what happened? Don't you want to know if the letters prove whether or not the legend is real?"

"There is one problem," Ravi said, despite his piqued interest. "We don't know if those letters are actually from the person in the legend. They could be from someone else entirely. And what if they are real? They could be evidence from some missing-person case."

Jessie's face paled. It was as if she was weighing the possibility of jeopardizing her grade against her interest in the letters. He would be lying if he didn't admit that he was also curious to find out what was in them, but a part of him was afraid.

Secrets were more romantic in the shadows than in the light.

The hustle of the diner continued to move around them like a scene from a movie in the sixties while they weighed their options in silence.

Jessie stared down at the book, her fries neglected, her shoulders slumped. "You're right," she said quietly. She put the book down on the table. "We might be able to read them to find out if they're connected to the legend, but I don't want to get into trouble and prevent the truth from coming out."

Okay, so he might not believe in the importance of uncovering secrets, but it was clear that she did. "What are you going to do, then?"

She shrugged. "I feel like we shouldn't just put them back where we found them. Maybe I'll hand them in to the library director in the morning? Say that I found them when I was down near the study room and hope she doesn't get suspicious? Either way, there is no reason for us to spend any more time together than we already have over these, so after today, we can just go about our regular lives—"

"What if I took the fall?" he said. The words rushed from his mouth, as if his heart were afraid his brain would stop him if he waited too long. He was panicking, or at least felt like he was panicking, at the thought of never seeing her again. "If you want to keep the letters to write your paper and find out what happened, I'll tell everyone that it was me who found them. I'm not on scholarship, and because of my family name, I doubt I'd get in trouble. If this means something to you, then I'll help."

"Why?" she blurted out. Her hands rested on the table between them, as if reaching out to understand his motive. "Why would you do that?"

"Because I feel responsible," he said, sharing a half-truth with her. "Because you wouldn't have been locked in there if it wasn't for my dumb friends, and I'm hoping that you're still willing to share the study room after you stayed the longest in Davidson Tower."

She smiled at him, and it softened all her harsh lines and edges. "Because of guilt and a study room, you'd take the fall?"

"Got to use my nepo-baby status for some good, right?" he said ruefully.

"Thanks, but you'd still be paying too high of a price to cover for me."

He thought about it, about their time together and their rush to get the study room after the last few weeks. The idea of not spending any more time with her didn't sit right with him. He'd have to think about why he felt that way later, but in the moment, he knew he didn't want to lose their shared moments of open and honest conversation. With Jessie, he could be himself, and he knew Jessie wouldn't lie to him about her feelings. "I'll tell you what. We can read them together."

"You want to read the letters, too?" she asked, with one perfectly arched brow.

Ravi understood why she had doubts, but he wasn't exactly going to tell her that he was more interested in spending time with her than in reading letters. "Yeah," he said. "I have the same class you do. Maybe we can both write about the letters for our final papers."

She nodded. Her hair was up in a messy bun now, and her shoulders were bare. "I mean, wouldn't you want to write about your name instead?"

Ravi scoffed. "What's the fun in that? No, this sounds like a way more intriguing story to follow."

"Fine," she said. "We can get together next week and read them all—"

"Nope," he said.

She gaped at him, and he had to hide his smile behind his coffee cup. Her expression was so earnest. "What do you mean, ‘nope'?" she blurted.

"Don't you remember what we learned in class, Jessie Jaissi Koi Nahin? What's one of the first rules of writing an observational piece?"

"Pay attention to the details," she recited.

"If we blow through all the letters at once, then we may miss some very important clues." He knew he was making excuses now, but hopefully she'd humor him. "We should read one or two letters at a time, decipher them, and then move on to the next."

She looked down at the book. Her finger ran under the lip of the cover as if she were on the verge of exposing its contents to the diner crowd. There was that huff of air, that admittance of defeat that he heard from her the first time he told her not to judge him for his name. "I guess you're right. Do you mind if I hold on to them, though?"

"No, go for it."

There was that smile again. The one that he liked to see. "You trust that I won't read them without you? That I'll keep our promise?"

He nodded slowly. "I don't know a lot about you, but I have a feeling you're the kind of person who'll stick to their word."

She smiled again. It was the second time that night. "Great."

He crossed his arms and leaned on the table. "Do you want to start now? Reading the letters, I mean."

Jessie shook her head. "I'd rather we do it either in the study room or someplace where there's not that many people."

"Fine," he said. "That works for me."

She bit into another fry, and they slipped into silence as they ate and sipped their drinks in that bustling late-night diner filled with upper-class students who looked like they were desperately trying to sober up. The silence wasn't new between them. After all the times he had walked by her side, Ravi was used to the quiet. It felt comfortable now.

Later that night, after he accompanied her back to her dorm room and watched her carry the hollowed-out book like it was precious cargo cradled in her arms, he took the long way back to his condo. It was on the edge of campus, closer to the downtown district than to any of the university buildings.

His parents had encouraged him to live in the dorms. They believed that he'd learn from his peers and feel challenged to do better. Competition, according to them, was an excellent motivator.

But Ravi knew that meant he'd constantly be living under a microscope. He was hardly able to go a day on campus without someone trying to talk him up or a teacher calling on him, expecting him to know the answer because of who he was. If there was one thing he desperately needed for his sanity after a full day of attention, it was a quiet place where he didn't have to pretend to be what everyone wanted him to be.

That was why Ravi bought the condo in secret. He'd used part of the trust money that he'd been able to access when he turned eighteen. It was meant to pay for college, but he'd gotten merit scholarships. The summer before his first year, he told his family he had to fly out for orientation. He'd used that time to secure a unit in the new-construction high-rise. He lived one level below the penthouse and had two bedrooms and two and a half baths, a balcony that overlooked the downtown area and campus, as well as hardwood floors and state-of-the-art appliances. He had someone come in once a week to clean, and he had prepared meals delivered every Thursday night.

The best part about his place? It was all his.

Ravi waved at the doorman, then took the elevator to his floor, where he pressed his thumb over the fingerprint scanner and entered his quiet condo. It was spotless. The only chaos was colorful, eclectic covers of his favorite paperbacks that he displayed in a rainbow pattern on shelves bracketing his TV. There were stacks of books on the coffee table, the dining table, and the floor next to the sofa, too. He had no other art, no souvenirs or picture frames.

Ravi kicked off his shoes on the doormat next to the entrance and then walked barefoot to his bedroom, stripping off clothes as he went.

Even though it was one in the morning, he strode into his ensuite bathroom and turned on the overhead rain shower before he stepped inside the glass-and-tile enclosure.

Jessie came to mind.

She looked so excited to find the book. It was as if she thought every single letter would have the answer to all her life problems. But the real world wasn't that fantastical, and he knew the reality contained in the letters had the potential of dashing any hopes of a happily ever after he knew Jessie was looking for. That didn't stop memories of her smile or her cutting humor from invading his thoughts. He closed his eyes and stepped under the hot spray. He rested one hand on the tiled wall on front of him as he gave in to the urge to stroke himself at the thought of her.

When he was spent, Ravi turned off the faucet and stepped out of the shower stall, careful not to slip on the wet tile. He pulled on some boxers, grabbed his vape pen, then walked into the guest bedroom that he'd converted into a small office space. He pulled out his high-back leather chair at his desk and sat in front of his computer. His heart swelled as a story began to form. The words were like smoke tendrils, disappearing if he didn't pay close attention.

For the first time since he was a child, when he used to tell stories to his grandfather for fun, Ravi decided to write his own happily ever after. He opened up a blank Word document and focused on the blinking cursor.

"I can't believe I'm doing this," he murmured, then began typing.