Call Me! by Dani Ripper Page A

got this straight,” I say. “You’re warning me that Ben had a creepy obsession for Mindy Renee Whittaker, and through dumb luck got a job tutoring her, but found her crazy. So he met me and decided I’d be her replacement? Is that your warning? That Ben wasn’t in love with me when we got married? Or are you warning me you think Ben’s a hebephile?”
     
    “I don’t even know what that is,” he says.
     
    “An adult who’s attracted to children in the early years of puberty. Is that your warning, Roy?”
     
    “No. My warning’s more specific.”
     
    “Can you just give it and go?”
     
    “When the world finds out you’re Mindy Renee Whittaker your life will never be the same.”
     
    “Roy.”
     
    “Yes, hon?” he says, in a mocking tone.
     
    “Why on earth would the world think I’m Mindy Renee Whittaker?”
     
    “Because I’m going to leak the story to the tabloids.”
     
    I force a chuckle. “You’re going to end up looking stupid if you do.”
     
    “I’m willing to take my chances.”
     
    “If you’re dead set on doing it, why haven’t you done it already?”
     
    “I wanted to tell you first.”
     
    “Why?”
     
    “To watch you sweat.”
     

“ROY?”
    “Yeah?”
     
    “Can I ask you a question?”
     
    “Of course.”
     
    “What really happened between you and Ben?”
     
    “What do you mean?”
     
    “You’ve been calling him for years, bragging, flaunting your success in his face. You spent a small fortune and went to a great deal of effort to set me up through Carter Teague. You didn’t go to all this trouble because you’re competitive. Ben obviously did something to you, years ago. Or at least, you think he did.”
     
    “Ask Ben.”
     
    I frown. “What are we, in junior high? Ben will have his own version, if he says anything at all. I’d like to hear your side.”
     
    He says, “I’ll make you a deal. Tell me how you erased the photos from my cell phone and I’ll tell you the truth about what Ben did to me.”
     
    “Carter sent the photos to your cell phone,” I say.
     
    “So?”
     
    “Since you didn’t take the photos from your phone, there was no memory of them. I didn’t have to erase them from your SIM card, I only had to delete them from your inbox. For example, I couldn’t have erased the pictures you took of you and Carter after I left, because those were taken by your phone.”
     
    “And they’d be in the memory chip somewhere.”
     
    “In a manner of speaking.”
     
    He nods. “You’re not stupid.”
     
    “Sometimes I am.”
     
    “He cost me a scholarship.”
     
    “What?”
     
    “Ben. He cost me a football scholarship.”
     
    “How?”
     
    “I used to play practical jokes on him. Nothing major, just funny, you know?”
     
    “Funny to you.”
     
    He shrugs. “Whatever. Anyway, one night he found me passed out on my bed and decided to play one on me. He wrapped twine around me, tying me to the bed. Then he hung my alarm clock from the ceiling so it was inches from my ear.”
     
    “Sounds harmless enough.”
     
    “Except this was the night before the away game with Georgia Tech, and the alarm clock was set for five a.m. And when Ben was screwing around with it, he somehow turned the alarm off by mistake. I woke up at eight the next morning and missed the bus.”
     
    “Why didn’t someone call you?”
     
    “College kids didn’t have cell phones back then. To make matters worse, the kid who replaced me played the best game of his life. Six weeks later our team went to the Independence Bowl, and the coach started him instead of me. The game was close, and I had to watch from the bench. I was a junior. That was my first and last bowl game, because the coach pulled my scholarship.”
     
    He’s staring off into space, reliving it. I remain quiet until he speaks.
     
    “I’ll never forgive him for that,” he says. “Never.”
     
    I nod. “That’s a big thing.”
     
    “Ya think?”
     
    “Yes.