Without fuss or suspicion, Amber joined the roster of Topics in Sociology. She wished, not for the first time, that she could’ve taken a real science course and not some bullshit class like this, but her target dictated such concerns.
Amber looked out at the audience of students for an open seat and, more importantly, for her suspect. Target. Mark. She couldn’t pick an appropriate term for him, since he wasn’t suspected of a crime yet. Amber considered not worrying about it too much just yet. Settling into her cover would be enough work for day one. Still, it would be negligent not to at least try to get near the guy and watch him.
She spotted Cohen as he entered with his headphones on and his backpack slung over one shoulder. He wore a Green Lantern t-shirt, a plain unzipped hoodie and jeans. Cohen moved up toward the seats in the back without worry or stress in his stride. He seemed to look out at the crowd, at the students taking their seats, and even at those still milling about near the lectern. Amber watched, finding his gait marginally curious, and soon discerned the cause of it.
He was checking out the girls. His gaze didn’t linger long on any one of them, and he took care not to stumble or bump into anyone, but within seconds she found herself drawing imaginary straight lines between his eyes and that girl’s cleavage, and then that girl’s ass, and that one’s legs… She stopped staring when he looked her way, breaking her gaze just late enough to note that he, too, broke eye contact when he realized he’d been busted.
Ordinarily, Amber wouldn’t have known whether to be flattered that he’d been looking her over or to roll her eyes. Today she called it a bonus. Her impression from Cohen’s profile was that he might be shy and reserved around girls-much as she’d been in high school and college with guys. She figured she’d have to be the one to initiate contact. If he thought she was cute, he’d be more receptive.
Several seats in his row remained open. The spots in the row behind his were taken, which spoiled the chance of looking over his shoulder. Sitting right down next to him would look weird, but taking up a spot a few seats down seemed reasonable. Amber considered all the advice of her much more experienced colleagues, weighed her options, and decided to trust her gut.
She didn’t look up at him as she ascended the steps toward his row. Best to look like she was minding her own business. She set down her books on an empty chair beside hers, pulled off her jacket to reveal her Blue Sun t-shirt, and settled in for class.
Amber fished a pen out of her pocket. Thumbed her notebook open to a blank page. Turned off her phone. Realized that Cohen had stood from his seat and stepped a little closer.
“Y’know,” he said in a “hey grrrl” tone that he couldn’t possibly be serious about, “your coat’s kind of a brownish color.”
She looked up, not at Jason but at the projection screen noting the class’s agenda, and restrained herself from grinning quite as broadly as she wanted. “It was on sale,” she answered nonchalantly. Exploit any opening, she thought. Geek culture for the win.
“Mind if I take this spot?” he asked with a far more reasonable voice.
“Sure. Can I look at your notes? I just transferred in.”
He sat down beside her. There was, she decided, enough room with the seats and the armrests for this not to be too forward-but only just. “I’m Jason,” he said.
“Amber,” said Amber as he dug his notebook out of his backpack. She looked at the clock, noted that she had made contact in less than two minutes, and tried not to laugh.
* * *
“Nothing worse than an ex who won’t leave you alone,” Jason nodded sagely. He downed another chip, realized the cheese sauce had dripped onto his chin and possibly onto his shirt, and quickly tried to recover.
Amber watched with mild amusement. “Had that happen to you often?”
“Never,” Jason admitted, finding a napkin amid the clutter on their simple table, “but it’s happened to friends. I’ve only ever had girlfriends cut me off cold turkey. Probably better that way.”
“Well, I went to the trouble of rearranging my whole class schedule to get away from him, and now I find out he dropped out of school entirely. Feels like half the quarter’s shot and I’ve got nothing to show for it. All the friends I’ve made out here-‘scuse me, thought I’d made out here-are part of his social circle. I feel like I don’t even know what people do around here for fun.”
“That sucks,” Jason nodded. Amber glanced up at him, saw his eyes wandering, and considered prompting him with more. Before her mouth opened again, though, she saw the light bulb go off. “If you’d like to come out and play pool sometime, I know a great place.”
“I dunno,” she mused, not wanting to look too eager too soon, “I mean, I’m just getting out of a relationship. I’m not completely sure where my head’s at.”
“You don’t have to consider it a date,” Jason shrugged. “I’m there a lot with my friends. You’d like them. They’d like you. I’m just sayin’, you want to go out and be around nice people, I know some. I’m not trying to hit on you.” He smiled. “Unless that would work. But I’m guessing it’s too soon, right? Too soon? Yeah. That’s cool. I’ll be all sensitive and zero-pressure and stuff.”
She couldn’t help but smirk. The obvious self-awareness in his tone and expression made his non-flirtatious flirting amusing, but not particularly effective. “You don’t ask girls out a lot, do you?”
“Not really,” he admitted with good humor. “Mostly it’s just been girls falling in my lap.”
“How often has that happened?”
His eyes narrowed thoughtfully, and then he held out his hands as if to offer up two ranges of distance. “What sort of sample period are we talking? Like, just recently, or all the way back to puberty?”
“Whatever works to your advantage,” Amber granted.
He narrowed the space between his hands to a couple inches. “Constantly,” he declared.
Amber got a good laugh out of that. She couldn’t deny that he was funny. He was perhaps more than a little awkward, too, but funny and confident in his own way. Nothing about him seemed criminal, though, or even dangerous. Amber remembered the picture of Jason and his necklace of vampire fangs, and knew how deceiving appearances could be, but she couldn’t picture Jason doing anything more violent than playing video games.
“Listen,” Jason went on, “I’m not gonna hard sell you on this. You sound like you could use some good company. If you’re not interested, no worries, but I’m goin’ out tonight anyway and I’d be happy to bring you with. No whining about ‘friend zones’ or any bullshit like that. I just think we could have a good time together.”
That she would accept the invitation was a foregone conclusion, but not for the reasons Jason believed. Yet she had to admit that she liked his pitch. For all his goofiness and self-deprecation, he seemed quite comfortable in his own skin. It was something she envied.
“Okay,” she nodded. “I’m interested.”
* * *
The game between Drew and Wade ground to a halt. They stood on the same side of the pool table, looking at Amber after Jason’s introduction without betraying a hint of emotion. They just looked on, not quite staring, leaving Amber feeling a little awkward in the silence.
She said hi already, and wondered now if it was worth repeating. The other customers, their games and the Foo Fighters song on the speakers weren’t so loud that one had to shout.
With several hours between lunch and the evening meet-up, Amber had plenty of time to prepare. She worked with the task force to establish back-up calls, got to know the immediate neighborhood around the pool hall and firmed up her cover story. She also had time to review Jason’s online presence, which given his youth and enthusiasm was considerable. Drew and Wade appeared many times in his photo album.
They more or less lived up to their online images. Drew was a tall, well-built and good-looking young black man, dressed in stylish slacks and a blue and black striped shirt. The tall white Southerner beside him seemed somehow even more unlikely as a friend of Jason’s, his heritage on display through his faded blue jeans and John Deere ball cap.