“Why don’t you shut up, bitch, before I make you my business,” I returned sternly. “I’ll show you where Tristan is,” I said to Trent, grabbing his wrist to pull him away from Patty before she could corrupt him. It took me a few minutes to stop fuming. Trent offered no resistance as I dragged him away like a dog on a leash. The surge of protectiveness I felt disappeared the instant we stepped outside. What the hell was I doing? I avoided him like the plague back home, and suddenly I felt the need to swoop in and save him. I would have blamed it on the liquor I had consumed, but I knew that was a crap excuse. Hell, I wasn’t even tipsy. “You could have waited until morning to check out Tristan’s laptop,” I snapped at him.
“Why?” He put on the brakes, bringing us to a halt with my hand still wrapped around his wrist.
I dropped it like it was a poisonous snake. “Because this kind of party isn’t for you, especially during pledge week. Things get pretty wild.” As if to prove my point, someone hugging another mattress leapt from the second-floor balcony and landed no more than three feet from where we were standing. The fraternity pledge climbed off the mattress, grinning like a buffoon before staggering off. Between flying mattresses and the wrestling, which had escalated to an all-out mud-slinging war, the backyard was total chaos. The kind of chaos I would have enjoyed if I wasn’t babysitting “Clark Kent,” as Derek had called him. Normally, I would have been in the thick of things. I freaking loved pledge week. It was cheap entertainment to see what the pledges would do to get into a fraternity.
“What makes you think I can’t handle wild?” he asked, adjusting his glasses. I could tell by the way he shifted his weight he was uncomfortable. Yet another way we were so different.
“You’re joking, right? I bet your computer brain feels like it’s been invaded by a virus.”
The corners of his mouth quirked upward. “Who am I to judge? If killing brain cells is the theme of these parties, so be it.”
Despite myself, I grinned. “Damn straight.”
His eyes lit up at my words. It should be a sin to waste such beautiful eyes on someone so different from the guys I usually went for. The thought had barely materialized in my head before I gave it a mental bitch slap. I needed to keep my shit together. “He’s over there,” I said, pointing to the far side of the backyard where Tristan had two pledges showing their goods to a group of sorority girls holding up scores to vote in some sort of contest. I turned and walked back to the house, ready to put some distance between Trent and me. I was pretty sure I heard him call my name, but I ignored it. He could sink or swim here, but there was no way I was sticking around to be his life raft.
“What did you do with your cub, momma bear?” Derek teased as I joined him and Cameo, who were on one of the sofas.
“Bite me.” Sinking down on the couch next to them, I reached over and snagged the red Solo cup Cameo was clutching.
“Hey, that’s mine,” she complained as I sniffed the contents. Rum. That would do the trick. Ignoring her grumbles, I downed the contents in one gulp. The rum burned a path down to the pit of my stomach, numbing my teeth along the way. My eyes took on a slightly fuzzy view. Rum was definitely what I needed to forget about jerky ball-scratching ex-boyfriends and electric blue eyes on nerdy superhero look-alikes.
“Don’t mind me. Go ahead and have my drink,” Cameo said sarcastically.
“Thanks, sugar lips,” I said, giving her a smacking kiss. The rum had given me a nice buzz.
“Gross. I don’t know where those lips have been,” she complained, swiping a hand across her mouth.
Grinning, I reached for her again, this time giving her a spectacularly sloppy kiss on her cheek while Derek laughed next to us.
“If you two are done making out, I’d like to do some more dancing,” he said, bobbing his head to the music.
“I need another drink first,” I said, pulling Cameo to her feet. She accepted my help, though she was still rubbing her cheek where my lips had been. “Sheesh, it’s not like I have cooties.”
“As far as you know. You owe me another drink.”
“Ouch. Don’t bother to ask me when you decide you want to experiment with being a lesbian,” I said, pulling her to the kitchen to make us another drink.
The rest of the evening passed in a blur. I know we danced for several hours, and I’m pretty sure Cameo and I did an impromptu karaoke show when Justin Timberlake’s newest song came on. One thing was certain: Chuck and Trent became a distant memory.
3.
I was jarred awake the next morning by an unmistakably male body pressed against me. Oh hell. How much did I drink last night? Opening my eyes a crack, my first instinct was to reach down to check whether I was still wearing panties before I spun around to see who was spooning me. I sighed with relief when it turned out to be Derek. His large frame was sprawled across my bed, trying to steal every inch of available space. Not quite ready to be awake, I shoved at him until he rolled over. This wasn’t the first time Derek had crashed with me. I didn’t mind, but you had to claim your space with him around—otherwise you’d end up on the floor. With more room for myself, I turned on my side and pulled the blanket up to my chin, drifting back to sleep in seconds.
The next time I woke, my bed was empty and I could hear the rustling noise of pans and plates coming from the small kitchen in the apartment I shared with Cameo. Rolling over on my back, I took stock of my hangover. On a scale of I need to throw up to I just need some coffee, I’d say I was more on the needing-coffee side. I had a slight pounding headache, which I could handle with Advil, but my mouth tasted like something had crawled in there and died. It felt like I would need a sandblaster to remove all the gunk from my teeth. Grabbing a clean pair of sweats and a Maine State shirt from my dresser, I staggered to the bathroom to shower. The mirror over the sink showed no mercy. Not that I was somehow expecting to look any better than I felt. I popped three Advil into my mouth before giving my teeth the long brushing they needed. My face resembled something out of a zombie movie. Both of my eyes were rimmed in a thick layer of black eyeliner and mascara. I didn’t remember being that liberal with the makeup, but the evidence was staring back at me. A dried patch of drool covered my left cheek. That was attractive. I looked like a hooker after a hard night at work. I reached around the shower curtain and turned on the water, leaving my freak show reflection behind. If a hot shower didn’t make me feel more human, I guessed I’d have to resort to a paper bag over my head for the day.
Derek and Cameo were cooking breakfast when I finally stumbled into the kitchen twenty minutes later. Derek set down a platter of crisp bacon and eggs on our small dining room table that would wobble slightly if not for the piece of folded-up cardboard under one of the legs. Classy, that’s the way we rolled. Cameo and I rescued the table from a Dumpster at the start of summer after the previous owner threw it out before heading home at the end of term.
Last year, our apartment had been pretty sparse when it came to furniture. We had nothing more than our beds and one futon couch, but when Cameo decided to take summer classes, we stuck around, keeping a sharp eye out for any furniture that would fill the gaps. We were shocked by what people would throw out, and in no time our apartment was filled with the treasures we had found. Most of it had seen better days, but we used strategically placed scarves to cover scratches and water marks. Nothing matched, but somehow it still looked good in a bohemian sort of way.
“She lives.” Derek greeted me in a booming voice that earned him one of my patented glares. He laughed, opening the cabinet to pull out more plates.
“You’re a bed hog,” I complained, filling my favorite oversized mug to the brim with hot black coffee. It had a cartoon dog with the caption: If you don’t want me to be a bitch, give me caffeine. My brother gave it to me for Christmas the previous year. He thought he was so clever, laughing his ass off when I opened it. He was a little shit, but I loved the mug. It could have read Tressa is a whore on the side and I would still use it because of the sheer size of the mug.
“You snore,” Derek returned, handing us each a plate.
“Liar,” I said, shoving him with my hip.
“You were pretty toasted last night,” Cameo said, placing her coffee and an energy drink beside her plate.