I covered my face with my hands. “Holy crap! I’m so sorry!”
“Nah, it’s fine. I’m a walking accident.” She laughed. “But if you plan on screaming all night, I’m taking the floor. My lamp killing days are behind me.”
Smiling, I nodded. “Sure. I just… I don’t want you to—”
“Stop apologizing.” Lisa’s smile was warm and inviting “Oh, and I sleepwalk so if you wake up to me standing over you, try not to punch me in the face.”
“Wow, we’re sure a fun pair.”
She grabbed a blanket from my bed and threw it onto the floor. “You know those little comment sections in the housing part of registration?”
“Yeah?”
“I swear it’s a setup to put all of us weirdos together.”
I yawned.
“I need a pillow,” Lisa announced. “I’ll be right back. No more screaming. Close your eyes, and in the morning we’ll go boy-hunting. Dream about that.”
“Boys?”
“Uh…” Lisa tucked her brown hair behind her ear. “That is, unless you’re interested in girls. I mean, that’s cool if you bat for the other team, I was just sayin’—”
“No, no, no.” A weak laugh squeezed past my lips. Did I look like I batted for the other team? “No, nothing like that. I’ve just never had a boyfriend.”
“You poor soul!” Was she serious? “How did you survive?”
“Netflix, Johnny Depp, books. I powered through.” I shrugged. “Trust me, if you grew up in the town I did, you wouldn’t have dated either.”
“Oh yeah? Why?” She held up her hand really quick and ran out of the room. When she came back she had her pillow in hand. Throwing it onto the floor she sat with her legs crossed and yawned. “Okay, you may continue.”
“Guys…” I lay on my left side so I could fully face her. “I didn’t date them because my town was so dang small that if I even sneezed in the wrong direction my mom said bless you before I even got it out. I mean, the one time I got a bad grade on my report card, it made the newspaper.”
“Huh? What the hell kind of town does that?”
“One that literally documents how many people visit it during the high season.”
“High season?” Lisa asked.
“Tourist season. When people go wine-tasting. Last year we had five hundred, which is more people than our entire town put together.”
“This information makes me depressed,” Lisa announced. “So no cute boys then?”
“Mayor’s son was cute.”
“Oh, that’s cool!” she gushed.
“Yup, the quarterback of the football team thought so too.”
“Did that one make the news?” She cringed.
I wrinkled my nose and nodded. “It did. Along with my bad grade.”
“I would have taken the bad grade.”
“Agreed.” I laughed. It felt good that someone could empathize with how bad it royally sucked to be the center of attention. Tension slowly left my body.
“Well, we’ll have to rectify this situation immediately.” She licked her lips. “I know plenty of guys. I met at least ten at orientation this morning. One of them had tattoos.” She sighed longingly. “I’m a sucker for tattoos.”