underneath her and looked at Cole.
“Oh no,” I said into my margarita.
Cole glanced at me. “What?”
“Here it comes.”
“Tell me everything about you,” Marley said. “What’s your major? What do you want to be when you grow up? What do your parents do?”
“Mars,” I grumbled. “We talked about this.”
She looked sheepish. “I know you told me to stagger my questions, but this is who I am.”
Cole just chuckled. “It’s fine. I don’t mind the third degree from your best friend.”
Cole’s other roommate patted him on the back. “Good luck with that.”
“Thanks, Tony,” Cole said with an eye roll.
Tony leaned forward. “I’ve known him since high school. Trust me, he’s not that interesting.”
Marley and I laughed as Cole punched him in the shoulder.
“Dick,” Cole grumbled. “My major is sports management and marketing. I don’t ever want to grow up. And my dad is a football coach. My mom is a middle school teacher.”
“Okay, okay,” Marley said, holding her hands up. “I don’t understand what sports management even is.”
“It’s someone who wants to work with sports,” I told her.
“Yeah, but … what do you do with that?”
“Ignore her,” I said. “You don’t have to submit to this interrogation. She’s a science person, and she wants to, like, cure cancer.”
“Dementia,” Marley corrected.
“Interrogation already accepted,” Cole said with that same smile. His blue eyes bright as they rested on my best friend. “Sports management could be anything from professional sports to running a rec league. Personally, I’d like to be a talent scout for a professional football team, but I’m also interested in marketing and PR. Which is why I’m a double major.”
“I’m surprised you have time with football.”
Tony chuckled. “He thrives most when he’s swamped. You should have seen him in high school. He played football, ran track, held down a job with his dad, volunteered at a nursing home, and kept a 4.0.”
My eyes widened. Thanks, Marley. Somehow, I was learning more about my own boyfriend through this conversation. I’d known he was a double major. He’d schooled me about that on our second date. But all the rest, I wasn’t aware.
“Yeah, fine,” Cole said, “I like to keep busy. Nothing wrong with that.”
“You were salutatorian without trying. You had to turn down an academic scholarship,” Tony said, crossing his arms. “You’re a monster.”
“You turned down an academic scholarship?” I asked.
Cole shrugged. “I had to. I was offered a football scholarship, too, and there are all these weird NCAA rules. The academic scholarship could go to someone else.”
“Whoa,” I muttered.
“Oh, so you’re smart!” Marley said with a smile.
“Well, I don’t need help on my Intro to Kinesiology paper if that’s what you mean,” Cole said, winking at me.
I stuck my tongue out. “It was a fair question! Most of the jocks aren’t writing their own papers. How was I to know that you’d turned down an academic scholarship?”
“It was cute.”
Marley nodded as if she saw the pieces fall together. “Sports management for you and physical therapy for Lila. You’ll recruit the players, and Lila will piece them back together.”
“Big dreams,” Cole said.
“I like your big dreams and big brain,” I told him.
“Is that a euphemism?” Cole asked, rubbing his nose against mine.
“Maybe.”
“You two are disgusting,” Tony said. He leaned away from our very public display of affection.
I didn’t mind being disgusting. I was exactly where I wanted to be.
Hours later, the house was packed. Everyone must have invited more and more people until I was sure that the police were going to be called for noise complaints. Not that I cared too much as we cheered on Marley doing an upside-down margarita. Marley sat on a chair with her head tipped back while one person simultaneously poured a bottle of tequila and a bottle of margarita mix into her mouth.
The crowd counted for her. “One! Two! Three! Four! Five!”
She waved her hands helplessly, swallowing down the contents and grasping for a lime wedge. Everyone applauded for her as she wobbled back to her feet.
“I’m never doing that again.” She clutched my arm and pulled me away as another victim took a seat. “Why did I do that?”
“Because you’re drunk, Mars.”
She giggled and stumbled a step. “I am not.”
“Yes, you most definitely are. Maybe that last upside-down margarita was a bad idea.”
“No,” she said, waving me away. “It was fine. I’m fine. It’s your birthday! Plus, I rarely drink at Duke. Mostly dance rehearsals and basketball games.”
“Same,” I said with a smile. “I miss having you with me.”
“I know. It’s not the same. Though