we just talked our way in. “Well, thanks for the naughty night. Maybe we should just head home.”
“Yes,” he says. “It was fun while it lasted.”
We arrive back to the quad, and I’m hoping—praying—my room is going to be free. Maybe Alex and April are both gone, out to a party or something.
But when I arrive, April is sitting there watching TV, and I can hear…noises coming from Alex’s room.
“What’s up?” Grant asks April.
She frowns. “Sexiled again.”
“Sexiled?” I retort.
April looks at me. “Sexiled: verb. To be exiled from your room because your roommate is having sex with someone. As in, Alex and DJ love to do it on Saturday nights so I get sexiled.”
My eyes widen. “Has this been happening a lot?”
Grant and April nod. “Alex and DJ have a healthy sex life,” April says. “Good for them.”
“Well…movie night?” I say, kicking off my thigh highs.
I borrow a pair of Faith’s PJs since we can’t get into my room. We all watch Ozark, and I chat with April a little bit.
Grant is stoic throughout the night, not saying too much.
Hard to believe that just a short time ago he was sitting next to me in the bar, pressing his thigh against me and heating me up…from the inside.
If Grant can do such things to my body with just his voice, God knows what he could to do me with other things.
Still, when he says good night, his tone is neutral, and I wonder if this little alternate reality where we become more than just friends is just in my head.
The next week, I drown in a sea of exams, papers, and indoor track practice.
Saturday, we’re hosting the first track meet of the season.
My suite mate Charlotte Williams’ her mom is the coach, so we arrive there early to help the event personnel get everything set up.
“Oh God,” she says. “It’s Noah and company.”
We look over at the entrance and see that our archrival, Saint Simeon College, has arrived in their track gear.
“They’re here early,” I comment.
“Yeah,” Charlotte says, putting little orange cones around the curve of the track. Her eyes move down the track. “You know it’s early when the baseball guys are still throwing here. Hey, is that Grant?”
I look down at the other end of the track, and see a tall, muscular man in gray baseball pants and a white t-shirt throwing pitches to a catcher.
My skin buzzes with desire just looking at him.
“Hey, what happened when you two went out last weekend? April said you were all done up in your thigh highs?”
I swallow. “Yeah. It was just a fun rebound date. He was being sweet.” Rebound is too funny of a word to use since I haven’t given one iota of a thought to rude Jude. After going out with Grant, I tried to analyze why I fell for Jude in the first place. I think it was more a romance of convenience than anything, because thinking of him now, I’m at a total loss as to what I even saw in him in the first place.
Then there’s Grant. I can’t seem to help but swoon when I’m around him. But I’m not about to acknowledge the full degree of what we were doing in that bar. After all, Grant and I are still sorting things out between ourselves. Maybe that night was just a fun, out-of-character move for both of us.
But I’m counting in my head and that makes three kisses now.
“Really? Well, uh, if that kiss you two shared during spin the bottle was any indication, you should get even sweeter with him,” Charlotte replies.
I freeze up for a moment, wondering if Charlotte somehow saw me kissing Grant that night at the Green Elephant. “You kissed him too, during that game,” I point out.
“Yeah, but there weren’t fireworks,” she says. “He’s just a good kisser.”
“Funny, that’s the same argument I used last year after he kissed me,” I add.
“You two kissed last year!? What!” Charlotte’s jaw hangs open. “How could you not tell me?”
“Yeah. It was in June after spring term last year,” I admit. And again, last weekend. But we won’t go there right now.
“So why didn’t you just go for it with him?”
“He wasn’t into my kiss,” I retort. Although after our date things may have changed but I’m not totally sure about that.
“And you’re telling me after the night of seeing you in thigh highs…nothing happened?”
I gulp. “Well, we had some pretty great conversation.”
If by great conversation I mean he made