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“Thank you, by the way,” she says bashfully. “For helping me. And sorry again for the collision in the hallway.”
“You’re welcome.” I run a hand through my hair. “I am curious, though…” I pause briefly, and she takes that as an indication that I’m looking for permission. The truth is, I don’t know what I’m waiting for. For some reason, I just feel an instinctual need to make sure she doesn’t think I’m trying to insult or disparage her.
“Shoot.”
“Where exactly were you headed?”
“Ohh,” she says, rolling her lips into her mouth. “You mean because the fire was in here?”
I nod, laughing as I do.
She lifts her shoulders helplessly. “I panicked.” The pillowy texture of her bright pink comforter fluffs as she plops down onto her bed. “And, apparently, when my fight-or-flight instincts kick in, I just run for the freaking hills.”
The corners of my mouth kick up into a smile I don’t plan. “Well…” I laugh. “I guess that’s how some people are wired. It’s not a bad thing. As long as you’re not majoring in law enforcement or medicine or something.”
She grins up at me. “Art major, actually.”
“Well, thank God for that.” I smirk and glance around her dorm room, taking in several painted canvases above her bed and resting along the wall beside a bookshelf. I don’t know a lot about art, but I know these are good. Fascinating creations with every color of the rainbow. Some abstract. Some looking more like actual photos than paintings themselves. And a few showing a viewpoint that reminds me of famous images I saw when I took an art class in high school and the teacher waxed poetic about Monet. “Did you paint these?”
She licks her lips, nodding just slightly before averting her eyes to her feet.
I open my mouth to ask her more about them, but she quickly changes the subject by standing up and holding out her hand toward me. “I’m Ava Lucie, by the way.”
“Luke London.” With her hand in mine, I don’t miss how soft her skin feels as we punctuate our introduction with a gentle shake.
“Are you a freshman too, Luke?”
“Yep.” I nod.
“Cool. What’s your major? Something more attuned to someone with a fight instinct?”
I smirk.
“Engineering.”
“Dayum, no wonder you use your brain in an emergent situation. It probably takes up your whole dang skull if you got into Columbia’s engineering program.”
“I do okay,” I respond, actually blushing at the compliment. I slide both of my hands into the pockets of my jeans and try to return the sentiment. “And you must be really talented to get into Columbia’s art program.”
She ignores my comment completely. “What type of engineering are you planning on doing?”
“Aeronautical. But…well, actually…engineering isn’t my end goal.”
She tilts her head to the side. “What do you mean?”
“First, engineering,” I explain. “Then, flight school. Then, NASA.”
“NASA? As in strap me to a rocket and shoot me to the moon?”
I nod with a laugh. “That’s the one.”
“Wait…so, it’s possible that the next Neil Armstrong just put out a fire in my dorm room?”
A laugh bursts from my lungs. “Let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves here. I have a long, long way to go before I get even close to that.”
“I don’t know,” she counters. “One small dorm fire for man, one giant blaze for mankind.”
I can actually feel my smile in my cheeks. “Now, you just need to get rid of the evidence before our RA sees it.”
Her eyes nearly bug out of her head. “Oh God. How the hell am I supposed to do that?”
“How about this?” I offer. “Since there’s no way you’re going to be able to eat that soup, and I was already on my way out to get some food, you come with me to grab a slice of pizza at Antonio’s, and we’ll make a pit stop on the way to buy some shit to clean all this up.”
“Okay, yeah,” she says with a soft, adorable smile. But just as she grabs her purse off her bed, her cell phone starts to ring. With a small frown, she flashes an apology toward me with her eyes. “Do you mind if I take this real quick?”
“Of course not.” I shake my head and wait patiently by the door as she puts her phone to her ear.
“Hi, Mom,” she says quietly. “Yep. Everything is good. I’m officially all moved in… Uh-huh… Do you mind if I call you a little later? I’m going to go grab a slice of pizza with a new friend…”
New friend. That’s me, I guess.
I don’t know why it irks me a little that I’m already friend-zoned by this gorgeous, blue-eyed firebug, but it does.
Considering I have a girlfriend by the name of Sarah at Stanford, it shouldn’t bother me at all.October 31st
AvaThe moment any woman in the Lucie family reaches the age of thirty and is still single, seriously annoying complications set in.
