“Bye, Ethan,” Kellan said in a singsong voice. “See you after class.”
He waved as he walked away, abandoning me at the writing department steps. My first class of the day was Fiction Writing, which had sounded fun when I’d signed up for classes but now felt like the hardest chore in the world.
I took a sip from my iced coffee and trudged up the stairs, thinking nothing could make coming to this class worth it. As I entered the building and walked down the halls, I noticed more of Dreamscape’s posters on the community boards. It was hard to look at them for too long. Just the image of Grey was enough to make my cheeks flush with embarrassment over the other night.
God, I’m so stupid.
A couple of girls huddled around one of the posters, talking excitedly to each other.
“See what he posted on his Instagram?”
“His cat issocute.”
“Are you talking about Grey?” The words leaped from my lips before I’d even thought to form them.
One of the girls, the pretty Black one, looked up at me, confused. Apparently, she hadn’t noticed my approach. “Uh, yeah,” she said uncertainly.
“What’s his handle?” I’d tried to find his social media after our fateful encounter, mostly as a way of ensuring he wasn’t obsessing over it as much as I had been. Not that he likely was.
“Are you a fan too?” The other girl, with jet-black hair, asked, excitement infusing her voice.
I nodded. “I saw them play Friday night. I wanted to find more of their stuff.”
The first girl got excited. “I was there too! I was so close, I could see the sweat on Grey’s face!” She tapped her phone quickly and showed me Grey’s Instagram.
“Greyhyundreams,” I read, pulling out my phone and following the account. “Awesome, thank you.”
“You should follow Dreamscapes hashtag too,” she offered. “And Grey’s. But that one gets a bit, um, thirsty.”
Heat rose to my face. I could only imagine what got posted about Grey. He was an attractive guy, after all. The internet would be all over that.
“Well, we better get to class,” the second girl said. “See you around.”
They walked off, going into a nearby classroom. I didn’t realize until they were already gone that I should’ve asked for their numbers. Or even their names. They were both gorgeous girls.Why had that slipped my mind?
I had no time to ponder that question because the clock on my phone hit nine. I swore and bolted, sprinting the rest of the way to my class. Thankfully, I still managed to get there before the professor called my name for attendance.
Class was as pointless as I’d thought it would be. As the teacher droned on about our books and writing assignments throughout the semester, I’d been glued to my phone, scrolling through old posts on Grey’s Instagram account.
The cat I’d heard the girls mention was all over his page, a gorgeous white-and-orange tabby named Kit. His band seemed to be playing bigger and bigger venues judging from a post from a year ago, where he’d played to a mostly empty dive bar. After reading a post about his family from a few months ago, I discovered he was a child who grew up in Seattle with his parents. His grandparents lived in Seoul, and he’d visited them about two years ago.
I knew I was going overboard, but I couldn’t keep myself from searching his Instagram to look through his tag on Twitter. I found the expected thirsty tweets, but between them was a lot of speculation about him, rumors that he was secretly a K-pop idol, rumors that he’d landed a record deal, speculationover who he was dating and his favorite restaurants, discussions about his outfits.
For all the fan information, I could find very little about his current personal life. I had no idea what his major was. In fact, if I hadn’t known he went to Redmond, I wouldn’t have been able to learn that much. When I finally pulled myself away from my phone, I was sitting in my living room, confused for a moment as to how I’d gotten there. Kellan sat on the couch across from me, playing a game on his Switch. Seconds later, I heard keys rattling in the door before Josh made his appearance.
“Hey, look who’s back to the land of the living!” he said by way of greeting.
“Don’t get too excited,” Kellan drawled without looking up from his game. “Ethan’s been in the ‘Grey Zone’ all day.”
“‘Grey Zone?’” Josh and I asked at the same time.
“It’s what I’m calling it,” Kellan said. “You haven’t said two words to me since this morning, and every time I see what you’re looking at on your phone, it’s Grey’s Instagram or a Twitter thread about him or something.”
“Isn’t all of this a bit much?” Josh raised a concerned eyebrow as he set his backpack on the dining room table. “I mean, this obsession can’t be healthy, can it?”
“It’s curiosity, not obsession,” I said defensively. “I didn’t realize how much the internet knew about him. He has his own hashtag!”
“Internet’s gonna simp,” Kellan said knowingly.
