Maybe an apartment complex with thin walls and dirty carpet, full of college students. Not an actual house on a normal street with a concrete path leading up to the front door and a plant on the porch that someone clearly takes the time to water.
I check the address.
Numbers match the ones on the mailbox.
This has to be it.
I don’t knock right away, Ryan’s warning replaying over in my head. Master’s program, so older. Throws parties. Sleeps with anyone.
So he’s probably normal. Probably won’t ignore me if I talk to him. Probably won’t feel the need to steal my notebooks or my hoodies for reasons I don’t want to think about.
The parties aren’t a deal breaker. I can stay in my room.
It’ll be fine.
There’s a stretch of silence after I knock, long enough that I begin to question again if I got the right address. Anxiety sits under my skin, threatening to bubble up over the surface. I clench my fists at my side out of habit, but unclench them when my left hand sends a shooting pain up my wrist.
And then the door swings open.
I completely forget what I came here for.
What’s my name again?
Mike Pierce isnotwhat I expected, and looking back, that was my first mistake.
He’s not wearing a shirt. The single article of clothing on his body is a pair of thin black pajama pants that hang way too low on his hips. He’s all pale skin and lean muscle, and his hair is long and black, obviously dyed, messy in a way that suggests he just woke up.
And his eyes. When his eyes meet mine, they are so blue.
Not blue like mine, average, nothing to write home about. A pale, crystal blue I could stare at forever and never get tired of—
I think I’m gonna be sick.
“Hey,” he says, his voice still scratchy with sleep. He leans against the doorframe with his arms crossed and looks up at me. Actually up. Because he’s not very tall, and that’s the only thing making me feel slightly okay right now.
No danger here, only the most beautiful person I’ve ever seen in my life, looking up at me expectantly.
In thin pajama pants.
And blue eyes.
“You must be the roommate guy. I’m Mike.”
“Alex,” I force out with a nod.
He steps back from the door, pulling it open wider. “Well, come on in.”
The inside of the house looks like there was a party. And then a tornado. And maybe another party after it.
But there’s a flat screen TV across from a couch that has seen better days, an Xbox on the floor beneath it with controllers scattered around. Beer cans crowd the coffee table, some half full, most empty. And there’s a half-eaten bag of chips on the floor next to the couch, chips falling out into the carpet.
I have a feeling nobody’s going to do anything about that today.
And then there’s the guitars.
They’re everywhere. Leaning against the wall by the closet, propped up in the corner behind the TV, a case open on the floor. An acoustic laying across the couch. Nice guitars.
I avert my eyes.
