“Come on, I wasn’tobsessedwith him,” I retort, lying a little. Fucking Zach tempted me into breaking my no-repeats rule, and I paid the predictable price by catching some inconvenient feelings. Hence why I’m doing everything I can to avoid it happening again.
“And now Nick,” Claire continues. “I think it’s clear you have a type for sweet, peachy posteriors.”
I shrug. “What can I say? I’m a guy who…likes other dudes’ asses.”
“So tap that.”
“You make it sound so easy. Nick’shot.”
“Hmm, yeah, and you’resucha loser. For real. He’s sooooo far out of your league.” She huffs. “Man, shut the fuck up. Go flirt with him the next time you see each other.”
“I’m so bad at it,” I counter.
Claire rolls her eyes. “Come on! I know you can flirt. If he’s like every other guy, you'll just need to compliment him, brush your arm against his, and then he'll drag you to bed by the dick. So easy.”
“Sure.”
I mean, she isn'twrong. It's just that if Nick and I hook up, wecan't exactly part ways afterward. I'd still have to tutor him, and besides, we alreadyknoweach other. For me, there’s an art to hooking up, and step one is making sure I don’t know the guy. Because otherwise, I’d get in too deep, and the last thing I want is to lead someone on or date someone with an expiration date. As much as I like to think I’m a strong guy, I can’t help how hard I fall.
Like with Zach after seeing himtwice.It isn’t like I shed tears when he wanted to keep things casual, and then stopped replying at all, but damn, he was cute. And sweet.
And caked uprealnice.
At least Nick is more of a dudebro, even if it’s in an endearing way. If anything, I can probably put him in a box and keep things stable?—
“Hey.” Claire whacks me on the head, and Ialmostyell before remembering we’re in a library. “Don’t get in your head about this. Just wear some nice clothes, come out if you haven’t, and then flirt with him until he falls into your bed and you fall into his something else. Or the other way around.”
“Okay, okay, I got it.” I raise my hands in mock defeat, since I really didn’t need too much convincing. “We aren’t meeting until after Thanksgiving break, so I’ll have time to hype myself up.”
Claire smiles, nudging my shoulder with her hand. “Awesome. Got any plans for break, other than overthinking the easy task of getting with Nick?”
I shake my head.
“Aww, you’re going to be alone?” she asks.
“Shut up. Probably.”
“Maybe you can ask your hot baseball boy if he wants to hang out.”
I shoot her a tired, pointed look. “He’s probably got a family to go back to like everyone else who’s from here.”
That’s when my phone buzzes again, snatching my attention. Claire snickers when I hurry to grab it, smiling when I find out it’s a textfrom Nick.
Nick Russell
yo here’s the assignment
kinda last minute but I have self-study and an assignment due right after break and I don’t want to leave those
f you’re free tomorrow I’d really appreciate help with the self-study part but no worries if not
“Nick wants to meet up tomorrow for help with something.”
“Don’t say yes. I mean, say yes but not immediately.”
“Hey, I know what I’m doing. I’m not a three-year-old child.”
Nah, sorry. You said it’s self-study so you’re on your own
