Page 35 of Josh’s Play

I stopped myself from running a hand up and down his leg and pulled my phone from the borrowed sweatshirt instead, scrolling until I found what I was looking for.

“Here we are at the beach. This was when we first got there, so before my finger got fucked.” I rattled off names, pointing at each face in the picture and ending with, “And that’s Vera, of course.” I swiped through a few pictures until I came to one where her smiling face took up the whole screen.

“She’s the first and so far only grandkid. Not just for my parents but for two other sets of grandparents as well.” Cam shot me a quizzical look, so I delved deeper into the Marchetti-Gordon family tree. “My dad was divorced when he met my mom. Dad and his first wife had two sons, including Vee’s dad, Jamie, and my other brother AJ.” I swiped back to the group photo and pointed out my two eldest brothers to Cambell once again.

“My dad’s ex-wife lives in England with her husband. My mom and dad, obviously, live here, and Vera’s other grandparents live within driving distance of the happiest place on Earth, down in Florida. So this sweet, smiling girl? Absolutely spoiled rotten by her Hampstead grandparents, her England grandparents, and her Florida grandparents.”

“She’s adorable.”

“Yeah, she is.”

“It’s really sweet how much you care about her. About all of them. It’s really special.” Campbell opened his arms, and I returned to the crook, nestling in. Campbell reached over with his other hand to tug on the hood of my—I mean his—sweatshirt.

“I’m gonna need this back, you know.” I snuggled in even more, tucking my hands in the pocket and burying myself deeper into Campbell’s firm, warm, huge body.

“But it’s so cozy,” I whined as I tucked my legs, one underneath his thigh, one over.

“It’s one of my official warm-up suits,” he explained, and I may have let out a pouty little grunt.

Campbell wrapped me in his arms then, and we went back to exchanging stories: about our families, our time growing up, our college experiences, and professors, friends, and acquaintances we had in common. That eventually led us back to sports journalism, and we fell asleep making plans for our podcast.

I awoke as I’d fallen asleep, snuggled tight against Campbell, keeping time to the beat of his heart as my head rested on his chest. He’d slouched down a little, and I’d followed as if sleeping Josh couldn’t bear to be anywhere but glued to sleeping Campbell.

We remained above the covers, and the warmth emanating from his big body helped keep the chill of the dorm room away. I lifted my head an inch and opened my eyes to peek out the window, the curtain open just a sliver and letting in the soft glow of the walking path pole light, which was just below my window. It was still nighttime.

I was reminded of times I’d fallen asleep during a hookup. If I’d been in some other guy’s room, I’d have been thrilled to have woken up before sunrise, hopeful that I could sneak out without waking up my bed partner. I was equally careful not to wake Cam but not because I wanted to sneak away. I just imagined that he could use the sleep after his game and our long night after it.

Slowly I extricated myself from all that warmth and crawled to the foot of my bed, slipping off with as little disturbance as possible. I’d gotten good at it over the past few years. The sliver of light from the window and below the door provided enough light for me to get around. I took a quick bathroom break, careful to close my dorm room door softly. Then I sat on my roommate’s bed, my small reporter's notebook in hand.

I turned toward the wall and pulled out my phone to use as a flashlight and saw a text from Devon that assured me I wouldn’t be seeing him until after classes the next day. Using my body to block the light, I scribbled out some notes from our brainstorm a few hours earlier, ending with a note to ask Campbell about his sleeping habits.

I wanted nothing more than to climb back into my own bed, and I might have risked it if, when I shut off the flashlight and turned back toward him, he hadn’t picked that minute to nestle down further onto my bed and turn on his side. I got myself comfortable, hugging one of Devon’s pillows and mirroring his position. Then I watched him sleep, or so I thought.

Not much time passed before he said, “You’re staring at me.”

“Shit,” I whispered as if I could lull him back to sleep with the expletive. “You’re up.”

“I didn’t want to interrupt. Were you doing homework?”

“No. Yes. Sort of? I was just jotting down our ideas for the podcast.”

“What time is it?”

“Almost four. I’m really sorry I woke you.”

“I don’t think you did.” In the darkness of the room, I could just make out a smirk on his face. His hand moved down his body from where it had been hugging the pillow, but I didn’t dare take my eyes off his face to discover where it roamed.

Whatever that hand was doing had him closing his eyes and letting out a sigh that was equal parts sexy and frustrated, and I tried really hard to focus on the part where he felt frustrated, not wanting to put any pressure on him and not wanting to think about how enticing he sounded or looked in my bed.

“Jesus, Josh. You could have been out with anyone last night, and instead you waited here for me. All I did was fall asleep, and then you got up to do fucking homework. I am so pathetic and so, so sorry.”

His hand was back in my line of sight, combing through his hair.

Without a second thought, I told him the truth. “I’m not. I was right where I wanted to be.”

“That can’t be true. You’re this out-and-proud person. I'm sure no other guy would ditch you to go hang with his bros at the bar. You don’t have to sneak around. You don’t have to pretend all the time.” His voice rose in frustration as he continued.

“It’s okay that you’re not out, Campbell. I can keep a secret.”