"Stop being nervous," Derek told me as I squeezed his hand.
"But what if they don't like me?" I whined, dragging my feet. We were going to meet his friends at their dorm room.
"What's not to like?" he chuckled.
"I don't know. You tell me!"
"Well there's nothing to tell... other than you're perfect in every possible way." He smiled and leaned his head down to kiss me. We'd reached their dorm where he pushed the buzzer and they unlocked the door. After a flight of stairs we reached a door that said, "Come on in to the party b!tch3$."
"Classy," I said sarcastically, with a little giggle to myself. Derek opened the door and we walked right in to find three other guys huddled around a t.v. playing xbox with about six different, huge bowls of chips. They stole a quick glance at the exact same time but went back to playing their game right away.
"Damn it!" one of them yelled, throwing his control at the ground. "This dick killed me for the twenty eighth time."
"Damn, you suck," another guy said, eyes still glued to the screen.
"What up bro?" the guy who apparently died twenty eight times said, nodding at Derek.
"Hey guys this is Nelly," Derek said to them.
"What up home girl? I'm Tyrone," the guy replied.
"Hi," I said shyly.
"That's Ricky," Derek said, pointing to an extremely tan, shirtless guy that was still glued to the screen. "And that's Ben." They both sat back as the game ended.
"Hey," they both nodded toward us. "You guys wanna come join?"
"Sure," Derek replied for both of us. "He grabbed my hand and winked at me as he pulled me toward the couch where we sat.
"Tyrone sucks, just so you're aware," Ricky said to me.
"Man, I told you!" Tyrone said. "That's 'cause this is a white people game. There's nothin' I can do about that!"
"Here, let me try," I asked, signaling to Tyrone for his controller. He handed it over.
"Alright, bro, which one should we do?" Ricky asked Ben.
"Do this one, it's easy," Ben replied.
"Wait, do this one," I told them, scrolling his controller down to one of the hardest levels. They all looked at me, including Derek. "What?" I asked.
"You know this is extremely hard right? Only really good people play on this one," Ben told me with concern.
"Yes, your point?" I asked him.
"Let my homegirl give it a shot," Tyrone said to them with a wink. I smiled. Derek had a bowl of chips in his lap as he sat on the floor, me on the couch.
I beat them. By a lot.
"Damn, where'd you learn to play like that!" Ricky asked once we'd finished about an hour and a half of playing it as we rotated controllers.
"I used to play with my twin brother all the time," I told them.
"You have a twin?" Derek asked. I nodded my head. It's not like I was lying. I did have a twin, I was just missing a couple of small details about him.
"Is anyone else extremely hungry?" Ben asked. It was midnight on a sunday and I had no idea what he was planning on doing.
"Yes," we all joined in agreement. They all hopped up and Derek helped me off the couch.
