His Muse

Possible date three

Kieran looked down at it, and laughed to himself. "Shit, I forgot what I was wearing. Bev likes to print random quotes on shirts and stuff. She made this for me last Christmas."

Nic came to stand against the counter, his forearms leant against the cool marble surface as Kieran took out a knife and cut around the edges of the loaf. "So... how long have you known Bev then?"

"Well, we're both sophomores. We were lab partners in our introductory propagation class, and... yeah. Friends ever since freshmen year, first semester," he said as he lifted the bread out of the pan and plopped it straight onto the counter. "She's pretty cool and artsy. You'd like her—maybe when she comes down again you can ask her about her photography project last year. I was in it."

"So you have a history of being a model for art projects, you liar," Nic laughed, and Kieran smirked at him. "What was it on?"

"Bathtubs. It was cool. We went to Lush and got a much of these bath bombs because neither of us had used them before, and she wanted to test 'em out. We were friends with some of the people already living here, so we got to use their tub," he explained, meticulously divvying up the bread into equal slices. "Freshmen aren't allowed to live here. They're required to be in the dorms so the University can leech off of freshmen corpses after they pay for all of their hundred-dollar textbooks."

"That's a bit grim, but it's accurate," Nic mused quietly as Kieran passed over a slice of bread to him. "Thanks."

"No problem. I hope you aren't allergic to nuts—probably should've asked sooner. Everyone here is crazy about nuts in banana bread and cookies and shit, so we had to put 'em in," he explained, and tapped Nic's glass of water. "Finish that. I'm gonna put milk in it."

When they settled on the floor again, legs spread out beside one another, it was with banana bread and glasses of milk. It was pitch black outside, so the window over their heads just reflected the kitchen. Nic tore bits of his banana bread apart and nibbled on them. It seemed to melt in his mouth, all creamy and warm with butter and a hint of cinnamon.

Bev came back down, along with a friend of theirs' that was attracted to the kitchen by the utterly mouthwatering smell coming from the banana bread. They all sat on the floor together, and when newcomers came, Nic could see them through the reflection on the window over their heads. They finished off the first loaf between six people total, and talked until nearly one in the morning.

It felt so... weird being out and about so late at night—on a school night for that matter. His Ma would never permit such a thing in high school. Back then, the thought of staying up past ten was just unheard of.

"Have you shown Nic around the house yet?" Bev asked Kieran as the conversations were winding down, and people had to leave to get ready for bed.

Kieran shook his head, and glanced over at Nic. "Would you want to stick around and look around the house? I mean, everyone's gonna be asleep and shit."

"I wouldn't mind," he admitted as they all stood up. Before they could leave the kitchen, though, Nic was convinced that they couldn't leave the kitchen in this state—people went and took out glasses and left them dirty on the counter, and there were plates form the banana bread, and not to mention the pan from baking it.

Bev helped clean up, and before she headed out, she wrapped Nic up in a hug and kissed him on the cheek. "Thanks for helping out. I'll be up for a bit longer, so y'all can stop by my room to check it out, I wouldn't mind."

"That'd be awesome," Nic said, smiling as he watched her twirl out of the kitchen before realizing that Kieran was staring at him. "What?"

"I'm just surprised everyone liked you. You've got them fooled," he remarked, and his smirk suggested he was joking, but either way Nic gawked and punched him in the arm.