Fluke

Bonus: Party Like A Rock Star

I already took two of the whales: Luna and Reagan Loves Logan Talbot. The former was my favorite, and I didn't need anyone else seeing the latter. That was a cringy lapse in judgement on my part.

Just as silently as always, Carter arrived and set up his presentation at the table next to mine. He had a glass of water, a microscope, and pages upon pages of notes. I wasn't sure where he got the water sample from, but he seemed excited as ever to share his knowledge with the world.

Jia, on the other hand, wasn't nearly as quiet as Carter with her entrance.

"Brett! Reagan! Carter! How are you guys?" She turned to me and raised her eyebrows. "Where's the fiancé?"

"He's under my table ignoring his responsibilities," I replied.

Jia lifted up the tablecloth and waved. "Hi Logan."

"Fuck off. I'm trying to sleep here," he replied, and I held in a laugh.

"You're lucky you're not engaged to me. I would smack the shit out of you for talking like that," Jia said.

"Yeah, good thing."

This time, I couldn't stifle the laugh.

"I missed your constant irritability." Jia dropped the cloth back down and looked up at me. "It's just so romantic meeting the love of your life on an island like that. I'm so jealous."

"What about your Minnesota boy? How's he?" Brett asked.

"He's good. He just got out of the ER," Jia replied.

"Wait, what happened?" I asked.

"He had another scooter accident. He's fine though."

I rose an eyebrow. "Another?"

Shouldn't have one scooter accident been enough?

"Anyway, we should totally make a study group or something, and then not study. It'll be so fun, just like all the time we wasted to piss off Darrell," Jia said.

Brett laughed. "At this point, I'm just like, C's get degrees."

"I'll study with you, but only if we actually study," Carter said.

"Carter, honey, I'm not sure you're grasping the concept of a study group. The whole point is that you just fuck around and get nothing done," Jia said.

I smiled. I loved Jia, but she and I were a little different on that issue.

The four of us (plus Logan, who was still supposedly napping) took our seats and waited for someone to visit our Paradise City corner of the student center.

After a few minutes, three familiar faces strolled through.

Three familiar faces that I didn't exactly care for, but I smiled anyway. Hailey had Darrell draped over her shoulders, and Logan Two led the two of them up to my table.

"Hi Reagan," Logan Two said. He picked up the photos I had laid out, laminated and everything. "Are these all the whales you identified over the summer?"

I nodded. "You don't have to pretend like you care about them. I know that you're a fraud."

Logan Two laughed. "And you're still just as funny as I remembered."

"Well, if you want to do your part to save the whales, since you don't want to continue this project next summer, you could always adopt one of the ones we saw."

"Is it free?"

"That wouldn't really accomplish anything. It's just a small donation of fifty dollars," I said,