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"You're supposed to pay for that before you start eating it."
Brandon was giving me judgement eyes but I ignored him and popped another donut into my mouth.
"Apparently I'm buying everything anyway. What's the big deal if I eat it now or later?"
He chuckled a little, "you offered to pay."
"I hardly think complaining their snacks are crap constitutes as offering."
I opened a box of nerds and tipped a bunch onto my tongue. The additives were not going to do a thing for my hyperactivity.
"I stand corrected, they said if you weren't happy with the snacks on offer you should buy your own, you stubbornly agreed."
He snatched the food from me, I opened a pack of twinkies.
"Stop, you are going to get us arrested in a minute."
He browsed around the store, his hands full of things I had dumped on him or he had confiscated.
"This is turning out expensive."
"It's fine. I'll be in a worse mood if I have to watch the dumb movie with twizzlers and plain lays."
"You've had a gob on for days. Why?"
I bit into my Twinkie really aggressively.
"I had a fight with Tia the night of Neil's party and I'm not over it." I tore open a pack of sour patch gummies and stuffed my face with them.
"Neil's party was like six days ago. You always fight with Tia, what happened?"
"Nothing, forget it. I'll get over it."
He was right though. We always fight. But this time felt different, this time I found myself dwelling over her poisonous words all week.
I don't know why it bothered me so much. We love to not get along. I guess this argument felt real. There was conviction behind her words and an intent to hurt.
We turned into the 'panic aisle' and Brandon stopped still. "Wow, why are the shelves so empty?"
"Hurricane season." His hazel eyes widened with alarm and I had to laugh. "You get used to it. When a hurricane is on the way people panic buy incase their water gets shut off or they lose power."
"Shouldn't we be buying this stuff?"
"Nah. By the time it reaches us it's probably downgraded into a tropical storm. Honestly, the locals are used to it, happens every year."
He didn't look anymore reassured. This was Brandon's first year in America, I guess the thought of a hurricane is intimidating to a first timer.
"It will be fine. Big J will take care of you."
"Now I'm even more worried."
I laughed, "Come on."
I paid for a bunch of stuff, including all of the food I had already consumed. Brandon carried it into the common room but I stopped by the water cooler out in the hallway.
"Hey stud."
I looked up to see Julia Benzoyl smiling at me.
Do you know who Julia Benzoyl is?
The coaches daughter.
"Sorry I missed our coaching time this week, I've been stuck in a rut that I can't break out of."
"Oh yeah, how sorry?"
There was a flirty implied meaning there. I paused, unsure what to answer.
Every single straight man on the soccer team wants Julia Benzoyl. Scratch that, every single straight man on the planet wants Julia Benzoyl.
It's not even speculation, it's pure fact.
Julia is a supermodel.
She's a goddess.
She's the most perfect woman in the entire world.
She ran her hand down my bicep.
"Are you sorry enough to make it up to me?"
"Yes. Holy fuck, yes." She laughed at my enthusiasm.
"Full disclosure? I'm not wearing any panties and I'm wondering how discreet we can be during the movie."
My jaw dropped open, she definitely just pulled me right out of that rut.
"I'm pretty sure—" my voice trailed off because Tia distracted me in the distance. She was wearing an oversized grey sweatshirt and figure-hugging leggings.
The hottest girl on the planet just told me she wasn't wearing any underwear and I'm distracted by comfy-looking Tia?
I'm insane.
Julia is flawless!
Tia has this cute little scar just above her right cheekbone.
Sometimes, when she catches me looking at it she'll untuck her hair from behind her ear and try to cover it up like she's self conscious.
Sometimes I look at it purposely to make her feel self conscious.
Sometimes I look at it because I want to glide my thumb against her skin and feel that soft ridge.
I found myself biting into my bottom lip to stop my smile stretching any further.
Julia doesn't really have any quirks, she's like a Barbie doll. Nice to look at but not very animated or deep and never really expressing much of an opinion about anything.
Tia has too many opinions, it's annoying.
She breathes through her nose when she's expressing them and it causes her nostrils to flare slightly. It's funny because she is so clearly pissed off about something but her nose is actually adorable.
God Jordan!
"You hear what I said?"
It took every ounce of will power I had to tear my eyes away from Tia.
"Yeah, can I—"
"Jordan? Can we talk?"
But her voice grabbed my whole attention again.
"Haven't you said enough?"
"Five minutes, please?"
"What do you even want?" I snapped.
I was conscious Julia was talking to me but I have no idea what she said, either way she walked off and left us.
"I wanted to return these." She reached into her bag and handed me my sneakers and jacket.
"Your shoes are still in my car."
"That's okay, I can get them another time."
I nodded and started to walk away from her.
"Wait—" her quick spoken voice stopped me. "I never thanked you. For, you know, making sure I got home safely despite my reluctance."
"Believe me, you fully expressed your appreciation in the moment."
Her mouth twitched.
I was making this hard for her.
I wasn't reciprocating her olive branch because I was still furious at her. So I resumed walking away but this time she followed.
"So I was thinking," she uttered nervously, trying to keep up with my pace. "I was out of line with what I said, clearly I struck a nerve."
I stopped walking so she stopped walking, a little too fast because she skidded and I had to reach out and grab her before she slipped on her ass.
"I've never seen you angry like that. Usually you go unaffected by everything. It shocked me." I didn't remark back to that. "I was drunk and a bitch. I guess I thought it was no different to usual. We fight like cat and mouse."
"Cat and dog."
Surprise registered on her face. "What?"
"We fight like cat and dog. The cat chases the mouse because he wants the mouse whereas cats and dogs hate one another, hence why they fight."
She didn't like being corrected, her face instantly morphed into irritation and she sighed, tired of me making her work hard.
"The cat wants to destroy the mouse."
I shrugged, "still sounds sexual to me."
She grit her teeth together angrily.
"That's because you're a pervert. But exactly my point!" Her hands waved through the air animatedly, "we even fight about how we fight. I'm over here trying to be the bigger person. I'm trying to apologise and you're acting like a child, it's infuriating!"
"We're not friends Tia, you don't owe me an apology. You go about your business and I go about mine."
"If I don't owe you an apology then why are you so upset about this?"
"I'm not."
"So that's it then?"
"Yep."
Her eyes were reading the hurt registered on my face and I hated that. I didn't want to hurt because of her.
"So you're not mad anymore?"
"Nope."
"You accept my apology?"
"Here's the thing Tia," I began to offload the speech I've been repeating in my head for the last six days and I'll give her credit, she stood there ready to listen.
"I'm an asshole, it's my default setting. I can dish it out to people all day every day but make no mistaking I sure as hell can take it when people dish it back.
We don't have to be friends. We don't even have to like each other but our friends are dating so chance will throw us together multiple times throughout our lives, meaning we have to at least tolerate one another."
She nodded her head, for the first time we agreed on something.
"I can't tolerate you if you have no regard or respect for my boundaries. Say whatever you want, drag my name through the dirt, I don't care but don't ever make my family the target of your punchline, there's no coming back from that."
"Okay." Her answer was barely a whisper, I felt like an authority figure giving her a good telling off. "I'm sorry."
"Okay." I replied a little caught off guard because I didn't expect her to comply so easily. "Good. So we're finally done here."
I started walking away again, this time she wasn't following me and I wrongfully assumed the discussion had ended there.
"You're not going to tell anyone about this, are you?" I stopped walking but refused to turn around. "About the guy at the bar?"
"Seriously." I muttered lowly.
That's why she's so compliant, to sweeten me up to maintain her do-gooder reputation.
"I don't usually do that kind of thing."
I turned around to face her.
"I don't just pick guys up at the bar and I wouldn't want that image of me being portrayed around campus. I made a mistake, I would appreciate it if you didn't tell—"
"I have better things to do than to talk about who you have or haven't invited to the all-you-can-eat pussy buffet. Excuse me."
She looked disgusted.
I threw myself down on a comfortable two seater sofa. Brandon refused to sit next to me because he wanted to share the bean bag with Caoimhe. So I pelted popcorn at the back of his head instead.
I caught Julia's attention and gestured towards the empty seat. I was elated to see she was still willing and became instantly excited at the naughtiness we were about to get up to under my blanket.
"Caoimhe! Over here!" Brandon yelled the second she set foot in the room. It was almost embarrassing how quick he pounced on the poor girl.
"Desperate much?"
"Sod off."
"There's space over here." Caoimhe pointed at the seat next to me, instructing Tia where to sit.
"What? No." I began to protest.
Julia reached halfway through the room when Tia sat down.
"Nooooo." I complained.
"What?" Tia asked, freezing like she was about to sit on something she shouldn't.
Like my chair.
I could've screamed.
Or threw up.
I stared at her, holding my lips closed so not a sound would leave them. Julia made her way back to her original seat, picking a soda can up on the way back to not make things look obvious.
I missed my opportunity. Tia fucking Adeniji is single handedly ruining my life.
She awkwardly shuffled away from me.
I awkwardly shuffled away from her.
Neither one of us felt comfortable being so close to the other.
The lights dimmed, the room silenced and I tried my damned hardest to forget how sexually frustrated I was.
Halfway through the movie I noticed Tia kind of swaying next to me, her body would flop forward slightly and then suddenly jerk back.
She was fighting with heavy eyelids, trying to force them to stay open but clearly failing.
There's no way she would make it until the end of the movie without falling asleep so I lifted my arm freeing up a space for her to nestle into my chest.
Surprisingly, without any fight she lay her head down on me and closed her eyes. My arm closed around her and she snuggled her cheek into the warmth of my T-shirt.
I was playing with fire here.
That feeling was happening again, the unsettledness of my insides.
It wasn't negative, it was bolts of electricity, making me feel alive. It was screaming colours making me glow. It was music with the most wonderful melody making me want to dance.
My heart was absolute chaos in my chest and she had her ear pressed directly against it, listening to the wild beat.
I could sense Julia glaring at me but I couldn't look. I just wanted to enjoy this feeling, even if it was freaking the hell out of me.
I decided I liked Tia way more when she was sleeping. Feeling warm, secure and sated I also closed my eyes.
"Hey lovebirds!" Brandon's voice made my eyes shoot open. "The movie has finished."
Tia sat up quick and moved away from me looking embarrassed and uncomfortable.
Caoimhe smiled at me really exaggerated. "You both looked really cute together. We took pictures and put them on social media."
Yep, can always count on other people to make things even more weird.
"Delete them." Tia demanded, reaching for her phone.
I didn't care about that, I needed to do some damage control.
I followed Julia out of the room. She was trying to make a quick get away and I can't say I blame her.
"Hey, rain check?"
"I don't think so." She was pissed.
"Oh come on, you're not seriously bothered about her falling asleep on me, are you?"
"Looked pretty cosy if you ask me."
"Yeah but it's Tia." I answered like that explained everything. "We grew up together, she's like my sister."
"Your sister?"
"You have a sister?" Brandon caught up with us at the exact wrong time. I felt my soul shrivel up, why does Satan hate me?
"Yes. Trust me there's nothing even remotely romantic there. I care for Tia like a sister. Isn't that right Brandon?"
"Yeah?"
"Fine." Julia swept her blonde hair back into a ponytail and let it swing from left to right like a metronome. "Rain check, you've got my number. Don't just let it sit in your phone."
"I will definitely call you."
We watched her walk away.
"I don't see the sibling dynamic there, you really think of her like a sister?"
"No I fucking hate her, she's such a little cockblock but did you hear? Julia Benzoyl is waiting on my call."
"And she's fit but—"
"Fit? There's more to her than just her athletic ability. The girl is smoking hot."
"You better be careful Jordan, you don't want to get tangled up in lies just to be tangled up in her sheets."
I smirked, "Oh I definitely do."