Landon Reilly
My head throbbed with every step I took. I had no idea where I was and my phone was dying. Eventually, I made it near that coffee shop I had gone to a few days ago and I could finally make my way back to my dorm.
There was no use going to class considering it had already started and I was still hungover and about fifteen minutes from my dorm room.
When I finally made it back onto campus, class had just let out and the walkways were crowded with students walking slow as shit to their next destinations. I wanted to plow over them, knock them off of the path and keep moving. But that was just the angry me trying to take over, the one with the misplaced anger.
It was no one's fault but mine that I decided to go out last night or that I ended up getting drunk and somehow sleeping in Wren's bed for the night. I could admit that the fact I had stayed the night with Wren was contributing to my agitation.
My teammates had intercepted me at the dining hall last night when I was getting dinner and dragged me out to the bar with them. What happened after, I couldn't really explain. It started with shots and ended with shots. I figured if I was being forced into a social situation, I should at least take the edge off.
It was a bad idea. I hadn't gotten drunk since I drank almost an entire bottle of tequila and walked myself over to Micah's house and cried. Crying and the brief memory of Micah and Elijah dropping me into bed were the only things I remembered from that night.
The only thing I remembered from the night before was getting to the bar and having the first couple shots. The rest was gone.
I wasn't looking where I was going, causing me to almost bump into someone. I stopped before we collided, ready to shout some rude remark, before I realize the person was Jess. She stared up at me with a playful expression, twirling a piece of her braided hair with her finger.
"Hey, Landon," she said with a wide smile. "How are you feeling this morning?"
"Like shit," I grumbled.
She looked to be perfectly fine and I knew she was with us at the bar last night. She was one of the ones that left me there. I couldn't even let myself be truly angry at her or the rest of them. They had no obligation to me. They weren't my friends, and that just reminded myself of how truly alone I was.
"I figured," she chuckled. "You were still going by the time I left. You're quite the party animal I guess."
She looked down at my clothes with a puzzled expression, then glanced back to my face.
"You're wearing what you wore last night," she pointed out.
"I haven't exactly had time to change," I said in a clipped tone.
"Did you go home with someone?" Jess asked, that playful glint back in her eyes.
Not in the way she was thinking.
"No," I snapped. I was not in the mood to be talking to her.
Jess's expression turned to one of confusion as I pushed past her and continued toward my dorm.
Back in high school, I would have jumped at the opportunity to entertain someone like Jess. She was pretty and outgoing and seemingly not looking for anything serious. That was what I would go for when I was trying to force myself to like girls. Nothing serious, purely physical. But I didn't have the energy anymore and I wanted to be left alone.
I stomped all the way back to my dorm and let out a sigh of relief when I walked inside to the room being empty. My roommate was almost never here, and that was a blessing.
I immediately took a shower and brushed my teeth, then changed into new clothes. I had two other classes for the day, and since I was trying to be a good student, I really didn't want to miss them. Even though my head was pounding, and my throat was dry and all I wanted to do was sleep, I grabbed my backpack and dragged myself to my last two classes.
One of my hockey teammates was in my last class, and he insisted on sitting beside me with the rest of the people he associated himself in the class. He didn't shut up for the entire time. I had debated on switching out during the add/drop period, but I hated change and didn't want to mess up my schedule or track for my classes.
"You coming out with us again tonight, Reilly?" my teammate, Cooper, asked, using my last name. I wasn't even sure if Cooper was his first name or his last, but that was what everyone called him.
"Nah," I said, shaking my head.
"Are you still hung over too?" he asked, annoyingly tapping his pen on the table. "I think I woke up still drunk."
"Yeah, I guess." I was short with all of my teammates. None of them seemed to care. Most of them would talk to a brick wall.
"Gotta enjoy it while it lasts," Cooper said, leaning back in his seat. "Only a few more weeks before training camp starts and we won't have the time."
I couldn't wait for that, to be able to finally play hockey again. On the ice, I didn't have to put up a front for anyone. I could just play my game, do what I was good at without being bothered. That was what I hoped for anyway.
Cooper had started talking to one of the other guys near him after that, and when class was over, I scurried out of the room before he could speak to me again. I went back to my dorm and started packing for the weekend.
My roommate, Kyle, came back at some point, but we didn't speak to each other. I was sort of lucky with that when I chose to have a random room assignment. Kyle was clean, quiet, and barely here. And he didn't bring anyone around, which was a plus.
It wasn't until later on that I started walking, and then running, to the bus station. I had somehow miscalculated how long it was going to take me to get there on foot, and I was desperate to get there because it was the only bus to the stop I wanted to go to for the rest of the night.
There were no stops directly to my hometown, but there was one a couple towns over that was close enough for me to get an Uber home. That wouldn't even matter if I missed this fucking bus.
Which I did, by about five minutes.
I kicked one of the near by benches out of frustration and paid no mind to how that hurt my foot. The pain didn't matter that much to me anyway. What mattered was getting home to see Olivia, and now I either had to wait until tomorrow afternoon for the next bus, or find some other way home.
I had just sat down on the bench and put my head in my hands when a car pulled up and beeped at me. I jumped back and narrowed my eyes to see Wren in the driver's seat, putting the window down.
"You put on quite a show just now," he said with that same easy expression he always wore. Seeing him just made me even more angry.
"What the fuck are you doing here?" I snapped. How many times was this guy just going to randomly show up in my life?
"I was driving when I saw you running for your life down the sidewalk," Wren answered and I scowled at him to hide my embarrassment. "And then I got to witness your little fit, so something's telling me you missed your bus."
I didn't answer him and he made no move to drive away.
"Well, are you going to get in or what?" Wren asked, impatiently tapping on the steering wheel.
"No," I replied. "Why would I willingly get in a car with you?"
"Because you need a ride home to see your sister," he said. My eyes widened slightly at his words. I was really beginning to think he was a mind reader.
"How do you even know that!" I exclaimed, standing up from the bench. "Are you some kind of fucking weirdo keeping tabs on me?"
Wren rolled his eyes. "You said it last night while you were drunk out of your mind."
Right, he had said something like that this morning.
Just another reason to never go out and get drunk ever again.
"So, you can either get a ride with me, since I'm heading that way anyway," Wren started. "Or you can sit around and wait for the next bus which is... never?"
I contemplated for a moment. No part of me wanted to get in the car with Wren. Not only was he a weirdo, but I didn't trust him, and I didn't want to be in a position where I owed him something. Something told me that he wasn't one to just give out favors and expect nothing in return.
"Lance, you have about two seconds before I'm gone," Wren called out, pulling me from my thoughts.
I huffed and grabbed my bags before walking over to the car. I pulled open the passenger door and got in. Wren didn't waste any time pulling away from the curb once the door was shut, causing me to bang my head on the window.
Wren didn't seem to notice the scowl I threw his way as I shoved my bag into the backseat and put my seatbelt on. He picked up his phone without looking away from the road and un-paused his music.
Well, what I expected to be music. It turned out to be someone talking, reading something aloud.
"What the hell is this?" I asked after a few moments. The half an hour drive back home would feel like hours if I had to listen to this the whole time.
"It's an audiobook," Wren replied casually.
I knew he was some kind of creature rather than a person because who the fuck listens to audiobooks in the car.
"This is what you listen to?" I asked, disgust in my tone. "What even are you?"
Wren shrugged as he turned to merge onto the highway.
"I like to read," he said. "I can't read while I drive, so I listen. It's not a hard concept, but I understand if someone with your ineptitude has trouble with it."
I ignored him, crossing my arms over my chest as he switched lanes.
The traffic we hit was going to make the half hour drive closer to forty-five minutes or an hour. Wren didn't seem to mind. He was content listening to his stupid book. I, on the other hand, wanted nothing more for this car ride to be over. My leg anxiously bounced up and down as we slowly inched forward in the traffic. Wren let out a laugh and I couldn't tell if he was laughing at me or something that happened in the book, but hearing it made me angry anyway.
"Are we really going to listen to this shit the whole way?" I snapped, causing Wren to direct his attention to me.
"It's either this or silence."
"I'd rather sit in silence."
That was a mistake to say because Wren took me seriously and paused his book. And now the two of us were going five miles an hour on the highway with no noise other than the beeping cars around us.
"This better?" he asked me. I could practically hear the smugness in his voice.
No matter how uncomfortable this was, I wasn't going to ask him to turn it back on.
"So, you'd rather complete silence?" Wren asked. "Okay." He started tapping on the steering wheel at about the same pace as my bouncing leg.
This suddenly felt like a mistake. Sitting here with Wren was practically torture, and I knew deep down, he wasn't doing this for free. There would be some sort of catch that I wasn't going to be prepared for.
Wren laughed again, and this time I knew it had to have been at me.
"What?" I hissed.
"It's just funny, that's all," Wren replied, laughing again.
"What is?" I didn't know if I even wanted the answer to that.
"You," he said. "I just thought you were this tough guy, but here you are shaking in my car. I guess that was just what you pretended to be."
"What the hell are you even talking about?"
"You acted all tough when you were trying to beat up my brother every chance you got," Wren responded, his voice as smooth and low as ever, but now it had an edge to it.
"If you're going to do something to me to get back at me for what I did to Fox then just do it," I spat, halting my leg. "Get it over with."
"Oh, I'm not going to do anything to you," Wren nonchalantly replied. "It seems like you punish yourself enough and that's good enough for me."
"Then why are you bringing it up?"
"Because if I need to rely on you punishing yourself for it, then you need to be reminded of it," Wren said, the traffic breaking a bit so he could pick up speed. "I had a tough time reading you before, but I think I've got you figured out now."
So that's what this was. He only offered me a ride to figure me out. Maybe that meant that was all he wanted, and he wouldn't be looking for me to do him any favors.
"How can you have me figured out when I don't even have myself figured out?" I hadn't meant to ask that out loud, but the thought had slipped out of my mouth like words did when I was intoxicated.
"That's how I know I'm right about you," Wren told me, taking one hand off the steering wheel to rest it on the center console. "You're incredibly insecure, unsure of yourself and your future. And that scares you."
I hated how right he was and that he could see right through me. Not only that, but he was nearly impossible to read. Or I just wasn't as perceptive as him.
"You use anger as an outlet for your emotions," Wren continued. "Because anger is secondary. It's all the other emotions you feel that make you angry. I don't really see you as an angry person necessarily, it's just that anger is easier to deal with than everything else."
I let out a huff. "Can you stop analyzing me? I liked it better when we weren't talking."
"So, you're going to deprive me of my book and my words?" he asked with faux astonishment.
"Just turn your fucking book back on then." And he did. And I wouldn't admit to him or myself that I was actually paying attention to the words and getting interested.
We eventually made it through all the traffic and once we were back in town, Wren paused his book so I could give him directions to the Hanson's house.
When he pulled up to the curb outside the house, I tried to immediately make my exit, but Wren grabbed my arm and held me in place, his touch paralyzing.
"Give me your phone," Wren said, nodding toward the device I held in my hand. I made no move to give it to him, so he rolled his eyes and yanked it out of my hand.
"What are you—"
"Here," he said, shoving the phone back into my hand. "Text me if you need a ride home Sunday. I don't answer phone calls."
"Not gonna happen," I muttered, pulling my bag up from the backseat.
"You can say thank you at any time."
With that, I flipped him off and got out of the car, slamming the door behind me,
**
Thanks for reading!!
What did you think of the chapter? Were you surprised Wren drove Landon home? Do you think Wren has any other motivations for driving him home? Do you think Landon is going to text him for a ride back to campus?