Only several more months to go.
Elethior and I fall into a rhythm.
We don’t talk to each other. If one of us has to get up to leave the room or check something in a supply area, we don’t look at each other. I don’t summon Nick again; like hell am I going to talk through my theories and risk Elethior eavesdropping. The lab is so quiet I can hear the squish of my internal organs every time I move.
Elethior is as focused as I am. Neither of us will leave until the other does, which adds another self-sabotaging layer to the already toxic work ethic we both seem to share.
He eyes me a few times, flinches like the sheer act of moving is offensive. And I realize—he’s waiting for me to play a prank. So I don’t, because thethreatof playing one is clearly enough to fuck with him. Plus, I don’t have the time; I am, despite what he thinks, capable of hard work.
By Friday, we’ve spent more than fifty hours together without bloodshed, and I almost bring a bottle of champagne to mark the occasion. But the days have passed in a fugue state of research and work, that near-unhealthy level of single-mindedness that descends when I get into a project. Making it through this first week is celebration enough.
I get ready to leave the lab a few hours earlier than I have all week. I have to pass by his desk to get to the door, and he does that flinch thing again before his eyes meet mine with a challenging glint.
“Tapping out already?” he mocks. “Probably for the best. Not like a few extra hours will make all that much of a difference for you.”
I stop midstride next to the disaster zone that is his workstation. He’s a mess, I’ve learned. Coats and winter hats, an extra pair of shoes, a gym bag, a grocery sack of chips, a dumb amount ofstuffis slowly encroaching on my area, while his desk has open books and uncapped highlighters and loose pieces of paper in a rising tide of disorganization. It’s honestly impressive he’s created this much disarray in one week. I should sic mine and Orok’s mothers on him.
“Make a difference with what?” I let my eyes linger on the state of his workstation and overemphasize my nose curl.
“With impressing the donors and board members.” He ignores my disgust. “That’s what you’re hoping to do for tomorrow’s party, isn’t it? Take advantage of this first chance to wow them with plans for yoursoloresearch project.”
I glare at him. “Like that isn’t your plan, too.”
“Oh, it is. But I’ll actually be successful at it.”
“Why? Because you’re staying and I’m leaving? If you haven’t figured out your shit by now, I hate to break it to ya, but a few extra hours isn’t going to save you. Excuse me for having asmoking hot datewaiting for me so I can blow off steam before tomorrow. You can go in sleepless and stressed; I’ll go in relaxed and freshly laid.”
I have no date; I’m meeting Orok and a few of his teammates for dinner.
Though, maybe getting laid isn’t such a bad idea. It’s been… afew months? Gods damn my busy schedule. And general lack of what the poets callgame.
Elethior’s cheeks flood red again. He blushes so easily; it shouldn’t feel like a victory every time I get one out of him, but it does.
“As tactful as always,” he mutters.
I head for the door again but pause with it cracked open. “Oh, and Elethior?”
He looks up from his notebook.
“If your shit crosses the demarcation line”—I point to the space between our workstations, about half a foot from where his gym bag is vomiting a towel and sneakers onto the floor—“that will be taken as an act of aggression, and I’ll have no choice but to declare an end to our ceasefire.”
I let the door slam as he flips me off.
Orok’s waiting at a place off campus that serves funky hot dogs, with toppings ranging from onions and chili to elote and pimento cheese. Students and weird, greasy hot dogs? Gold mine.
Orok blinks at me from the booth he’s claimed near the back.
“Is that—” He rubs his eyes, squints, and I pause with my arms out, thinking I must have a stain somewhere. Fucking public buses.
But he gasps melodramatically. “Is that—it is! Sebastian Walsh! As I live and breathe. I barely recognized you.”
I shrug off my puffer jacket. “Hilarious. You saw me this morning.”
I up-nod two of his teammates—Ivo and Crescentia, unsurprisingly. The only grad students on the team tend to stick together.
“I saw ablurthis morning,” Orok says. “Like I’ve seen a sleep-deprived wraith stumble back home every night. You’re taking thislast semester before we graduatething too seriously.”
“Yeah.” Ivo picks up a menu. “We’re basically done. What could the university do to us at this point?Notgive us our degrees? Coast, man. Coast.”
