We finished our beers, split the tab, and headed for the parking lot. Marcus clapped me on the shoulder before we went our separate ways.
“Get some sleep, Landry.”
“You too.”
The drive home was quiet. I pulled into our lot, cut the ignition, and sat there for a moment. Through the window, I could see the glow of a lamp in our apartment—Tanner still awake, still working.
Something to protect. Marcus had no idea how right he was.
Wednesday afternoon,we claimed the back corner of the coffee shop near the engineering building. Six tables, perpetually empty creamer dispensers, and an espresso machine that sounded terminal. The windows fogged from the contrast between the November cold and the overcrowded heat inside.
Tanner frowned at his screen, fingers drumming against the scarred wood. His capstone presentation was due next week, and he’d been rearranging the same three slides for an hour. Every few minutes, he’d delete something, undo the deletion, then stare at it like it had personally offended him.
I was supposed to be reading about rotator cuff rehabilitation. Instead, I watched him—the furrow between his brows, the way he bit his lower lip when he was thinking, how his sweater pulled across his shoulders when he leaned forward.
“You’re staring,” he said without looking up.
“You’re interesting.”
“I’m fighting with PowerPoint.”
“Interesting PowerPoint.”
His mouth twitched. Under the table, his foot found mine—pressed against it, then slid up my ankle. At some point, he’dtoed off his shoe. The contact was deliberate, and when I glanced at his face, his expression hadn’t changed at all. Still frowning at his screen. Still clicking through slides.
I went back to pretending to read. Three sentences later, his knee bumped mine. I bumped back. His foot traced higher, nudging against my calf, and I watched him swallow hard without looking away from his laptop.
“Stop distracting me,” he murmured.
“I’m not doing anything.”
“Your existence is distracting.” He shifted in his chair—restless, adjusting. His foot pressed more firmly against my leg. “I can feel you looking at me.”
“Can’t help it.” I let my own foot slide up the inside of his leg, slow, stopping just below his knee. “You’re very lookable.”
His fingers fumbled on the keyboard—a typo he had to backspace through. The flush I’d been waiting for crept up his neck, and under the table, his legs parted. Not much. Enough.
“We’re in public,” he said, voice dropping.
“I’m aware.”
“So behave.”
“This is me behaving.” I pressed my calf against his, let my foot drift higher along his inner thigh. “You should see me when I’m not.”
His breath caught—barely audible over the dying espresso machine, but I heard it. His hand had gone still on the trackpad. When he finally looked at me, his pupils had blown wide, the brown almost swallowed by black.
“Seth.” My name came out strained. “I’m trying to work.”
“So work.”
“I can’t focus when you’re—” He cut himself off, jaw tightening. Under the table, his thighs pressed together, trapping my foot between them. The pressure made my pulse spike. “This is your fault.”
“What’s my fault?”
“That I can’t get enough of you.” The admission came out rough, almost angry. “I couldn’t focus in my morning class. Kept thinking about—” He stopped, shook his head, but his ears had gone red.
“About what?”
