I shook my head, reciting my father’s words aloud. “A mindset like that leads to procrastination.”
“I procrastinate all the time, and I’m passing. Right now, anyway.” River shrugged. “What’s your major?”
“Biology pre-med,” I spoke as confidently as I could.
River’s eyes flashed with something I couldn’t quite put my finger on, then he blinked it away. “Damn, no wonder you can’t procrastinate. You wanna do that?”
My eyes flicker to my lap, and my tone softens. “I’m doing it, and that’s all that matters.”
With my father being a surgeon and my mother a nurse, it was the most logical path for me. Truth was, I was okay with doing it because I had no clue what else I wanted to do. Deciding for myself had always been a challenge, and I liked to stick to what was easy.
After a second, I looked up and met River’s brown eyes. The way he squinted told me he wasn’t satisfied with my answer, almost as if he could see right through me. I thought he was going to press it, but he broke eye contact and began twiddling his thumbs and spinning in circles again.
“After we eat, I’m probably gonna head out. Coach added a morning practice since the scrimmage is in two days,” River mentioned. He was speaking more to himself than to me.
“There’s a scrimmage Friday?”
“Yep, and I’m a starter,” he vaunted.
I didn’t understand basketball beyond the basics, so I had no idea what that meant. I didn’t have to ask; he could see the confusion written all over my face.
“Oh, it’s not a big thing.” He waved his hand casually. “It’s just the strongest five players who start every game, and I made the lineup even though I’m only a sophomore.”
It shouldn’t have surprised me. River used to eat, sleep, and breathe basketball as kids—it was honestly a tad concerning. Sometimes while he played, I’d sit at the edge of the court and watch just to be near him, and he loved it. Said it made him play better. It was good to know that all of his hard work in basketball as a kid paid off.
“Yeah, definitely not a big deal,” I chuckled, forgetting why I was even upset with River in the first place. “Isn’t it a lot of pressure?”
River scrunched his nose. “A bit, but I manage. The confidence I get when I score, and the crowds’ cheers make up for the nervousness.”
I pursed my lips. “Yes, I’m sure your ego skyrockets when that happens.”
“Why do you say that?”
“You and your friends already prance around school like you’re the shit, flirting and winking with everyone you see, andyouspecifically act mysterious. Once you start playing, and hopefully winning, you will get cocky just like the rest of them.” When I finished my rant, there was a smug grin painted on his face. I cleared my throat. “I’m not saying it’s a bad thing, just telling you what I know is going to happen.”
The smug grin turned into a smirk. “Ah, so you do watch me.”
Dammit.
Rolling my eyes, I silently hoped that my tinted cheeks weren’t giving me away. “Not really, I only noticed.”
I heard the rolling of the swivel chair against the floor, and suddenly, River was in front of me. “I hope you’re planning on taking the personal invitation to the scrimmage.”
“What personal invitation?”
“The one I’m giving you now,” he spoke smoothly, and it was only when this close that I could make out the soft mustache shadow above his lip. “I want to see you at my game, front and center, Alex. Can you do that for me?”
His arm rested on my thigh, and I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t sending pulses straight to my dick. It threw me off, and I was sure I was hearing things, but the determination in his eyes told me otherwise.
I swallowed the abundance of saliva in my throat. “You don’t even know me.”
The confidence in his eyes faded into something uncertain—scared, even. Sorrowful?
His arm stayed draped over my thigh, and his fingers rested there, too. My leg hairs stood up when his fingers lightly brushed over my thigh, the motion not calculated and seemingly unintentional. It was absentminded, like River knew what he was doing, but not enough to knowwhathe was doing.
“We aren’t strangers anymore. We’ve been working on the project together,” he said, as if it were a simple fact.
River’s fingers continued dragging in a small motion over me, and his eyes searched mine like there were answers written behind them. Too bad I didn’t have an answer, but I was looking for one on how to suppress the growing of my pants subtly with him this close to me.
