“For the presentation ball.” I turn another page. “He’s my escort.”
“Oh.”
Aggressively hard knocks from the marker’s felt tip puncture through our silence.
“Which I wouldn’t need,” I add several seconds later, “ifsomeonehadn’t announced my presence to the entire Segner hallway.”
A faint snap sounds as he recaps the marker. “I’m not apologizing for that.”
“Didn’t ask for one.”
Another weighty pause.
“But ithadto be my roommate again?”
When I dart my gaze in his direction, I find he’s already looking at me. Adrenaline rushes up my spine, as if preparing me for a standoff. “What do you mean?”
“Last year it was Brayden, this year it’s him.” He twists the marker in his hands. “I’m just saying there are other people, who are not my roommate, that you could have asked.”
My face burns. “Ididn’t ask,” I snap. “He askedme.”
Now Sumner looks uncomfortable. “When?”
“A few weeks ago.”
Another very long, very awkward silence.
Sumner has no right to be pressed, especially after what happened between us. If anything,Ishould be mad. But that anger only proves I still care, and I don’t. Besides, he’s had his fair share of situationships and hookups over the years. I see the way Hailey Collins acts around him now. And he’s going to sit here passing judgment over me?
Neither of us has broached what happened in my backyard before he returned to New York with Jared. If I’m being honest, I don’t know what to say. He spoke plainly when he rejected me. That was my answer. We don’t owe each other anything. We never have. Our communication style has always been in the form of jabs and barbs, roasts and taunts. It was a mistake for me to think it could transform into something different. Instead, it crumbled.
My phone tells me it’s closing in on ten thirty, which meanswe have fifteen minutes to make it back to our houses for weekend curfew.
I gather the rest of the cake, which I’m going to have to trash since outside food isn’t allowed in the houses unless it’s prepackaged, and I dig my fork into another heaping scoop. Between the four of us, we’ve put a healthy dent in it. My tongue collects the spongey sugar as I savor another few bites.
Sumner collects his belongings and slings his bag over his shoulder. He eyes the remaining cake in my hand, so I extend it in his direction. A peace offering. We’ve been thrust into an impossible situation together. I don’t want to be at his throat any more than I am.
Instead of going at it with a fork, he cranes his neck to take a giant bite, and I get a split-second idea to gently shove the lumpy mass of sugar, flour, and butter toward him. The frailest of nudges.
He straightens, frosting smeared down his chin and on the tip of his nose. “That,” he chides, “was uncalled for.”
“It’s my birthday,” I counter. “I can do what I want.”
His eyebrows rise as he takes the cake platter from my hand. “Are those the rules?”
“Don’t,” I warn through a laugh. “I swear!”
He scoops a glob with his bare hand and waves it toward me. I duck away and sprint toward the door, but he follows.
“You know you want to.”
I take two tentative steps closer, and he holds the platform toward me. I move for a bite, fully expecting him to shove thewhole thing in my face, but he doesn’t. The cardboard remains balanced on his palm as I mimic his move and claim a mouthful.
I get frosting all over my face. It’s worth it.
“Candles are overrated,” I decide. “This is how cake deserves to be eaten.”
His mouth hitches into a tilted smile as he discards the rest in the trash before rinsing his chin and frosting-filled hand in the water fountain. I do the same when he’s done.
