“Nope. We’re just gonna play board games and Xbox and stuff.”
Val nodded and took a sip from her S’well water bottle. It was bright orange like Luke’s, but not as big. “I like to stay hydrated,” he explained when Reese first teased him about it. He also had a blue one, always filled with coffee. “And caffeinated.”
“You should come,” I said. “Sage has told me about your legendaryFortniteskills.”
Val laughed. “But I’m not in Merriman anymore.”
“Who cares? You were a year ago.”
“Well, sure, I guess that’s true,” she said as I invited myself to join her on the yoga mat. Partner stretching was pretty effective.
“Nobody will care,” I assured her. “Come. It’ll be fun.”
She didn’t respond.
I leaned forward to touch my toes.
“Okay,” she said. “I’ll be there.”
There was shouting coming from the common room when I came back to Daggett after dinner, Luke right behind me. We’d gone to Peace Love Pizza with everyone.
“Dude, I’m telling you,” I heard Paddy saying, “I don’t know where it is! It was right here last time I checked!”
“Wherewhatis?” I asked.
Kyle sighed. “Twister.”
I eyed the bookcase where we kept all our board games. Monopoly, Clue, Life, Scrabble, and a few random others. But sure enough, there was no Twister. “Here, let me text Sage,” I said, unlocking my phone. “She has one.” The two of us had once played for hours, determined to master the game.
I’ll come by @ 8:30,she responded, and I sent a thumbs-up back.
“All good,” I told the guys, and after Kyle sighed in relief, Luke and I left to go upstairs.
“So what’s a mixer?” he asked once we’d reached the second floor. “Is it like a date party?”
“Sort of,” I said. “I mean, yes, the activities are usually similar, buta mixer’s when one house invites another over, and a date party is when you ask someone from whatever house you want. Date parties are typically more formal too.”
“Which do you like better?”
I didn’t hesitate. “Mixers, because they’re more relaxed. Less pressure.”
“Yeah, because you’resoawkward.”
I responded by hip-checking him into the wall, and he crashed into Dhiraj’s closed door. “Come in!” we heard him call from inside.
Luke didn’t say anything; the look he gave me was enough. But then he did speak, his voice low, “I am going tokillyou.”
A surge of something shot up my spine as I took off down the hall, racing toward my door. Unfortunately, though, Luke was pretty damn fast. I was closing in on the last few feet when he launched himself up onto my back. We promptly fell to the floor.
No wrestling followed. If Luke was Nick or Paddy or Jack or basically anyone else, I’d guarantee we’d be rolling around on the ground right now, trying to get the other to concede first. But hewasLuke, so I scrambled up before anything could happen.
“Okay, truce.” I turned to unlock my door. My heart was trying to make a break from my chest.Relax, I told myself.
Luke grabbed the remote and flopped down on the chesterfield once we were inside. “Yup, cool,” I said, after chugging about half a bottle of water. “I wanted to sit on the floor anyway.” Now flipping through the channels, he was sprawled across the entire couch. “Don’t worry about me.”
“Copy that,” he said, settling onLaw & Order: SVU.It was past 7:30 p.m., so the episode was probably a little over halfway through.
I rolled my eyes and retrieved my laptop from my desk. And then, without me needing to employ more sarcasm, Luke made space for me. I sat and propped my feet up on the trunk.
