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Dominick wasin the middle of straightening up his room when his phone rang with his weekly call with hismother.
It was the phone call where his mother made sure he was aware of the many sacrifices the family made for him to go to Florida Southern. In exchange, he would give a breakdown of his grades. They were all A’s, of course—anything less than that was unacceptable. The fact that he’d never made a B didn’t deter his parents from checking in on him. Dominick had assumed the progress reports would stop eventually, but after almost three years away at college, his mother was still calling likeclockwork.
His grades were important after all, and his mother wouldn’t let him forget that anything less than A’s would mean the end of his college career. Or at least the end of his time at a pricey private college in central Florida. The second his grades dropped, he’d be back to the northern part of the state and applying for a community college. Not that there was anything wrong with that, in fact, that had been his plan through most of high school. But he’d wanted to behereat Florida Southern ever since he found out the campus had an extensive collection of Frank Lloyd Wrightarchitecture.
And beyond the campus, he just loved being in Central Florida. The winters were milder, he was close to both the gulf beaches and the east coast beaches, and Lakeland was on the verge of becoming a hipsterparadise.
Not that Dominick was a hipster by any stretch of the imagination. But he enjoyed the many small businesses that had popped up around town even in the few years he’d beenthere.
No, he wouldn’t let his grades suffer because he had no intention of movingbackhome.
“Talk to you soon, Nicky,” his mother said through the receiver. Dominick groaned. Oh, how he hated that nickname. It was everything he didn’t want to be—it felt childish every time his motherusedit.
Knock! Knock!Knock!
“Bye, Mom,” he said quickly before hitting END on his phone. Dominick looked over at his roommate Conrad and lifted his brows. "Are you expectinganyone?"
Conrad shook his head, not taking his eyes from the TV. He'd been playing video games all afternoon and hadn't left his bed for several hours. Dominick was used to the behavior by now, and knew Conrad wouldn’t move off his butt to answer the door unless it were a hot pizza or a hot girl (though the first was more likely in Conrad’s case). So Dominick set his textbooks aside and went to see who was knocking sofrantically.
When Dominick opened the door, he came face-to-face with the self-proclaimed Date Maker. Her blond hair was tied back in a ponytail, and she carried a large bag filled with oversizedenvelopes.
"Hey, Morgan,” Dominick said and looked back to where Conrad sat. He wore a pair of workout shorts, and nothing else. But his roommate's state of undress was the least of Dominick's concerns. The dorm was an utter mess… well, half of it was. There were empty food containers on Conrad's desk, an overflowing trash can, and dirty boxers on his roommate’s side of thefloor.
No matter how tidy Dominick was, it never made up for the tornado that seemed to perpetually strike the other side of the room. It didn’t matter that Dominick’s underwear were in the drawer like they were supposed to be, Conrad's mess always seemed to overshadoweverythingelse.
Dominick and Conrad were opposites in all the worst ways. It was a miracle a small friendship blossomed between them at all. But it had Freshman year, and the two had agreed to be roommates until graduation. That didn’t make the mess any less embarrassing toDominick.
"Do you want to come in?" He opened the door allowing Morgan to enter, his pride warring with his sense ofhospitality.
"I can't," she answered. "I just wanted to drop off your match. I'm so excited to have found someone for you, and I think you're going to lovethedate."
She held out one of the over-sized envelopes from her bag. On it was his name, written in delicate cursive. He pushed his dark-rimmed glasses back up his nose and took itfromher.
"I'll be calling you in about two weeks to see how everything went. Thanks for using the DateMaker."
With those words, she was racing down the hall like some kind of fairy godmother on steroids. He didn't want to think about how many dates she was setting up that day. If her bag was filled entirely with envelopes like the one he held in his hand, Morgan was setting up half the campus with oneanother.
Dominick closed the door and was surprised when silence greeted him. The sound of gunshots and angry cussing was absent. In its place was a curious Conrad. He looked up at Dominick with a mix of curiosity andhumor.
"Was that Morgan?" he asked, waggling hiseyebrows.
Dominick nodded. He'd been one of the first people to sign up for the Date Maker service. Morgan promised to find a match for everyone, or your money back. Not only that, she planned thefirstdate.
"Is that what I think it is?" Conrad asked, looking strangely excited about something that wasn’t food or videogames.
Again, Dominicknodded.
"Dude! Why aren't you moreexcited?"
"I am excited," he answered. He cleared his throat and tried again. “I’m totallyexcited.”
"Then open it up. Let's see if you got agoodone."
"Did it occur to you I might want to open it inprivacy?"
Conrad stood up, moving closer to Dominick, narrowing his eyes. "Why would you want privacy? Wait, don't tell me youwantto…"
