He’s not avoiding me, ignoring me, or keeping his distance. But Colten is clearly upset about something, and I can’t keep letting it go on like this.
I go down the hallway and go through the first open door. It’s a bathroom and clean enough for college student standards.
I turn to lock the door shut behind us, thinking I can trust Colten to keep himself steady, at least for a second.
Colten nearly faceplants into the bathroom counter.
I lurch forward and end up with one arm wrapped around his waist again and the other grabbing the edge of the sink before we both go down like a pair of extremely uncoordinated dominoes.
Colten squints at himself in the mirror like it personally offended him. “I’m fine.”
“You nearly brained yourself on the toilet,” I inform him, which causes him to scoff in disbelief.
Rolling my eyes, I make sure he’s steady against the counter before plucking the cup from his hand and dumping the rest of it into the sink. Somehow, it didn’t spill out during the whole near-brain injury.
I rinse the cup, fill it with water, and hand it back to him. “Here, drink this.”
He stares at the cup, then at me, before deliberately looking away, his chin up in clear refusal.
My eye twitches. “What did you eat today?”
“Nothing.”
I close my eyes, sighing.
“I was busy,” he says stubbornly. “I was going to eat dinner after our physical therapy session, which you decided wasn’t worth your time. Apparently, parties and girls are more important to you.”
Ah. There’s the stab of guilt returning.
“And since I suddenly had free time, I decided I’d party too,” he finishes.
He says the wordpartylike it’s something he’s forcing himself to do. I sigh again, rubbing a hand down my face before shoving the water back toward him.
“Drink,” I repeat.
He crosses his arms like a sulking five-year-old. “No.”
My patience snaps like a cheap shoelace.
“Colten, you hate hangovers,” I say, voice tightening. “And if you drank all that on an empty stomach, you’re going to pass out in like—”
I glance at him, wobbling slightly.
“—ten minutes.”
“I won’t,” he insists, glaring.
“You always do,” I remind him. I forgot how stubborn drunk Colten could be.
He lifts his chin even more, unfazed. “You drink it. I’m not drinking it.”
That’s when I lose my last thread of patience. “That’s it!”
It’s not my proudest moment, but I grab his jaw and try to force his mouth open. His eyes go wide, immediately resisting and clawing at my arm.
I tilt the cup, and he jerks away, which turns the whole situation into a very uncoordinated wrestling match.
Colten might be drunk, but he is still incredibly strong and extremely determined not to drink water.
