I didn’t think Margie would charge me rent while she fixed the place, but I also didn’t think she’d let me completely out of the new lease I’d just re-signed.
Even if she did, I didn’t have anywhere to go. And with fall just around the corner, I’d be fighting against the rush of NBU students trying to find places, too. I’d dealt with that nightmare time and time again already. The thought of having to face it again now made me want to fall into a heap on the floor and cry.
“Hear me out,” he said, approaching me slowly when I didn’t immediately respond. “You get to stay for free. It’s right across the street, so you don’t have to move all your stuff into storage or across town. You don’t even have to change your mailing address. You have me and the other guys to help you move. You have your own room. We’re clean…” He paused. “Ish.”
I rolled my eyes.
“Did I mention it’s free?”
I chewed my lip, hating how many good points he had. It wasn’t like I didn’t know the guys, either. I’d spent enough time partying or hanging out at The Pit now, thanks to Julep, that I felt like an adopted little sister.
It would be nice to not have to worry about paying rent for a while, to possibly get some sort of savings started…
I shook my head for even considering it, mentally slapping myself. This was Leo Hernandez, for God’s sake. This was the prick who’d made my entire high school existence absolutely miserable and then completely forgotten about it because that was how little it mattered to him.
How little I mattered to him.
“I’ll be fine,” I said, turning on my heels.
His hand shot out, catching me by the crook of my elbow. Heat shot through me just as much as revulsion as I pulled away from the touch.
“Come on. Let us help you out. You’re Julep’s friend, and therefore, a friend of ours.”
I narrowed my eyes at him. “Since when are you nice?”
He feigned offense, pressing a hand to his chest. “Me? I’m always nice. I’m the nicest guy you’ll ever meet.”
I blinked at him, ignoring the urge to refute that statement in a law-based manner complete with evidence and a jury of women I knew would find his ass guilty.
“Just… think about it. Here,” he said, holding his hand out. “Give me your phone. I’ll put my number in, and I promise not to say another word about it. But if you change your mind, one text and we’ll be here helping you move everything out and across the street. We won’t have anyone else in that room until fall, so you have at least a couple months, and it should all be fixed by then, right?”
I couldn’t do anything but look at him and slowly blink again.
I loathed his existence, and yet in that moment, I saw a glimpse of the boy I used to know.
The boy I thought I knew, anyway — the one who was crushed under the pressure of what he thought he should be, who laughed in a particular kind of way when I surprised him, who had deep thoughts and feelings that he didn’t share with anyone but me. I saw the boy who cared about the girl he stayed up with every night online.
“Phone,” he said, wiggling his fingers.
I blamed the lack of sleep and the supreme yearning to get him out of my house for my actions next. I dug my phone out of my pocket and handed it to him. For a split second, I panicked, thinking that when he tried to text me, he’d be blocked. But I’d gotten off my parents’ phone plan a couple years ago — another way of me asserting my independence — and so it would be a new number altogether, and a new area code, too.
He put his number in, sent a text to himself so he’d have my number, and then gave it back to me.
“One text,” he said, and then true to his word, he turned and left.
“Fucking shit hammock,” I muttered under my breath once he was gone.
I was exhausted, and angry, and stressed the fuck out. All I wanted to do was take a hot shower, get in my pajamas, and pack a bowl.
I didn’t care how desperate things were. No way was I moving into The Pit with a house full of disgusting football players, especially not with Leo Hernandez being one of them.
Three days later, I sent a text.
Me: Don’t make me regret this.
One minute later, Leo wrote back.
Shit Hammock: That’s a weird way to say thank you.
And within the hour, my house was full of football players hauling my belongings across the street.
Mary
I hung my hands on my hips, staring at all my stuff crammed into Holden’s room.
My room, now.
It was smaller than mine across the street, but still more than adequate. It had built-in bookshelves I could use for my tattoo machine, along with the needles, tips, tubes, and grips. The rest would be used to display my art. There was a small desk against the wall facing away from the window. I’d set up my gaming system there. The closet was actually larger, which was the biggest blessing of all. And though I was downgrading from a queen bed to a full, at least it was dry in here. I also had an en-suite bathroom and a window that overlooked the garden out back, one Holden had nurtured when he lived here.
I wondered who took care of it now.
“This isn’t terrible,” Giana said, startling me as she slid past me and right into the room. Her arms were full of my clothes that I was certain weighed more than she did, and she plopped them down on the bed before sitting next to them and catching her breath. She mopped her curls out of her face with one swipe of her hand and shoved her glasses back up the bridge of her nose. I marveled at how she’d shown up to help me move in a plaid skirt and thigh-high socks with whiskers at the top of them.
Riley came in after her, two boxes balanced in her arms. One of them had my textbooks and tattoo books in them, and the other was everything from my bathroom. The fact that she carried both of them like they were just a couple of pillows reminded me of all the strength packed into that tiny package.
What was it that her boyfriend called her?
Mighty Mouse.
She was in her usual athleisure, sporting NBU Football across the chest of her crop tank top. I wondered if she’d had that specifically made for her, since she was the only female on the team, and I doubted the staff had a crop top on the menu for team swag.
“I think you have more makeup than the entire Kappa Kappa Beta sorority house.” She huffed once she set the boxes in the corner of the room.
“Makeup is to me what football is to you,” I said.
“Wouldn’t that be tattooing?” Giana argued.
I shrugged. “I don’t know, they might be tied for first place in my heart.”
I met Riley and Giana through Julep last year. Riley was the North Boston University football team’s kicker and Giana worked for the team’s Public Relations department. They were both dating football players, and I half-blamed them for not helping me talk sense into Julep when she was falling for Holden.
Then again, Julep was engaged now, so I guess it was me who was in the wrong.
I couldn’t help it, projecting my own feelings toward football players onto my roommate when I saw so clearly that she was falling for the guy. Football players had ruined my life in high school, and as far as I was concerned, they were all assholes.
No matter how my three friends tried to prove that theory wrong.