Page 7

Grant

I shut the apartment door behind me, dragging a hand down my face.

Our front door leads straight into our living area. It’s a smaller living area than Cami’s, with us having four rooms compared to her two bedrooms. She’s got more space, but we make it work by being college hockey players who are in class, at the rink, or at a party.

Two of the rooms sit next to the open kitchen, and the other two walk directly into the living area. It’s pretty messy in here as clothes hang haphazardly around, and there isn’t much décor apart from hockey gear and game controllers hanging around.

I slap Bear on the head as I walk past the couch. “Hey,” he shouts, continuing to start up his game. I can already see where the night is going. “What was that for?”

“Next time, don’t talk when we are trying to intimidate someone,” I throw over my shoulder, heading to the fridge and finally taking my first sip of beer for the night.

Once I got to the party, I was just enjoying myself when Cami texted Bear with the SOS, and I hadn’t even opened my beer yet, as Katy was talking my ear off.

Unlucky me.

“I was trying to be helpful.” He sticks his tongue out the side of his mouth as he plays, and I know he does it in goal, too. “Thought I could hurry it along.”

“That worked out well for us.” I scoff, taking a deep chug of my beer and sitting on one of our bar stools, leaning back against the breakfast bar that sits in front of the balcony doors.

“Hey, he said shit about Cami,” Adam chimes in, walking out of his room and jumping to the back of the couch to sit next to Bear and grabs another controller.

“You know Cami can hold her own.” I laugh, taking a long pull on my beer. “That girl scares the hell out of me.”

The guys all nod, agreeing.

“So, who’s the mystery girl?” Adam asks.

“No clue.” I shrug, thinking about the brunette whom I only know as B; she was a lot better looking without the dirt. Her dark brown hair was long, and she had striking green eyes. Now her skin wasn’t covered in mud. I could see that just how beautiful she was, even without makeup.

In a strange first, she wasn’t all over me.

“She looks hot; I don’t get what you mean when you said she looked dirty,” Bear mumbles, losing his round of Mario Kart and chucking the controller at Gunnar, which hits him in the chest because he was too busy looking at his phone.

“Dude, that’s not cool.” Adam shakes his head at me.

“I didn’t say she looked dirty. I said she was dirty as in covered in mud,” defending myself. “I’m talking. A walking, mud-covered forest was sitting in the back of my car earlier, and that girl out there was a different girl.”

“You don’t think she’s hot, Anders?” Gunnar smirks. “Cami’s probably warning her about you already.”

Of course, I thought she was hot. I hadn’t stopped thinking about how her full lips had curved into an almost smile when she flounced back into her apartment after she enjoyed insulting me.

“Cut me some slack.” I swig from my beer. Deciding the easiest thing to do is to let this conversation go, I’m not looking to hook up with a girl who’s just had her heart broken. “She’s just broken up with Jim; I’m not that bad.”

“He’s an idiot for letting her go,” Adam says. “I feel a bad for him.”

I couldn't agree more.

“We should have gone back to the party,” Bear moans an hour later. He’s half hanging off the sofa while I kick Adam’s ass at Mario Kart.

“You’re the assholes who wanted to leave,” I state while aggressively pressing buttons.

“It was a SOS from Cami,” Adam grits, matching my aggressiveness. “She would have killed us if we didn’t answer.”

“Yeah, well, now we are stuck at home.” Bear checks his watch. “At 12:30 on a Saturday night, this blows.”

“Why does my being home early on Saturday have to be suspicious?” Gunnar says, walking past the couch into the open-plan kitchen.

His long-distance girlfriends Sasha giving him shit again.

He could do the most perfect thing, and it would still be wrong.

I had the misfortune of meeting Sasha during our freshman year, and quickly discovered she’s the most negative person I have ever met.

She came to watch one of our games, and nothing could have made her happy.

The arena was too cold. It took too long to park.

Gunnar agreed to go to the bar without asking her.

He had already planned their next day together, which he had off without telling her.

She could have had the best day ever, and something would have been wrong with it.

He opens the fridge and cracks open a can of beer while cradling the phone between his shoulder and ear; he motions to us if we want another; we all nod, and he chucks them to us.

“What?!” He pauses,Why does it matter if I’m drinking?” He runs a hand through his hair, leaning against the island.

We all share looks; we all hate her, but what can we do? They’ve been together since high school. Adam once said offhandedly that she ragged on him too much and she could cut him some slack, and Gunnar exploded at him. So we’ve all learnt just to hold our breath until the arguments are over.

There is a knock at the door, and Bear shoots up and runs to it, escaping the awkward one-way conversation we can hear from Gunnar.

“Umm, did we order pizza?” he shouts from the door.

“Oh, shoot. Sorry, it’s for the apartment next door.” We hear the pizza guy say.

“We can take it over to them,” Adam shouts, jumping off the sofa. Bear stares at him as Adam runs up to the door. “We can run it over, we know them,” he repeats, and I lean over the couch to see the pizza guy shake his head.

“I’ve got to deliver it straight to the door.” The poor guy sounds conflicted when faced with the wad of cash Adam has pulled out and is waving around.

“Look, I don’t want to be a gossip, but the girls next door are super broke. They will not tip you,” he says. The guy doesn’t take long to decide and grabs the money, shoving the pizzas at Adam.

“Adam, what the fuck?” Bear says, shaking his head and shutting the door. “We can order our own pizza; we don’t need to steal it.”

“I’m not stealing it, asshat.” He glares at him, grabbing his phone from the sofa. “The girls have been blasting breakup songs for the past half an hour, and I know Cami has broken into her stash of tequila by now.”

“How do you know that?” I ask, standing up.

“I heard it through the wall of my bedroom,” he answers, shrugging.

“Bud.” I wipe my hand down my face as Gunnar and Bear shake their heads. “That’s creepy.”

“Whatever, I’m going to bribe my way into whatever they are doing; it’s got to be more fun than this Dick Fest.” He grabs the pizzas and strolls towards our door.

I choke on my beer as I hear Gunnar say, “I don’t know why Adam is talking about girls and dicks, Sasha, I’m not Adam, am I?” he snaps. “Fuck.” He frowns down at his phone. “She hung up on me.”

“Great, let’s go then,” Adam says, motioning towards the door with his stolen pizza boxes and raising his eyebrows, looking at us like he can’t believe we haven’t moved yet.

“Adam, we can’t crash a girl’s night,” Gunnar states, leaning his forearms on the back of the sofa. “Rule number one of having a girlfriend.”

“Neither of them is our girlfriend, and there is no way they are eating all this pizza.”

He has a point; there are like four whole pizzas and sides he’s holding.

“Fuck it,” Bear says, grabbing a hoodie from the coat rack and looking towards us expectantly.

“Eh, I mean, my night can’t get any weirder,” I say. I nod my head towards the door at Gunnar. “Let’s go.”

“What?! No, I can’t, I should ring Sasha back,” he stutters, pushing off the sofa and running his hands through his short hair.

“Let her sweat for once, bud.” I pat him on the back, smirking, and steer him towards the door, and that’s all it takes as he downs his beer and walks out the door.

When Gunnar and I first met freshman year, we went out a lot, and it was never hard to convince him to join me on random nights at the bar or parties, but recently he hasn’t been going out as much, and I feel like he’s missing out to please Sasha.

Another reason I’m in no rush to get serious is that I don’t want to miss out on my last years of college to be tied down.

As soon as I step out the door, I can hear Shania Twain blasting from next door and some very off-key singing.

“How are we propositioning this?” I ask as we huddle in the doorway.

“Leave it to me,” Bear says with confidence and knocks loudly; shouts come from through the door, and the music continues as the door opens to Cami, who immediately narrows her eyes.

“PIZZA!” Bear shouts at her, smiling; she immediately slams the door in his face.

“Dumbass.” Adam groans, knocking again and moving Bear out of the way.

Cami opens it again, now with her still unnamed friend next to her, both with their hips cocked, looking intimidating as fuck.

“Look, we’ve got your pizza,” Adam states. “Now, I’m not saying I’m holding it hostage, but I know you’ve got tequila, and,” he says as the door inches closed, “Gunnar can do a mean Kelly Clarkson, ‘Since You’ve Been Gone’.”

“Dude.” Gunnar gapes at him while I cover my laugh with my fist behind him. It’s his go-to drunken song. I’ve heard him singing it in the shower after nights out at the bar.

“Let us join you, and I promise you won’t regret it,” he practically begs them.

“Sorry, boys, it’s girls night.” Cami sighs. “I don’t come over when one of you has been dumped, do I?” she asks.

“I mean you could,” I state, giving them a half smile and shrugging. “I feel like your advice would be a hell of a lot better than Adam’s.”

“That’s not cool.” He whips back at me. “I give expert advice: don’t call, don’t text, go out and pick up some…” He lifts his fingers, ticking them off. Luckily, Bear puts his hand over his mouth to stop him.

Cami is glaring at Adam while, surprisingly, the mystery girl is smiling. “What the hell, Gunnar, was it?” she asks. “Get in here and show me what you’ve got.” She moves out of the way.

“Seriously?!” Cami stares at her friend with her mouth open.

“Sure, I ruined their evening with my stupid drama, anyway; it’s the least we can do.” She grins, making grabby hands at the pizza. “Gimmie, I’m starving.”

Adam gives her the boxes and slings an arm around her shoulders. “I could go for some Alanis Morissette, you know, maybe some Sinead O’Connor,” I hear him say as Bear follows, leaving Gunnar, Cami, and Me looking after them.

“What am I witnessing?” Gunnar whispers.

“I think Adam and Bear just adopted her,” I whisper back.

“Oh boy,” Cami mutters, “this will never end well.”

I don’t know if she’s referring to the night or our new friendship.