Off To Uni! (Written after Nick & Charlie by Alice Osmen)

Chapter Ten

**WARNING - HOMOPHOBIC LANGUAGE**

CHAPTER TEN.

Charlie:
We get in Nick's car and begin the drive to Tara and Elle's school. I can tell that Nick is bothered by what happened earlier. I'm trying to not show that it made me uncomfortable because I know how protective he can be. Once we get there, we meet up with Tara, Tao and Elle at the dorm before venturing off to the parties.

"So how are your roommates?" Elle asks.
"Picture the perkiest person you have ever met in your life and multiply it by at least one thousand," Darcy complains.

Elle, Tao, Tara and Nick burst into laughter.

"She's not even exaggerating. She was a lot, even for me," I add.

"And Nick? Your roommate?" Tara asks.

Darcy and I look at Nick who rolls his eyes.

"Seems like an asshole to me," he says while shrugging.
"Did he say something about you and Charlie?" Tao stands up from the bed, clearly getting enraged already.
"About me really. He couldn't understand why I would CHOOSE a guy over a girl if I was bisexual."

Tara and Elle's jaws drop, while Tao places his hand on his head.

"What a fucking moron," Tao says.

I don't want this to be the focus of the night. I grab Nick's hand and slightly smile at him.

"Is everyone ready to go?"

Everyone nods and we start walking around; trying to find a party that we want to slip into. We walk into one and we are all immediately handed drinks.

"My kind of place!" Darcy says, laughing.

We all walk over to an empty corner and start observing everyone while we sip on our drinks. I can still sense that Nick is bothered.

"Hey, you okay?" I ask.

Nick places his hand on my leg.

"Yeah, I'm okay. I figured this was going to happen at some point, I just, why did it have to be my roommate?"
"Maybe he didn't know any better. Maybe he'll apologize," I say.
"Doesn't seem like the type," Nick replies.

Tara and Darcy go over to a group of people who are playing beer pong and join in. After they win, they look over at me, Nick, Elle and Tao.

"Who wants to go up against me and Tara?" Darcy asks.

Elle drags Tao up to the table as he sighs. He isn't the most coordinated person, even when it comes to throwing a ball in a cup. Tara and Darcy dominate them in what I can only assume is a world record. Tara's gaze meets ours.

"Ready to lose?"

I'm not really one to play these kind of games either, but I want to get Nick's mind off of what happened earlier. I'm leaving tomorrow and want to have a good night. I pull Nick over to the table and we begin to play, now tipsy after having two other drinks before starting this game. Sometimes I wonder how alcohol works because I can barely walk in a straight line when I have a drink but suddenly I'm a beer pong pro. Nick looks at me in shock.

"You're literally carrying us right now," he says.
"Should be a little embarrassed since you're the jock here," I tease.
"Oh yeah? Fine," Nick says as if he accepted a challenge from me.

He bounces the ball instead of tossing it and it bounces right into the last cup and everyone around us starts cheering. We look at each other and then back to Tara and Darcy.

"Oh, I'm sorry. I thought we were going to lose," I say sarcastically.

Darcy and Tara stick their tongues out at us and the next two people come up to play against us; and then another; and then another. At this point, I think we might be the beer pong champions of the night.