Abby Ryan has her whole life planned out, up until graduation that is. As a journalism student at the University of Southern Washington, she has one goal in mind for her last semester of senior year: secure a scholarship for graduate school. But whe...
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I'm not sure what was worse—the hangover, the inquisition I walked into when I got home from breakfast, or the fact that I still can't seem to stop thinking about how good it felt to have my fingers knotted in Tristan's curls while his lips explored me again.
I knew from the moment he hesitated in the kitchen that nothing had changed. I was still just a lust and liquor-fueled temptation to him. Except something had changed. I had.
I didn't care about the title or the meaning of it, or hell, even the consequences. I just knew that I wanted him. And if that tiny sliver of a moment in his barely lit kitchen, slightly drunk, with chocolate-tinted lips at three in the morning was all I was ever going to get, then I wasn't going to pass it up.
But now that it's over and I'm left with the memory of what his fingertips felt like tracing circles on my back as I fell asleep in his arms, I realize the high I felt while his lips crashed down onto my own, comes with a low. A low deep enough to keep me dazed and wanting and confused, all while wishing it could happen again, even just once more.
The daze lasted all weekend, which was mostly spent in the same pajamas I pulled on Saturday afternoon when I got home from breakfast at his parents' house. After being practically criminally interrogated by Jenny and Nia for the details of my sleepover, and the dramatics that came along with them realizing that Tristan is Mr. Big, I spent the rest of the weekend in bed with a bag of Cheetos and my favorite Netflix shows, shamelessly wearing his hoodie just to smell the cologne still clinging to it.
To make a pathetic weekend even worse, while I was smack dab in the middle of throwing myself a pity party, I was slapped in the face with the one thing I didn't realize would hurt the most until it was said out loud—"James and I are officially dating."
It was a tough pill to swallow. The words sparked the jealousy that comes with the harsh realization that there's a big difference between being the girl conveniently there when you're drunk and horny and the girl you actually want to date.
It didn't take long for James to become an almost constant presence in our apartment. And even though I've done a pretty spectacular job of looking happy for them, I've been wallowing silently in the mess I made for myself because it's getting harder to not think about the what if's.
What if things were different?
What if that was us instead?
What if I wasn't just a hookup?
I'm usually pretty good at shutting down those thoughts before they can spiral out of control. Still, it's hard when I walk out to see them cuddled up on the living room couch or when I'm scrambling to find my headphones when their muffled moans echo down the hall in the middle of the night—or the middle of the day, or honestly, any time they venture into her room alone.
Which is why I'm currently sitting in the coffee shop on campus, trying to study with my chemistry textbook and flashcards sprawled out in front of me. I'm ten cards deep when a familiar voice sounds.
