1: Whispering Smoke - Evan Peters

Knock Knock

We arrived back in St Louis at 5 o'clock that night. I asked Evan to drop me off at my dorm and he said he couldn't stay because he had to go back to his condo. He got out of the car and gave me a long, tight hug and said he'd miss me and he'd see me soon. I agreed and went up to my dorm, where I saw Dana sitting on her bed reading.

She jumped up and ran to the door to give me a hug. I placed my small suitcase down on the ground and wrapped my arms around her.

"Oh my god, Alex! Welcome back, how was your trip, I swear it felt like a month," Dana exclaimed, pulling away from the hug and holding onto my shoulders with both hands.

"It was really good, Evan asked me to be his girlfriend," I said, and Dana screeched back in excitement.

"Oh my god that's so great Alex!" She moved away and I moved over to my bed, laying down flat on my back, exhausted from the long trip back home. Dana sat down next to me.

"Soo.. how did it happen?" She asked me, batting her eyelashes.

"We got there and went skinny dipping, it was so fucking cold," I laughed, as Dana listened intently, "but he pretended to drown and it made me swim in, then he asked me," Dana's mouth hung open at Evan's cruel joke.

"Oh my god I would've been scarred for life," We both laughed and I talked to her about the rest of the trip, including the message he got from Emma and everything he finally told me about their relationship. I knew he told me in confidence, but, I couldn't keep anything from my best friend.

"Holy shit that is so fucked, as if she sent that text," Dana said, moving off my bed and onto her own. I nodded my head in response and stared up at my ceiling. I guess it was the first time since it happened that I was able to properly process the full extent of what Evan told me. How sad and worried he looked for me, for himself. How quick he was to snap out of it. I wonder if he was thinking about it now the same way I was.

"You okay Lex?" Dana asked me, and I turned to face her.

"Yeah I'm fine, just thinking," I said and got up from my bed to unpack, throwing most of my clothes into my washing hamper.

"I'm gonna go out for some food with Elliot and Lucas, do you want to come?" She asked.

"I should get an early night, thank you though," I replied, as I watched Dana put on a coat and grab her car keys.

"Okay Alex, love you," she said as she walked over to the door to leave.

"Love you too," I said, sitting back down on my bed as she closed the door behind her.

Class early on a Tuesday morning was always the hardest. With a bright and early 8am start, the sun had barely risen in St Louis and the air still had an early morning chill. I sat at the top of my lecture hall, with my laptop open, trying to take note of what the lecturer was saying. My mind was somewhere else. Evan had sent me a good morning text, and said he was going to work today in the evening. Because of that, he couldn't see me. I had arranged to fill in a shift myself at the diner, and I knew Lucas was on tonight too.

My eyes filtered towards where Lucas was sitting in the lecture hall, his head in his hands looking like he was sleeping. I wasn't sure what Dana, Elliot and Lucas did last night, but Dana came back to the dorm early in the morning, maybe 1am.

Our lecturer closed the class, and one by one everyone got up to head to their next class. I had an online unit that I did in the library on Tuesday's that I had coordinated with Lucas. I slid across rows to reach him, where he was still resting his head in his hands.

"Lucas?" I asked as I approached him, placing my hand on his shoulder.

He jumped and almost knocked his laptop to the ground.