Tutoring the Bad Boy

There You Are

Ryan

"There you are. I thought you wouldn't show," Aiden said as I sat at his table at the Campus Café.

Aiden was an art major and my roommate. You'd think an art major and soccer player wouldn't get along, but we had grown close over the past two years. He was also a senior like me.

We met the beginning of our sophomore year and just clicked. Maybe it was his past and his troubles with the law that I related to, but I knew our friendship ran deep. I had met his brother a few times, but he was older and had graduated from college a year ago.

"Rough practice," I said as I ran my fingers through my still damp hair. I always took a shower after a game or practice. Quick in and out. But today, I stuck around until I was the only one left in the locker room. It had been two days since Emma told me she couldn't tutor me, and I'd been a wreck.

Aiden lifted the straw in his smoothie to his lips and nodded. After taking a drink, he said, "Sure it was just practice?"

My lips thinned. He had that look on his face that practically screamed he didn't believe me.

"I can have a bad day like anyone else," I grumbled, gazing anywhere but at him.

The thing about having close friendships was that the friend knew when you were lying.

"Bullshit." He sat up and leaned across the table. "Sure, you can have a bad day, but I know you, Ryan. This isn't you having a bad day. This is you hung up on something." He rubbed his chin before sitting back. "Or hung up on someone."

Fuck. I should just go live in the woods and be a hermit.

"Fine." I slapped the table a little too hard, and his smoothie almost fell over. The guy loved his smoothies. If it had hit the floor, he wouldn't hesitate to make me pay for it—and I didn't mean in cash.

I might have been a big guy, but Aiden was Hulk-like. With his tats and the scar that ran along the side of his neck, he wasn't someone to mess with.

"It is a someone... I met a girl, and I can't get her out of my head."

He winced while lovingly cradling his smoothie. "Remember what happened last time with Jill? Your heart wasn't just broken; she smashed it into dust. I should know; I'm the one you made binge-watch all those Stephen King movies with you to get your mind off her. I still can't look at clowns because of that."

I frowned. "Sorry. But this is different. She's different."

He rolled his eyes and slurped more of his smoothie. I groaned because I knew he wouldn't believe me. What did it matter? Emma wanted nothing to do with me.

I was such an idiot trying to kiss her after I only just met her. She obviously liked to take things slowly. She mentioned an ex. Maybe he moved fast with her, and she later regretted it.

Maybe he cheated on her the way Jill cheated on me?

I clenched my fist. That made me want to punch the guy. I didn't even know the entire story, and I already wanted to make him the soccer ball while I kicked him around the pitch.

"That's what every guy says. Let me guess, she was sweet and shy, and you practically fell all over yourself to make her at ease?"

I tilted my head. "Yeah, what's wrong with that?"

Aiden shook his head. "That's the game they play, man. They pretend they aren't into you, that they're this meek little thing and then, bam!" He sat up quickly, almost losing his grip on his smoothie. "They screw you over."