Boarding with the Bad Boy [COMPLETE + BONUS published edition]

MacMillan

                 

MacMillan is hot with summer and moving bodies. Boys are hanging around the common areas and hallways, catching up after summers on Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard. I keep my bag high and my head low, trying to be inconspicuous and hoping no one catches on to the trespassing girl in their midst. Whether by luck or happy accident, I make it to 202 unnoticed. As I lift my hand to knock on the door—it just seems wrong to waltz in there like I own the place; what if he's naked?—a tall, skinny guy steps out of the bathroom across the hall. I glance up in surprise. He's wearing nothing but a towel around his waist and his light eyes pin me to where I stand, a look of confusion over his features.

            Sam? I wonder. I'm about to ask when the boy looks down at my fist against the door, a grin of understanding blooming on his face.

            "Sam's out, but he should be back soon. Go ahead and settle in."

I look up at him, surprised both by the fact that he's so quickly figured out the admissions mistake and how casually he's accepting it. Maybe this will be easier than expected.

            I give him a grateful smile and twist the knob. It moves without my needing to unlock it, and I'm about to push open the door when the guy says, "Or, you know, you could take whatever costumes and toys you have in that duffel and come down to my room while you wait." He wags his eyebrows at me suggestively and a boulder of understanding settles in my chest.

            "Do you think I'm...?" He can't actually believe I'm a prostitute, right? I shake the thought. No way the students can have prostitutes in the dorms.

"Evans' flavor of the week?" He laughs at my repulsed reaction. "Aw, don't give me that look, babe. No matter what he's telling you, Sam doesn't do the boyfriend thing. But I've always been good at picking up the mess he leaves in his wake."

            "Is that really something to be proud of?" I challenge.

            The guy shrugs and heads past me, toward—presumably—his own dorm.

"If you change your mind, you know where to find me." He flashes a predatory grin before opening the door to his room. I can see from where I stand that it's 208. Looks like I'll be avoiding that side of the hall as much as possible.

"Not a good start," I mutter, turning the knob to my room and opening the door slowly to find... no one. The room is clearly occupied; half the space is covered in a guy's paraphernalia, and it smells of male deodorant and surf. It actually smells, well, sexy, but the fact that a stranger in the hall just referred to me as Sam's 'flavor of the week' and presumed I had prepared costumes and toys for our rendezvous helps me feel more disgust than attraction toward my new roommate.

With Sam out, I decide I ought to use the opportunity to snoop. I'm not unpacking anything yet; I still don't know if he's going to be cool with a female dorm mate—even temporarily. It's not worth having to repack everything if he kicks me out.

            I drop my duffel on the bed against the right-hand wall of the room and start exploring Sam's. His bed is rumpled and unmade, with a pair of board shorts and a t-shirt slung over the foot of it. A skateboard leans against the desk and a couple hats with logos I've never seen take up the majority of hooks inside his open wardrobe. I pluck one of them from the bunch and pull it over my hair, admiring myself in the room's built-in mirror. So this is what I'm doing now, I think. Basically breaking and entering and stealing hot boys' hats. Hope you're proud, dad.  

            I'm just pulling one of Sam's photos toward me when the door swings open. I spin, dropping the picture and looking exactly like what I am: a girl out of her depth, caught in the act of snooping through her new roommate's things.

            "Yo, Sam," the newcomer is saying, his eyes on his phone. He stops when he looks up and sees me, laughing awkwardly. "You're not Sam."

            "I am definitely not," I confirm, regaining a modicum of composure and stepping closer to my side of the room. The boy glances between me and the duffel on the bed.

            "You the new guy's sister or something?"

            I shrug. "Or something, yeah."

      "Wait a sec," he says, narrowing his eyes conspiratorially. "Don't tell me you're the new guy's girlfriend. You are, aren't you? Oh shit. Evans is going to have a field day."

      I shake my head, annoyed. "Trust me. I'm not the new guy's girlfriend. And what the hell does that mean, 'Evans is going to have a field day'?"

The kid has the decency to look abashed at the tone of my voice. "Damn girl. I wasn't trying to offend. Just saying that Evans has a reputation of being something of a ladies' man around this campus and you would be right up his alley. And then, knowing that he was already kind of pissed at getting a last-minute roommate...whatever...I just thought, you know..."

He trails off and I finish his sentence for him. "You just thought that he'd go for me and because I'm a hopeless girl, I'd fall straight into his arms."

"I didn't say anything like that!" He protests.

"You may as well have."

"You haven't seen Sam." He raises his eyebrows.

"Trust me, based off what I know about Sam, it wouldn't make a difference."

"I like you," the kid says, appraising me openly.  "I'm Spencer." He holds out a hand that I take.

"People usually do." I grin at him. "Logan."

"Nice to meet you, Logan. I was gonna grab Evans to get dinner, but it looks like he headed there without me. Asshole." Spencer gives me a crooked, 'what are you gonna do about it?' grin. I tack another point against Sam for being a shit friend.

"I'll go with you," I say, at the same time my stomach lets out a veritable roar of hunger. Spencer looks at my torso, his eyes widening.

"Sounds like you probably should," he says. "Onward, Logan!" Then he marches out of my room and into the hall.