College [c. hood]

12

For two weeks, all Calum could think about was what Ashton had said at the party about Alyssa.

Calum knew he could be right, by the way Alyssa acted around him sometimes. But he knew he was also leading her on by never putting a stop to it.

It was already awful that Alyssa still had no idea that Calum is taken.

He's been trying to seem like he's uninterested, but it's not working.

Part of Calum thinks it because deep down, he is interested.

That's what scared him. Even though he has already said he's not sure he's in love with Danielle anymore, he couldn't leave her. And he sure as hell wouldn't cheat on her.

But why couldn't he leave her? He had no idea. He just couldn't.

Maybe she was what he knows, what he's comfortable with. Maybe it's because she's the closest person to him. Maybe it's because she's something that reminds him of home.

Either way he was screwed.

He was also not paying any attention to his professor as he taught, since this was all that was on his mind.

When class was dismissed, Calum shot out of his seat and rushed through the halls and out the main doors to cross the parking lot towards the residence building.

Calum didn't say anything to Alyssa when leaving class. He just ran out.

He couldn't face her.

Once Calum was back in his room, he sat at his desk with his head in his hands.

He couldn't believe he was losing his mind at college over relationships instead of the coursework. Yes, the work was stressing him out, but he spent more time worrying and thinking about his relationships than he did with his homework and assignments.

"Hey." Michael says, startling Calum and making him jump.

"You scared me." Calum heavily breathes, looking over at Michael.

"Why so jumpy?" Michael asks, chuckling at Calum.

"I'm stressed." Calum simply states, not wanting to discuss this right now.

Michael raises his eyebrows, intrigued as he waits for Calum to elaborate, "About?"

"Stuff." Calum shrugs.

"Now I'm interested." Michael replies, taking a seat on Calum's bed.

"You're so annoying." Calum groans, his head falling back in frustration as his hands cover his face.

"But you know what? I'm having a great time at college not hiding another girl from my girlfriend. Now talk to me. You'll literally go crazy if you sit here alone thinking about it." Michael replies.

Calum sighs, "I've already sort of talked about it with Ashton. I don't want to talk about it again."

"So... You're going to break up with Danielle?" Michael asks.

"Dude!" Calum exclaims, looking over at him.

Michael rolls his eyes, "Hey, I'm trying to help you. I know Alyssa is interested in you, I can tell. I've told you before. Ashton told me he could see it too. Now, you wouldn't be this stressed if you weren't interested, so..."

"Honestly, I don't know what's going on with me right now. I need to talk to Danielle. And I need to talk to Alyssa. But I can't." Calum replies.

"Look, I know we've had conversations like this before. I know you've talked to Ashton before. But you have to talk to Alyssa and Dani and tell them no matter what you can or can't do." Michael tells him, standing up.

Once Michael left the room, Calum groans before hitting his head against the desk multiple times.

"Stop that!" Michael calls, walking by Calum's door.

Calum gets up and walks straight out of the room as if he was on a mission.

"Hey, man. What's up?" Kurtis asks as Calum walks by him in the hall.

Calum barely acknowledges him, just dismissing him with a wave as he gets in the elevator, heading to the third floor.

He continuously knocks on Alyssa and Talia's door, waiting for somebody to answer.

"What the fu- Calum?" Alyssa says, smiling once she sees him.

She closes her notebook, holding it close to her chest. Though Calum was one of her closest friends here, there was no way that white marble notebook would end up in his hands.

"What's up, what're you doing here?" She smiles, opening the door wider for him to enter the room.

"Uh- I... I'm not really sure." Calum replies.

"Oh, well, I could put Netflix on again, or we can go eat, or on a walk maybe?" Alyssa suggests, hoping Calum would want to do something with her, as she tries to subtly hold her notebook behind her back.

Calum nods, "Let's just watch something. You can keep writing in that mysterious notebook of yours."

He couldn't help but smirk as he heads to her room, and Alyssa sheepishly smiles pulling the notebook out from behind her.

She didn't acknowledge the notebook comment, she just tucked the notebook away before pulling her laptop out.

"You know, I wasn't kidding. You could keep writing or whatever you're doing, if you want. I just wanted to be around a good friend." Calum tells her.

"I'd rather spend time with you." She quietly mumbles, joining him on the bed.

She starts the sign into her laptop, but Calum couldn't stop think about her comment. He excused himself to the bathroom but all he did was stare at himself in the mirror.

"Dude, get yourself together." Calum whispers to himself, staring himself down in the mirror.

Alyssa keeps saying things that scare Calum. They could be taken the wrong way. The things that she does could even be taken the wrong way. He knows if she knew he was dating Danielle she'd never touch him again, even if it's the friendliest way possible.

He takes a deep breath, before opening to door to see Talia sitting at the small table in the shared space.

"Oh, Talia, I didn't know you were here. It took a while for somebody to answer I just thought only Alyssa was here." Calum chuckles, somewhat startled to see Talia now at the table.

"I almost answered the door when you showed up. I was asleep and I almost had to." She lightly chuckles, "Man, when that girl starts writing she can't stop. I swear she's transported to a different world. Do you think she'd ever say what she writes about though? God only knows."

That's how Calum found out what that notebook was. He didn't know Alyssa was a writer. He had no idea. They were both studying business. If she was a writer, why wasn't she in a program related to that?

Calum went along as if he knew what the hell she was talking about, "Right, yeah. Well, I gotta get back to her, see ya."

Talia just smiles as Calum goes back into Alyssa's room.

She was curled up under her blankets and her laptop pulled close. It was paused on the next episode of Brooklyn Nine-Nine that she needed to watch.

Calum debated just turning around and walking right out of her room. He knew that getting into that bed with her once again wasn't going to help anything, but he did it anyways.

__________

hey I'm so fuckin sick I feel like garbage don't make out w older hot boys if u know they're sick learn from my mistakes