richpez for mae

5

Joey had woken up late. The training from the night before had killed him off and Joey fell asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow when he arrived back at his dorm. Unfortunately, he was so tired that he fell asleep with his phone in his hand, dropping it on the mattress when he fell asleep and rolled on top of it. This meant that he was muffling the sound of his alarms so he slept through them all. He only woke when his phone started buzzing from under his torso, deliriously grabbing it and pulling the phone to his ear.

"Hello?" He grumbled groggily.

"Hey man, its Brian. I was just wondering where you were, the lectures going to start any second now."

Joeys eyes grew wide and his heart leapt from his chest, pulling the phone away from his face to see that it was 8:59 and his lecture would start incredibly soon and he wasn't there. He felt a wave of nervous nausea overtake his body as he shot out of bed, rushing to Brian that he had slept in and would be there as soon as he could before hanging up and rushing around his room. He threw on the first items of clothes he could find, being some boxers, grey jogger pants, and a red plain t-shirt and ran to the bathroom to quickly brush his teeth. He grabbed his rucksack with his notepad inside, his phone and his dorm room key before sprinting out of the room. He ran down the stairs and flew out of the main doors, praying that he was going in the right direction and that he would remember which corridors to go down in the building to get to his lecture. His body was running on pure adrenaline, his legs moving faster than they had ever moved before until he reached the building, throwing the door open and running down the corridor.

He was nearly there. He just had to turn left at the end of the corridor and he would be there, albeit late, he would make it only being a few minutes late. Joey skidded around the corner, but only when he turned the corner did he see a small brunette coming straight towards him. He jerked his body to the right, trying to avoid the person coming towards him. He thankfully missed the girl but his arm knocked the coffee cup from her hand, spilling on him and falling to the ground as if it was slow motion. Joey almost immediately came to a stop, being hit with a burning sensation and realising that the girls coffee was in fact very hot now running down the side of his body.

"Hey what the fuck man watch where you're going!" The girl growled angrily as they both turned around to face each other. Their eyes grew wide when they realised who they were talking to, and the girls face immediately softened and grew into concern.

-

Lauren's Fridays were quite calm, not needing to be at her first lecture until 9:30 and having no early morning training on Fridays. This meant that she could sleep in, waking up at the same time as Julia and they both could eat breakfast together and walk to their lecture in good time.

"I feel like I barely saw you yesterday." Julia sighed, leaving the cafeteria, coffee in hand, as they walked to the Walgreen Drama Center. "How was your day?"

"So busy. I can't even remember most of it. You?" She replies, and Julia shrugged.

"Not too bad. Just lectures and then did some basement arts stuff."

After a short walk, they reached the building and headed inside. There was a huge staircase opposite the doors that could take them to the second and third floors, and the girls stopped in front of it.

"I'm just going to head upstairs to grab a book that I left in a lecture yesterday, meet me in M113?" Julia asked, already starting up the stairs.

"See you there."

Not in a rush, Lauren sauntered through the long corridors, trying to sip her coffee but burning her tongue in the process, and scrolling through Twitter on her phone. She was so invested in the screen that she didn't hear the heavy footsteps advancing on her from the adjacent corridor of a boy who was running very late.

Suddenly, a tall man came rushing round the corner, heading straight towards her tiny frame. She froze in panic as the man quickly swung around her and slowed as fast as he could. She thought she was safe from impact until she felt his arm hit her coffee cup, sending it hurtling to the ground. Her mood quickly changed from calm to panic to anger as she stood in the corridor with this wrecking ball of a man who had suddenly ruined her morning and gotten rid of her coffee.

"Hey what the fuck man watch where you're going!" Lauren shouted, turning towards the man in question, but immediately softened when she met his bright hazel eyes staring right back at her. Without thinking, she relaxed her shoulders from when she shrugged them preparing to be hit, and suddenly saw the coffee stain on his clothes.

"Oh my god, I am so sorry!" Joey exclaimed nervously, worry spreading across his face as Lauren immediately stepped forwards. "I slept in and I'm super late for my lecture, I'm so sorry Lauren."

All the anger dispersed from her body when she heard him call her by her name, instead, worry residing in her head as she looked at the coffee stain on his clothes.

"Don't worry about it, but are you okay? That's boiling hot coffee." She asked, seeing his toned abs through the loose fitted t-shirt that was currently sticking to his body from the coffee. Her mind flashed back to seeing him emerging from the pool the night before, knowing exactly what was under that shirt, but quickly shook her head. She thought about moving a hand to his body and pulling the shirt from sticking to his stomach but decided against it at the last second.

"It hurts like a bitch! But I deserve it, I shouldn't have been running and I almost hit you. Are you okay?"

He placed a hand on her arm and Lauren almost forgot how to breathe. She hurriedly tried to formulate a sentence in her head.

"Yes... I'm fine. I'm just more concerned about you and your new coffee-stained clothes and burns. Is there anything I can do?"

She met his eyes again and relaxed slightly.

"No, no, this was my fault. I'm so sorry about the coffee but I'm running so late to class right now. But the next time I see you, I'll buy you a coffee to apologise for this one."

Before she could even muster up a sentence to say back to him, his hand left her arm and he darted off to his lecture, leaving Lauren alone in the corridor with her empty coffee cup and the warm feeling from where his hand had been on her arm.

She suddenly had butterflies in her stomach thinking about what Joey had said about taking her out for coffee. She thought about them chatting away to each other, mindlessly flirting, walking through Michigan hand in hand. And suddenly her mind was racing thinking about all the things her and Joey could do together in the future.

She had never felt this strongly about a person before, especially one she barely knew. For all she knew, he could be an asshole. A perv. A murderer, even. But from the way he had spoken to her and the way she reacted, she knew her feelings were too great to ignore.