Page 10 of Pinkie Promise

Carter U Cheer Squad Car Wash, this Sunday!

I roll my shoulders and almost smile as I slide the flyer into my pocket, right next to the keys to my truck.

Good thing that I’ve got a car.

Chapter 3

Fallon

You know what’s even crazier than hosting a car wash on Frat Row?

Hosting a car wash in the fall.

While it’s raining.

“Hmm,” Aisling says, cocking her head to one side as we observe the scene in front of us from the opposite side of the road.

It’s a stormy Sunday afternoon meaning that we were originally going to cancel our fundraiser, but nothing motivates the frat guys like the prospect of unabashedly staring at cheerleaders. They’ve set up a portable gazebo-canopy for each car to drive through, one at a time. It means that the team can wash the cars without getting pneumonia, while the frat boys sit on the sidelines, watching open-mouthed and soaked to the bone.

I tilt my head as I watch one guy snuggle up under a wet Carter U blanket.

Aisling switches the umbrella that she’s holding over us from her hand to mine, and she snaps a picture on her phone to post on the team’s Instagram page. I have to physically restrain her from hitting the post button when I see that she’s captioned itCum rain or shine!

Technically I should be over there with the rest of the squad right now, but I’m still feeling a little sulky over getting benched.

Although working this wash would kind of be good practice, my brain suggests.For when you go for that job at the–

I quickly shake the thought away, bringing myself back to the present.

“The queue for the wash is like thirty cars long,” I say, staring in disbelief down the block as another vehicle joins the queue. And these are reallynice cars because the majority of Carter U’s student population typically doesn’t struggle when it comes to money.

Aisling must sense my vehicular lusting-slash-daily neurotic finance spiral because she starts adjusting my bow and stroking my hair, her usual caretaking methods of choice.

“You know that no-one else knows the situation that you’re in, right? You don’t need to worry about… image, or whatever,” she says to me quietly as the current car leaves the canopy and is immediately replaced by another. These cars are so expensive that I feel like I’m in a Formula 1 fixing pit.

I know that no-one other than Aisling and Connell are aware of my money troubles. Or my grant troubles. Or my at-home troubles. And that’s exactly the way that I need for it to be. Some people say that a problem shared is a problem halved but I know the reality of the situation: people either use your weaknesses against you, or you become a burden that they need to rid themselves of.

This is why I try to never bring them up to Ash, but she always seems to know exactly what I’m thinking damn it!

“Ooh, this one ishuge,” she says suddenly, and both of our attentions divert from the row of dazzled frat guys to the large truck currently driving up the wrong side of the road.

I blink at it in confusion as it heads straight towards us.

It isn’t brand new like most of the other ones. It’s big and gnarly and I think that I like it the most.

“Uh, do you think that they’re trying to cut in?” I ask, raising an eyebrow as the truck begins to brake. I glance briefly across the road, grateful to see that the frat guys haven’t noticed yet.

An oestrogen-shimmer radiates out of my roommate. “I hope so,” she purrs, entranced by the prospect of a live scuffle.

I’m about to hair-swish and selflessly say “I’ll deal with it” when the truck parks up right in front of us and I finally see who’s sat in the driver’s seat.

Readingmy book.

“Oh my God,” I whisper, as I watch him cock up a leg and flip to the next page. I catch sight of a pink sticky-tab through the rain-washed window and my fingers fly up to smother a gasp. “Ash, please can you go back over to the tent while I get rid of this, um, this…” I gesture vaguely toward the death-trap in front of us, while handing her the umbrella again.

Aisling streaks across the road. My eyes don’t leave the truck.

Sat in the driver’s seat is the guy who almost knocked me unconscious when I was flyering in the sports building at the start of this week. He has dark messy hair and shoulders the size of Colorado. And I know that they’re the size of Colorado because that’s where I’m from.

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