Page 14 of Clichés & Curses

For the life of me, I couldn’t tell why he specifically mentioned boyfriend. But I decided not to dwell on it. ‘Nope. Don’t have one of those either.’

‘Then how are you going home?’

‘By foot,’ I gestured to my feet.

‘You mean, you’re walking back?’ he asked somewhat outrageously, alarmed by my plans.

‘Yeah,’ I confirmed. ‘My apartment isn’t too far from here—a thirty-minute walk. Tops,’ I pointed in the direction of my apartment building.

Colton seemed to be lost in his thoughts mulling over something. When he finally made up his mind, he said, ‘Let me drive you home.’

What.

‘What?’ I verbalized my thought out loud, a bit bewildered by what he had said.

I must have misheard him; there’s no way he just offered to drive me back to my apartment.

‘Let me drive you home,’ he repeated.

Turns out Ihadheard him correctly.

‘That’s not necessary,’ I told him. Sharing a class was still safe territory curse-wise, since we didn’t really have to talk to one another unless absolutely necessary. But being in a car together seemed to be pushing it a bit too far for my liking. ‘And you should already be inside, hanging out with your teammates.’

‘They can wait,’ he answered without missing a beat. ‘Come on. My car is parked over there.’ He started heading towards the fleet of cars chaotically parked on the driveway. His steps slowed down to make sure I could catch up with him.

Think of an excuse. Any excuse.

‘Are you sure about this? Won’t your girlfriend be mad?’ I argued with him. I wasn’t one to mingle in college gossip, but that didn’t mean I was too far out of the loop. And, according to the gossip floating around, rumour had it that Colton didn’t date, nor did he have a girlfriend. But that wasjusta rumor, and it didn’t hurt to at least confirm the suspicion. The last thing I wanted was to be caught up in some couple drama because of a simple friendly gesture.

‘Don’t have one,’ he confirmed, his steps never faltering.

‘Colton, you really don’t have to do this,’ I tried negotiating with him once again, throwing out one last ditch effort for him to change his mind. ‘I’m really okay with walking back.’

‘Then do it for my peace of mind,’ he answered me, his voice firm. Then, he added in a softer tone. ‘Please?’

It was the softpleasethat melted the rest of my resolve. Here was Colton, kindly offering to drive me back to my apartment. And here I was, trying to come up with excuses to reject his offer, simply because of a stupid curse.

I re-evaluated my options once again, and honestly, the idea of walking back started to sound less appealing by the second.Curse or not, I was pretty sure I could handle a short car ride with Colton.

‘Okay,’ I finally agreed. ‘Where did you park?’

Colton’s car was parked a bit further from the party venue, since he had arrived late. Whatever space that was available near the house had already been filled.

While walking to his car, I told him the name of my apartment building and the street it was located on. The building was situated on a familiar street, so I wasn’t surprised he knew where it was, without me having to navigate.

We finally reached his car, and just as I was about to open the door to the passenger seat, Colton beat me to it and opened the door for me instead.

‘Milady,’ he said with a teasing smile, a slight bow in his stance.

I wasn’t sure what he was doing, but decided there was no harm in playing along. ‘Milord,’ I answered back. His eyes lit up at my reply and my heart squeezed just a tiny bit at his reaction.

Once I got myself into the passenger seat, Colton shut the door and went over to the driver’s side. As he turned on the engine, music started playing from the car’s speakers.

And it was playing ‘Mamma Mia’.

By ABBA.

My eyes widened a bit upon recognizing the song. But then, I thought it might have come from a radio station. I tried to see what channel he was tuning into, when I saw that the song was playing from a CD. My eyes widened a bit more.

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