Page 13 of Freshmeet
Her eyes stayed closed as she nodded, one of her hands wrapping around the back of my neck, pulling me into a kiss that was all teeth and tongue. Messy, messy, just like it should be.
Sarah’s breathing became labored as her grinding got more desperate. I pushed into her, giving her the pressure she was searching for. With a gasp, she broke away from my mouth, and a deep, satisfied moan fell from her lips. Our movements slowed until she stopped altogether and looked up at me with a dopey smile.
“Let me tell my friends I’m leaving, and then we can go.”
I took a step back. “Sounds good.”
She straightened her hopelessly wrinkled dress and wiped around her mouth, missing most of the smeared gloss. “Do I look okay?”
I nodded. It was dark in there—she’d be fine.
A part of me wanted her to go in there all mussed so everyone would know she already had plans for the night—and morning if I could swing it before work.
Taking a deep breath, she smiled at me and squeezed my hand. “Be right back.” She sashayed back to the party, her ass swaying, promising me all kinds of wonderful things.
Once I was alone, I leaned against the wall, trying to get a hold of my own personal excitement. I didn’t want to walk twelve blocks with a semi. That didn’t sound fun.
As I calculated how much money I’d need to shell out for books, or how many hours I was scheduled this week at all my respective jobs, I heard a few voices coming closer. Pushing off the wall, I came face to face with my little brother and two older dudes.
“Connor! There you are! Have you met Brian and Stephen?”
I shook my head, not paying too much attention to Jamie’s new friends. I was more worried about how drunk he was.
“Hey, man, you need to get him out of here,” Stephen said. “He threw up on a beer pong table, and the Prez wants him gone.” He patted my brother’s back affectionately.
“I want pancakes, Con. Like the biggest stack of them. Can you take me?”
“Sure. Uh, can we hang out here for a second? I’m waiting for someone.” As the last word left my mouth, Jamie turned and sprinted down the hill, away from all of us, yelling, “Pancakes!”
“Son of a—” I took off in a dead sprint after him, glancing over my shoulder at the party, hoping and praying the next time I ran into Sarah, she wouldn’t be pissed about me bailing on her.
I caught up with him about four blocks from my apartment, only because he’d stopped to smell some flowers planted on the edge of campus. On the edge of our very dry campus. The kind of campus that handed out a Minor in Possession charge as if it were no big deal. Jamie didn’t have the money or time for that kind of setback.
“Hey, dipshit!”
“Look at these flowers, man. I think Mom has these in her garden.”
“Yeah, she does.”
He turned his brown eyes to me. While I looked just like the bastard who left us, my little brother was my mom through and through.“Will you make me pancakes?”
“Sure, Bud. Let’s get home.”
A light mist of rain started as we stumbled the last few blocks, Jamie stopping every few feet to tell me how much fun he had and how happy he was that we were in college together.
“It’s so cool you live above a bar. The walk home from All You Can Drink will be nothing.”
There was a high-pitched shriek, and I tensed, quickly taking a step toward the alley next to the Welkum. There was no way I could turn away from a person in trouble. Before I made it a foot from my front door, five drunk ass, cackling women spilled out of the alley.
Safe. They’re safe.
Heart still racing, I pushed open the outside door. “You forget, I won’t be doing all you can drink, I’ll be working it.”
He frowned and looked up the stairwell that led to my apartment. “Oh yeah. Working sucks.”
I huffed. What the hell did he know about it? Sure, he worked for our uncle’s crew doing drywall or whatever else we could get him to focus on for a few hours, but that was just a summer gig. During the school year, he was supposed to focus on studying and being a normal kid.
That ship had sailed a long time ago for me, but Jamie had been able to have a relatively normal high school experience full of proms and homecomings, so I wanted him to have the same in college. If that meant joining a fraternity, so be it.
