Chapter 2
Ground Rules
Austen
Ships passing. Fine by me. Four weeks would fly if we kept this up.
I rolled out of bed, toes landing on the narrow rug I’d measured to avoid the cracked linoleum seam. A quick shower and two pushes of the French press, three measured scoops, kettle to boil and my morning routine seemed to steady the room.
Luke’s side had settled into a state I’d classify as “organized chaos”—water bottle on the floor, stickhandling ball under the desk, notebook open to a drill diagram I could only interpret as circles and angry arrows.
We’d exchanged maybe forty words since Friday.
Pleasantries. Logistics. The verbal equivalent of nodding across a crowded hallway.
I kept my gaze on the coffee bloom instead. Numbers made sense; curves on a sheet of ice did not.
At 7:08, mug in hand, I locked the door behind me and headed for Ridgeway.
Ridgeway Hall smelled like whiteboard cleaner and over-brewed tea. I slid into the second row of Dr. Renner’s lecture a minute before the bell. Proofs flowed, Hagoromo Fulltouch chalk flew across the board, my pen keeping tempo.
An hour later I claimed a carrel on the top floor.
The desk light flickered until I smacked the switch—three times for consistency—then settled into homework.
Because Dr. Renner had assigned a stack of problems for us to complete by the next class period.
Outside the window, a warm drizzle drifted sideways across the quad, slicking the early autumn leaves.
Somewhere under that gray sky, Luke was blocking pucks and pretending the humidity didn’t matter.
My phone buzzed.
Maya: lunch? 12:15, Blue Mug.
I typed with one hand, the other scribbling a boundary condition.
Me: Can do. Need ten quiet minutes first.
Maya: define quiet.
Me: Quiet = no hockey gear, no AC drone, no people levitating a mini-fridge down the hallway.
Maya: so…library steps?
Me: Deal.
I finished the problem set, checked it thrice, and jogged downstairs.
Maya waited on the wide stone steps, baseball cap pulled low, glasses perched on her head. She handed me a to-go cup before I said a word.
“Iced white chocolate mocha,” she declared. “Because you look like you slept in Ridgeway Hall and it’s eighty degrees out.”
“You know me, took a nap and dreamed in LaTeX,” I admitted.
She grimaced sympathy. “So, roommate?”
I exhaled, taking the cold cup. “Exists. Tall, hockey, polite. Also takes up space that should be mine.”
“Luke Carter.” She dug in her pocket for lip balm.
“Saw the team’s Insta earlier. They were filming goalie drills at dawn.
He’s kinda hunky. If you like someone who is…
” She dug out her phone and opened the school’s Instagram account and started reading, “’Six-foot-two, 220 pounds of solid muscle from what I can tell.
Short brown hair and brown eyes,” she said as she zoomed in on his face.
“Is that his athletic profile or are you looking at his dating app?”
“Oh, is he on Grindr?” she asked
“I wouldn’t know,” I said rolling my eyes. “And I doubt he’s gay. And even if he was, I doubt he’d go for someone like me. We’re very different. Anyway, changing topics, housing promised Luke four weeks, then they can move people around and—fingers crossed—get us our singles back.”
“You file for a move?”
“No. I let the jock do it.” I nudged a pebble off the step with my sneaker. “Transfer paperwork comes up, scholarship office notices, and I’m the cost-intensive kid complaining about freebies.”
“Scholarship is housing-inclusive. You’re entitled.”
“Entitled is a loaded word when you don’t pay full freight.”
She squinted at me. “Translation: you’d rather recalibrate than risk notice.”
I lifted a shoulder. Confirmation enough.
We walked toward Blue Mug, shoes scuffing on the pavement. Maya matched my pace, deliberate and steady.
“You like him?” she asked.
“I’ve collected approximately twenty minutes of data. He labels fridge shelves.”
“That’s bordering on soulmate territory for you.”
I elbowed her, gentle. “Funny.”
We ducked inside the café’s air-conditioned blur of espresso and indie guitar. Lines moved fast; campus noon rush. I grabbed a turkey wrap, Maya a lentil soup. No seats open, so we claimed a standing counter by the window.
She blew on her spoon. “So, what’s the actual problem with him as a roomie? Space? Noise? Or that he’s an unknown variable?”
“Unknown variable,” I echoed. “My room was fixed; now it’s fuzzy logic.”
“From what I remember of calculus, variables can become constants,” she said, eyes grinning over the rim of her cup.
I broke the wrap in half, less hungry than restless. “Constants take time. Also, he smells like hockey pads.”
“He showers eventually. Or should I explain to him the necessity of soap and water?”
“Sure thing, Dr. Chen.” A laugh escaped before I could stop it. Relief tasted like oregano and too much student-loan caution. I swallowed. “I’ll adapt.”
“From your mouth to Sun Wukong’s ears.”
“Really, the monkey king? From what I remember, he’s a trickster god.”
“More mischievous than trickster. I think he’s just misunderstood. Like someone else I know,” she opened her eyes widely, creased her brow, and tilted her head in my direction.
“I’m not misunderstood. I’m perfectly understood by those who possess more logic than a testosterone-fueled meathead.”
“Have you actually talked to him? Beyond ‘your shelf, my shelf, goodnight’?”
“We’ve exchanged enough information for cohabitation purposes.”
“Austen.” She set down her spoon. “That’s not talking. That’s a terms-of-service agreement.”
“I wasn’t aware roommates required emotional bandwidth.”
“They don’t. But you’re already cataloging his sleep schedule and shower habits.” She raised an eyebrow. “That’s more attention than you gave your last three lab partners combined.”
“Survival metrics. Entirely practical.”
“Mmm hmm.” The sound carried an entire thesis of skepticism. “Just promise me you’ll say more than ten words to him before the semester ends.”
“I’ll consider twelve if he stops leaving his stickhandling ball in the middle of the floor.”
She saluted with the soup spoon. “Text me updates. Especially if he offers a private stickhandling lesson.”
I beat Luke back to the room.
The chill hit first—someone had set the window unit at arctic blast. I spun the dial down to low, then faced the room. His gear bag was open on top of his desk, gloves drying over a vent. A faint rubber-sweat mix hung in the air, familiar from every gym corridor on campus.
I stepped around the stickhandling ball in the middle of the floor, “accidentally” toe-poking it until it rolled under his bed.
Then, I turned to my desk.
It was too cluttered. The messiness was making my skin itch. I rearranged immediately: office supplies on the left, laptop centered, calculators on the right,—aligned parallel to the edge—and all of my writing utensils nicely stored in a metal pencil holder—writing tips pointed down.
The act slowed my heart to its usual cadence.
It was an old reflex, a hangover from the system.
When you grow up sleeping in bedrooms that belong to other people’s kids, or in group homes where privacy is a theoretical concept, you learn to keep your perimeter tight.
If your things are scattered, they’re vulnerable.
If they are aligned, cataloged, and locked down, they are yours.
I ran a finger along the edge of the stapler. Perfect alignment.
For tonight, at least, I controlled this variable.
Then came the heavy artillery. I pulled a massive hardbound book from my bag and dropped it onto the wood surface with a thud that made the bedsprings vibrate. Advanced Topology. Dr. Aris Thorne had warned us that her thesis requirements would make grown men weep. I intended to be the exception.
The door latch clicked. Luke walked in, hair damp from a shower. I refused to look at his naked torso, but I stole a glimpse, anyway.
“Hey,” he said.
I raised a hand. “You survived practice and your first day of class.”
“Barely. Harper skated us after scrimmage. The ice felt soft with this humidity.” He toed off sneakers, noticing the glove on the vent. “Sorry about the smell. Needs to dry or it rots.”
“It’s fine.” I nudged my chair under the desk. “Vent’s communal property.”
He grinned as if that was a joke, though I’d meant it literally. “I’ll crack the window a minute. Let some real air in.”
The sash squealed open the whole six inches we were able to open the windows. Warm, damp air slashed in; the glove fluttered. Luke braced a textbook against the sill to keep it from slamming shut.
I pressed save on my code file, realized I’d done no work since entering. “Got class in twenty. Mind if I change?”
“Do your thing.” He grabbed a protein shake from the fridge and drank half without breathing. Then he glanced at my polo shirt and dress pants—slate gray, low on style, high on function. “You presenting?”
“TA session. They expect us to dress professionally.” I smoothed the collar.
“Looks sharp.” He said it casually, like stating the hallway color. Compliment or observation? Hard to tell. Either way it unsettled.
I buried my nose in my textbook, gripping the edges like a steering wheel. Behind me, the wardrobe door creaked. The soft whump of a damp towel hitting the floor followed.
I didn’t turn around. I stared at a complex derivative, willing the numbers to make sense, but my brain was entirely focused on the acoustic data behind me: denim sliding over skin, the click of a belt buckle, the snap of a fresh T-shirt being shaken out.
Finally, I heard the creaking sound of his box springs as he sat back on his bed.
I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding.
Cardiovascular beats pulsed from his earbuds, faint but insistent. Luke bounced a rubber ball off the wall—tap, catch, tap—keeping rhythm with the track. My eye twitched at the disruption, or maybe just the proximity, but he stopped after three and pocketed the ball.