Chapter Three
SCOUT
Iwoke up alone. I had a half memory of Trey slipping out of bed earlier and saying something about having shit to organize, so at least I knew he wasn’t actively avoiding me. I couldn’t decide if I was feeling better or worse about the whole Christmas thing today.
Better, because I hated keeping secrets from Trey, even though him knowing the situation had him looking at me like I was the last puppy at the shelter.
But worse, because Trey and I had fought yesterday and we hadn’t resolved things. We’d muttered apologies last night and shared a bed, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that the slate wasn’t clean. I’d disappointed Trey, and maybe disappointed myself too. I didn’t know anymore.
Sad boy Christmas was going to suck. And fuck Trey for coming up with that name, because now it was stuck in my head playing on a loop.
I pulled on my robe and went downstairs to make myself some coffee. At least I’d be able to drink it in relative peace.
Except… something was seriously wrong. With the fact there were people in the living room in general, and with Marty O’Brien specifically.
Why was he still here, and why was his boyfriend, Dalton, up a ladder hanging Christmas decorations in the living room while Marty shouted directions?
And why was Marty decorating a tree—and where the hell had it come from? I was almost afraid to ask, but because it was Marty, I was also afraid not to. If the campus police were going to turn up asking questions about missing spruce pines, I wanted to know what I was denying.
“Why do we have a tree?” I asked him suspiciously. “And weren’t you meant to leave yesterday?”
Marty shrugged. “Time is just a construct, bro. And we need decorations in the background. Otherwise the pictures of Squirrel in his new Christmas sweater will look sad and lame.”
From anyone else I would have thought it was over-the-top, but coming from Marty, it was honestly on-brand. Of course he’d wait until he was meant to be leaving to decorate, because he was an idiot.
“You’re taking them down before you go,” I said. “And putting them back in… wherever they came from.”
“The Dollar Store,” Marty said cheerfully, somehow tangling himself in a garland.
“Well, just clean them up then,” I said. “I’m the last person in the house, and I don’t want to do it.”
Dalton climbed down from the ladder and helped Marty untangle himself.
“Don’t worry, Scout. We get it. You hate fun,” Marty said, snapping the garland. “Whoops. Do we have tape?”
“We’ll clear it all up,” Dalton said. “Promise.”
I shot a narrow look at James Two. “Didn’t you leave?”
He ate a sugar cookie from a tin. “Forgot my AirPods.”
Whatever. I didn’t care.
“Are you done with the ladder yet?” Briar asked, sashaying into the living room with his arms full of fairy lights.
“Why are you involved in this?” I asked suspiciously. Briar was even less of a group project activity kind of guy than I was.
He shrugged. “Because it’s for Squirrel. Of course I’m helping.”
Which made sense, but was it wrong that I was jealous of a dog?
I left them to it and went into the kitchen in search of coffee.
Fuck. I’d been looking forward to the house being almost empty today, and now it’d be full of guys who should have already left but who were hanging around to help Marty stage a photo shoot for his dog.
Which was exactly the kind of stupid thing that always derailed Marty’s plans, but usually the rest of us did our best not to get caught up in his bullshit.
I wasn’t sure why they were all so invested today.
I just wanted a quiet day to feel miserable yet validated, okay, and to really ease my way into the deeper misery that awaited me at the end of the week. I’d been planning on putting on my velvet smoking jacket and wandering the house like a Victorian ghost. It was the sad boy Christmas way.
Knox was in the kitchen. He took one look at my expression, forced a smile, and then backed away.
Good.
Knox got me.
I made my coffee and then took it out onto the front porch to drink.
The weather was cold and bitter and gloomy, which suited my mood more than the cheery warmth inside the house.
I checked the weather app on the phone, and saw that yeah, it was about to get nasty.
Maybe the guys weren’t just hanging around to help Marty with Squirrel’s photo shoot.
Maybe they’d put off driving in the hope the storms forecast for later in the day would clear by tomorrow.
That made sense, at least. Well, apart from James Two, who had apparently braved the drive back to campus for the sake of his fucking AirPods, but I wasn’t his parent and I wasn’t in charge of his life decisions. Thank God.
The only person I was responsible for over the next few weeks was me, and at least I could be trusted not to do anything stupid.
Like lie to your boyfriend, Scout?
“Shut up,” I muttered into my cup. I hadn’t lied to Trey. I just… hadn’t kept him updated when my plans had changed. And nobody would have been any the wiser if he hadn’t busted me packing for DC.
Because, okay, sad boy Christmas wasn’t Trey’s problem.
It was a choice I’d made, and one that I would deal with myself, and that should have been the end of it.
The last thing I wanted was to put Trey in the awkward position of having to invite me to impose on his family’s Christmas just because he felt bad.
I wasn’t one of those needy, clingy boyfriends.
I didn’t need Trey to sweep in and rescue me. I was fine.
Footsteps creaked on the porch, and I looked up to discover we were having a visit from the neighbors. From Kappa Beta Rho specifically. It was Tanner, Charlie’s boyfriend. He was wearing jeans and a coat and had a sports bag slung over his shoulder.
“Hey, Scout,” he said.
“Hey. Here to pick Charlie up?”
He wrinkled his nose. “Uh, kind of? We were, um, gonna leave today, but I think it’s tomorrow now. But Kappa is locking up, so I’m staying over here.”
What was up with people changing their plans today? What were they all smoking, and why hadn’t they offered me any? I had the proper outfit and everything.
But before I could ask him, Tanner scuttled inside the house.
I finished my coffee, then pulled out my phone and texted Trey.
Where are you?
I stared at the screen for a minute then shoved the phone back in the pocket of my robe and pretended I wasn’t worried that there wasn’t a reply. And logically, I knew Trey wasn’t the kind of person who would leave someone on read just to avoid dealing with his feelings.
That was me.
I went back inside and found that somehow, while I’d been out front, even more people had filled the house. I tapped Eli, Archer’s boyfriend, on the shoulder as he walked past me carrying a six-pack. “Why are you here? Aren’t you and Archer meant to be staying at Carmichael?”
Eli fixed his gaze on a spot on the floor and said, “There were weird noises in the walls. Anyway, I gotta go. Arch needs me.” And then he bolted around me and disappeared in the direction of the main living room.
The sound of laughter floated through the air and set my nerves on edge.
How was I meant to stay in the mood for sad boy Christmas if people were going to go around being festive and cheerful?
I slipped past the living room and made it up the stairs without running into anyone else.
I showered and dressed, and I was back in our room styling my hair when my phone buzzed with a message from Trey.
Hey. Want to meet for brunch?
Huh. Trey didn’t do brunch. He claimed it was ruining two perfectly good meals. But he knew that I loved it. So maybe he felt as bad as I did, and this was his prelude to us making up.
I fired back a reply.
As long as it’s not Waffle House.
I would never. I was thinking Cafe Meow in twenty minutes?
God. Cafe Meow was Hopewell’s answer to fine dining, if the question was Is there a step up from eating from a trash can? I checked the time. Maybe if we took long enough, by the time I got back, all the strays Alpha Tau seemed to have collected would have left and I’d finally get some peace.
See you there.
I grabbed my keys and headed downstairs.
I passed Squirrel on the landing and he panted happily at me.
He was wearing a set of fake reindeer antlers and chewing on what looked like an actual antler of his own—which was seven different Inception-type levels of horrifying if you stopped to think about it.
When I got to the café, Trey was waiting inside at a table, and I slid into the seat opposite him and said, “You don’t like brunch.”
“No, but I’m choosing to think of it as late breakfast.” He slid the menu across to me.
I slid it back. “You know my order. Eggs Benedict with smoked salmon, sourdough, extra hollandaise on the side.” I glanced around at the full tables and wrinkled my nose. “It’s busy.”
Trey hummed. “Because it’s good.”
I raised an eyebrow at that. “No, it’s because it’s one step up from a Waffle House. Barely.”
Trey grinned. “Two steps. And one day I’ll force you inside a Waffle House and make you eat your words.”
It would be better than eating anything on the menu, probably, but when I opened my mouth to point that out, Trey cut me off.
“Biscuits and gravy, Scout. Biscuits and gravy.”
I let him tease me by thinking I’d never had biscuits and gravy before and wondered if this meant that last night’s fight was done with.
Unless he invited you here to break up with you because he knows you’d never cause a scene in a crowd.
I ignored the sudden cold rush of panic that flooded my chest. No, of course he hadn’t.
If he had, he wouldn’t be threatening me with Waffle House food in the future.
And also, this was Trey. He’d been putting up with my shit for literal years.
What were the chances that last night had been his breaking point?
Shit, though.
What if it had been?