Choose me anyway

I can never live with boys

“What the fuck?” A girl yells out in disbelief. Her head snaps backwards.

One second, she is standing with a cluster of girls and football players, drinking cheap beer from a plastic cup. The next, half of that beer is on the floor and a polished brunette has a fist twisted into her hair.

“You just kissed my boyfriend? You bitch.” The brunette yells at the blonde girl whose hair she’s currently pulling, practically spitting the words into her face.

The blonde reaches behind her and closes both hands around the brunette’s wrist.

“Which one is your boyfriend again?”

The brunette blinks.

The blonde looks around the room as far as her current position allows. “Also, who are you?”

“I’m Jenny.” The brunette gives the blonde strands another vicious pull. “And you just made out with Jake, my boyfriend, you slut.”

She loosens her grip just enough to point across the room at the footballer at the pool table, who is now standing frozen.

The blonde squints her eyes, turns to the ripped guy, “Oh.” She lifts her fingers in a small, innocent wave. “Hi….”

Then she turns back to Jenny with the beginnings of a smile. “He kissed me first. And stop calling me a slut. It’s becoming repetitive.”

I’m already moving.

Not because some noble instinct compels me to stop a college cat fight. The blonde being publicly scalped is, unfortunately, my roommate. And I promised her sister I would drive her home safely, preferably with the same amount of hair she arrived with.

“Okay.” I cross the room in three strides. “Everyone let go of everyone.”

The brunette finally releases the blonde’s hair as I step in between them. A dozen phones are already raised around us. Nothing inspires collective campus spirit like the possibility of two hot girls committing assault in public.

The brunette notices the audience too. Her gaze jumps from the phones to me, then to blondie behind my shoulder.

Jenny clearly has her revenge, considering how the blonde is still rubbing her head, checking for permanent damage.

There, problem solved.

My mistake.

“Wait.” The blonde leans around me and catches Jenny by the ponytail.

She gives it one sharp, retaliatory yank. Jenny gasps helplessly.

“He’s a great kisser, by the way. I assume that’s why you kept him around.”

Jenny stares at her. I stare at her.

“Maddy,” I say through my teeth. That’s the crazy blonde’s name, by the way.

My hand flies to grab her wrist but she doesn’t let Jenny’s hair go. “We’re leaving.”

She tears her wrist from my hand and steps around me. “No, wait. Jenny, right? Jenny should know the rest.”

“No,” I tell her firmly. “Maddy. Let g—”

“Your fucking boyfriend asked me to blow him in the bathroom.” She cuts in. She is breathing hard, but her voice comes out perfectly clear.

Maddy faces her attacker with her hair dishevelled, beer staining the front of her white top and a strange brightness in her eyes.

Every conversation around us dies.

The phones swivel towards Jake, now lowering the pool cue.

Maddy points at him without breaking eye contact with Jenny.

“Twice, actually. The second time he said please, which was actually cute.”

“Maddy,” I warn again.

“Lucky for you, I told him he could suck himself off instead. So instead of taking it on me, go tell your cheating boyfriend to keep his dick in his pants.”

Jenny yanks her silky long hair out of Maddy’s grip, turns to Jake now too. “Oh, you fucker.”

“Exactly,” Maddy says, almost encouragingly. “Fucker. Now we’re getting somewhere.”

Jake raises both hands. “Jenny, it isn’t what— I don’t know what she’s talking about—”

Maddy glances towards one of the phones pointed at her.

“And whoever’s filming this, get my good side. My hair has already been through enough.”

A guy nearby bursts out laughing.

Then she looks back at Jenny.

“So next time you want to confront me in public, break up with your cheating boyfriend first. Then you and I can talk.”

Before I can get hold of her and drag her out of this party, Maddy spins around and heads for the front door.

“Maddy.” I catch her hand.

She tears it from mine without even looking back.

Jenny finds one final reserve of anger behind us. “Crazy bitch! I’m never talking to you.”

Maddy stops.

Slowly, she turns around. She looks exactly like her name. Mad. But not the angry mad. The serial-killer unhinged madness that probably precedes arsons with a smile.

“Didn’t anyone tell you?” A wicked smirk curves on her lips. “I’m the crazy bitch around here.”

Then she walks out without another glance.

I drag a hand down my face.

Yep. That blonde is the crazy bitch who lives ten feet from my bedroom.

————

Nate appears beside me, still watching the front door. “You’re not going after her?”

I shake my head, take a slow drink of my beer and pull out my phone, texting our house group chat.

Will: Maddy, get an Uber. I’m not chasing your ass across campus.

The replies arrive immediately.

Lizzie: What happened?

Will: Your sister just bolted from the party. Can’t find her outside.

Nate: Maddy where r u????

Lizzie: Maddy, WTF??? Will????

I ignore Lizzie’s final message.

Maddy is a freshman, not a lost child. If she is capable of making out with random men whose names she does not know, she is capable of ordering an Uber. It is not as though she needs the money. Her boots alone probably cost more than most people spend at this party over a semester.

Nate nudges my shoulder. “Dude. Lizzie asked you to keep an eye on her.”

“Not my problem. I did.”

“You lost her.”

“She left of her own accord.”

I lift the beer to my mouth again, ending the discussion.

Thank God, Nate can’t continue pretending he has any moral superiority, because a girl catches him by the wrist and drags him towards the beer-pong table. He protests for perhaps half a second before allowing himself to be taken.

Dude loves female attention.

To be fair, everyone on the basketball team does. Nate is simply better at acting surprised when he receives it. He is my other housemate and, by default, probably my closest friend these days.

Girls call him the golden-retriever boyfriend, which is apparently complimentary. All his exes still adore him.

Last week, one of them came over because she was stressed about her current boyfriend, and Nate stood in our kitchen making her cocktails while Lizzie and DJ had a very cuddly, giggling movie night in our living room.

A hand slides over my bicep.

“Your friend was terrifying.”

I glance down at a redhead looking up at me through wide, carefully innocent eyes. Her fingers continue tracing my arm.

So I smile. “Not my friend. Housemate.”

She pretends to be interested in whatever I say next while her fingers wrap around my arm. “You live with a girl?”

“Two of them.”

She shakes her head shyly. “I can never live with boys.”

I raise my eyebrows, to her surprise. “Yeah? Why not?”

“Not one who looks like you.” She squeezes my arm lightly. “I’d be too distracted.”

Valid.

Nate and DJ walk around topless half the time. Fortunately, neither of the women in our house has any interest in us.

Except Lizzie, which became a complete fucking nightmare for me personally, but I am not thinking about that tonight.

“You wouldn’t be distracted,” I tell the redhead. “I don’t walk around half naked.”

Not lately, anyway.

Lately, I am barely home.

If I am not on the court, I am in the weight room, the film room or the library. Yes, the library. I study.

Unfortunately, I am not one of those gifted assholes who can drink until four in the morning, arrive at class wearing sunglasses and submit an A-grade paper written entirely during breakfast. A few former teammates could do that.

I have to spend twelve hours on an essay to receive a B and then pretend I was not mentally invested in the possibility of a B-plus.

I am good at basketball, never said I am smart.

Which is why agreeing to come tonight had seemed really stupid.

The little blondie discovered we were going to the same party and asked me to drive. Lizzie asked me to make sure blondie got home without causing a campus incident. Same destination. Same house afterwards. Simple.

That was before I learned Maddy’s apparent life philosophy: How can I make every person in this room regret knowing me within the next ten minutes?

The redhead sees me sigh and tightens her fingers around my arm. “Come play beer pong with us.”

“Give me a second.” I check the house chat again.

Nothing from Maddy.

Nothing from Lizzie either.

Only DJ has appeared.

DJ: What happened?

I type.

Will: Is Maddy home?

Then I open my private messages with her.

Will: Where the hell did you go?

The redhead shifts closer, clearly displeased that my phone is receiving more attention than she is. “Nate is desperately looking for you.”

I glance across the room. Nate is not desperately looking for me.

He has one hand buried in a girl’s hair and his tongue down her throat beside the pool table. Three feet away, Jenny is still tearing Jake apart while he attempts to explain why asking another woman for oral sex was a misunderstanding.

I slide my phone into my back pocket. “Sure. Beer pong.”

The redhead brightens and pulls me towards the table. “You used to be so good at beer pong.”

Of course. I make throwing things look effortless. But that wasn’t beer pong.

“That was strip pong,” I correct the redhead.

Her smile turns slow and deliberate.

“Oh.” She presses closer to my side. “Now I really want to play.”

I put the cup down. “Let’s play.”

The redhead gasps every time I put another ball cleanly into one of the red cups. I am surprised they agreed to play against me in the first place.

What began as entertaining is rapidly becoming boring. There are only so many times I can watch a football player stare into a plastic cup as though better defensive strategy might alter what just happened.

“Another one!” the redhead screams cheerfully.

I reach for the next ball.

Her hand slips under my T-shirt.

Warm fingers spread over my stomach, gliding across hard muscles and one of the sore spots left from yesterday’s training. Every nerve across my torso catches fire.