20. Mason
Mason
“I’m bored,” Tank groans from the couch on the other side of the room.
“What,” I say, laughing, “caveman no know what do with himself when no party?”
He nods a couple of times. “Yeah…basically.”
Ryan turns his phone around so we can all see the screen. “Ava just sent me a picture of the girls getting ready for a movie night. At least we aren’t bored enough to be cuddled up with each other watching Lord of the Rings, 50 Dresses, or 27 First Dates.”
“It’s 27 Dresses and 50 First Dates, you dumb ass,” Tanner corrects him as he takes a sip of his beer.
Ryan raises his hands. “I’m sorry that I don’t know the right name of fucking chick flicks like you do.”
Tank sits up, intrigued. “Maybe we should…do a check-in. You know, be neighborly.”
Chase lights up. “I have an idea.”
Tanner rolls his eyes. “What kind of idea?”
Somehow, within the span of five minutes, the guys conjured up a plan to crash the girls’ movie night with as many of the guys in the house as they could round up.
Chase looks down at his watch and then back up at all of us. “It’s almost eight o’clock, so that means we have exactly…six minutes to get over there and get in position before the sprinklers come on.”
Everyone locks in like this is an FBI raid we’re about to do.
We all head out of the house and down to the Gamma house, sticking close to each other.
We sneak around back and thankfully find the door is unlocked.
On the count of three, we all rush into the house, and the girls start to scream.
At first, you would have thought they were about to be murdered until they realized who it was.
The screams quickly turned into squeals and laughter.
My original plan was to get in and find Simone as my chosen victim, but another guy got to her first, so I just grabbed the nearest girl to me and threw her over my shoulder. They’re all in little cute PJ sets, making this a lot more fun.
Once every guy has a girl over their shoulder, we rush out of the front door.
When we’re all outside, we plop the girls down in the yard right as the clock hits eight and the sprinklers come on like they do every night.
We all move to block the path back into the house as the girls start screaming and running to find cover from getting soaked. Simone finds a break in the boys and sneaks past us, heading straight for the front door when Tanner scoops her up like a trained firefighter.
She looks over and finds me watching. “Sinclair!” she yells desperately as he takes her back in the yard, soaking both of them. “Call your boy off!”
“He doesn’t listen to me,” I shout with my arms crossed, watching in amusement.
“We are so getting y’all back for this!” she screams.
Joy eventually gains control, calling a truce after all the girls are soaked and shivering.
Tank nods at us, and we all move out of the way, letting the girls run back into the house.
Everyone is laughing and grabbing towels when we get back inside.
The girls are glaring at us now, and we’re all just standing there with shit-eating grins on our faces.
Joy, Madison, Ava, and Kimberly—all chair members of the Delta Gamma house—walk up to us, hands on their hips.
“Your little stunt caused us to burn all our cookies.” Kimberly scolds.
“And my blondie brownies,” Ava pouts, stomping her foot.
Ryan laughs and walks up to her, kissing her on the nose. “How can we make it up to you?”
I nudge Chase’s arm and whisper, “Whipped.”
Chase laughs, and Ryan turns around to us in full boyfriend mode.
“You know what,” he says, glaring at us. “I think the boys will go grab whatever you need from the store and then help you guys bake some more brownies and cookies.”
My mouth drops open, but Ryan just gives us all a look that says we don’t have a choice in the matter.
I hear some of the girls giggle and look over his shoulder to catch Simone laughing.
“Fine,” I say. “I’ll go on the store run…but I’m taking one of the girls with me. If I have to suffer through this, so do they.”
Ava nods.
“Edwards,” I shout over my shoulder as I turn around, heading towards the front door, “let’s go.”
“What?”
I turn back around to see her hands on her hips.
“Come on,” I tell her, pointing to the door.
“But I’m in PJs…”
I shrug. “Looks like you’re dry enough to get in my car. Should be a fun trip.”
She throws her hands up, huffing.
I reach for the door, smile, open it, and wait for her to walk out before closing it behind us.
“Why me?” she asks as we’re walking over to the Sig house to get in my car.
I smile over at her. “Why not you? Any other girl would have been boring to take.”
Her pout turns into a smile, and she shakes her head at me. “Fine, let’s just hurry this up and get back. You’re also buying me a pint of ice cream as payment that I’ll be eating in your car on the way back, so the other girls don’t steal it.”
I let out a laugh. “Deal…but I might steal some on the way back.”
She narrows her eyes at me. “We’ll see.”
We make it back to the house, and I grab my keys from inside. When I walk back outside, I hit the unlock button on my keys that lights up my Lexus RC F.
I watch Simone look over to the car, and she shakes her head. “I knew it.”
“Knew what?” I ask, walking around to the passenger side and opening the door for her.
She walks over and gets in, looking back up at me. “I told you all assholes come from money.”
I rest my arms on the door frame and lean my head down to look at her. “How about I just come from money, and we can drop the asshole part?”
She studies me for a second, then presses her lips together like she’s thinking about it. “The prank y’all pulled isn’t helping your case…but you might still be able to earn the dropage of assholery if you get me that ice cream.”
I nod. “I think I can do more than the bare minimum of buying you ice cream to earn it.”
I close her door and walk around to the driver’s side, sliding into my seat.
We run into the store, grab everything Ryan texted me we need, and Simone grabs her precious ice cream before we check out.
She tried to grab some of the grocery bags, and I swatted at her hands. She just laughed and put her hands up as I grabbed all of them.
I pop the trunk when we’re back outside and throw most of the bags in, except the one with her ice cream and the two spoons I grabbed from the bakery section.
I don’t unlock the car until I’m back on her side to open her door up. I can already tell her autopilot is set to independent, and I like challenging that.
She gets in without arguing, and I hand her the bag. “Wait until I get in the car before you devour it. You picked my favorite flavor, so I’m definitely stealing some.”
She hugs the small pint to her chest like it’s a newborn baby, and I laugh, closing her door.
We’re driving back to campus when Simone takes over the radio.
Some Taylor Swift song comes on, and she gets so excited that she turns it up as loud as it’ll go.
It makes me smile watching her start to sing with no care in the world, windows rolled down, PJs on, and ice cream in her hands with the spoon still in her mouth.
She pops the spoon out to fully shout the lyrics, and then she starts using the spoon as a mic, leaning it toward me to sing with her.
“I’m sorry to burst your bubble,” I tell her, “but I am not a Swiftie.”
She gives me the most judgmental face, and just as I’m about to dig my spoon into her ice cream, she snatches it away.
“Hey,” I play pout.
She takes her spoon and gets a scoop out for herself.
We pull up at a red light right before she puts it in her mouth, and I grab her wrist, pulling it towards me. I take the bite, and she just stares at me, appalled.
“You just ate my bite!” she yells.
“And it was good,” I tell her with my mouth still full.
“You licked my spoon!”
The light turns green, and I turn my attention back to the road, still grinning. “Good thing I don’t have any cooties.”
She rolls her eyes. “How can you be sure? I’ve heard about how you party.”
I give her a mock-offended look with my hand over my chest. “Excuse me for having a good time in college.”
“Yeah, well, I’d prefer not to take those good times home with me,” she says, wiping off the spoon with her shirt.
Back at the Gamma house, all of us boys have been put to work, slaving away in the kitchen—mixing batter, rolling out balls of cookie dough, and trying not to eat all the ingredients before they make it into the oven.
Chase and Tank are messing with some of the girls when all of a sudden, flour is being thrown everywhere. There’s laughing and yelling tangling together in the large space.
I see Simone out of the corner of my eye with two eggs in her hands.
“Don’t. You. Dare,” I warn.
She bites the inside of her cheek, smiling before she lets the intrusive thoughts win and hurls one at me and one at Tank.
Two more girls behind them grab more eggs, and we’re defenseless as they keep throwing them.
I try to duck under the counter, but one of the girls sneaks around and gets me from the back.
My shirt is now covered in egg yolk.
I stand up and call a truce, looking around at the destroyed kitchen.
Simone laughs. “Looks like you just added clean-up duty to your list, boys.”
I shake my head and grab the back of my shirt, peeling it off and tossing it at her. She catches it on instinct and then drops it in disgust. “Mason! Ew!”
A couple of the girls start whistling and clapping, shouting that they want a show.
Within a matter of minutes, someone has music playing, and Tank, Tanner, Chase, and I are all shirtless on top of the kitchen Island, dancing to Pony by Ginuwine.
Tank grabs one of the girls, lifting her up on the counter and grinding on her. She squeals under him and definitely does not keep her hands to herself.
“Off!” Kimberly says, smacking my calf. “Off my sanitary surfaces!”
I hop down off the counter and start dancing on her, trying to get her to loosen up a little.
“You’re all devolving,” she says while now laughing. “The rest of you get down and help me salvage what’s not ruined.”
Everything moved easily after that—music still playing, insults being thrown between the guys and girls, smells that make every childhood memory show up uninvited.
When the images of my mom and me in the kitchen, singing and baking together, pop up, I try to distract myself enough not to let them drown me.
I wipe down the counters while Simone loads a tray into the top oven, and when she reaches up to grab something from the cabinet, I watch as the hem of her shirt lifts.
I can’t help but stare for a second before looking away, not wanting to be a creep.
“Help,” she says, pointing to a high cabinet. “Joy keeps the cooling racks where only tall people can reach them.”
I help her step back and then grab them for her. “You want them here or on the island?”
“Counter,” she says. “The island’s infected with Tank.”
“Infectious charm,” Tank shouts from across the room, now doing a very serious attempt at scooping cookie dough with a measuring spoon. It drips like lava, and Joy confiscates it from his hands, sighing.
When the kitchen stops smoking and the last tray goes in, someone dims the lights, and everyone starts to move into the living room.
I rinse one last bowl and dry my hands, then head into the room, hopping over the back of the big couch. I land between Simone and Paige, and Simone arches a brow like she wasn’t sure if I’d meant to sit with them.
“Personal space,” she warns.
“I’m compact,” I say, stretching out anyway.
“Your ego isn’t.”
“Rude.”
Ryan drops down next to Ava and kisses her temple. She melts into him, and someone makes a gagging noise.
“Knock it off,” Simone teases. “I’m getting jealous over here.”
Ava grins. “When’s that boyfriend of yours visiting again, Edwards?”
Simone tries not to blush and fails. “Soon, actually.”
“Good,” Ava says. “You deserve a…release.”
The girls start laughing as someone gets the movie rolling.
She has a boyfriend…okay, cool, noted.
I mean, I don’t really care about picturing them having sex. But I don’t really care to picture anyone’s sex life if it’s not my own.
I prop my arms on the back of the couch, getting comfortable. They land behind both Simone and Paige, neither of them saying anything. My feet have nowhere else to go, and the ottoman is too far away, so I lift them onto Simone’s lap.
She pushes them off instantly. “Absolutely not.”
I try to hold in my laugh and give her a confused look. “What are friends for if not to be useful in times of need?”
“Since when are we friends?” she asks, tilting her head and smiling.
I look over her shoulder at my watch and then back to her. “Since about two hours ago, when you were in my car shouting out Taylor Swift lyrics and feeding me ice cream.”
She lets out a laugh. “I did not feed you. You stole it.”
I wave her off. “Same thing.”
She huffs.
“Fine…” she says, looking me over. “Friends.”
I nod. “Friends.”