Chapter 22
twenty-two
MORGAN
The study room is perfect in its sterility, a chapel of virtue in which we will complete the work required and absolutely not fall victim to the sizzling feelings between us. Or so I tell myself as I sit here, waiting for James in the cell of beige walls and fluorescent death.
It’s the academic equivalent of a sensory deprivation tank, which is exactly what I need. Because, in here, with the mission ahead of us, there can be no distractions, no ambiance, and absolutely, positively nothing that could be construed as romantic.
In addition to the isolation and privacy, I chose this location for its complete absence of comfort.
The chairs are plastic torture devices designed by someone who definitely got rejected from art school, the lighting makes everyone look vaguely tubercular—there is absolutely nothing sexy or warm about this space.
Perfect.
I arrange my supplies. There's a new binder with color-coded tabs, because organization is the foundation of excellence.
There's a mix of pens, because God knows he won’t bring his own.
I'm pretending as if all the stationery in the world could somehow protect me from the force of nature that is James Fitzgerald.
Everything present and ready.
Except him.
Him.
His mouth, hot against mine, his hand tangled in my hair with exactly the right amount of force, the solid wall of muscle pressing me back until the world narrowed to just us, just—
I slam my palm down on the table hard enough to make the pens jump, because that sort of imagery right now is, frankly, rude and completely fucking unnecessary. The sharp sting clears my head, replacing unwanted sense memory with immediate, grounding pain.
Much better.
The library is tomb-quiet at 10:00 p.m., abandoned by everyone with actual social lives. Somewhere in the distance, a printer whirs to life, spits out pages, then dies again, the mechanical manifestation of my attempts to resist thoughts of him and that.
And then he enters, like a brass band at a wake.
First comes the crash, something heavy hitting the floor with prejudice a few doors down, followed by a muffled, “Shit, sorry!” directed at the universe. Then what sounds like an entire hockey bag being upended, items cascading in a symphony of chaos.
I listen, not sure if I should smirk, frown or run away. His footsteps approach, somehow both shuffling and thunderous, like he’s simultaneously trying to be quiet and completely incapable of it. And then he enters the small study room like a slap to the face.
Jesus Christ on skates.
Those jeans should be illegal, hugging his ass and clinging to thighs that could crack walnuts. His PBU Hockey t-shirt has been washed into transparency, the fabric practically painted across his chest. His hair is damp at the edges from a recent shower, and I can smell his fresh scent from here.
This is fine. You’re fine. You’re not considering licking the water droplet currently sliding down his neck.
“Made it!” He grins like arriving one minute late is an Olympic-worthy achievement. “And I brought nourishment!”
The nourishment turns out to be a family-sized bag of sour cream and onion chips that looks like it survived a war and a water bottle that’s more dent than bottle. He puts them on the table, then pulls out a sociology textbook that has at least a dozen coffee rings on the cover.
"James," I say, carefully. "Have you been using that book as a coaster for the whole semester?"
He doesn't confirm or deny it, but the grin tells me everything I need to know as he collapses into the chair across from me. His legs immediately sprawl under the table, and suddenly the area shrinks to the size of a matchbox. His knee brushes mine—barely a whisper of contact—and he doesn’t pull back.
Neither do I, because that would be admitting it affects me.
Which it doesn’t.
It totally doesn't.
The artificial onion smell from his chips wages chemical warfare against the library’s usual bouquet of old paper and crushed dreams. My stomach growls, loud enough to echo, reminding me I haven’t eaten since noon because I was too busy war-gaming every possible disaster this session could become.
“Hungry?” He pushes the bag toward me with the casual intimacy of someone who shares food without thinking about it. “They’re the good kind. Extra oniony.”
“I don’t eat processed food,” I lie, even as my hand twitches toward the bag like it has its own agenda.
“Right.” His eyes dance with barely-contained laughter. “So what is it, then, organic kale and the tears of your enemies?”
A short, surprised laugh punches out of me before I can censor it, a hiccup of humanity I didn’t authorize. And in that moment I realize that James is actually funny, when he's telling jokes at the normal time and in the normal way people tell jokes, rather than as a crutch for anything serious.
“So,” he says, crunching a chip with what seems like deliberate volume, “how does this work? Do I get a syllabus? Office hours? A nice motivational poster?”
"You need at least a B on the next paper to lift your average to where it needs to… be…" I pause, enjoying the smirk my joke earns. "There'll be an exam after that, which I can't do for you, but I can help you prepare for it. Nail the paper and a C or better on the exam, and you're golden…"
"Easy, right?" He grins. "So what's the paper?"
I slide the laminated rubric across the table with enough force to establish dominance. “Your professor wants five pages analyzing social disintegration through a sociological lens. You’re going to deliver exactly that. Nothing more, nothing less.”
He leans forward to examine the rubric, and suddenly he’s in my space, close enough that I can see the faint scar through his left eyebrow and feel his body heat like a physical presence. The fluorescent light catches gold flecks in his brown eyes that have no business being that distracting.
Academic paper.
Social disintegration.
Not thinking about disintegrating the professional distance between us.
His eyes scan the paper, then lift to mine with a look that could melt steel beams. “So are there any extra-credit opportunities in this…” He pauses, his voice dropping into a register that makes my stomach perform an unauthorized barrel roll. “arrangement of ours?”
I lean back, raising an eyebrow and crossing my arms in what’s definitely a power move and not at all to keep my hands from doing something stupid. “You want extra credit? You fail this class, you lose your eligibility, so how's that work for you?"
His grin widens. “But I’m motivated by positive reinforcement. Gold stars. Smiley faces.” His gaze drops to my mouth for a second. “Other rewards.”
I ignore the obvious attempt to flirt, my voice sharp enough to etch glass. “Social disintegration. Five pages. Can your attention span handle that?”
“I don’t know.” He tilts his head, studying me with an intensity that makes my skin feel too tight. “I’m very tactile. I need to feel my way through the material.”
The double meaning lands with all the subtlety of a check against the boards, and I slam my hand down on the textbook. “Page 247. Read.”
He flips it open, but concentration appears to cause him physical pain. His knee bounces under the table, creating a rhythm I feel through the floor. At the same time, his fingers drum, his chair squeaks, and then he starts spinning his pencil like a tiny baton, nearly launching it twice.
“The author’s primary thesis—” I begin.
“—is boring as fuck,” he finishes, then launches into a tangent. “You know what’s wild? The etymology of ‘thesis’ actually comes from the Greek word for ‘position,’ which is ironic because most thesis statements have no position at all, they’re just—”
“Focus.”
“Right, focusing.” He lasts maybe ten seconds before reaching for his water bottle, his fingers grazing mine in the process—warm, calloused from his stick, lingering a breath too long against my wrist where my pulse hammers like a puck against the boards.
“You were saying?” His innocence is a performance that deserves a Tony.
Murder. That’s the solution. Hide the body in the philosophy section where no one goes. Find literally any other way to save the team that doesn’t involve his stupid, perfect hands.
Twenty minutes in, and we’ve accomplished exactly nothing except establishing that his brain runs on chaos and my patience has limits. He’s now folding page corners into origami while explaining his teammate’s theory that sociology is just “gossiping with citations.”
I snap. “This isn’t working.” I shove the rubric away with enough force that it flutters to the floor. “You can’t focus for thirty seconds. Your thoughts are completely non-linear. You think academic writing is an appropriate venue for stories about Nash’s bathroom disasters—”
“That was relevant context about social bonds in closed communities—”
“It was a story about him getting stuck in a stall!”
He’s grinning now. “It illustrated group dynamics during crisis intervention.”
I want to strangle him. I want to kiss him. I want to do both simultaneously.
“Forget it.” I stand abruptly, needing distance, needing air. “This was clearly a mistake. You can’t do this, and I can’t teach someone who thinks in—”
“Explosions?” he supplies helpfully.
“I was going to say chaos, but sure.”
He laughs—warm and rich and genuinely delighted. “Sit down, Morgan.”
“No.”
“Please?”
The request is quieter, less performative. When I look at him, really look, the manic energy has drained away, leaving something vulnerable. The same boy from the coffee shop who admitted hockey is the only thing holding him together.
I sit, making it clear I’m not happy about it. "Last chance," I say. "Because I don't have time to waste if you're not taking this seriously, gear or no gear."
“Look.” He scrubs a hand through his hair, the gesture pure anxiety. “I know I’m not academic and my brain doesn’t work in straight lines, but I’m not stupid.”
“I didn’t say—”
“You’re thinking it.” No accusation, just resignation. “Everyone does, like I'm a big dumb jock.”
The admission hits a nerve I don’t want him touching, because I did think that, before. Before I saw how he processes the world through connections that aren’t linear but aren’t wrong either. He may not be built for papers and exams and punctual attendance of class, but there's a brain in there.
“Prove me wrong,” I say, softer than intended. “Forget the essay structure and just talk. Tell me what the author’s saying about social disintegration.”
He stares at me, evaluating my sincerity like I'm a bomb with all sorts of complex wires. Then his entire demeanor changes. The fidgeting stops. His body stills with the same laser-focus I’ve seen in the net. Even the air feels different, charged with sudden intensity.
“It’s like…” He pauses, searching. “OK, so penalty kill, right? Everyone has their position. Their job. The system only works if everyone trusts everyone else to be where they’re supposed to be.”
I nod, leaning forward without meaning to.
“But then one guy gets anxious. Maybe he sees a puck he thinks he can win, even though it’s not his zone, so he leaves position.” His hands sketch plays in the air with surprising grace. “Suddenly there’s a hole.
Another nod.
"Well, the whole box collapses because one person broke trust. That’s social disintegration, where the system doesn’t die from some big explosion but rather dies from a thousand small betrayals of trust.”
I’m frozen, pencil motionless. Because he’s right. He’s absolutely, brilliantly right. He understands the material at a level most students would miss, and he's just given me a perfect example to illustrate it. He knows everything he needs to to ace the paper, which might be a sign of a miracle.
Holy shit. James Fitzgerald might actually be a genius disguised as a golden retriever.
“And the author,” he continues, eyes bright with excitement, “he’s saying that’s happening to communities now, with everyone chasing their own puck instead of maintaining position.
The trust is gone, so the whole defensive structure just…
” He splays his fingers, mimicking an explosion. “Boom. Chaos.”
“That’s…” I clear my throat, trying to recover from the whiplash. “That’s exactly right.”
He blinks, surprised. “Really?”
“Really.” I grab paper, my thoughts reorganizing to figure out how to translate his hockey metaphor into academic language. “Say that again, but slower.”
“You’re going to write it down?” The question is vulnerable, skeptical. “Just like that?”
“I’m going to translate it into something your professor will recognize as sociology, but the ideas are yours.”
The look he gives me then—soft and grateful and surprised—shows me no one has ever told him his thoughts matter. And, right there, it makes me wonder if the chaos and noise and energy aren't just to avoid silence and emotions, a protective mechanism against the pain in his family's past.
Is it possible he's a hell of a lot smarter than anyone gave him credit for?
“OK,” he says, his voice now focused. “From the beginning?”
I nod, pen ready. “From the beginning. And James?”
“Yeah?”
“Keep the chips on your side of the table.”
He grins, warmer now, more real. “Yes, ma’am. Very professional. Should I also stop doing this?” He stretches, his shirt riding up to reveal his abs.
My mouth goes desert-dry. “That would be helpful.”
“What about this?” His knee presses against mine, deliberate, warm through the denim.
“Especially that.”
But neither of us moves. We sit there, our knees touching, him talking, me translating his beautiful chaos into structure while trying not to think about how easy this feels. How his voice has settled into something hypnotic as he explains defensive coverage like poetry.
You’re so fucked, Morgan.
“OK.” I force steadiness into my voice as he connects defensive zones to social contract theory. “Keep going. Tell me about the trust component.”
Wonder colors his voice. “You really want to hear this?”
“I really do.”
It’s not a lie. I want to hear everything. I want to catalog every gesture and expression, and I want things I have no business wanting from the boy who walked away three years ago. And judging by the way he’s looking at me—soft and intense and hungry all at once—he knows it.
We’re both absolutely fucked.
And for the first time in three years, I’m not sure if I mind.