Theo
“It’s Halloween, not an orgy, H.” Leon threw him a look as he crept into the parallel-parking spot across from the party that already had lights swirling through the windows.
“Are you regretting the turtleneck? Because you look great,” Leon answered without missing a beat while he threw the truck into park. “And you’ve always had better luck than most.”
“I think they suit me just fine.” He kicked his foot out, as if admiring the rhinestones on the red leather.
They didn’t make it past the living room before someone shouted, “Jackson!”
Leon opened his arms as if accepting praise from his loyal subjects. Theo chuckled. It earned a wink from Leon over his shoulder when two girls appeared beside Leon.
Theo’s phone buzzed in his pocket, and he slipped it out to find his group chat with his sisters, Katarina and Olivia, blowing up. The thread had a video his older sister sent of his nephew, Henry, dressed as a chicken, toddling around on his unsteady legs.
Kat
Henry’s first Halloween costume!
Liv
Is this supposed to be a play on his name, aka Hen?
Kat
He’s clearly a boy chicken!
Liv
Boy chicken! LOL!
Liv
Do you mean a rooster?
Kat
Yes! I swear, I can’t remember anything anymore.
Liv
Mommy brain hit hard, huh?
Kat
It’s real. Asher couldn’t find the coffee this morning. I put it in the bathroom cabinet and left the toilet paper in the pantry.
Liv
I do not envy Asher.
Kat
Ha, you’re hilarious.
Liv
Where the hell is H? He’s usually commented something nerdy by now.
Kat
Oh, shit, you’re right. Yeah, where the hell is he??
Liv
H!
Where!
Are!
You!
***
Step away from the desk!
Kat
Put the notes down and have a life for five seconds!
Theo sighed as the little dots appeared and disappeared, indicating they were typing again. He sent a response before they started calling him.
Theo
Henry would be a cockerel—roosters are “boy chickens” over the age of one.
And I have a life. I go out plenty.
Idk why everyone acts like I’m a shut-in.
Plus! I’m at a Halloween party, so leave me be.
Liv
So embarrassing when he feels the need to lie about having a social life.
Kat
Agreed. No photo = clearly a lie.
Liv
Truth!
Theo leaned his head back and let out another slow breath.
Leon was ahead of him, already in the kitchen with a water in hand, across the counter from where Kirin and his girlfriend, Rose, were leaning.
He cut through the crowd until he was with his friends.
He slapped Kirin on the back before he wrapped Rose in a quick one-armed hug.
Then grabbed a water bottle for himself.
“What are you?” Kirin asked, only for Rose to cut in.
“You have to guess!”
“You’re clearly the rhinestone cowboy,” Theo said as he took in the denim-on-denim outfit: a rhinestone-detailed button-down, tight boot-cut jeans, and a flashy belt.
Kirin tipped an imaginary cowboy hat.
He glanced at Rose. Her dress was vintage, definitely seventies, which matched the release date of the song he suspected, given Leon’s outfit.
She looked like a very pretty girl next door; the understated outfit highlighted her natural beauty and long, curly auburn hair. “And if Leon is Dolly, you’re Jolene.”
Rose groaned, reaching forward to pinch Leon’s arm. “Leon! You said you wouldn’t tell him! Half the fun is guessing!”
“I didn’t tell him!” Leon countered with a yelp before he pressed a hand behind his ear. “I’m not hearing any guesses about H’s song.”
“Well, he looks very suave.” Rose tilted her head back and forth. “The black-on-black is a strong look. The turtleneck is”—she pursed her lips—“a choice.”
Leon grinned. “That was my idea.”
“This entire outfit was your idea.”
“Maybe he’s a Bond theme song,” Kirin guessed.
“The turtleneck makes me think no,” Rose cut in.
While they guessed, bickering back and forth, Theo checked his phone again, unlocking it to find the thread had grown. They were still taunting him about the lack of photo evidence.
“Can you guys take my photo?” Three sets of eyes swiveled toward him.
“Are we in the Twilight Zone?” Kirin whispered, and Rose laughed.
“No,” he answered. “My sisters don’t believe I’m at a party.”
“Oh, that checks out.” Leon grabbed the phone out of Theo’s hand, then motioned for everyone to squish together and turned around, stretching his arm out for a selfie. “Smile.”
They all looked up at his phone, and Theo could see his friends on the screen. It took a second of smiling to realize Leon’s thumb was holding down the button, creating about a hundred photos in a few seconds.
“Leon, let go,” Theo said, and Leon captured another fifty photos, then also caught Rose and Kirin laughing while Theo wrestled the phone out of his grip.
Damn quarterbacks and their muscular hands.
“I’m just proving you didn’t dress up to take a photo with us at the house. They need to see you’re surrounded by strangers,” Leon argued, and to his dismay, Kirin and Rose nodded as if it were sound logic.
Theo ignored them as he sent a message back to his sisters, along with a few shots that showed people in the background, because his sisters would accuse him of faking it.
Theo
Photographic evidence that I am out of the house.
And socializing.
Kat
Rose looks gorgeous. Where are her cute roommates?
Liv
They’re out of his league.
Don’t even bother getting his hopes up.
Theo
It’s a wonder I have self-esteem with you two in my life.
Liv
We live to keep you humble.
He breathed out a chuff, grateful there were no gray dots indicating they were going to keep roasting him. With no further nagging messages, he slipped the phone back into his pocket.
“Jackson!” Jace Dawson, the backup quarterback, was weaving his way through the crowd in a shiny silver astronaut costume and over-the-top glasses.
“I’ll bet he’s ‘Rocket Man,’” Leon said.
“Oh, that’s a good guess!” Rose said with a clap.
“You still haven’t guessed what song I am,” Theo said to Rose a second before Jace’s hand slapped his shoulder.
“Give me a clue.”
“It’s not going to be what you expect,” he answered, and she frowned.
“Not exactly helpful, H.”
“You’d sell your soul to him in an unholy bargain,” Leon chimed in, then turned to Jace. “Wasn’t expecting to see you out and about tonight.”
“So the devil of some kind,” Rose murmured to herself, her head tilting again, amber eyes narrowing as she looked over Theo’s outfit. “Do your glasses tie into this?”
“No,” Theo said at the same time Leon said, “Yes.”
“Helpful,” Rose muttered, and Leon grinned.
“I locked myself in my dorm all week. I needed to look at something besides those four walls.” Jace shrugged, slapping hands with Kirin and then with Theo, his eyebrows rising in surprise. “Though I could say the same to this guy. What’s Rose doing?”
“Trying to guess the song H is supposed to be,” Kirin answered as he took a sip of his water. “Three clues so far include devil, not what you expect, and his glasses are—possibly—part of it.”
Jace glanced at him again, this time his attention dropping to Theo’s outfit, his thick eyebrows furrowing as he thought. Theo took a deep breath and let it out slowly.
“‘Runnin’ with the Devil’?” Jace asked, and Leon smirked.
“Nope.”
“‘The Devil Went Down to Georgia’?” Kirin guessed.
“Is he talking with a Southern accent?” Leon threw a look at their best friend.
“‘You, Me, and the Devil Makes Three’?” Jace asked, and Leon shook his head.
Theo adjusted his shoulders and pulled his phone out, flipping through his apps until he found his music. He scrolled through the list and updated his playlist.
“‘Sympathy for the Devil’?” Rose asked, and everyone glanced at her, but she just waved her hands in his direction. “He could be wearing black-on-black because he’s mourning.”
“Excellent observation, but no,” Leon answered.
“‘Devil Woman’?” Kirin asked, and Leon tapped his nose.
“So close.”
“You’re ‘The Devil in Disguise’!” Rose all but shouted, earning them several looks, but Leon held up a hand for her to high-five.
She practically leaped over to slap it. With a shake of his head, Theo gave her one as well before he looked at the crush of people around them.
They’d carved out a little space in the kitchen, but that had more to do with the popularity of his roommates than anything else.
People parted for them, and by staying with them, he avoided getting crushed about seventy-five percent of the time.
Parties were a necessary part of his friendship and the life he’d built for himself at Montgomery, but they’d never been his scene.
This was the cost of befriending two extroverts who mostly thrived around people.
It was why they were so good at their jobs on the field: people came to them as if some magnetic force drew them.
He’d watched it plenty of times, most of all on the field in high school and college.
Leon was like the sun, with people constantly orbiting him. Kirin was something else, still magnetic but more aloof, probably closer to whatever came between an extrovert and an introvert, since his social battery seemed to thrive during games but wore out twice as fast in crowds and at parties.
“On that note, I’m out.” Theo pulled Kirin in for a one-armed hug and a slap on the back, then did the same to Leon before hugging Rose and patting Jace on the shoulder.
“I’ll see you three tomorrow,” he said as he glanced at his teammates, then looked pointedly at Rose. “Make sure you let him sleep tonight.”
“Promise.” Rose smiled and leaned back against Kirin, who leaned down to kiss her cheek.
“Incoming,” Jace said, and they all followed his gaze to the dance floor, where a parade of girls in various Halloween costumes danced through the crowd. All of them wore different outfits: a go-go dancer, a ballerina, and a handful of sexy police officers, firefighters, nurses, and—
Theo’s brain stopped at the fallen angel. His eyes skittered over the fitted black tulle dress, sparsely feathered black angel wings arching above a head of chestnut hair, adorned with a cracked black halo headband that completed the costume.
“Have fun,” Theo murmured distractedly as he edged out of the kitchen, keeping his eye on the edge of the black wings he could see between heads.
He disappeared into the crowd, then hunted for an empty stretch of wall where he could watch the fallen angel while he pretended to update his playlist, undisturbed.