Chapter Seven: The Morning After-Math

Saturday morning arrived not with a gentle sunrise, but with a blinding, aggressive shaft of golden light cutting right through our window, accompanied by the far-off, high-pitched whine of a campus lawnmower.

​I blinked against the glare, my throat feeling like I'd swallowed a handful of dry sand. I dragged myself out of bed, still entirely in a daze, and spent a solid fifteen minutes in the steaming communal showers, letting the water wash away the faint scent of amber cologne, spilled tequila, and the dizzying humidity of the night before.

​When I walked back into Room 304, I was securely wrapped in my plush, baby pink bathrobe, a matching microfibre towel twisted up into a high turban on my head to protect my damp curls.

​Talia was currently a hostage to her own bed. She was sprawled out under her green duvet, the silk bonnet from the night before sitting slightly askew on her head. She let out a low, dramatic groan, burying her face into her pillow as the lawnmower outside revved its engine.

​"If that man does not turn off that machine in the next three minutes, I am going to throw myself out of this window," she rasped, her voice incredibly gravelly from shouting over the bass.

​I sat down at my vanity, rubbing a pump of vanilla body lotion into my arms. "Good morning to you too. How's the head?"

​"The head is a war zone," Talia muttered, shifting onto her side and staring blankly at the ceiling lights. "But the real tragedy of my night was that cafeteria athlete. Let's talk about it."

​"The tall one?" I asked, turning around on my stool. "The one you tracked across the living room like a missile?"

​"The very one," Talia sighed, letting out a sharp, unbothered scoff as she reached over to her bedside table to grab a stray scrunchie. "Kelsey, the social math did not add up. On a scale of one to ten, the face was an easy nine. The posture? Immaculate. But the actual execution? A solid three. It was like dancing with a stiff piece of drywall, and the conversation was just him explaining the rotation of a zone defense for twenty minutes. I left him by the bathroom stairs at two AM and didn't look back. Completely unprovoked behavior."

​I let out a loud laugh, completely charmed by how utterly unaffected she was. That was just Talia—she was an unbothered, fiercely confident girl who knew exactly what she wanted, lived life entirely on her own terms, and didn't waste a single second crying over a bad link-up.

​A soft, rhythmic knock sounded at our door.

​"Enter," I called out.

​The door pushed open and Bianca slipped into the room. Even with a Friday night hangover, she still managed to look curated. She was wearing an oversized cream crewneck sweater that belonged to one of her dads, grey lounge shorts, and her dark hair was gathered into a loose, messy clip at the back of her head. She immediately slumped onto the edge of Talia's mattress, holding a hand to her forehead.

​"My brain is actively vibrating against my skull," Bianca groaned, her eyes adjusting to the low amber light of our room. "Everything hurts."

​Talia instantly popped up from her pillow, a massive, wicked grin breaking across her face as she reached out a hand. "Which means we had an absolutely successful night. Up top, B."

​Bianca let out a dry chuckle but raised her hand anyway, their palms meeting in a sharp, definitive smack. "Successful for the school's social ecosystem, maybe. I think I inhaled four different types of vape smoke just standing near the kitchen."

​I bit my lip, the sheer, dramatic weight of my secret suddenly pressing against my ribs until I couldn't contain it for another second. I stood up from my vanity stool, my pink robe swirling around my ankles as I stepped onto the center of our rug.

​"Girls," I whispered, my hazel eyes wide as I looked between the two of them. "Guess what."

​Talia's eyes narrowed in instant, tactical recognition. Bianca tilted her head, her hand dropping from her forehead.

​"Malik," Bianca stated deadpan. "What happened after you went for water?"

​"We kissed," I burst out, a massive, helpless smile overtaking my face. "Like, really kissed. On the kitchen counter."

​Talia literally shrieked, throwing her duvet off her legs as Bianca's jaw dropped. We all instantly lunged toward the center of the room, our hands flying up as we simultaneously went, "SHUSH! Shush, shush, shush!" our eyes darting toward the wall shared with Room 303. The last thing we needed was Phiona knocking on the door at ten in the morning to deliver another housing handbook lecture.

​We collapsed into a tight, giggling huddle on the edge of Talia's bed, keeping our voices down to an intense, high-velocity whisper.

​"Details. Now," Bianca demanded, her dark eyes glowing with pure, unadulterated curiosity. "From the beginning, Kelsey."

​"Okay, so I went to get water," I began, my hands moving dramatically as I recounted the scene. "And he was just... standing by the pantry looking fine. No effort at all. We started doing that easy banter thing, and then he just stepped directly into my space. Girls, he is so tall. And he smells like cedar and money. He told me I caught his attention in a room of four hundred people, and then he just leaned down."

​Talia clutched her chest, letting out a silent, theatrical gasp.

​"And it wasn't just a quick party peck," I continued, my voice dipping into that breathless, romantic register. "He lifted me completely onto the counter. His hands were under my jacket, and I had my arms around his neck, and it felt exactly like a scene out of a book. Like the floor was tilting. Marcus walked in with an ice bucket and made a joke about cognitive research, which made us laugh, but it was so intense."

​"Oh, he is locked in," Talia purred, leaning her chin in her hands. "The counter lift is a high-level maneuver. So, go on. How did his morning text make you feel? What did he say?"

​My smile instantly faltered. The fluttering warmth in my stomach dropped by about twenty degrees. I blinked, looking down at my fuzzy slides. "Oh. He... he hasn't texted me."

​Bianca's expression shifted instantly from amused to a cool, cautious neutrality. "Oh, no."

​Talia leaned back slightly, her eyebrows pulling together. "Wait. Not even a Snap check-in?"

​Okay, internal panic button officially pressed. Because here is the reality: I am nineteen years old, I have spent more time analyzing fictional relationships than actual real-world boys, and my experience level is sitting at a casual zero. In my head, a kiss like that means you're basically soulmates. But in the real world? In the elite college world?

​"What?" I asked, my voice rising in pitch as I sat down heavily on the edge of the mattress. "What does 'oh no' mean? Tell me already."

​In my minor state of panic, my hand automatically reached into the open bag of barbecue potato chips sitting on Talia's bedside table, grabbing a handful and stuffing them into my mouth without thinking.

​Talia looked at the bag, then up at my face with a look of pure, amused disbelief. "Hey! Those are my hangover chips."

​"Distraction food," I mumbled around the chips, looking at them with wide, concerned eyes. "Go on. What does the silence mean?"

​Talia sighed, her tone shifting from gossiping best friend to the brutally honest big sister. "Kelsey, look at me. You are a sweet, gorgeous girl who believes in romance and slow burns. But Malik is a sophomore varsity athlete with a blue checkmark. If a guy like that kisses you at a house party and doesn't follow up by the next morning... it could mean the kiss was just the start of a consistent hookup dynamic. Like a casual, weekend thing. And that's not what you want, is it?"

​"Oh my gosh, absolutely not!" I cried, my dramatic side taking full control as I threw my hands in the air, a few chip crumbs scattering onto the duvet. "A casual hookup? Our first kiss was in a dirty frat house kitchen next to a guy filling an ice bucket! We haven't even gone on a proper date! We haven't even talked about our favorite movies! If it's just a hookup, I have completely ruined the entire timeline!"

My mind is currently sprinting a marathon. I am standing in a spotlight while my brain cells run around screaming with clipboards. I didn't leave Brookhaven to become a Friday-night footnote in a basketball player's social calendar. I need structure! I need a romantic arc!

​"Breathe, Kelsey, breathe. Calm down," Talia said, grabbing my shoulders and forcing me to inhale. "You are spiraling."

​"He might just be busy," Bianca chimed in reasonably, her practical Connecticut mindset kicking in. "Think about it. It's a basketball house. They definitely stayed up until four in the morning cleaning up spilled drinks and dealing with the aftermath of four hundred people. He's probably still asleep, or at an early practice."

​"Yes. Yes, you're right," I said, clutching my pink robe tighter around my neck, desperately catching onto the lifeline Bianca was throwing me. "He's an athlete. He probably has to run laps or something. You're completely right."

​"Good," Talia said, nodding decisively. "Let's give him the benefit of the doubt for now."

​"I'll just send a snap," I blurted out, my fingers already flying to my back pocket to retrieve my phone before either of them could stop me. "Not a text. A snap is casual. It doesn't look desperate. It just checks if he's active."

​I opened the camera, flipping it to the front lens. I crowded myself between Talia and Bianca on the bed. "Okay, look silly. Let's look completely unbothered."

​Talia threw up a peace sign, crossing her eyes with flawless comedic timing, while Bianca let out a resigned sigh and made a goofy, wrinkled-nose face at the lens. I pulled a dramatic, wide-eyed pout in my pink robe and towel turban, took the photo, and sent it directly to malik_thompson. I dropped the phone screen-down onto the duvet like it was a hot coal.

​"Okay, it's out there," I breathed, pressing my palms against my cheeks. "Please distract me. My mind is going to five different worst-case scenarios right now."

​Bianca shifted, leaning her back against the wall as she picked up her phone to check her calendar. "Well, if you want a real distraction... there's a university academic seminar tomorrow afternoon. I'm going because it counts toward my honors credits. Are either of you interested?"

​Talia immediately groaned, sliding back down under her green covers until only her bonnet was visible. "A seminar? On a Sunday afternoon? Bianca, I love you, but that sounds like a form of institutional torture. School stuff is so boring when it's voluntary."

"I'll go," I spoke up, my ears perking up at the word. "Actually, that sounds perfect. The architecture in the humanities hall is gorgeous, and I can use the campus aesthetic for a really cute photo dump on I*******m next week. I need to keep my feed active anyway."

​"Perfect. It starts at two," Bianca said with a small smile.

​My eyes instinctively drifted back to the duvet where my phone was resting. The silence coming from the device was deafening. Don't look at it, Kelsey. Do not be that girl.

​Five seconds later, my hand moved on its own. I snatched the phone, unlocked the screen, and opened Snapchat.

​My heart froze.

​The gray arrow next to his name had turned into an empty pink hollow outline.

​Opened · 4m ago

​I stared at the screen. I scrolled up. No typing bubbles. No reply. He hadn't even double-tapped to save the picture of us in the chat. He had just... looked at it four minutes ago and left me on completely read.

​A wave of intense, hot embarrassment flooded from the tips of my toes straight up to my ears, turning my cheeks a deep, frantic crimson.

​Please open the floorboards and let me slide directly into the campus sewage system. I want to disintegrate. I want to pack my pastel pink pillows, get back in my mom's car, and move back to Brookhaven where the boys are predictable and the social stakes don't make you want to pass out. I have been left on read by a verified sophomore. The universe is officially over.