by Tessa Teevan
It just sucks that this had to be the fraternity Seth had to rush. I wonder if she had a chance to listen to the mix CD. My hopes to start to rise at the thought that she might have, and if she did, she’ll understand the olive branch I was extending.
Throughout the night, Seth introduces me to his new fraternity brothers, including Reese’s boyfriend, Cy, and even to the guy Andi is seeing, who I now know as Teddy. He actually seems like a pretty cool guy, and I find that I can’t hate him. Reese eyes me warily as I shake his hand, but she doesn’t comment.
Seth and I spend the night mostly playing beer pong and flip cup. I try not to look for Andi, but by the time we’re ready to leave, I realize that she never showed up.
The next day, I somehow let Seth talk me into going to another party, again, at the same fraternity. Even though I have a shit-ton of homework, for some reason, I’m feeling restless and I agree to go. The party is more of the same from the night before.
I’m waiting to play the next round of beer bong with when Seth finds me and tells me that he needs me to play wingman. I readily agree. It’ll be the perfect distraction, and also, I figure that it’s time to get out there and see what other girls UT has to offer.
Seth leads me across the room to where two pretty girls are standing. They’re both relatively short, especially compared to Seth and me. One has sleek, black hair and blue eyes that look huge on her small face. She looks like a pretty, little porcelain doll. The other has curly, bleach-blonde hair and brown eyes, and she is actually downright gorgeous. He introduces me to the girls—Jessica is the black-haired girl and Kelsey is the blonde—juniors who are roommates with an apartment off campus. According to the shit-eating grin on Seth’s face, he thinks he hit the mother lode by meeting an upperclassmen, and he wastes no time pulling Jessica onto the makeshift dance floor in the living room, leaving Kelsey and me alone.
“How old are you?” Kelsey shouts above the noise of the crowd. She’s eyeing me like a piece of meat she can’t wait to sink her teeth into as soon as she’s told it’s allowed.
“Eighteen,” I yell back, and a gleam fill her eyes. I don’t know if she’s a cougar in the making, but it seems as if she likes the fact that I’m barely legal. “How about you?”
Someone bumps her from behind and she falls into me. Instinctively, my arms go around her so I can steady her. She takes that as an invitation and slips her hands around my waist.
“You’re pretty cute for an eighteen-year-old. And it’s your lucky night, Cohen. I like them young.” The way she says it makes me wonder if this isn’t her first time preying on freshman meat. I hope she’s not an education major.
Before I can respond, she takes my hand and pulls me to the dance floor, which is completely fine with me. I’d much rather dance than talk right now.
We get lost in the music, stopping only to refill our cups every so often. By the time Kelsey whispers in my ear that she wants to get out of here, I have no idea how long we’ve been dancing. All I know is that I’m pretty drunk and downright sweaty and my cock is hard as hell from Kelsey’s grinding on it all night long.
“It looks like Jessica’s not done with your roommate either,” she says, nodding to where Jessica and Seth are leaned up against a wall, making out. We make our way over to them and Kelsey taps her roommate on the back. When she finally tears herself away from Seth, she gives Kelsey a dirty look. “I don’t mean to interrupt, but why don’t we continue this party back at our place?”
Jessica looks back at Seth, who gives an enthusiastic nod. He’s like an eager puppy who has the world’s biggest bone dangling in front of him. I make a mental note to tell him to tone it down a notch.
Clearing my throat, I peel myself away from Kelsey. “I’m just going to head back to the dorms. My head’s already swimming and I’m ready to crash.”
Seth’s the first to protest, followed quickly by Kelsey. “Don’t worry, Cohen. I promise I won’t take advantage of your drunken state,” she promises, although the look in her eyes tells me that she doesn’t mean it.
“Come on, man. It’ll be fun,” Seth echoes, giving me a look that is half pleading, half ‘I’ll kill you if you leave me hanging.’
I spend about two seconds mulling it over in my brain before I finally relent. Who knows? Maybe this is what I need to get out of my funk. Seth gives me an appreciative grin when I nod my head.
As we make our way outside, Jessica grumbles about being the designated driver. On the way to their apartment, she declares that we have to play a drinking game so she can catch up with the rest of us. The entire time, Kelsey’s sitting next to me with her index finger rubbing up and down on my thigh. She gets dangerously close to the bulge in my jeans, and it twitches involuntarily as her fingertip grazes it.
She leans in until I feel her lips on my ear. “Someone’s packing,” she whispers, excitement lacing her voice.
Before I can respond, Jessica stops the car, announcing that we’re at their place. When we get into their apartment, they pull out a bottle of liquor, four shot glasses, and we begin to play Never Have I Ever. Two hours and an entire bottle of rum later, Seth and Jessica disappear, leaving me alone on the couch with an extremely drunk Kelsey. Apparently, there’s not much she hasn’t done, because I’m pretty sure fifty percent of that bottle went down her throat. As soon as the other two are gone, she climbs onto my lap, where she straddles me. She leans in and rains sloppy kisses all over my face.
“You know, you’re really hot,” she slurs between kisses.
“Umm, yeah, you’re hot, too,” I tell her, but she doesn’t even hear me. At this point, the alcohol’s making my own brain fuzzy, and I don’t even care that her lips keep missing my own.
Her hands roam down my chest, and she tugs on the bottom of my T-shirt, pulling it up. I raise my arms so she can get it off, and she gives me a crooked grin as she tosses it aside. With fumbling hands, her next course of action is to unbuckle my belt and undo the button of my jeans. She slides the zipper down and I lift up so she can pull my jeans down as well—just enough so she can have easy access. I let out a groan of pleasure as her hand slips inside my boxers and finds my erection. Even drunk, the girl knows what she’s doing.
Finally, she finds my mouth with hers, her tongue slipping in as she proceeds to play the most drunken game of tonsil hockey known to man. The way she’s stroking my dick has me not giving a shit how wet and sloppy her kisses are, and I slide my hand up her dress, not surprised when I find that she’s not wearing any panties. I slip my hand between her legs, and she moans when I press against her clit before moving down to find her completely wet for me. I don’t waste any time pushing my fingers inside her, and it’s not long before she’s writhing on top of me, moaning her release into my mouth as I feel her clench around my fingers. Pulling back, she gives me a drunken smile that’s laced with satisfaction. Her eyes are hooded as she begins to come down from her orgasm.
“That was soooo good,” she mumbles as she pulls her hand out of my pants. Apparently, Knox’s advice has been working, because even though she’s been jacking me off for a good ten minutes, I’m nowhere near close to getting off.
She climbs off my lap and lies face down on the couch next to where I’m sitting up, placing her head in my lap. I lift up when she pulls on my jeans, and when I do, she pushes my boxers down and then looks up at me. With glossy eyes, she begins to giggle.
“You have a really pretty penis,” she informs me.
Shifting, I reach down and begin to pull my boxers back up to cover myself, not really in the mood for a hot girl to start talking to my erection, but she pushes my hand away.
“Stop that! It’s so pretty. I want to know if it tastes as good as it looks.”
Oh, hell yeah. I’m definitely up for a blow job, and I rest my head back against the couch, more than ready for her. She leans her head forward and takes me into her mouth. All of me. I swear my dick’s touching the back of her throat, and it feels so good. So fuckin
g good. That is, until she begins to withdraw. I inhale sharply.
“Teeth! Fucking Jesus Christ, no teeth!”
The scraping stops and she gives me an apologetic smile before she proceeds to bob up and down, not going nearly as far and, thankfully, no longer using her teeth to scrape my skin. I lean my head against the back of the couch as I enjoy Kelsey’s mouth on me. I’m pretty damn proud of myself for lasting this long, but a small part of me wonders if I were with Andi if I’d already have exploded. Kelsey’s good, but she’s no Andi. I immediately feel bad at the thought and drive all thoughts, all images, all anything of Andi outside of my mind and focus on who I’m here with.
All of a sudden, Kelsey stops sucking me and lays her head down on my lap, my erection apparently acting as her pillow. “I’m so tired and this is taking too long. Can I finish tomorrow?” she asks sleepily, and before I can even answer, she’s already snoring.
With a heavy sigh, I lift her up just enough so I can slip out from under her and off the couch. I fumble with my jeans and find my shirt before grabbing my phone and calling a cab, not caring or wanting her to finish tomorrow. When she wakes up, I want to be a long gone. Not that it matters. She probably won’t even remember it. Which is my fault, anyway. I should’ve known she was too far gone to actually do anything, and it’s not like I came here expecting to get some. Yeah, I figured something would happen, but that was before she drank half her weight in Captain Morgan. I should’ve stopped her the minute she touched me, but it’s not the easiest thing to tell a warm, inviting mouth no, especially when I’ve had my fair share of alcohol, too. Sighing at my stupidity, I wait outside for the cab, desperate to escape this place.
When the cab drops me off at the dorm, a thought crosses my mind. Was this how Andi felt the morning she slipped out of my dorm? I sure as hell hope not, because even through my alcohol-induced haze, I feel like shit. Drunken hookups are officially crossed off my list. And suddenly I realize that I’m still overanalyzing things even though I told myself I’d stop. What fucking good is booze if it still doesn’t make my brain stop thinking clearly?
When I fall on to my bed, I stare up at the ceiling, wondering what the hell I’m doing and how things in my life seem so complicated when just two months ago I was headed off to college, more interested in my course load than anything. Yet here I am, an overly analytical asshole. That’s what I feel like, and it’s kind of true. This is me, unlike ever before. Cohen Wellington. Oh for two. Fuck my life. College is a lot harder than I thought, and I’m not even talking about academics.
I SIGH with relief as I walk into my dorm. After spending a long weekend at home, visiting my parents, I feel exhausted and more than grateful that I can get away from Bethel whenever I want. Dad wanted to know all about classes and if I’d determined a major. Mom wanted to know all about the boys on campus and if I’d met anyone special. Riley, my older brother, who also happened to be home, wanted to know if I had any hot friends for him to visit whenever he was in town. The answers, respectively, were no, no, and a very emphatic no.
All I need is for Riley to walk onto campus and have all the girls swooning over him. I dealt with that enough in high school, and I’m finally enjoying having my own territory where I’m not known as Riley Kane’s sister. As a baseball player for the University of Memphis, he’s tall, lean, and according to Reese, hot as hell. With a head full of dark-brown hair, he was fortunate enough to skip the redhead gene. Because let’s face it. The odds of an attractive redheaded guy are pretty much every three out of ten. That might even be generous. Trust me—as a redheaded woman, I feel bad saying that, but it’s the truth. Even I’m not attracted to my own kind.
Turning on my latest feel-good playlist, I begin to unpack and wonder what I missed over the weekend. Teddy made sure that I knew about the raging party I was going to miss even though I’m not sure why he thought I would care. The night he asked me out, I more than let him know that I hated parties.
After that night with Cohen, I decided to let it go, to let him cool off. I stopped hiding from him around campus and figured that, if he changed his mind and wanted to be friends, he’d make a move. Instead of doing so, he always looked away when he saw me. It didn’t help that Teddy seemed to always be around at the most inopportune times.
We’d gone to dinner the night after the party and had a great time. While he made me laugh, it just wasn’t the same. I told myself that I needed to give it time, because unlike Cohen, he and I were actually on the same page in that neither of us wanted to jump into a serious relationship. That didn’t mean I was going to jump into his bed right away. I’d definitely learned my lesson with that one. At the end of the night, when he leaned in to kiss me, I was surprised to find that I actually liked it. He was a true gentleman—another thing that surprised me—and he pulled back before deepening the kiss. We made plans to go out again, and I’ve seen him almost every day since thanks mostly to Reese.
“About time you got back, roomie!” Reese says as she enter the room. “How was your trip? Was Riley home? Did you steal a T-shirt for me? He always wore the best cologne.” She dramatically flops down on my bed and gives me a hopeful look.
“It was fine. Nothing exciting happens in Bethel. You know that. And if you wanted to be a perv and smell Riley’s shirts, you should’ve come with me. But nooo, you couldn’t leave Cy’s side.”
She sits up and scoots back until she’s resting against the wall. “Trust me. Staying here with Cy trumps your brother’s clothes, no matter how good they smell. Plus, I wanted to stick around for the party Friday.”
“Reese, there’s always a party on Friday. Missing one won’t kill you.”
“Yeah, but you said Bethel was boring. And it is. Speaking of frat parties, missy,” she says in an accusatory tone, “who the hell is Cohen?”
His name coming from her lips causes me to freeze just as I’m in the process of hanging up my clean clothes. “How do you know Cohen?” I ask, trying to sound like that name means nothing to me.
As much as Reese wanted me to lose my virginity, there was something that kept me from telling her about what happened. I wasn’t ready to share it, and now that she’s mentioning Cohen to me, I’m getting apprehensive about what she may or may not know.
“The better question is how do you know Cohen?” Her tone is suspicious, and even though I don’t want to look her in the eyes, I slowly turn to face her. “A-ha! You are the Andi he was looking for. I mean, I knew you were, but the guilty look on your face definitely confirms it. So come on. Out with it. I know he’s the guy you left with the night of Cy’s first frat party. I want details.”
“There’s nothing to tell, Reese. But what do you mean the Andi he was talking about? And how do you even know that he and I know each other?”
She sighs loudly but gives in. “You’re not getting out of this, but whatever. He came into the coffee shop Friday after you’d already left. Somehow, he knew I was your roommate. Anyway, he ordered a coffee and then asked me for your number. He said you’d given to him but that he’d lost it. I wasn’t sure I believe him until he described you as sexy redhead wearing an Elton John T-shirt. I knew, or at least hoped, there was only one Andi on campus matching that description.”
I can’t help but smile at both Cohen’s description of me and his lie that I’d given him my number. The thought that he’s finally ready to make contact pisses me off as much as it makes me happy. I’m not exactly the most patient person, but I’m thrilled that he’s ready to be friends.
“Okay, and after you were done insulting my wardrobe?”
“Oh, Andi, I felt so bad for the guy. I hated to be the one to spill to him that you were already seeing someone. I swear, for a split second, he looked like his heart was broken, but I think I was just seeing things because then he just shrugged it off and left.” As if she didn’t just crush me, which, well, she wouldn’t know, she moves to the end of the bed to where her purse is and pulls out a small CD case. “But he did
tell me to give you this.”
I take the case and turn it over in my hands to where his handwriting has written a playlist on a sheet of paper that’s stuck inside. Looking back up at Reese, I have to ask, “Why would you tell him I’m seeing someone?”
She shrugs. “I figured he’d want to know about Teddy, and it’d save you the trouble of having to let him down later. We both know how bad at that you are.”
It’s true. I’m really bad at that, which is how I ended up on so many bad dates in high school. “But Teddy and I aren’t a thing. We’ve only gone out a couple of times,” I protest.
“Oh, come on. He’s totally into you, and I can tell you like him. Plus, it’s really not a big deal. Cohen was at the party on Friday night and then Saturday. I saw him having a great time with some blonde chick I recognized from one of my classes. I’m pretty sure he left with her, too, so it’s not like he was crying in his beer or anything. You’re totally off the hook.”
“Yeah, thanks, Reese. You definitely helped me dodge a bullet,” I say flatly then excuse myself to go shower.
When I get back to the room, I pop the CD into my laptop, import the songs, and the transfer them to my phone. I tell Reese that I’m exhausted and pop my headphones in as I lie down in bed. The first song brings a smile to my face. I can only imagine Cohen waving the white flag as he put War’s Why Can’t We Be Friends on the CD. It’s followed by We’re Going to be Friends by The White Stripes, and I love to think that this is a declaration from him. You’ve Got a Friend in Me, Count on Me, and countless others continue to play. The more songs I listen to, the more the thought of Cohen with someone else hurts.
The songs change from just friendship to ones with a little more of a hidden meaning, especially when the song She Changes Your Mind from an unfamiliar to me band, Copeland, comes on. As I listen to the words, I feel a pang in my heart that makes no sense—especially if all I wanted from him was a friendship. Now I feel like the shoe is on the other foot and I completely understand where he was coming from. For us, I don’t think friendship will ever be enough, but at the same time, I’m not sure either of us is ready for what lies beyond that, and trying right now would probably just ruin everything even further, which is why I have to stick to my guns. I feel like I have whiplash from all this going back and forth, and it makes me think that my decision is the right one. I just can’t be friends with Cohen Wellington.