Page 31 of Mud, Love, and Chemistry

“Why did it have to be him?”

“Why does it matter? It’s a stupid bull.”

“It’s not just the bull.” I fold my arms, hugging myself. “Do you remember the night I set that record?”

Lisa nods and puts her arm around me. “Yep, sure do. It was my birthday.”

“And a week after Connor left.”

Lisa crinkles her nose. “Yeah, I forgot about that part.”

“Well, I haven’t.” I take a deep breath, my headache ebbing finally. “Connor leaving for New York broke me. I felt like such a failure, felt so out of control, and setting that record on the bull gave me something to hold on to.”

Lisa squeezes my shoulder but says nothing.

“That sense of failure came back after all this shit with Sam, and I don’t know, him beating my record amplified it. Like, I can’t hold on to anything. Ugh, is this making any sense?”

“No.” She grimaces, and I laugh. “But I know how much you like to have a handle on things, so I can see how all this Sam stuff has you turned topsy-turvy.”

“I don’t know what it is about him that makes me so dumb.”

“Um, have you seen the guy? I’d be a bumbling idiot too if a guy like that even looked at me. Phew!” She fans herself with her hand.

A giggle escapes me. “I have seen him. A lot of him.”

“Maybe you should hook up again.”

“What!?”

“You know, a hate-fuck. Get him in your system one more time to get him out of your system for good.”

“That’s got to be the answer,” I say sarcastically, laughing as Lisa elbows me. “There’s no way that would work.”

“It would at least be fun.”

Shaking my head, I sigh. “No. I think the best thing for me to do is to ignore the fact he even exists.”

Chapter 10

The following Tuesday is my first lab day, and I’m both excited and petrified.

I love labs. I love being able to work on problems hands-on. It’s so satisfying to see the equations from class translate into physical experiments.

But this is O-Chem lab, which means Sam will be here. And as much as I like our lab professor, Dr. Hinkle, he always gives assigned seats, and he does it alphabetically by last name. So, unless there are the right amount of people with last names that come before mine, I’ll be sitting at a table with Sam. Possibly sitting next to him.

When I arrive at the lab room, students have already gathered in the hall. The door must be locked, and Dr. Hinkle must be late.

Great.

Slumping against the wall, I pull my phone from my pocket like everyone else has done. I get through three rounds of Wordle before I get stuck on a word. Three letters down, two to go. The letters I have remaining make absolutely no sense. A “U”, but no “Q”. No “S” or “T”, but an “L”? This is impossible.

“Try ‘awful,’” Sam’s deep voice rumbles next to my ear.

With a flinch, I whip my head up. I don’t know how I didn’t notice him, nor do I understand why he’s even talking to me. Our previous interactions haven’t exactly been friendly. Giving him the side-eye, I scoot a few feet away.

“Sorry,” he says, putting his hands in his pockets. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”

“Well, maybe you shouldn’t sneak up on people.”

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