Page 88 of Wildest Dreams

I wasn’t there, but it looks like everyone else was.

I blink down at it, my heart thumping wildly, as I try to work out why the hellTanner was there.

How is that even possible?

I scroll to the messages below it and suddenly I’m getting my answer loud and clear.

ARIA:I’m sooooo jealous you girls met THE hockey heartthrob!

WHITNEY:The Carter Ridge Rangers have a BIG new player on their team!

ARIA:So when you say ‘big’…?

KASEY:I’ve heard, like, nine inches.

WHITNEY:Girl, I heard ten – and from a LOT of different sources.

KASEY:look at his tagged photos though – he’s been with, like, literally EVERY pretty girl in Carter Ridge

I stare down in horror at the screen as more and more photos filter through, screenshots from one of his social media profiles and a million different selfies that he’s been tagged in.

With, like, a million different girls.

I type out a message to the squad, fingers shaking as I tap the screen.

AISLING:wait, who is this guy? what do you mean by ‘hockey heartthrob’?

Whitney, a fellow freshman, quickly answers my questions for me.

WHITNEY:his name’s Tanner and he’s fucking FAMOUS in Carter Ridge – and not just because he’s being predicted as a future star for the NHL, but because he’s been AROUND if you get what I mean. The rumours about him are HUGE.

I immediately message her back.

AISLING:what rumours?

The blood drains from my face as I hit the send button.

It takes a minute before Whitney’s message comes through and when it does, I wish that it hadn’t.

WHITNEY:Aisling, what you are looking at right now is the biggest player on campus. There’s genuinely a rumour that he fucked every single girl in his senior year class.From what we saw of him the other night, I’m pretty sure he’s planning to continue his streak at college too. And like, thank God, because who wouldn’t want a piece of that? Besides, there was a hockey social last night and he didn’t show up, so it’s freaking obvious what he was spending his evening doing instead. But seriously, get in line. Girl code doesn’t exist when Tanner is involved.

She follows up her message with a billion crying-laughing emojis and I slowly sit down on the edge of the bed, feeling my heart plummet in my chest.

“This was a huge mistake,” I whisper to myself, fingers shaking as I hold my phone.

I was so caught up in how kind and handsome Tanner was last night that I didn’t for one second think that it could have all been an act? That he might not be as sweet and wholesome as he’d let on?

I mean, come on, I didn’t even know that he was a student at Carter U! And now I’m finding out that he’s some big shot hockey heartthrob who’s slept with the entire female population of the town that I’m about to spendfour years in?

Tears sting at the back of my eyes as I tap back onto his message, a blank page except for the one text. My heart breaks a little bit in my chest.

I can’t believe that I didn’t even question him.

How the hell could I have been so naïve?

A million more messages fly through on the cheer chat – more photos screenshotted from his accounts with more pretty girls – and a sob rips through my chest as I realise what a fucking idiot I’ve been.

It’s my first week at Carter U and I already fell for it – I fell for the exact type of shit that I specificallydidn’t want to fall for.

---