Page 21 of Defend Me

“Of course.”

“Sweet. See you Thursday, Tilian. You should sit with me at the game.”

His face brightened a little, then he walked away. Fucking adorable.

Chapter 7

Tilian

Oh, god. I was going to throw up.

Brooks, easily the hottest guy to ever hit on me, invited me to sit with him at the game. Well, he probably wasn’t hitting on me. He was obviously a flirt in general. Every time I saw him, he was talking to someone. He was friends with the freaking quarterback and that guy, Kai. They were both otherworldly.

In layman’s terms, he and his friends were so far out of my league that I might as well have been in another galaxy.

I looked at my hand while I walked toward the field. Did he touch everyone like that, as if it was no big deal? My stomach had been trying to claw its way free of my body at the time. I needed some of that molly I had at the Halloween party. It made me more open. Although, it nearly got me beaten up by Kai, so it probably wasn’t a good idea.

Someone glared at me as they passed. I maintained eye contact while I brought the joint to my mouth. I hated judgy people. We weren’t allowed to smoke on campus, but anybody who mattered was already at the game. They’d probably just give me a warning anyway. If they kicked every student out for smoking weed, they’d lose half of them.

I should’ve gotten here earlier, but the idea of waiting for Brooks was worse than coming late. Now, though, I had no idea where to start. He told me which row he’d be in, but it was hard to study the numbers when people were going up and down the stairs, flailing their arms, and just being generally chaotic. It was so loud that I couldn’t think.

Who liked this shit?

After I flicked the burned out joint into a trash bin, I took a deep breath and headed into the mayhem. It wasn’t too hard to find the row, but I didn’t know which section he was in. There were multiple sets of stairs that separated them. Unless I was going to go up and down each one, I’d never find him.

Pulling out my phone, I leaned against the railing.

Tilian:Not sure where u are and this is kind of a lot…

Brooks:Don’t back out. I’ll cry. Where are you?

Tilian:Bottom of the stands.

He read it, but he didn’t respond, so I put the phone away and gripped the railing behind me. It felt like people were looking at me, but I knew they weren’t. There were too many more interesting things going on for them to care. I just had to keep telling myself that.

Yeah, I didn’t want to do this. Nope. There wasn’t enough weed or Xanax in the world for this.

I turned and started walking toward the exit. Brooks would understand. Maybe. I had no idea, actually.

A hand latched onto mine and pulled me to a stop. Someone got really close to me from behind and I felt breath on my ear.

“Hey, I’ve got you. Come on.”

I gripped Brooks’ hand and let him lead me. While he walked, I glanced at the side of his face, then at our interlocked hands. Was I going to throw up before? Now, it felt the same, but I was also elated. I didn’t want to let go, so when we reached our seats, I held onto him tighter. He didn’t make an effort to pull away, which just made my heart race faster.

When I saw that Kai’s boyfriend, Sen, was with us, I felt a little awkward. He offered me a smile, though.

“Hey, I’m Sen.”

“Tilian. Uh, you probably shouldn’t talk to me. Your man hates me.”

He laughed lightly. It was clear why I’d tried to hit on him on Halloween. He was super attractive, but in a different way than the others. There was this sweet undertone to everything about him.

“Don’t worry about Kai,” he said. “It was a bad night when we met. If Brooks likes you, you’re good people.”

“Cool.” I smiled at him, then sat down. Brooks slipped his hand from mine and I felt a little bummed about it, but then he put his arm around my shoulders. When he dipped his head to say something in my ear, I nearly died from the proximity.

“You okay?”

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