Page 62 of Tempting the Player
Brogan pauses the video game. “How’s our little Rocky?”
“They dragged the highlights out of me,” Jane confesses.
“It’s fine,” I assure her. “He’s all right. Gonna have a hell of a black eye and he’s suspended for three days.”
Archer whistles. “Damn. I can’t believe it. Flynn punched someone?”
“I’ll let him tell you the details if he wants, but maybe give him a few hours before you start hounding him?”
“We gotta head back to campus anyway.” Brogan drops the controller onto the coffee table and looks to Jane. “You need a ride?”
“Oh.” She shakes her head. “No. I’m good.”
“I can take her,” I say, standing.
Brogan and Archer get up and start for the door, but not before they both send me a knowing smirk.
Once they’re gone, I wait for Jane to pack up her things.
“I’m sorry about dragging you along,” I say, then remember we were supposed to get lunch. “Dammit. You must be starving.”
“I could eat,” she says. She lifts her backpack to her shoulder.
“I’ll swing by and get you something on our way.” I glance at the clock. “Or I’ll drop you first and then go to University Hall and grab food. If you sit in the back of that giant lecture hall, I can sneak it in.”
“Or we could go sit down somewhere together and have lunch? You haven’t eaten either and you look like you could use an hour or two of downtime.”
“I’ll be fine. Come on, I don’t want you to be late.”
She does move to the door, but not all that quickly. “I already emailed my sociology professor and let him know I had something urgent come up. We’re just reviewing for a test next week.” She shrugs. “It shouldn’t be an issue.”
“You didn’t need to do that.”
“I know. I wasn’t a hostage here.” She smiles. “It’s no big deal. Seriously. But feeding me is a big deal because I’m on the verge of getting hangry.”
We go to In-N-Out. The lunch rush is gone, and the place is quiet as we sit together at a little booth by the window, eating burgers and fries and watching traffic.
“It’s sweet,” Jane says after I tell her the full story about Flynn. “This is the kind of stuff I missed out on in high school. No guy ever punched someone in my honor.”
I find that incredibly hard to believe.
“That you know about,” I say as I swirl a fry in a ketchup and mayo mixture before tossing it in my mouth.
“Trust me. I would have known.”
“Listen,” I say, holding back a sigh. “I know Flynn doesn’t need someone watching over him while he’s home during his suspension, but I’d like to be there for him anyway.”
“Right. Of course.” She nods, and she looks so understanding that it makes me feel worse.
“I’ll find someone to cover for me. That part shouldn’t be a problem.” I spent all of lunch trying to come up with a solution and this is the best I can do. I hate it.
“What if I just hang at the house with you guys?”
“With me and Flynn?”
“Yeah. I mean, I guess that’s presumptuous, but I could just chill there during the day. I won’t get in the way or anything. You won’t even know I’m there.”
Yeah, right. There’s no room we could be in together that I wouldn’t be aware of her.
