Tara

****

Hey, uh, it’s Mike. I, um. . . this is stupid, why am I leaving a voicemail? I just figured you’d. . . I don’t know, you didn’t show up tonight, so I just wanted to make sure you were. . . okay. If we’re okay? No, that’s not what I mean. Shit. Just, yeah. Call me back.

You pressed play on the answering machine for what felt like the dozenth time. Mike’s deliciously raspy timbre filled the confines of your room. At that point, you knew every intricacy of the message he’d left - each place where he’d stopped to carefully consider his words, the crackle of static when he shifted the phone against his ear, the deep breath he took at the end before saying, “Call me back.”

You were sitting on your bed, legs tucked up to your chest, cheek resting atop your knee as you listened to his message again. There was a painful aching in your ribcage, one that stemmed from an emotion you couldn’t quite pinpoint. It was an odd mix of excitement and remorse.

On the one hand, you didn’t miss the implication of Mike calling you and leaving a voicemail. It meant he’d purposefully sought out your phone number, thumbed through the phone book looking for your name. On the other hand, you were sick with guilt over not showing up. You didn’t think skipping your weekly ritual would result in Mike calling and practically begging you - no, not begging, you were just being dramatic - to call him and let him know if you were okay.

If the two of you were okay.

What had he meant by that? You couldn’t decide if you were reading too much into it. Did he mean the casual sex situation? Was he asking if their arrangement was over? Or was he implying something more? That maybe there was an element of. . . friendship that you’d been unaware of.

Was friendship too strong a word? Was it the right word to describe the dynamic between two people who fucked and did nothing else?

You pressed play again.

It was Monday afternoon. You’d spent all day sitting in the same position, or a variation of the same position, repeatedly listening to Mike’s voice and reconsidering everything you thought you knew about him. Your conversation with your best friend, which you’d already left feeling like you didn’t have a true grasp on Mike Wheeler, had only complicated things further.

Because if you hadn’t spent the night with your friends, Mike would have never called you, but if you’d gone to his apartment, you would have gotten your feelings hurt.

It was all too confusing.

The voicemail finished, and you sighed, flopping back into your pillows to stare at the ceiling.

What did it mean that Mike rarely slept with a girl more than once? What did it mean that you’d slept with him four times? What did it mean that he was calling you to see why you hadn’t shown up for the fifth time? Was it really just a matter of Mike relishing in your humiliation and the fact that he had such control over you? Or was it something else? Did he like hooking up with you?

If so, he was really bad at showing it.

You couldn’t believe that you’d skipped your writing seminar, so unprepared to face Mike in person that you instead chose to listen to a 20-second voicemail over and over and over and over. . .

This happened sometimes, though, didn’t it? Things you had a history with wouldn’t let you go, even if those things were boys with lanky limbs and a pretty face.

What if you couldn’t set yourself free from Mike Wheeler?

Ever.

It would have been less painful if Mike cut you open and carved his name into your organs, if he plunged his fist into your chest cavity and pulled out your still-beating heart. Anything other than this, this dizzying back-and-forth of a non-committal relationship. You’d never occupied the in-between space where somebody could matter so much and technically mean nothing at all, and it was sending you into a spiral.

Truthfully, it had been sending you into a spiral since that day in the library when Mike complimented your writing and offered you his joint.

There were so many what-ifs. So many possibilities that could have led you down an alternative route. What if you’d called Mike out on his rude, distant behavior? What if you’d never gone to his apartment? What if you’d never gone to the library that day at all?

You slipped under your sheets, swaddling yourself in your blankets before closing your eyes.

Deep down, even with all these hypotheticals, you knew that your encounter with Mike Wheeler was inevitable. You could just feel that your schoolgirl crush on him had set off a natural chain of events that would, in every timeline, lead you to him.

You reached out from underneath the blankets and blindly pushed play on the answering machine.

Hey, uh, it’s Mike.

****

There was no logical reason why you decided to return to Mike’s that Friday. It wasn’t as if he called you again or anything, and you’d skipped class both Monday and Wednesday (which was a poor choice, in hindsight), meaning he hadn’t been able to leave you another cryptic note. Yet, here you were, standing in front of the apartment door that was growing more and more familiar.

You knocked on the door, the sound making you cringe. Mike was there in an instant.

“Hi,” he said breathlessly.

“Hi.”

“You’re here.”

You nodded. “Yeah, I, um. . . sorry I didn’t show up last week.”

Mike stepped aside to let you into the apartment, looking a little dumbfounded. He looked devastatingly gorgeous, as usual. He wore a faded shirt that read HELLFIRE CLUB, softened by too many washes. The hem was too short and pulled slightly across his chest, so with each movement, it exposed a sliver of his stomach. The right side of his face was pink, as if he’d been leaning on the palm of his hand, and there was a smear of ink on the strong bridge of his nose.

You’d quickly become familiar with the comforting warmth of Mike’s apartment. Your apartment was always a flurry of activity, vibrant with noise and half-finished conversations, as was common when five twenty-something women shared a place. There were always clothes in the living room, shoes in the hall, and makeup bags spilled across every surface. The air was always redolent with perfume, hairspray, and shampoo in preparation for dates and nights out. The mirrors were always fogged over from rushed mornings, and if music wasn’t playing, then someone was singing. There were mugs left out, lipstick stains on the rims, and sweet little notes scattered on counters - have a good day, girls!

And while you wouldn’t have had it any other way - you loved your roommates and the liveliness they brought to your life - you were fascinated by the tranquility of Mike’s apartment. It was always unchanged, stagnant, a snapshot of a moment. There was a sense that everything in the space knew where it belonged. His couch was always slightly sunken in the same spot, the coffee table always covered with pages of messily scrawled drafts and bookmarked novels.

The sound of Mike shutting the door made you jump.

“It’s fine,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck. “You didn’t have to. . . I didn’t expect. . . sorry, I just didn’t think you’d come back.”

“I was sick,” you blurted out. “Nothing contagious. It was my period, actually. Really bad cramps.”

“Oh.” Mike nodded, seemingly unsure of how to reply.

“I would’ve called, but-”

“You still could’ve come over,” Mike interrupted.

You frowned. “I don’t know if I’m into period sex-”

“We could’ve just smoked and watched a movie. Or something,” he finished, looking at you with those big, brown eyes. His lashes were so dark, casting shadows against his pronounced cheekbones. He looked like a puppy. “If you don’t want to have sex, we don’t have to.”

“Oh,” you said, a little dazed. “Oh.”

Mike cleared his throat. “Yeah. I just don’t want you to think I’m using you for sex.” He laughed a little sheepishly at that.

“I don’t think that.”

“You did. You do. And that’s fine. I just want to tell you that if you ever wanted not to have sex. . . you’re still welcome to come over.”

You opened your mouth to say something before closing it again, completely at a loss for words. Mike wouldn’t even let you stay for more than a minute after he rolled off you, and here he was saying that you were welcome to come over and hang out?

Had Mike Wheeler been possessed?

“We could also compare manuscripts,” Mike continued to ramble. “It doesn’t have to be a movie. It just. . . it doesn’t have to be sex. If that’s not what you want.”

“Oh,” you repeated hollowly.

“Yeah.”

“Okay. Well, thanks. I, um, did come here for sex this time, though,” you said. You didn’t quite know how to segue out of this unexpected conversation, especially without admitting how much Mike’s words meant to you, even if they were a lie. “Unless. . . you don’t want to.”

“No, I want to have sex,” Mike said quickly, eyes going wide.

You couldn’t help but laugh a little at that. “Okay. Sex it is then.”

Mike grinned crookedly, leading you to his bedroom. He flicked off the overhead light so the two of you were bathed in the lamplight and the silvery moonlight filtering through the window.

Mike rounded on you, gently pressing his lips to yours. It was a sweeter kiss than you were used to, but there was still an underlying urgency to it, like he was afraid that if he didn’t kiss you fast enough, you would disappear again. You’d honestly expected him to be angry at you for skipping out on your arranged Friday meeting, that you’d show up and he’d slam the door in your face, but the tenderness of his touch took your breath away.

He held the sides of your neck in his hands, stroking your jaw with his thumb. You slid your hands up his shirt, the stupid faded devil face warping with the movement. You’d have to ask him what Hellfire Club was later. You savored the shiver that went through him as your palms pressed flat against his skin.

Mike tasted like apple cider, and the idea of him making himself a steaming mug made you laugh against his lips.

“What?” he murmured into your mouth. “What’s funny?”

“You taste like apple cider,” you whispered, looking up at him. Your faces were pressed so close that you could almost feel the flutter of his eyelashes against your skin and the hint of stubble on his chin.

“I had some. Earlier.”

“You’re sweet,” Mike replied. “You taste like a vanilla milkshake.”

“I had one earlier,” you echoed.

Mike laughed quietly, sliding one hand down to cup your ass. “Stick your tongue out,” he ordered. You obeyed.

Mike lay his tongue flat against yours, his piercing leaving an indent on your taste buds, the maintained eye contact practically pornographic. The two of you remained like that for a moment, spit mixing and threatening to spill out of your mouth, Mike’s hands gripping and kneading at the fat of your ass. Then, he took your tongue into his mouth and dove in for a sloppy kiss, the two of you practically eating each other’s faces.

“Fuck, I missed you,” he muttered, pulling you in closer by the waist, peppering kisses at the corners of your lips and the apples of your cheeks, then down your throat to your collarbone.

“Don’t say that.”

“Why not?” Mike asked, pulling back, a sincerity in your brown eyes that you’d never seen before. “It’s true.”

You shook your head, dropping your gaze to his chest. “Just. . . I don’t want to talk.”

Mike didn’t object, instead maneuvering you to lie down on the bed.

“I just wish I could have the whole day with you,” he said under his breath, more to himself than anything, peeling your jeans and lace panties off. “Wanna take my time with you for once - eat this pussy for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.”

“Mike,” you choked out, covering your face with your arm. The vulgarity embarrassed you, but you were quickly distracted by the feeling of him pressing a wet kiss directly onto your clit. It had been forever since he’d gone down on you, and the sensation was overwhelming.

Mike nudged his nose against your inner thigh, biting a bruise into the flesh, before turning his attention back to your cunt. Curiously, you peeked out from behind your arm and the sight of him between your thighs, pupils blown out to unreal proportions, was almost enough to make you come.

He wrapped a hand around your ankle, dragging you further down the bed, practically directly onto his face. You let out an undignified squeak that dissolved into a moan as Mike wrapped his lips around your clit and sucked hard.

“Fuck, Mike,” you gasped out, fingers drawn automatically to his curls. You heard him laugh between your legs.”

“Feel good.”

“Fuck off. You know it does.”

Mike delivered one last teasing kiss, right against your dripping slit, before licking his lips and climbing over you. “I’ll take my time with you another day,” he promised, sliding your shirt over your head. You’d worn a lacy top, one that would’ve been completely see-through if you hadn’t decided to wear a bra (you’d toyed with the idea, admittedly, but put one on anyway). “I missed you this last week, missed the way you feel. I can’t wait any longer.”

“Don’t,” you repeated, shrugging off your bra as Mike reached behind you to unclip it.

“I mean it-”

You pulled him down for another tooth-gnashing kiss, trapping his words and swallowing them down. You didn’t want to hear it this time, didn’t want his pretty words replaying in your mind the entire drive home. Mike ran his hands up your naked torso, pinching and pulling at your hardening nipples while simultaneously licking into your mouth.

It was the filthiest experience you’d had with him so far, more spit and drool than usual, and you could even taste the faintest hint of yourself on his tongue, masked by the fading apple cider. Your cheeks felt hot as Mike rolled his hips against you, his cock hard inside the confines of his sweats.

“If you don’t go down on me,” you said in between Mike’s frantic kisses, “then can I suck you off?”

Mike pulled back, his face flushed. “What?”

“Never heard of a blowjob before?”

“You don’t have to.”

“You don’t want me to?”

“I didn’t say that,” Mike corrected, averting his eyes, deft fingers tracing lightly down your sides. “You just don’t have to, like, repay me, or whatever.”

“For fuck’s sake, Mike. It’s a blowjob, not a loan.”

Mike swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat. “Okay,” he said weakly. “Fuck, please.”

In record time, Mike pulled his clothes off and perched himself on the edge of his bed. His hands flexed against his thighs, lips slightly parted as he watched you sink to your knees before him. You wished you’d thought to slide your underwear back on, because you’d practically started dripping down your thighs just from kissing Mike, but it felt unnecessary. He would just have to take them off again.

Especially when you had Mike Wheeler’s dick - long, flushed, and pretty - right in front of your face, leaking precum and standing hard against his flat stomach.

You had a fleeting urge to suck hickeys into his thighs, mar the milky skin, but you didn’t know if he’d want the next girl seeing them, so you let the thought pass. From above you, Mike looked like he was about to come from the sight of you kneeling in front of him.

You weren’t as good at sounding sexy when you talked, not like Mike, so you let your actions speak instead, leaning forward and dragging your tongue up the underside of Mike’s dick, tracing the vein. His hips bucked up unexpectedly, and he let out a little groan, head tipping backward slightly.

When you wrapped your fingers around him, the taut muscles of his stomach tensed. You squeezed lightly, your fist slowly sliding higher. You paused, watching his reaction before running your thumb around the tip, a bead of slick precum where your skin met his. Your knees were already aching uncomfortably against the carpet, but it just made the whole thing feel more real. Mike’s eyes looked hazy, the same way he looked after he smoked, and his fingers continued to move restlessly, clearly itching to touch you in some way.

“If I can pull your hair, it’s only fair that you can pull mine, right?” you said, repeating your movement from earlier, drawing your wet tongue against the length of him.

Almost as if it was punched out of him, Mike reached out to dig his hands into your hair. It was at this moment that you realized, for the first time, that Mike’s overly dominant persona might partially be a facade. That maybe he liked being told what to do from time to time, liked relinquishing control.

In the same way you stored away the idea of giving him hickeys, you pocketed this realization for later. You could certainly get behind the idea of Mike being pliable.

Finally, you gave him what he wanted, your kiss-swollen lips wrapping around the head of his cock. Tentatively, your tongue slid out, tasting him. Mike twitched in your hand.

“Shit,” he hissed. His hand fisted in your hair clumsily, his fingers tangled at the roots. You squirmed a bit, aching to reach down and relieve yourself of the arousal growing inside you.

Your mouth stretched around him as you took more, eyes already beginning to water. Gently, Mike guided you. You could sense his restraint, the way he was fighting against fucking up into your mouth, so you bobbed your head a little faster. You were overcome by the urge to please him in the same way he pleased you.

“So good, baby,” Mike babbled, his cheeks a pretty pink. You stifled a gag around him. “Your mouth feels s’good. Fuck, please. I can’t-”

He was losing control of himself with each twist of your hand, each bob of your head from tip to base. There was drool dribbling out from the corners of your mouth, down your chin, and onto his thighs. Mike’s eyebrows furrowed, his hands digging tighter into your stands, before finally he snapped.

“Baby, m’sorry,” he moaned out, rutting into your mouth with reckless abandon. You let your jaw go slack, hand dropping as you surrendered yourself to his haphazard thrusts. You choked around him, tears spilling over your lash line. “Fuck, you sound so pretty with my dick in your throat. Choking around me. So pretty.”

You hummed, content to let him fuck your mouth for as long as he pleased, but that was enough to push Mike over the edge. He let out a broken whimper, pressing your nose against the dark thatch of hair at his base, pumping cum into your eager mouth.

You swallowed, wiping your lips with the back of your hand, sitting back on your heels. “C’mere,” Mike mumbled, pulling you to your feet. You stood on shaky legs, falling into his embrace. Mike positioned you on your back and nudged his face into your neck, placing open-mouthed kisses along the line of your throat. “That was so hot, baby.”

“Did I do okay?” you wondered meekly, voice a little wrecked.

“Yes. God, yes. You’re so good to me,” he soothed, his hands sliding between your legs. “My pretty girl. You’re so wet for me, just from sucking me off.”

“Mike,” you urged.

He chuckled. “Always so needy.”

“Says you,” you pouted, reaching for his wrist to press his fingers inside you.

“What do you want, sweetheart?” he asked, pulling his hand just out of reach.

“You, Mike. Please.”

Mike, clearly too aroused to tease, stroked his quickly hardening cock slowly. He caught his bottom lip between his teeth as he rubbed the head of his cock against your clit in small circles. His other hand reached out to grope and squeeze at one of your tits, entranced by the sight of your pussy clenching around nothing. Slowly, he began to push inside you, cock twitching at how tight you are.

You grit your teeth, gasping at the stretch.

With the hand on your tit, he slid it around to the back of your head and tilted you forward to look down between your thighs, right where the two of you were connected. “Watch, baby,” he cooed, pulling out with agonizing slowness before pushing back in. “Look how I fill you up.”

“So full,” you agreed, nodding your head, tears pricking at your eyes again. “Feels so good.” Your head dropped back down onto the pillow, unable to hold yourself up anymore.

Mike tenderly began to kiss the tear tracks on your cheeks, licking at the saltiness of your tears down to where they dripped off your chin. With each fresh teardrop that escaped from your eye, he was quick to drink it up. He then pressed his chest against yours and buried his face in the crook of your neck. You could feel his breath against your skin. 

For the first time, the sex was less rabid. Mike shallowly thrusted into you, alternating between sweet kisses and reaching deeper inside you than you thought possible. Despite the minimal movement, you could already feel a tingling in your limbs. You held tightly to his shoulders, digging your nails into his freckled skin.

“M’gonna come,” you sniffled.

“It’s okay, sweetheart, I got you,” Mike gasped out, reaching down to rub tight circles against your clit. “I got you.”

The affection in his words was enough to have you clenching around him, vision going blurry for a second as you arched up into his touch. When you came to, the first thing you noticed was the feeling of his cum dripping down your thighs and him pulling out of you.

Without lifting his face too much from your neck, Mike reached over and grabbed a tissue from the box next to his bed, using one to wipe carefully between your legs. When you brushed lightly over your pussy, you whimpered a bit, still sensitive.

The two of you stayed there for a minute, sweaty skin against sweaty skin, both of you panting slightly. You could feel your baby hairs sticking to your forehead.

Finally, when Mike rolled off you, you expected the usual - him subtly asking you to leave. You prepared yourself, already moving to slide off the bed as Mike pulled his boxers back on. You hesitated, arms wrapped around your body, waiting to ask permission to use Mike’s bathroom. He walked over to his closet and pulled out a clean shirt, tossing it in your direction.

It landed right next to you, and you just stared at it for a moment. If it had been for him, why hadn’t he just put it on? Did he need to throw it on the bed?

“What’s that?” you asked.

“A shirt.”

“Okay, obviously. I mean-”

“It’s for you,” he interrupted, looking over his shoulder. “That little lacy top you wore over here doesn’t look too comfortable.”

“I wore it for you,” you grumbled.

“I know, baby, and you looked so pretty in it before I took it off.” He grinned, his previously cocky demeanor having returned. “But I figured you’d want something else to wear while we smoked.”

“While we smoked?” you repeated, cautiously pulling the shirt over your head. It was huge on your - probably would’ve been huge on Mike, too, that’s how big it was - and it smelled like his detergent, the cologne he wore on occasion. It was comforting, somehow, to be swathed in something so uniquely him.

“You’ve done it before, yeah?” Mike inquired, grabbing his lighter and a joint out of his bedside table before sitting back on the bed and propping himself on the headboard. His legs looked especially longer as he stretched himself out, his tattoos darker than ever. “Here, c’mere.”

You crawled over to him and settled on his lap. The feeling of his boxers against your bare inner thighs was a little odd, but you liked being this close to him. You were still a little put off by this differing behavior, however. You figured it was only a matter of time before he kicked you out again - maybe right after he got high enough to realize the mistake he was making.

Mike, seemingly acting on impulse, leaned forward and placed a chaste kiss on your lips before lighting the joint. He tossed the lighter across the bed and brought the end of it to his mouth, his other hand settling gently on your thigh, tracing softly against your skin in tiny movements.

Per usual, you were entranced by the sight of him. He took a slow drag, the cherry glowing briefly before dimming again. His cheeks hollowed slightly as he inhaled, accentuating the sharp lines of his cheekbones. A faint cloud drifted from his lips as he exhaled, curling upward in uneven ribbons before dissolving into the air.

You watched the tension in his shoulders soften before your eyes. He kept the joint balanced between his fingers while wisps of smoke rose lazily toward the ceiling. Even just watching him made you feel heavy-eyed and drowsy, the tender touches on your thighs soothing you even further. You wanted to lean your head against his chest and fall asleep to the sound of his heartbeat.

“Will you tell me about your tattoos?” you asked quietly as Mike took another drag.

Mike tilted his head slightly. “My tattoos?” he repeated through the exhale.

You nodded, fiddling with the hem of the shirt just to give your hands something to do.

“You like them or something?” His mouth quirked slightly. You just chewed on the inside of your bottom lip, looking at him with expectant eyes. Mike sighed. “Okay, sure, yeah.”

He placed the joint in the ashtray on his bedside table and turned his arm, pointing to the little spaceship tattoo you’d noticed on your first hookup.

“My friend Dustin drew this for me,” Mike began. “It looks like shit on purpose, trust me. He’s not a very good artist.” He leaned back, stretching his arm out more fully toward you, and pointed toward a constellation on his bicep. “But this one, this one my friend Will drew. It’s. . . not a real constellation. We made it up when we were like, shit, thirteen? It looks real, though, right?”

You smiled and reached out to trace the thin lines connecting the small star-like dots. “Yeah, it does,” you agreed. “What about this one?”

You poked a tattoo on his ribcage, the one you’d been most curious about since you noticed it. It was a slightly faded line of thin lettering.

“Grace to be born and live as vicariously as possible,” Mike recited without looking to where you were pointing. “It’s Frank O’Hara. I got it right when I moved here, out of my parents’ house. Sentimental teenager bullshit.”

You shifted slightly closer without thinking. “Okay, then what about this one?” You tapped the tiny black key near his collarbone.

“My childhood house key. A perfect replica,” he said proudly.

The two of you continued like this for a while, the conversation drifting wherever your curiosity took it. You would point at a tattoo, and Mike would give you an answer, sometimes only a sentence or two, other times a long-winded story.

“What’s that one?”

“A moth.”

“Why a moth?”

Mike shrugged. “Thought it looked cool.”

The cassette tape on the back of his upper arm earned an unexpectedly heartfelt story about his sisters and the old stereo in the basement when he was growing up. The crow feather on his shoulder blade led to an even longer tangent about collecting feathers in the woods with the aforementioned Dustin, Will, and a new addition, Lucas.

He laughed at the “This Machine Kills Fascists” tattoo he’d gotten above his knee, the one his mother nearly screamed over when he showed it to her. He told you about the smiley face stick-and-poke on his ankle that was terribly blown out, but he stubbornly defended it. He even showed you the cigarette burn on his wrist, the one he’d gotten at fifteen the first time he’d tried to smoke. 

By the time you stopped pointing, your hand had settled between the two of you, absentmindedly messing with a thread of his boxers. “You’re gonna run out of tattoos,” Mike muttered, shifting a little beneath you.

“You have a lot.”

He huffed a quiet laugh at that, reaching for the joint again, just rolling it between his fingers. “Yeah,” he agreed.

“I like the Frank O’Hara quiet,” you said. “I can’t even find a pond small enough to drown in without being ostentatious.”

Mike smiled. “God, where have you been all my life?”

Your heart fluttered at his words, so you ignored him. “What’s your next one gonna be?”

“I’m not sure,” he admitted.

“Well, what’s your favorite thing right now?”

Mike considered it for a moment. “Lemon bars,” he decided finally.

You laughed. “What?”

“Yeah, lemon bars. Specifically, the ones from the coffee shop on campus.”

“I’ve never tried one.”

“Fuck, they’re so good,” he said. “You’re missing out.”

“Maybe I’ll get one next time I go.”

Mike scoffed. “Good luck. They’re always sold out when I go. Or maybe they just stopped making them. Either way, I can never get one anymore.”

You frowned. “Well, maybe if you show them your lemon bar tattoo, then they’ll start making them just for you.”

Mike laughed, a sweet, unexpected sound. It was the first time you felt like you weren’t performing around him, trying to be some sexy girl from his creative writing class, mysterious enough that he continued to invite you back. But this conversation - the entire night, actually - had felt comfortably mundane.

“What do you think?” he asked, pinching your thigh lightly. “What should my next tattoo be?”

You pursed your lips, thinking. “I’m not sure. It wouldn’t really have much meaning if I chose it.”

“That’s not true.”

“I think. . .” you tapped your chin, pretending to be deep in thought. “You should get a belly button piercing.”

Mike laughed in disbelief. “What?”

“Yeah,” you said, poking him in the stomach. “It would be hot. You’d be, like, a total rockstar, or something.”

Mike rolled his eyes. “Yeah, I’d be a real Robert Smith.”

“Oh! Do you like them? The Cure, I mean?”

“You could say that. I’ve got all of their albums on vinyl.” He motioned with his head toward his extensive collection of vinyl records.

“What’s your favorite?” you asked, climbing off Mike’s lap. His hands followed you, trying to maintain the contact for as long as possible. When you were out of his reach, Mike got to his feet and stood behind you.

“Disintegration,” revealed Mike.

You began to thumb through his collection, shaking your head. “So basic,” you muttered. Mike wrapped his arms around your middle, resting his chin on top of your head.

“Hey, it came out right before we graduated high school, and half the songs are about aging, can you blame me?”

“You really are sentimental.”

“What’s yours?’

“Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me,” you said, stumbling across the album you wanted to play. You pulled it out and turned around in Mike’s arms to face him.

“If you insist,” Mike murmured, leaning down to press his lips lightly to yours. You smiled against his mouth. “And you call me basic.”

“It’s popular for a reason!”

“Yeah, yeah. Just say you have bad taste.”

“Whatever. Here, I’m putting on your sad little album about turning thirty. Happy?”

Mike grinned, flashing his teeth at you as you shoved him gently in the chest. His hands tightened around your waist before finally letting you go, reaching around and taking the record from your hands.

“I didn’t expect you to be such a nerd,” you said, sitting back down on the edge of the bed, the first notes of ‘Plainsong’ filling the room as Mike placed the needle on the vinyl. “What’s Hellfire Club, anyway?”

Mike glanced down at the faded logo stretched across his discarded shirt, lying in a heap on the floor. He returned to his previous spot, propping himself up against the headboard. “Come back here, and I’ll tell you.”

You scrunched up your nose but moved toward him anyway, taking your position atop his legs.

“It was a Dungeons & Dragons club. I was fourteen and just starting high school. I’d been playing D&D for years by then, but just with my friends - the ones I told you about.”

“Will, Dustin, and Lucas,” you recited.

“Yeah. Well, we played every week after school. I was the dungeon master, mostly. It’s sorta how I got into writing, I guess. Spending six hours writing stupid fantasy stories really has an impact on a kid.”

You smiled and leaned your head against his shoulder. Mike’s large palms came up to rub against your back. “That’s cute.”

“Yeah, yeah. Just don’t tell anyone - it’ll ruin my reputation.”

“Don’t worry, tough guy, I won’t.” You paused. “Do you have a tattoo for it?”

“Of course, I do,” Mike said. You sat back up, eager to see how he’d commemorated his nerdy habit. Mike bounced one of his legs. “20-sided die on my ankle.”

“Really?” you shifted, trying to get a better look. “Show me.”

“You really wanna see every inch of me.”

“Don’t flatter yourself.”

The warmth of his palm returned, rubbing slowly between your shoulder blades, as you inspected the small 20-sided die, just above his ankle bone, outlined in black ink. “Cool,” you muttered, barely realizing what you were saying.

“You think so?”

You nodded earnestly. “Yeah. All your tattoos, I mean - the piercings too. Fourteen-year-old Mike would probably agree with me. You’re cool.”

Mike shook his head, a faint flush creeping up his neck. While you were gawking at his tattoo, he’d grabbed the joint and lit it again. He took a long drag and reached for you, gripping your chin with slender fingers and turning you to face him. There was still a trace of self-consciousness lingering as the hand came up to the back of your head, steadying you as he leaned closer.

Your lips parted instinctively as Mike exhaled the smoke into your waiting mouth. Your eyes fluttered closed, the feeling of Mike’s lips feather-light against yours. The smoke curled down your throat and into your lungs, your head already swimming.

The world seemed pleasantly hazy around the edges now, the music drifting through the air and blending with the smell of weed. Mike’s gaze never left yours, the smoke curling between you before dissipating into the warmth of the room.

“You should go,” Mike said suddenly, his voice low and raspy.

Your stomach dropped. “What?”

“It’s getting late,” he added, now staring somewhere over your shoulder. “So, you should probably leave.”

“Did I. . . do something wrong?”

“No. No, of course not. It’s just getting late. So you should leave.”

You blinked in disbelief. The record was still spinning, the joint still burning between Mike’s fingers. “Why do you always tell me to leave?” you asked, voice cracking on the last word. All the confidence you’d built up over the course of the night was shattered with just one sentence.

Mike ignored your question.

“Fine,” you snapped, not in the mood to argue. You got to your feet and began to tug off the shirt he’d given you.

“You can keep it,” Mike grumbled.

“Huh?”

“The shirt. Just keep it?”

“Why?”

“Yeah. It looks good on you anyway,” he shrugged.

“It’s a fucking shirt, Mike.”

“Yeah, but it’s mine. I like seeing you in it.”

You suppressed the urge to scream. It was hard to believe his charming words when he was actively kicking you out, when the night had taken such an abrupt turn. “Right,” you said, pulling the oversized shirt back down. “Very romantic.”

Mike stood as well, pulling on a hoodie and watching you tug on your pants and shoes with more force than necessary and gather up your little lace top and bra. There was an awkward amount of space between the two of you, the glow of the moon painting one side of his face, catching on the sharp line of his nose.

“Well,” you said finally. “I’ll see you around.”

Mike just continued to stare at you.

“What?” you asked, frustrated.

“Nothing.”

You just glowered, incredulous, and turned around to leave.

“Will you call me when you get home?” he muttered.

“What?”

“Call me when you get home.”

“Call you?”

“Yeah. So, I know that. . . you got home okay.”

“Okay,” you lied. Mike was staring at the floor.

“And, uh, I’m sorry. Thanks for staying,” he added in a whisper.

“I’ll always stay,” you said. “You’re the one who doesn’t let me.”

****

The following Friday, you showed up at Mike’s an hour later than usual. You’d spent a long time debating whether or not to go that night - time spent pacing your room and sitting in your car, just outside his apartment. You were still mad at him for what happened the last time, but you also didn’t want another repeat incident of Mike calling you and leaving a voicemail.

Over the course of the last week, Mike had looked more exhausted than usual. He didn’t even comment on the fact that you never called him after getting home, didn’t acknowledge you at all, which wasn’t really new (even though you’d hoped something might change). Andersen had even called him out in class on Wednesday, publicly berating Mike for the ‘tonal shift’ his writing had taken.

Mike had stormed out angrily, of course, not even bothering to defend himself.

That was why you decided to show up. That and the pastry bag you had clutched in your hand.

When Mike opened the door, his curls were still damp from a shower, dark ringlets clinging to his temples. He wore a black t-shirt and green sweats that hung low on his hips. “What’s that?” he asked immediately.

“Nice to see you, too, Mike. My day was great,” you teased, stepping past him into the apartment and shrugging off your coat.

He shut the door behind you.

“It’s a gift,” you explained.

Mike stared at it suspiciously. “You bought me a gift? Is it dangerous?”

You shoved it into his hands. “Open it, dumbass.”

A smile twitched at the corner of his mouth as he unfolded the top of the bag. Mike peered inside, and immediately his eyebrows lifted. You knew exactly what he was seeing - a lemon bar, wrapped neatly in wax paper and dusted with powdered sugar that had already begun to smudge against the sides of the bag.

For a second, he just stared at it. Then, in a small voice, “A lemon bar?”

“You mentioned you liked them,” you explained sheepishly. “I had an early meeting with a professor this morning, so I stopped by before they sold out.

Mike looked up.

Then back down at the lemon bar.

Then back at you again.

“It might be a little dry,” you added quickly, panic seeping into your voice. The expression on Mike’s face was so stunned that you couldn’t tell if he was happy about your surprise. Maybe you’d misread the situation, and he didn’t want you here. “I tried to keep it wrapped up, but it’s been almost a full day.”

Cautiously, Mike pulled the wax paper package from the bag. The powdered sugar dusted his fingertips. “You remembered.”

You frowned. “Uh, yeah? Jeez, Mike, you’re acting like I brought you a bar of gold.”

“You practically did,” Mike replied in awe, his voice strained. He swallowed thickly and then said, “Do you want to watch a movie?”

“Aren’t you going to eat it?” you asked.

“Yeah, I will. Do you want to, though?”

“Yeah. That sounds nice.”

Mike nodded. “Okay, good.”

Then, Mike spun in a circle, like he was disoriented, before heading for the kitchen. You followed, watching as he searched through his cabinet for a plate.

“We have to share,” he explained.

“You don’t have to. It’s for you.”

“I want to share,” Mike emphasized, placing the lemon bar on a cutting board and lining up a sharpened knife. He sank the knife into the pastry, attempting to split it in half, but he somehow miscalculated, and the two halves became more of a tiny sliver, plus the rest. “Oh, shit.”

You laughed loudly, covering your hand with your mouth when he glared at you.

“And to think I was going to offer you the big piece.”

“Well, good. You should have the bigger half.”

Mike transferred the microscopic sliver onto one plate with the precision of a surgeon, pushing it over to you. He stared at the plates for a moment before you could even reach for yours, and then swapped them.

“Mike, no,” you said, swapping them back. “I brought it for you.”

“I’m trying to apologize,” he whispered, eyes big. “For last time.”

The kitchen was small enough that the two of you were practically shoulder-to-shoulder, leaning against the counter. There was still powdered sugar dusted across Mike’s fingers, and you longed to lick it off.

“You don’t have to apologize.”

“But, I do. I keep fucking things up. I don’t know how to. . .” his voice faltered, his eyes glassy. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry I’m such an asshole.”

He glanced over at you. You didn’t know how to respond - you wanted to assure him that it was okay, that you accepted his apology, but it wasn’t okay.

“Let’s just watch a movie, okay?” you said instead.

Mike visibly deflated. “Okay, yeah.”

You picked up his plate and shoved it into his chest. “And try your lemon bar. Don’t let it go to waste.”

****

It was the last day of the quarter, the last day before winter break, and you were sitting in the campus coffee shop, discussing the logistics of your upcoming vacation with two of your friends - Stacey and Tara - when Mike walked in.

It was snowing outside, just enough to cast a filter of white on the world, and there was a thin layer of snowflakes on Mike’s hair when he entered the cafe. The highest points of his cheeks and his nose were flushed pink from the cold.

“Is that Wheeler?” asked Tara, looking up from where she was preemptively writing an itinerary for your week. “God, he looks gorgeous today,” she added as he walked by your table, closer than was probably necessary.

You hummed in noncommittal agreement.

“You knew, he invited me over the other day,” Tara said, lowering her voice to a stage-whisper. She didn’t mind if anyone knew her secrets - she shared them like people shared smiles. “I was surprised when he called me. It’s been months since he even talked to me last.”

Your hand froze on its way to pick up your coffee cup, a terrible, sinking feeling gnawing at your stomach. “Mike invited you over?”

Tara nodded. “Yeah. Super late at night, too. He just, like, called me out of nowhere and told me his address - not that I needed a reminder, I’ve been there before - and so I went, obviously. He called at such a good time. I’d just showered a few hours before. Anyway, we had like crazy good sex, and then I guess we fell asleep while talking or something, because I woke up in his apartment the next morning.

“Crazy good sex,” Stacey mocked. “Come on, how good can it really be?”

“You’re just jealous Mike hasn’t hooked up with you yet,” Tara snapped defensively. She looked at you. “You too, right? You haven’t slept with Wheeler?”

You shook your head, your mouth suddenly dry. You took a panicked sip of coffee before clearing your throat and saying, “No, I haven’t.”

“Well, the two of you are missing out. Not that I want to share-”

“When did you say this was?” you interrupted.

Tara pursed her lips. “What’s today? I’d say. . . probably two weeks ago? I think it was a Saturday night - no, it was a Friday. That’s right, I had class that morning. It was a Friday.”

“Oh,” you said. “And you said you spent the night?”

“Yeah, not on purpose, though. We just smoked a joint together and talked about life and shit. Real philosophical stuff. But, like I said, we must’ve just fallen asleep in the middle of our conversation. It’s not like he invited me over.”

You stood abruptly, knocking your knee on the table. “I have to go,” you said.

“What?” Stacey and Tara said at the same time.

“I, uh, forgot that I was going to meet Andersen for office hours. I’ve missed a lot of class recently, so I just need to make sure I’m not forgetting anything important before our final portfolio is due,” you rambled, gathering up your stuff. It felt like a mocking imitation of your first interaction with Mike.

“Are you sure you feel okay?” Stacey asked, getting to her feet as well. “Do you want me to come back to the apartment with you when you’re done?”

You shook your head. “No, I’m fine. You stay here.”

“We’re supposed to figure the schedule out,” Tara whined, motioning to the itinerary she’d been writing. “We leave in two days.”

“I know, and we can do that another time,” you promised.

“Come over tomorrow night,” Stacey proposed to Tara. “The two of us will be there, and I think all the girls will, too. We can figure it out then.”

Tara sighed, leaning back in her chair. “Fine, I’ll clear my schedule.”

“I’m really sorry. I just completely forgot I was supposed to meet with Andersen,” you said, eyes darting to where Mike was slouching over a book, his long fingers tapping at the table. “We can do tomorrow night.”

“Good luck,” said Stacey with a sympathetic smile. You hoped she hadn’t sensed your apprehension about Tara and Mike and was instead just sympathizing with Tara’s overbearing planning tendencies and having to meet with Andersen.

The cold air made your eyes sting as you stepped outside. The flurries had picked up slightly, coming down harder and sticking to the ground. You clutched your jacket tighter around yourself, already shivering.

You knew that all of this could be solved with a simple conversation with Mike, but was there really anything to be solved in the first place? If anything, this was just a reminder that Mike didn’t belong to you, that you were easily replaceable if you didn’t show up. Did you have any right to be upset at Mike for inviting a girl over in your place? Even if that girl did happen to be one of your friends?

Sure, Tara wasn’t your roommate anymore, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t constantly at the apartment. Which meant that now you, Tara, and your best friend had all slept with Mike at one point or another. Was that weird? You weren’t sure.

Throughout your secret little tryst with Mike, you’d almost forgotten who he really was. If Mike didn’t have a reputation for sleeping around, you doubted you’d be in this situation in the first place. He likely wouldn’t have slept with you at all.

You trudged through campus, keeping your head down as the snow pelted your face, blurring the clean contours of the buildings. You couldn’t really go back to your apartment now, just in case Stacey showed up. Or worse, Stacey and Tara. And you’d already submitted your portfolio for Andersen’s class, so there was no point in talking to him. Unless he had advice on the complicated situation you’d found yourself in.

You thought of that day, just a week ago, when Mike had stormed out of Andersen’s class after the broody professor had critiqued the vulnerability Mike had begun to show in his writing. You wished you could read his latest submission, know what he had been lamenting about, and why it had led Andersen to criticize his star student.

What would have happened if you’d gone after Mike? Would it have changed anything? Not that it could undo him sleeping with Tara, but would it give him a reason to go after you?

You looked behind you, wondering if you’d spot Mike’s silhouette in the snow.

He hadn’t followed you, of course. He likely never even noticed you left. Barely even acknowledged that you noticed you were in the coffee shop in the first place.

You ducked into one of the buildings on the edge of campus, needing a reprieve from the chill. It was delightfully warm inside, swathing you in a blanket of comfort as you sank into one of the plush chairs lining the hallway.

You knew that the right thing to do was to talk to Mike. It could all be solved with a simple conversation. You knew that. But part of you didn’t even want to solve anything in the first place. What was the point? Ask Mike to explain his behavior, completely justified behavior (you had bailed on him after all, and it’s not like the two of you were exclusive), just so you could have your accusations confirmed and your feelings hurt.

The idea didn’t exactly sound appealing.

The alternative, though, in your mind, was to distance yourself from Mike for good. You were about to enter the second half of your senior year - in approximately six months, you would be graduating, and would likely never see Mike Wheeler again. Unless the two of you ended up working with the same publisher. . . or speaking at the same book events. . . but that seemed extremely unlikely. 

After you received your degree, Mike would be a blip on the radar, a campfire story, the mythical legend he was always meant to be in your life. There was no logical reason why he’d ended up in your life in the first place.

Ending up in his bed had been a mistake. He was a mistake.

You shivered, despite the warm air pumping through the vents.

It seemed that your dilemma had been solved. The only answer was to stop talking to Mike, to stop answering his calls and showing up at his door. To stop letting him woo you just to break your heart afterward. To stop bringing him lemon bars just because he liked them so much.

What had he ever done for you?

****

The trip had done exactly what you had hoped it would.

For the first few days, your mind wandered to Mike constantly. Every time Tara opened her mouth, you couldn’t help but imagine her kissing Mike, a shared joint passing between them. You tried not to be heartbroken - Mike did technically have the right to sleep with her - but it was hard not to be upset.

By the end of the week, something had changed.

You laughed with your friends, stayed up too late talking about stupid things, and let yourself exist in a world where Mike Wheeler wasn’t the center of every thought.

By the time you packed your bags, you almost felt normal again.

Almost.

You decided to leave a day earlier than everyone else. You missed your own bed, your own shower, and the comfort of being alone for a little while. Frankly, you were burnt out on being energetic all the time and trying not to pretend that Tara’s face didn’t piss you off.

The sun had set by the time you pulled up to your apartment complex and lugged your suitcase up the stairs.

There was someone familiar sitting outside your door. Someone who unfolded himself the second he saw you coming down the hallway.

Mike.

His curls were longer than you remembered, a testament to the amount of time that had passed, and there were dark circles underneath his eyes.

“What are you doing here?” you asked, stopping right outside your apartment.

Mike swallowed. “Your best friend, she, uh, told me you were coming home.”

“She called you?’

Mike nodded and rubbed the back of his neck. “Yeah, she did.”

Anger bubbled up inside you at the betrayal, and you pushed past Mike, unlocking the door with a shaky hand and shoving your suitcase inside. Mike didn’t follow immediately, just stayed in the hall like a vampire who needed permission to cross the threshold.

Maybe he was a vampire. All he’d done was suck all the joy from your life.

“Can I come in?” he asked.

“No, Mike. Go home,” you seethed, flipping on the light switch. All you’d wanted was to come home to some peace and quiet. “I’m done talking to you.”

“I needed to see you.”

“You could’ve waited like a normal person.”

“I did wait,” he said. “For days. You didn’t come over on Friday, and so I kept calling you. You didn’t pick up.”

“I was busy,” you said flatly. Mike looked pathetic standing in the doorway. “Fuck, just come inside.”

Mike obeyed. You didn’t look at him; instead busying yourself with your suitcase, dragging it toward your bedroom. He followed behind like a lost puppy, hands shoved in his jeans pocket, a joint tucked behind his ear for later.

“What do you want?” you asked, exasperated, turning to face him. “Are you just here to annoy me until I sleep with you again? Because I’m not doing that anymore, okay? We’re done.”

Mike recoiled like he’d been hit. “No,” he said, his voice crackling at the edges. “That’s not. . . that’s not why I’m here.”

“Then why, Mike?” you asked, crossing your arms tightly across your chest.

“I want to apologize.”

“Yeah, you want to.”

“I’m here to apologize,” he corrected. “I want to fix everything.”

“What is there to fix?” you cried. “We were hooking up, weren’t we? It’s not like we were exclusive or fucking dating!”

“I hurt you.”

“No, you made me sad, Mike.” The word sounded childish on your tongue, but it was the truest way you could convey your emotions. You’d spent your entire college career coming up with clever ways to say simple things, but in that moment, it all boiled down to the fact that you were sad.

It was almost as if Mike was the opposite, as if he didn’t know how to express real emotion outside of thickened metaphors. He bogged his own heart down with his inability to communicate, and it would be his ruin.

“I can’t even blame you,” you continued, tears welling in your eyes despite how badly you willed them not to. “You’re a fucking folk tale on campus, a fucking celebrity. I knew who you were long before I met you that day in the library, and I still chose to sleep with you. I knew that you’ve slept with every girl you can get your hands on, half my roommates included, and yet I still went to your apartment. I have tried so badly to blame you, Mike, for how disposable you made me feel, but it’s really my fault, isn’t it? So, I don’t need you to come here and mindlessly apologize for something that isn’t even technically your problem, just because it will make you feel better. Because it won’t make me feel better.”

Mike’s face crumbled at that, and he went very still. “I’m not here because it makes me feel better,” he said eventually. “I feel worse, actually.”

You let out a sharp breath through your nose.

“I mean it. I didn’t come to apologize just so you’d sleep with me again. I came here to tell you. . . to tell you how I feel. About you.”

Mike tugged at his sleeves.

“I know what people think of me. That I’m someone who just takes and leaves, and maybe I am that person. But I don’t want to be. Not with you.”

You wiped at your face aggressively.

“I know you think I don’t care about you,” he continued.

“You kick me out every time we have sex,” you argued back.

“Because I don’t know how to do this,” he exclaimed, motioning between the two of you. “This is what I’m bad at - the emotions and the fucking feelings. It’s why I keep everyone at arm’s length, so I can’t fall in love with anyone. But you. God, you. How could I not fall in love with you?”

“Love?” you echoed.

“Yes. Love. That day in the library, I had been building up the courage to approach you for weeks. Years, actually. I mean, shit, yeah, we’ve slept together, but we’ve also read each other’s writing. Terrible rough drafts and vulnerable, poetic bullshit that means nothing. What’s more intimate than that? Of course, I fell in love with you.”

Mike looked like he regretted saying it the moment it left his mouth, but he didn’t take it back. He just stood there, breathing a little unevenly.

“You kicked me out,” you said quietly. “Every single time.”

“I know,” he said urgently. “I know how it looks-”

“It’s not how it looks,” you cut in. “It’s what it is.”

“I didn’t mean to make you feel used. I didn’t. I swear I didn’t.”

“You slept with Tara.”

“What?” For the first time, Mike looked genuinely confused at your words. “No, I didn’t.”

“She told me, Mike.”

“No. No, I didn’t,” he assured. “Okay, yeah, I invited her over when you didn’t show up, but the second I even kissed her, it didn’t feel right. She wasn’t you. It’s only been you since the first time you came over, okay?”

“You’re lying,” you said automatically. “She said-”

You stopped yourself, jaw clenching as you replayed it.

“She said you let her stay the night.”

‘I didn’t sleep with her,” Mike promised, taking your hands in his. “I kissed her, yes, but then I stopped. And I felt like shit after. I was trying not to think about you. I was trying to be what everyone thinks I am instead of. . . whatever this is. It was easier to feed into it than to try to convince you that I’ve changed, but I don’t feel that way anymore. It will never be anyone but you.”

Your throat tightened. “That’s not fair,” you said weakly. You tried to pull your hands back on instinct, and he didn’t resist when you did. The loss of contact made the air feel colder. “I have spent the last few months spiraling over you, trying to figure you out. One second, you were so sweet, and the next, you were acting like I was an inconvenience. How am I supposed to believe anything you say?”

“You don’t have to,” he said. “But I need you to know. I don’t want to keep doing what I did before, even if you don’t choose me.” Mike paused and closed his eyes. “All I want is a room up there and you in it.”

You sniffled. “Frank O’Hara,” you whispered.

He smiled, just barely. “I’m not good at the part after,” he admitted. “I never have been. The hookup part is easy. You know what people want from you. You do the right thing, say the right thing, then everybody leaves, and it’s over. With you, it never felt over. I don’t know how to just. . . let people matter to me normally. I always screw things up - I did screw things up - so I convinced myself that if I kept it physical, I could control it. Like if we just hooked up, then I wouldn’t have to admit that I liked you so much it was actually making me miserable.”

“Mike-”

“I need you to know that I’m never going to ask you to leave again,” Mike finished. “I’m not going to leave, not even if you ask me to.”

****

There wasn’t a single person on campus who didn’t know the name ‘Mike Wheeler.’ He was like a mythical creature, an apparition who haunted pretty girls’ bedrooms without a trace. He was the person on the other end of the phone, whispering sweet nothings through the landline in a low, sleepy voice as the 20-something undergrad twirled the cord around her finger like it was a strand of hair, kicking her feet in the air and smiling until her cheeks hurt. He told them things nobody had ever said to them before.

His name was passed around in whispered conversations between dorm bathrooms and fraternity basements alike. One weekend, he was leaving a party with a girl from the bio department, his hand warm on the small of her back. The next week, he was seen outside another girl’s apartment, hair damp from the rain, while she screamed at him from the doorway, mascara streaked beneath her eyes. 

On a relatively small campus, where half the student body went to high school together, being a local legend might not be considered a feat. But nearly everyone had a Mike Wheeler story. A roommate’s older sister, who swore he’d almost asked her to be his girlfriend. A girl from Psych who claimed he stayed over three nights in a row and made her pancakes in the dorm kitchen. Somebody’s friend who cried in the bathroom at a frat party because Mike had shown up with somebody else.

Everyone knew a girl who swore Mike Wheeler had fallen in love with her. Everyone knew a girl who’d cried over him, too. And somehow, despite all the warnings traded between friends in crowded dining halls and outside lecture buildings, it never stopped anyone from answering when he called.

You wished you could say that you hadn’t fallen victim to the infamous ‘Wheeler Charm,’ but unfortunately, you had a pathetic taste in men and an even more pathetic crush on Mike Wheeler.

Well, not a real crush, exactly. It was more embarrassing than that somehow - a persistent classroom crush that had rooted itself inside you over the course of three years and refused to die, no matter how much common sense begged it to.

You and Mike were both creative writing majors, which meant your lives had been awkwardly orbiting each other since freshman year. And in that time, you were one of the only people who hadn’t managed to earn a spot on his roster. It seemed that all your closest friends had managed to slip between his sheets and leave with tales of earth-shattering orgasms and a dick so large it split them in half.

Casual hookups weren’t your thing, and would likely never be your thing, but there was a tiny part of you that wanted the shared thrill of just being another one of Mike Wheeler’s girls. It was practically campus tradition to sleep with him at this point, and you didn’t want to be the outlier.

You’d spent the last few years admiring him from afar - his thick, dark curls that hung into his eyes constantly, catching against the silver bar of his eyebrow piercing half the time until he shoved them back with an impatient hand. His lips, soft-looking and distractingly pink, pressed around the end of his pencil whenever he got lost in thought. The scattered, black tattoos on his arms multiplying slowly with every passing semester. And the tongue piercing hidden behind his teeth, the one you’d heard stories about oh so many times.

Maybe it was the writer in you (it definitely was), but you’d always found him so alluring. Outside of the reputation, he was unfairly cinematic.

So, yeah. If Mike Wheeler asked you to hook up, you’d probably say yes in a heartbeat.

Thankfully for you, on a rainy day in October, he did just that.

You were curled up in your favorite spot in the library, a worn-in chair on the third floor that bore the indentations of generations past. It was the perfect place to crack open a good book, do some homework, or frantically scribble out a draft due the next morning.

The third floor always smelled like old paper and a faintly warm tinge of coffee and bagels from the café downstairs. It was perfectly quiet, save for the patter of rain on the roof when the weather turned dour.

With no impending assignments or due dates, you decided ot treat yourself to a relaxing afternoon. You settled on a Toni Morrison book that day - one you’d been meaning to get around to - a coffee and a scone on the tiny table next to you.

Twenty minutes later, the warmth of the library and the sound of the rain were making you so drowsy that you’d barely made any progress, lingering on page 3 and rereading the same passage over and over again. So, when someone spoke, you were startled to see someone standing a few feet away.

Even more so to see that someone was Mike Wheeler.

“Do you mind if I smoke?” he asked, already kicking open one of the rusted windows, letting in a gust of autumn air.

You blinked. “Oh, um, I don’t think you’re allowed to,” you replied dumbly.

Mike just scoffed and sank to the floor next to the open window, pulling a joint out from behind his ear and lighting it wordlessly. He was dressed in all black, the hood of his sweatshirt pulled over his curls. His clothes looked slightly damp from the rain.

As he took a drag, you were entranced by the movement of his mouth, the curve of his lips as he exhaled the smoke into the cool, wet air. Mike sat only a few feet away, no further than the two of you sat in class, but it felt like he was invading your personal space.

“You’re in my writing seminar,” he said after a moment, his words dragging together lazily. You barely heard him, completely hypnotized by his eyes. God, his eyes were awful. Big and dark and heavy-lidded and so intense as he looked at you expectantly, waiting for an answer.

“Oh, yeah. With Andersen,” you affirmed finally.

He nodded. “You have great prose.”

“No one’s ever told me that before. Thanks.”

He raised an eyebrow, a hint of his piercing glinting in the horrible library light. “No? I swear Andersen’s told you the same thing.”

You scrunched up your nose. “I just meant from another writer without. . . the pretense of peer review, y’know? Sometimes those comments feel-”

“Artificial?” Mike finished.

“Yeah, artificial,” you repeated. “Andersen doesn’t mean it anyway - he doesn’t like me. He thinks my writing is too trite and my characters too introspective. That my narrative style isn’t straightforward enough.”

Mike scoffed again. “He’s just bitter that his biggest accomplishment is a self-published poetry collection. A shit poetry collection, at that.”

You laughed, shocked at how blunt Mike was. “I suppose,” you said before pausing. “My sophomore year, he, um, told me that I write like I’m the smartest person in the room. That I think I’m making observations no one’s ever made before.”

Mike frowned and took another drag, blowing the smoke out of the corner of his mouth this time. The heady scent curled toward you, making his outline hazy.  “Andersen’s a shit guy,” Mike insisted. “Misogynistic, too. I could turn in my grocery list, and he’d act like I was Shakespeare reincarnate.”

“I didn’t know he favored you,” you said, finally shutting your book and placing it on the table. 

“You think I’d be on track to get my degree if the head of the department wasn’t kissing my ass?”

“Oh,” you said, curious but not willing to press for answers. “Um, your writing is good though.”

Mike’s expression shifted almost imperceptibly at that. Not smug exactly, but instead vaguely guilty, eyes flicking away from yours toward the rain-streaked window beside him.

“I know,” he said. 

He rested his head back against the wall, smoke curling upward around the sharp line of his jaw. The tilt of his posture allowed you to notice little things like the silver chain disappearing beneath the collar of his hoodie and the tiny mole on his jawline. You wanted to scoot closer to Mike, sit across from him, and look at all the finer details of his face that you’d never before been privy to.

 Mike Wheeler was the perfect muse.

“You’re good, too,” he added after a second. “Andersen doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”

“Thanks.”

“I mean it,” he said. You stared at him, wondering if he would elaborate, secretly hoping he wouldn’t. You hated critiques in workshops enough, and you didn’t want to sit here and listen to what Mike thought about your writing. He’d seen the development of your prose and characterization over the course of nearly four years - he probably knew your writing style better than any of your friends.

Finally, Mike broke the silence.

“Here. You want a hit?”

He held the joint out toward you between two ringed fingers.

Immediately, you shook your head. “Oh, that’s okay. I should probably get going anyway. I have homework to do,” you lied. Truthfully, you just wanted to get home and scream into a pillow over this whole interaction, replaying it in the hopes you hadn’t embarrassed yourself too badly.

Mike hummed, tapping the ash against the windowsill. “You’re breaking my heart, baby. I thought you were enjoying our little chat.”

“No! I mean, yes. I am! I just. . . I have to go,” you spluttered, already gathering your things. Your scone and coffee lay forgotten on the table beside you, a waste of money. Mike watched you shove your book into your bag with poorly concealed amusement.

“I don’t bite, y’know. Unless you want me to.”

You rolled your eyes. “What a line, Wheeler. Do you practice in the mirror?”

He chuckled. “You’re cute.”

“How profound.” You busied yourself with pretending to search for something in your bag just to avoid looking directly at him.

“You should come over sometime.”

You froze. “Why? For what?”

“You know what, baby,” he said.

You wrinkled your nose. “What, you think I want to hook up with you? Just because you complimented my writing?”

Mike shrugged, nothing in his face hinting that he was offended. “Didn’t say that.”

“That’s usually why you invite girls over, is it not?”

He started to get to his feet, flicking the joint out the window onto the library roof. “You’re not very subtle when you stare at me,” he said, ignoring your question. He took out a pen and an old receipt from his pocket and scribbled something down before handing it to you. “If you reconsider my offer, come over, pretty girl.”

You looked down at the words - an address. His address. Such coveted information. You felt your cheeks growing hot as you realized that he did want to hook up with you.

You looked up fast, almost like you might catch him changing his mind, taking it back, laughing it off the way people did when they were joking, and you were the only one who didn’t realize it yet. But Mike was already halfway down the hall.

Rain kept ticking softly against the glass. The library around you stayed suspended in its quiet, indifferent to the fact that your entire afternoon had just shifted.

****

The last thing you ever expected to be doing on a Friday afternoon was hooking up with Mike Wheeler.

You’d been picturing this moment for as long as you could remember. Still, now that the opportunity had finally presented itself, you were debating turning around and sprinting back to your car. And maybe burning the paper with his address.

For the entire week since that day in the library, you’d been suffering in silence. You were too ashamed to admit to your friends that Mike had alluded to having sex with you, and even more ashamed to admit that you were strongly considering it. Your mind was running in circles trying to justify a casual hook-up - you were the only person in your friend group who hadn’t slept with him. . . it would be a bonding experience! But also, your crush on him might complicate things. . . what if you get your feelings hurt? What if the knowledge that he’d slept with your best friends ruined everything?

You knocked on his apartment door. If he didn’t answer in ten seconds, you would leave and pretend that this had never happened.

Mike swung the door open before you lowered your fist.

Warm air spilled out from the apartment into the cold hallway, carrying the smell of weed and something burnt - maybe popcorn. Music played softly somewhere deep inside, a slow guitar muffled by blown-out speakers.

He looked unfairly good, all sleepy eyes and messy curls, slightly damp at the ends and hanging low over the silver bar through his eyebrow. The sleeves of his faded black shirt were pushed up enough to expose the blur of tattoos along his forearm, and the collar stretched wide enough to expose the sharp line of his collarbone.

“You made it,” he said. His lips were pink and slightly chapped from smoking, parted just enough for you to catch the glint of metal against his tongue when he spoke.

You shifted your weight awkwardly. You were completely oblivious to the protocol of hookups. “Uh, yeah.”

He tilted his head, the corner of his mouth quirking up into a smile. “You wanna come in?”

“Oh, right. Okay, thanks.”

Mike’s apartment looked exactly like you imagined it would.

It was small, as studios usually were, but cozy. There were clothes draped over the arm of the couch and vinyls stacked precariously beside a cheap record player. There were several ashtrays placed strategically, each of them overflowing with ash and blunts smoked down to the roach. There were books everywhere, spines cracked and filled with sticky notes. You spotted Joan Didion underneath a copy of Slaughterhouse-Five. A Raymond Carver collection face-down on the floor beside the couch was bent over some sort of comic book.

Mike wandered toward the kitchen, fiddling absentmindedly with his lighter. Just flicking it repeatedly. He seemed oddly restless, broad shoulders tense beneath his shirt. “You want anything?” he asked, leaning against the counter. “Water? A beer? I have like, half a ginger ale, if you wanted.”

“I’m okay.” You swallowed. “Sorry, I’ve just never done this before.”

“Sex?”

“No, no. I’ve done that. “I meant. . . a hookup. One-night stand. Whatever you call this.” You motioned vaguely with your hands.

Mike’s jaw tightened slightly. “You can leave if you want, y’know.”

You chewed on the inside of your cheek. “I know,” you said quietly. “I don’t want to.”

Mike took a slow step forward, slow enough for you to stop him if you wanted to. With a careful hand, he reached up and placed his thumb on the spot between your eyebrows and smoothed it over. 

“You’re thinking too hard,” he murmured, his other hand settling carefully against your waist. They were big and warm, and you could feel the heat of them through your clothes. There was a restraint in his grip, the tendons in his fingers flexing.

“You don’t have to be so gentle,” you whispered, settling your gaze on a tiny tattoo on his wrist. It was a little spaceship, lines shaky and poorly drawn. “I can take it.”

“I believe it, baby,” he said. “Don’t wanna scare you away though - need you to come back for more.” 

The words left you dazed, but before you could even process them, he was cupping your face and pressing your lips together. There was a brief, unexpected flicker of sensation - metallic tasting and so subtle that you wondered if you imagined it. You wanted to feel it again. There was something sickeningly erotic about the taste of his piercing on your own tongue.

Your fingers trembled slightly as you clawed at his shirt, untucking it from his sweatpants, eager and impatient. It had been a long time since you’d slept with anyone. You slid your hands under his shirt, feeling the smoothness of his abdomen and the way his muscles contracted at your touch.

Mike’s hands roamed from your face to your hips to the curve of your waist, before settling on your ass. His mouth was hot against yours and he kissed in a way that left you unable to catch your breath. You could barely do anything but keep your palms pressed flat against the flat expanse of his stomach and let him squeeze at the softest parts of you.

“Bed,” he finally asked into your mouth, and you nodded, aching for him.

The two of you didn’t disconnect the entire short distance from the kitchen to the bedroom. He pushed you unceremoniously onto the bed, the roughest treatment you’d received so far, before pulling his shirt over his head and crawling to you.

There was a visible outline in his sweatpants, and you felt a little thrill at the notion that you’d gotten him hard. You wanted to believe that you were special, the only one he treated like this, even if you knew it was likely a lie. When you looked away, it was only because Mike’s fingers were hooking under the hem of your sweater. He pulled it off with one swift motion.

Mike’s warm brown eyes were completely blown out, all pupil as they latched onto your tits. You’d purposefully not worn a bra, deciding that accidentally leaving it at his place was worse than feeling a bit uncomfortable on the drive over. His hands are immediately drawn to them, fitting around your tits perfectly. He pinched at your hardening nipples, watching your face for a reaction.

“Ah,” you breathed out, the combination of the cool air and his fingers unexpected.

“You should get these pierced,” he noted absentmindedly, still rolling and pinching at your nipples. You laughed slightly, shaking your head.

“No way,” you said, your voice wavering slightly as Mike started to trail his fingers down your stomach to the waistband of your pants.

Mike raised an eyebrow. “No? Not even for me?”

“Fuck me good enough and maybe I’ll consider it.”

Mike grinned boyishly at that before diving in for another sloppy kiss. His position over you blocked you from being able to cover your chest with your arms. You weren’t used to being naked in front of someone. You didn’t really like how you looked without any clothes on, truthfully.

As Mike slowly, teasingly, began to slide your pants and underwear down, you chewed on your bottom lip and looked up at the ceiling, not wanting to see his face. You heard the faint thud of your clothes landing on the floor.

“Can we, um, turn the light off?” you whispered meekly, still avoiding eye contact. “Just use the lamp or something.”

Mike grabbed your face softly, forcing you to look at him. “Are you shy, baby?” he teased. You nodded imperceptibly. “I thought you wanted a good fuck?”

“I do, but-”

“Don’t be shy,” he interrupted, leaning down to nudge his nose against your jaw, placing a tender kiss there. Lowering his voice, he said, “Don’t be shy. You’re pretty. Pretty face, pretty tits. Makes me wanna ruin you for everyone else. Don’t want you taking anyone’s dick but mine.”

You whimpered slightly. Even with these words, Mike is still reaching over to turn on his bedside lamp. And then, in a very college boy fashion, he grabbed a book and chucked it at the light switch, hitting it with perfect precision. The overhead light flicked off, leaving the two of you swathed in the soft, golden light.

He looked even better in that lighting. Unbearably attractive as he hovered over you, lips parted and eyes filled with desire. Instinctively, your thighs tightened where they’re bracketed low around his hips. “You like it when I talk like that?” he questioned. You nodded, and he chuckled. “Cute. Thought you were all sweet and innocent - guess I was wrong.”

“M’not innocent,” you insisted, digging your heel into his lower back, urging him on. Please, touch me.

“Okay, baby. Whatever you say. Open up.”

You obeyed immediately, and Mike pressed two of his fingers against your tongue, his knuckles pressing against the corners of your mouth. When Mike seemed to deem his fingers sufficiently wet, he pulled his hand back and started to slide his fingers along your cunt, prodding at your weeping hole with a long finger. Even the stretch of his index finger was enough to have your hips jerking slightly off the mattress.

Mike continued to fuck you with a tantalizingly slow speed, eventually adding a second finger and brushing your clit with his thumb. After a while, you can’t help but squirm, wanting more. Sure, the sight of Mike Wheeler looking entranced by his own fingers sliding in and out of your pussy was hot, but you wanted him inside you.

“Mike,” you whined. Mike looked up at you, amused. Something in your face must have given him a bright idea, because he suddenly retracted his fingers (cleaning them off by sucking them into his mouth) and knelt between your spread legs. Without a warning, he licked a long stripe up your pussy.

You gasped at the contact, fingers digging into his sheets. The metal of his tongue piercing was unlike anything you’d ever felt before; the contrast between that and his hot mouth is absolutely delicious. Mike forced your legs apart, palms splayed on your inner thighs, spreading you wider.

His tongue dove deep and messy into your cunt, his spit mixing with your wetness, pooling and dripping onto the bed. You let out a brazen moan, your own hands twitching across your stomach and up to squeeze at the curve of your breasts. Mike released your thigh to reach for your wrist, placing one of your hands in his hair.

“Good girl,” he cooed as you dug your fingers into his curls, nails scratching at his scalp.“Take what you want, baby.”

You ground against his nose, the strong bridge of it prodding at your clit and sending jolts of pleasure up your limbs. Mike continued to sloppily lick and suck, sliding a finger back inside you. Your eyes fluttered closed, completely lost in the feeling of Mike Wheeler’s mouth.

Eventually, and much quicker than you would’ve liked, the feeling became too much. Your legs trembled underneath his hands as you simultaneously tried to pull him closer and push him away using the grip on his hair. With your free hand, you covered your mouth, eyes rolling back in your head as your orgasm began to crash over you.

Suddenly, your hand was being pulled away from your mouth, and Mike was hovering over you again. His mouth and lower face were absolutely glistening, his lips swollen. “No,” he demanded in a low voice. “I get to hear you.”

You nodded feebly, gnawing so hard on the inside of your cheek that you drew blood. He looked intimidating, the Mike Wheeler you heard rumors about.

“As much as I love how sensitive you are,” he continued, brushing your hair back from your forehead with a reverence, “I think I’ve teased you enough, yeah?”

You nodded wildly. “Please, Mike,” you begged, barely aware of how desperate you sounded.

“Please, what, pretty girl?”

“Please fuck me.”

“There you go,” Mike purred, already freeing himself from the confines of his sweatpants. His dick slapped against his lower stomach as Mike began to pump himself slowly, eyes half-lidded as he stared down at you writhing beneath him. His dick was pretty, just as pretty as him. Long and achingly hard, your mouth fell open slightly at the sight of it.

Your pussy was still throbbing from your interrupted orgasm as Mike rolled on the condom and lined himself up, teasing at your clit with the head of his cock. He supported himself on his elbows, barely an inch of space between your chests, and began to push in.

The stretch burned slightly, but it still had your back arching sweetly. He wasted no time snapping his hips against yours, bottoming out in one quick movement. You gasped, hands reaching out for something to hold onto, steadying yourself with his broad shoulders.

“Fuck,” he grunted out, his pace unrelenting. “You feel so good. So fucking tight, baby. So perfect.”

You clenched around him, and Mike let out a beautiful moan. It only made him thrust into you harder, your nails surely leaving claw marks down his lean frame. You were already close, already on the precipice from his tongue alone.

“Come on, let me hear you, sweetheart,” Mike gritted out, his other hand going to your jaw, tilting your head up to look at him. You blinked dazedly at him, practically drooling at the sight. Damp strands of hair clung desperately to his forehead, the highest points of his cheekbones flushed with exertion. It made his freckles all the more prominent, and, with what little energy you had left, you leaned up to kiss him.

It was sloppy, nothing like the delightfully curious kisses you’d received before. It was all teeth and tongue. You dug your hands into his hair again, tugging and pulling him closer than was probably physically possible. Mike shifted his position too, reaching down to pull your leg higher so he could hit even deeper inside you.

The new position punched a moan out of you, and Mike took the opportunity to bite down on your bottom lip, hard enough to draw blood.

“Mike, please,” you whimpered pitifully. “Please.”

“Please, what, baby?” he panted, his movements never faltering even for a second.

“Mike, I’m-”

“Use your words,” he insisted, almost mockingly. You could hear the waver in his voice, the way his brows pulled together, his thrusts growing sloppier. He reached between you and began to messily rub at your puffy clit, the pleasure curling in your lower stomach.

You can’t say anything as your eyes roll back, your nails surely jabbing painfully into Mike’s skull as you come with a vigor you’ve never experienced before. For a moment, your vision goes black, and all you can hear is static, the feeling of Mike continuing to pound into you too much.

When your vision returned, you were rewarded with the sight of Mike’s abs twitching and convulsing as he came. His breath was warm against your neck as he collapsed onto you, your sweaty bodies pressing together in a strangely intimate way. You couldn’t do much but just stare at the ceiling, catching your breath after the best sex of your life.

You grinned a little bit, reaching up to card your fingers through Mike’s curls, when he suddenly rolled off you, throwing the condom into the trash.

Mike grabbed a pre-rolled joint off his bedside table and placed it between his lips. “You can let yourself out?” he asked, a hint that he wanted you to leave. Your stomach dropped at the same moment Mike flicked on his lighter and touched it to the end of the joint.

“Oh. Yeah, I can,” you paused, covering your still-naked body with your arms. Mike pulled the sheets over his hips, but that seemed like a luxury you weren’t allowed yet - lying underneath his bedsheets - so you just submitted to the vulnerability.

Mike nodded wordlessly, exhaling a plume of smoke into the air. You stared at him for a few more seconds, wondering if he would do. . . something. You weren’t quite sure what you wanted from him. Maybe just a bit more affection, like the kind he’d shown you during sex. But maybe this is what hookups were like, and Mike was just really good at pretending to care.

Finally, you stood and gathered your clothes from where they were scattered around his floor before slinking into the bathroom just down the hall. He didn’t spare you a glance.

You felt sick to your stomach, throat growing thick with tears, and your eyes burning. You’d never felt so humiliated in your life. So. . . discarded. Jesus, even a condom got more attention than you after a hookup.

After you used the bathroom, you tried not to look at the details of Mike’s bathroom. If there were a spare toothbrush or extra hair tie on the counter, you probably would’ve thrown up. Slowly, you began to dress, limbs numb as you did so. It was only when you caught a glance of yourself in the mirror, hair messy, and a post-sex glow on your skin, that you broke down in quiet sobs.

You covered your mouth with your hand (something you would now always associate with Mike. Fuck) and sank to the floor, wrapping your other arm around your middle as you cried silently. The tears were hot as they streamed down your face and dripped off your chin onto Mike’s bathroom rug.

This was why you didn’t do casual hookups. You get your feelings hurt too easily.

How stupid you were to believe that Mike was treating you any differently. How stupid to forget why you were here. For his pleasure, at his request. You were just another hole to stick his dick in, and when it was over, you were just another unimportant girl he’d lured to his apartment with meaningless compliments and empty promises.

You wiped your face with the back of your hand, getting to your feet. You needed to leave - you could cry in your car on the way home.

After splashing your face with cold water and ensuring your eyes weren’t puffy - not that Mike would notice - you exited the bathroom. Mike was still propped against his headboard, smoking absentmindedly and staring off into nothing.

“Okay, well, I’m gonna. . . go,” you said, shifting your weight awkwardly. Your voice cracked on the last word. Mike, thankfully, had the decency to look at you.

“See you in class?” he asked.

“Yeah. Of course.”

****

Monday arrived despite your repeated hopes that it somehow wouldn’t.

You spent the entire weekend trying not to think about Mike, which only resulted in thinking about him constantly. You cleaned the apartment with borderline concerning intensity, vacuuming under furniture no one had touched in months and reorganizing kitchen cabinets that didn’t belong to you. Your roommates seemed thrilled by this sudden burst of domestic responsibility and didn’t question what had spurred it on.

Anything was better than sitting still long enough to remember Friday night.

Every time your thoughts drifted toward Mike’s apartment - the intoxicating smell of smoke clinging to his sheets, the softness in his voice that had turned out to mean absolutely nothing, the tenderness of his kisses - you immediately found another pointless task to occupy yourself with.

By Monday morning, you were exhausted.

When your alarm went off, you stared at the ceiling for a full minute while the awful chirping sound drilled directly into your skull. Briefly, genuinely, you considered skipping class altogether. Perhaps you could give Andersen some vague excuse about a migraine. Food poisoning. Sudden death, maybe.

How were you supposed to survive two hours sitting in the same room as Mike? How were you supposed to workshop stories together like he hadn’t worshipped your body only to look through you afterward? Worse, how were you supposed to read your draft aloud knowing he’d be listening?

The thought made your stomach ache. Still, you dragged yourself out of bed. And then, humiliatingly, you spent far too long getting ready.

You told yourself you only wanted to look put together because seeing him again would already be mortifying enough. You wanted to come across as unaffected, indifferent. You told yourself that the extra swipe of mascara had nothing to do with the possibility of Mike looking at you for longer than a second. That the tiny sparkly earrings were just because they matched your sweater.

None of this stopped the voice in your head from cutting through every justification.

He does this all the time.

To girls prettier than you. To girls cooler than you.

You’re not special.

The thoughts settled ugly and heavy in your chest while you applied lip gloss with shaky hands.

By the time you reached Andersen’s class, your stomach hurt so bad that you briefly wondered if your appendix had burst.

You took your usual seat - third row from the front at the edge nearest the windows - and methodically arranged your notebooks and pens into neat lines just to give your hands something to do.

Mike wasn’t there yet. Of course, he wasn’t. He always arrived late, drifting into class with careless ease. Now that you knew Andersen believed him to be Steinbeck reincarnate, it made more sense how he got away with acting like punctuality was optional.

Students trickled in slowly around you, jackets rustling as they were shed, annoyed voices complaining about midterms. The noise of the room settled around you, the warm scent of coffee calming your nerves.

When Mike finally walked in, your body recognized him before your mind did. You almost hoped that someone would gasp or something ridiculous like that, physical proof that Mike had made an impact on someone other than you.

Nothing like that happened. Mike just slunk toward the back of the room, headphones around his neck beneath the hood of his sweatshirt. Andersen made an amused comment, looking brighter than before. Well, at least someone was delighted at the arrival of Mike Wheeler.

God, it was like he was some misunderstood literary prodigy. As far as you knew, no one else in the room knew what Mike’s mouth tasted like. It made sitting three rows ahead of him feel impossible, so you forced your attention downward and pretended to reread your draft, your pulse throbbing in your throat.

This was exactly why you shouldn’t have slept with him. Before, you could at least pretend your interest in Mike was intellectual, that you were just intrigued by his writing or fascinated by the strange contradiction of someone so arrogant producing prose so painfully sincere. Now, here you were, curating yourself for a man who probably forgot girls’ names by the next morning.

Humiliation crawled hotly up your neck.

What were you doing?

At the front of the room, Andersen shuffled through workshop submissions while rambling distractedly about narrative voice. Usually, you loved hearing him lecture, even when he irritated you. Usually, you’d already be scribbling down fragments of sentences inspired by something he said. Today, your notebook remained mostly blank except for the imprint of your thumbnail digging repeatedly into the edge of the paper.

Andersen wrapped up workshop with a few final notes, the room loosening immediately as chairs scraped back and conversations broke out into overlapping clusters.

You stayed still for a second too long, momentarily too lost in your thoughts to realize that everyone was packing up and leaving.

And then, something slid onto your desk.

Paper.

A folded piece of notebook paper.

You didn’t even look up. You already knew it was him.

Slowly, you unfolded the paper. Just one word in his endearingly messy scrawl.

Friday?

****

The second time you showed up at Mike’s door, you convinced yourself the first time had been a fluke. The third time you showed up at his door, you told yourself this would be the last time. The fourth time you showed up at his door, you hated yourself more than ever before.

It was never any different. No matter how many times you tried to will it into existence, telepathically convince him to give you something after he rolled off you, chest still heaving, it was always the same. He’d light up and ensure that you’d be able to find your own way out.

And you never fought back. You just got dressed and left his apartment, tears already brimming.

You told yourself you were being dramatic. Nothing was being taken from you. You were an adult making choices, and therefore, whatever consequences existed were self-inflicted and not allowed to hurt this much. This is what casual hookups were; you just weren’t familiar with the intricacies and unspoken rules.

You were the one who kept going back, the one who kept allowing him to hurt you like this. How was Mike supposed to know how you felt if you never told him? It wasn’t his fault - he was fluent in a language that you weren’t.

All you wanted - all you needed - was to feel his devotion, even if only for a night. Even if it ended as abruptly as it started. You understood how girls got so attached to Mike; he made it hard not to, whenever he spoke in his honeyed-dulcet tones about how beautiful you were, how good you were to him.

It was a torturous cycle you couldn’t break yourself out of. Mike would ignore you in class, and then you’d show up at his door, and he’d ravage you like you’d been apart for years. Then, he’d wave you off like a mild irritation. Like a gnat.

It was after this fourth time, the one-month mark, that your roommates started to notice something was wrong. That night, after returning home from Mike’s, you were faced with an intervention from your best friend.

“Come on, babe, spill,” she said, standing in the entryway as you snuck through the door. “Where have you been sneaking off to?”

“Nowhere,” you insisted, kicking your shoes off into the shared pile.

“Don’t lie to me,” she said. “Every Friday for the last month, you’ve been coming home looking like a kicked puppy with hickeys all over your thighs.”

You winced, dropping your purse onto the counter. You were bone-tired, muscles jelly-like, and lips swollen. You wanted nothing more than to curl up in your bed and fall asleep. “You saw those?”

“I’m your best friend. I notice everything. Especially when I’m convinced something is up with you. We’re all worried about you, babe. So, spill.”

You sat down at the table with a sigh and placed your forehead against the wood. “You can’t be mad at me,” you whispered. “I’ve been so stupid.”

She sat down next to you, placing a soothing hand on your arm. “Come on, what is it? Did someone hurt you?”

“You could say that.”

“Do I know him?”

“Very well, unfortunately.”

She went very still beside you. “Okay,” she said slowly. “That’s not a reassuring answer.”

You groaned. “I know.”

“Who is it?”

Your answer came out muffled. “Mike Wheeler.”

There was a moment of silence and then, “Oh, Jesus Christ.”

You let out a little sob. “I’m such an idiot.”

“Oh, honey,” she sighed, pulling you into a hug, kneeling before your chair. “You’re not an idiot, okay? Just start from the beginning.”

So you did. You told her about the library. About how Mike had invited you over, and you’d believed that you were special. And then, when it was over, he’d rolled over and kicked you out. How you kept going back, because the notes that he slipped you gave you such a rush that you just couldn’t say no.

“Did he do the same thing to you?” you asked.

Your best friend shook her head, smoothing your hair down with a maternal touch. “Oh, no, I only slept with him once. Last year, at that Halloween party, remember? We were both drunk, and he looked ridiculously good in eyeliner. But it was a one-time thing. We both needed a good fuck, and that was that.”

You pulled back. “That’s it?”

She snorted softly. “What, were you expecting more?”

“No,” you muttered. “I don’t know. I just thought. . . well, I’ve slept with him more than once.”

“How many times?”

“. . . four.”

Her eyes widened slightly. “Four?”

You nodded. “Once a week for the last month.”

Your best friend leaned back on her heels. “Okay, that’s. . . interesting.”

You laughed weakly. “You think?”

“No, I mean. . . Mike doesn’t do repeats.”

“Wow, somehow that makes me feel worse.”

“I’m not saying it to be mean,” she said quickly. “I’m just saying that everyone I know - everyone that you know - has only slept with Mike once. Maybe twice if they’re lucky. But four times? Fuck, that’s like, unheard of.”

You folded your arms tightly across your chest. “So, he thinks I’m easy? He gets off on how pathetic I am?”

Your voice cracked on the last word, and her face softened immediately. “Oh, honey.”

“I just don’t understand why he keeps asking me over,” you said, voice now thick with tears. “If he doesn’t even seem to like me afterward. I feel insane. In class, he acts like I barely exist, and then I-” you cut yourself off with a frustrated sound. “I don’t know. Every time I think it will be different.”

“And it never does.”

You swallowed hard. “No. It never does. It just keeps getting more and more impersonal. He doesn’t even go down on me anymore. I mean, fuck, that was like the best part.”

She laughed softly, rubbing her hand up and down your arm soothingly. “Listen to me. Mike’s good at making people feel chosen. I don’t know if he was dropped on his head as a baby, but he just can’t do commitment. And I know you’ve been crushing on him from afar-”

“Don’t remind me.”

“-but you have to stop going over there.”

You let out a shaky breath. “I know.”

“I’m serious.”

“I know.”

“If he called right now, would you go?”

You paused. “. . . no?”

Your best friend gave you a look so deeply unconvinced that you almost laughed. You turned your attention back to the table, tracing the wood grain with your fingertip.

There were worse things a person could be than pathetic. At least pathetic people wanted things. At least they felt things deeply enough to humiliate themselves over them.

The alternative - becoming detached and unreachable and impossible to embarrass - somehow felt lonelier than whatever this was. Mike made you feel wanted in a way that bypassed your self-respect entirely.

And you knew that was bad. You knew it was fucked up and twisted. But you didn’t know how to fix it, how to overcome the satisfaction of being chosen when you’d experienced it, even briefly. And maybe that made you shallow and weak and narcissistic, even, but you spent so much of your life feeling merely tolerated by people. You were smart, funny enough, and easy to keep around.

Mike made you feel devastatingly wanted for one night, and maybe that was enough to survive off of.

But you couldn’t go back.

“I’m not going to tell you who to sleep with,” your best friend said, getting to her feet, “but please, for the love of God, don’t let Mike Wheeler of all people do this to you.”

You nodded, giving her a small smile. A smile that said, no, I would never let Mike Wheeler do that to me.

So, next Friday, you didn’t show up at Mike’s door at the usual time. You stayed in with your roommates and rewatched Pretty Woman and The Princess Bride and laughed about high school incidents you’d recounted dozens of times. You stuffed your face with popcorn and candy and lounged around in your pajamas, face bare of makeup.

And so, when Mike Wheeler called you, you didn’t even hear the phone ring.