“Hey.”
Georgia looked up. “Hey. You look happy.”
She hadn’t realized she’d been smiling. She’d probably walked across campus like that, which was silly. Silly but unavoidable. “I am.”
“Want to share?”
She dropped her backpack and sat on her bed, taking out a textbook. Trying for calm and sensible. Up until today, she tried to tell herself they were friends, just sitting on the Knoll, and that she was happy with that. That it was enough. Not that she felt unworthy, but Nick definitely wasn’t the kind of guy usually interested in girls like her. The tall, dark, and athletically Godlike hot guy.
Even so, there was a different side to Nick—a deeper, gentle, serious side. She wondered if the girls who paused on the Knoll to say they missed him and ask him to parties knew that side.
“Mia!”
She jerked her head up, stilling the finger that had been steadily tapping the cover of her book. “Nick kissed me.”
“Really?” A sly smile spread across Georgia’s face. “The broody Calvin Klein underwear model you sit with on the Knoll every day?”
“Not every day. I mean, it’s three days a week for four weeks, minus one day it rained and one day Hannah was sick, so really—”
“Seriously? I say ‘underwear model’ and you count days?”
“I’m just being accurate.”
“So he kissed you. Aaaand?”
Mia felt a dam burst. She shoved her book aside. “Georgia, I mean he really kissed me. Do you know what I mean?”
“Yeah. I think I’m familiar.”
“I’m having dinner with him tonight.”
Georgia moved to her desk, grabbed a nail file, and came back. “What fraternity is he in?”
“I don’t know. It didn’t come up.” Her roommates were everything Greek. She was everything not.
“She doesn’t know,” Anna Margret said, walking in from the attached suite she shared with Robyn.
“Figures.” Georgia shook her head sadly. “He looks like an SA or a Kappa Phi. They’re almost all hot. I don’t know any houses that are open for dinner, though. That’s only for lunch and only on game days.”
“It’s not at his fraternity house.”
She looked confused. “He’s taking you to a restaurant? Well, that’s different.”
“No. His house. His real house. Where he lives with his brothers and sister. You know he has Hannah.” She was so happy, it took her a second to notice Georgia’s scowl. “What?”
“I don’t know. It’s just kind of… weird, isn’t it? I mean, off campus? Are you having dinner with all his brothers?”
“I don’t know if they’ll be there, but Hannah will. I’m excited. It’ll be fun.”
“Okay. If you say so. Just call me every so often so I know he hasn’t locked you up to be the family sex slave.”
“Eww. Georgia. Why would you say that?”
Anna Margret pushed a pile of clothes aside and sat on Georgia’s bed. “Didn’t you go to the freshman sexual assault lecture? Didn’t you watch the video?”
“Of course I did. It was required.”
“Just make sure you know what you’re doing. For such a genius, you don’t have much street smarts.”
“I’ve seen pictures of your house, G. You didn’t exactly carry a knife walking to the corner bus stop.”
“No, but I’ve been out. I know how to read the signs of grabby guys and watch my drink so I don’t get drugged.”
“Why would you want to go to a party and hang out with people that you think might put something in your drink?”
“Because it’s fun. Duh. And because they’re hot.”
She didn’t get it, but there were a lot of things about Georgia and Anna Margret that she didn’t get. Nick was definitely hot, but she wasn’t worried. Maybe she should be, but she wasn’t.
“What are you wearing?” Georgia asked.
She looked down at herself. Khakis and a white button-down blouse. “This?”
Georgia and Anna Margret burst with a simultaneous and emphatic “No!”
“Okay. What do you think I should wear?”
The girls exchanged a look. “Finally.” Anna said, slapping a hand over her heart, and Georgia raced to her own closet.
* * *
MIA ARRIVED AT NICK’S a few minutes before six in the lime-green VW Bug she’d borrowed from Georgia. His family home was in a nice neighborhood just ten minutes from campus, and she was early. Bad habit.
She shut off the engine and sat, staring at the one-story brick house. Sidewalks ran in front of mowed lawns of one- or two-story houses shadowed by mature trees. She’d passed several people walking as she drove. A couple had waved when she’d slowed, searching the mailboxes for the house number. The place was friendly, like her neighborhood in Boston.