“Did it offend you?”

“Not really.”

He laughs into the phone again, and if I wasn’t sitting down, my knees would be a little weak. Jesus his voice is sexy; it suddenly has me wishing he was a tad better looking.

“So, Alex, where are you from?”

A knot of guilt prickles at the mention of my cousin’s name.

“Illinois. Not nearly as exciting as Baton Rouge.”

“No alligators?”

“Only at the fraternity house,” I joke.

The line goes quiet. “Spend a lot of time there?” he asks quietly, his voice gruff.

“Not really.” Not anymore. “That place is a cesspool of bad decisions.”

“So if I said, ‘Alex, meet me at a frat party Saturday night,’ you wouldn’t go?”

“If you said meet me there, I’d think about it.”

“Only think about it? Ah, I see how it is.”

“What do you see?”

“I think you’re tryin’ to flirt with me. Am I wrong?”

I want to deny it but can’t get the words off my tongue. “Are you flirting with me?”

“I’m terrible at it, but I think it would be obvious if I was. Besides, I don’t even know you.”

“You don’t have to know someone to flirt with them, Rhett.”

“I know that, but it’s just not the same, is it?”

“I’m not so sure about that. For example, if I told you the sound of your voice makes my imagination run wild, what would you say to that?”

“I’d say…I’d say…” He stumbles over his words—adorable.

“Shit, I don’t know what I’d say.”

“I can hear you smiling, so I’ll take that as a good sign.”

I’m smiling too—grinning actually, wide and goofy. I picked up a pen a few minutes ago and have been doodling a cartoon crocodile aimlessly on a notebook, surrounded by little black hearts.

When I look down at the paper, there are dozens of those tiny ink hearts scattered like confetti across the flat surface. “That’s good, right? Smiling is good.”

“It’s very good.”

“What do you look like?” I can’t help asking, though I already know the answer. I want to see if he’ll tell me, want to see what he’ll say. “I’ve seen the poster, obviously, but is that really what you look like?”

“Yes.” He forces out a strangled laugh.

“You sound hot,” I blurt out, because he does. The sound of that raspy voice is doing a wild, reckless dance in my stomach, down my pelvis. “What color is your hair?”

“Brown.”

“Just brown?”

“What kind of question is that?” he wants to know. “How many browns are there? Is that question a chick thing?”

“A chick thing? Yeah, I suppose it is. Are your eyes brown, too?” I wasn’t close enough to see those in the parking lot of the diner, and the photocopy of his face on the flyer obviously didn’t translate colors.

“Yeah. Dark brown.”

I hum, thinking. “Do you play sports?”

“I wrestle.”

“How tall are you?”

“Six one.” Rhett pauses. “How tall are you?”

“Five-seven. Kind of tall for a girl, I guess.”

“What color is your hair?”

“Black,” I lie—again, because I can’t tell him my long, straight hair is the color of flaming hot cinders. I’m a natural redhead, and he would see me on campus and know me on sight. “My hair is black.”

Like Alex’s.

“Black,” Rhett repeats, mulling it over. “Huh.”

“What’s the ‘huh’ for?”

“You don’t sound like you have black hair, that’s all.”

Awll.

“What color hair does it sound like I have?”

“I don’t know, blonde? Brown? Definitely not black.”

“Interesting theory. Got any other interesting thoughts?”

He stops to think for a second, and I hear him rustling around. Picture him climbing onto a bed and leaning against the wall, legs hanging over a twin-sized mattress.

“I do actually.”

“Let’s hear them.”

“All right.” Hesitation. “Since I’m never going to meet you in person, I can safely say this without anyone findin’ out: I’m beginning to regret comin’ to school here.”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s just not what I was expecting, that’s all. The people I’ve met are…” His voice tapers off and I finish the sentence for him in my mind.

The people I’ve met are assholes.

The people I’ve met fuck me over.

The people I’ve met lie.

The people I’ve met can go to hell.

“The people I’ve met aren’t who I thought they would be when I decided to enroll here. I’ll leave it at that.”

I don’t reply because I feel like a jerk, like one of his teammates that’s yanked him around, left him hanging, humiliated him publicly.

I contributed to that.

I’m doing it right now.

In the background, I hear banging, muffled shouting. Rhett covers the mouthpiece of his phone and demands, “Hold on one fuckin’ minute, will you?”

He returns. “I should get goin’. Team meeting in twenty.”

“This time of night?”

“Yeah.”

“All right, well…” Why do I feel like I’m standing outside on a first date, waiting for my date to make a move? To ask me out again or try to kiss me? Weird.

“Thanks for callin’.” That smile is back in his voice.

“You’re welcome.”

“Alex?”

I cringe. “Yeah?”

“Want to go to a frat party Saturday night?”

My heartbeat hitches and shockingly, I find myself a little breathless.

“I’d love to.”

Me: What are you up to?

Rhett: Just walked in from practice. Eating dinner with my dickhead roommates.

Me: How many of them are there?

Rhett: Two, but it might as well be ten, they’re such pains in my ass.

Me: Who do you live with?

Rhett: Assholes from the wrestling team. The team manager and a senior named Eric. What about you?

Me: I live with my two best friends, a guy and a girl. How did you end up living with your roomies if you can’t stand them?

Rhett: When I first transferred, I obviously didn’t know anyone. Coach set it up.

Me: So you’re a transfer…I don’t think we talked about that.

Rhett: Yeah.

Me: So you don’t get along with your roommates? Doesn’t that make it hard being on the same team?

Rhett: They’re total assholes. They won’t stop hazing me and I’m getting tired of it. Jesus, now I sound like I’m whining.

Me: No you don’t. Everyone knows hazing is against school policy and I’m sure it’s against your athletic policies, too.

Rhett: Absolutely it is.

Me: I never understood why people—guys, especially—put up with that crap. Fraternities and sororities are the worst…

Rhett: Maybe, maybe not. Athletes are really bad, but no one ever hears about it.

Me: Should you be telling me this?

Rhett: Honestly? Probably not. I almost did the other day on the phone, but since I don’t know you, figured it was a horrible idea.

Rhett: So what about you. You get along with your roommates?

Me: Yes. I live with a guy named Donovan, and my best friend Lana.

Rhett: Donovan is the guy?

Me: Yes, lol. Does that bother you?

Rhett: Why would that bother me?

Me: I don’t know; sometimes when a girl has a male roommate, the guy she’s talking to gets all weird about it.

Rhett: Is that what we’re doing?

Me: I mean…I think we’ve slipped into the weird beginning of something. Don’t you?

Me: Hello? Why did you go radio silent on me?

Rhett: Sorry. I guess I don’t know what to say.