Page 10 of Dibs
“I’m just teasing. You’re one hell of a shortstop. Do you think you’ll go pro one day?”
Lisa moved closer to us as though she wanted to hear my answer too. I looked at Gage and he shook his head. What the fuck was he doing with a chick that clearly had a hard-on for baseball players? Was she only with him because he might go pro one day? He had a chance because he was the best I’d seen play second base and he wasn’t bad in the batter’s box either. Wasn’t my place to ask him though. I just hoped it didn’t mean she was going to be around more because again, I didn’t need to listen to them fuck.
“That’s the dream,” I responded to Miranda.
“Yo,” Campbell called. “We’re up.”
“Ready to see how I handle some wood?” I winked at Miranda.
She snorted a small laugh, and I went to the wall where the pool sticks hung.
The entire time we played against Campbell and Richards, I flirted with Miranda, lining up my shots so my ass was pointed in her direction, winking at her over the lip of my cup as I took each sip of my beer, and I might have stood shoulder to shoulder with her as I waited for my turn.
“Can we dance now?” Lisa moaned just as I sunk the eight ball to win the game. I was too buzzed to worry about her anymore. She was a bump on a log the entire forty-five minutes the game went on.
Gage ignored his girl too while we both stuck out our hands for our teammates to put a twenty in each of them.
“Next weekend, we switch teams,” Richards groaned.
I chuckled. “Hell naw. It’s roommates versus roommates. We’re not switching because you two suck.”
“Yeah, whatever,” Campbell mumbled. “I need another beer.”
I turned to Miranda. “You want another beer too?”
She blew out a breath. “I should head back to my dorm. It’s getting late.”
“Which dorm? I can walk you back.” And then go inside and not have to leave until after Gage and Lisa were asleep.
“Rieber,” she replied.
“All right. Let me walk you back.”
Lisa continued to bitch at Gage. “Come on, babe. You promised me dancing.”
“Have fun dancing.” I grinned at the fool and winked before grabbing Miranda’s hand to lead her through the house that was still full of partiers.
Once the two of us made it outside, I let go of her hand and grabbed my phone to check the time, only to realize I had a text from Gage.
I don’t dance, asshole. Code: Ice cream.
We had a dry erase board on the door and used it to leave secret notes. One being code words if we were with someone inside the room and didn’t want to be disturbed.
I slid my phone back into my pocket and Miranda and I chatted as we made our way to the Rieber Hall building and up to her dorm room. I’d thought things were going well until …
“Thanks for walking me back. I appreciate it.”
“Sure, no problem.” I rubbed the back of my neck, waiting for her to invite me in.
“I had a good ti—”
I was stunned, frozen in place, when she finished her sentence by barfing on me.
“Oh, my God. I’m so sorry.” She covered her mouth as though she was going to hurl again and took off toward the bathroom.
I stood there for a couple of seconds while I processed what had happened. Miranda had consumed only a few beers that I knew of.
Not wanting to smell like puke, I left and headed back to my dorm. There was no code word on the dry erase board and I hurried inside to grab my things to shower.
