Misadventures of a College Girl (Misadventures #9)(13)
“Shit.” He exhales. “Zooey, listen. All that stuff I said earlier, I’m thinking maybe I jumped the gun and we should—”
“No, no, you were absolutely right. I would have regretted having a one-night stand with you. I might even have turned into a Stage Five Clinger on you, to be honest. You know how freshman girls are—we’re all batshit crazy, especially small-town girls like me with no experience.” I force a smile. “Truthfully, I think we both dodged huge bullets tonight. I dodged giving my V card to some random, drunk-ass dude at a party who didn’t even buy me a freaking cheeseburger first. And you dodged having a potential Stage Five Clinger on your hands.” I force another smile, even though my stomach is suddenly churning. “So let’s both count our lucky stars and call it a night.” I motion for him to step away from the door. “Excuse me, please.”
Tyler sighs and slowly steps aside, a pained expression on his face. “Shit,” he mutters. “Zooey, listen—”
“No, no. Please. There’s nothing more to say. Have fun avoiding ‘emotional distractions’ until the draft.” With that, I swing open Tyler’s bedroom door and bolt down the hallway, praying to God I’ll never see Tyler Caldwell and his savagely blue eyes and heart-stopping smile ever again.
Chapter Seven
I stop walking and look down at the campus map on my phone, trying in vain to figure out how to get to Randolph Hall. This is my first time down here in South Campus, the land of future scientists, and this map isn’t helping me at all. Thank God I came down south with so much extra time before the start of my Social Psychology class, or I’d be totally stressed right now. I look up from my phone, trying to orient myself, and immediately notice Dimitri walking about twenty yards away.
“Dimitri!” I call out.
Dimitri stops and looks straight at me, not a hint of recognition on his face, and then continues on his merry way as if I’ve said nothing at all.
“Dimitri!” I shout again, bounding toward him. I wave at him like a dork. “It’s Zooey from the football party!”
Dimitri’s eyes widen with astonishment. “Holy crap, I didn’t even recognize you!” He embraces me, laughing. “You look so different with your hair curly like this. I love it.”
I touch my crazy hair. “Yeah, Clarissa gave me quite the makeover the other night.” I motion to my tank top, shorts, and sneakers. “The real Zooey is more Farm Girl from Nebraska than Kendall Jenner.”
“You look awesome either way.” He shifts his backpack on his shoulder. “So how’s Clarissa? We’re meeting tomorrow for coffee. Got any pro tips for me?”
“Pro tips?”
“Inside info I can use to make her fall desperately in love with me.”
I make an “aw” face. “Just be your sweet and charming self, Dimitri. After the party, Clarissa said some really nice things about you.”
“‘Nice’ as in ‘he’s totally in my friend zone,’ or…?” Dimitri looks at me expectantly, obviously hoping I’ll spill the beans. But I’ve got nothing for him. After the party, Clarissa and I stayed up talking for hours and hours, at which time she told me she likes Dimitri a lot, but she’s on the fence about whether she could see herself sleeping with him. “He’s definitely cute,” she said that night. “But he didn’t even try to kiss me, even though I kept giving him green-light signals. If a guy doesn’t make a move on me early on, the window for romance slams shut. It’s just the way I’m wired. I need to feel desirable right away.”
I look into Dimitri’s earnest, expectant face, and my heart pangs for him. “Okay, Dimitri, I’ve got one pro tip for you. You’ve got to cowboy up and make your move early with Clarissa. If you don’t make her feel like she’s completely irresistible to you, she’ll put you in the friend zone, and that will be that. No second chances.”
Dimitri looks distressed.
“Just go for it,” I urge. “Better to make a move and get rejected than wonder ‘what if’ later on.”
Dimitri takes a deep breath. “Wow, thanks, Zooey. Okay, I’ll go for it.”
“Good luck.”
“So enough about me and my whopping crush on your unbelievably gorgeous roommate who totally rocked my world the other night,” Dimitri says. “How’s your first day of classes treating you so far, college girl?”
“So far, so good. I had History of Theater this morning up in my neck of the woods. And now I’m down south to take my required science class. Shudder.”
“What class?”
“Social Psychology. Thankfully, I’ll be heading back up north immediately afterwards for Modernizing Shakespeare.”
“Oh, I took that class last quarter for my creative writing minor. It was cool.”
“Awesome. So would you mind giving me directions to Randolph? I’m terrible at reading maps, and I don’t want to be late for class.”
“It’s not you, it’s the map. The first time I tried to find Randolph my freshman year, I got lost for four days. If I hadn’t had a granola bar and a Red Bull in my backpack, I would have starved to death while waiting for the search party.” He grins adorably. “I’ll walk you there. It’ll give me a chance to tell you about an interesting text I got from a certain someone right after the party.”