Oxford

eighteen

"The moon looks like a thinner version of Sam Smith."

    "There's no way you're still drunk."

    "I wasn't—and am not—that drunk—"

    "You pointed at the stoplight when I asked where the pedestrian lane was."

    "—Just look."

    "Holy shit. It does look like Sam Smith."

    "Told you."

    Luca stretched out his limbs, lying down on the floor of the dim, empty gym with a deep exhale. His shirt rode up a little, revealing a sliver of skin and the top half of the waistband of his Calvin Klein's. I forced my eyes to look away before he could notice and let my head roll back to rest against the wall, my gaze landing on the TV bracketed on the wall before us. The dizzy feeling was slowly fading. The fog in my mind was clearing up. As we were waiting for Les Miserables to start showing, the countdown stating we had less than a minute of waiting, I was actively trying to avoid thinking about Luca and his lips and his leaning in (or was I the one leaning in?) and how much I wanted him to just close the remaining 60 percent of space between us—

    Fuck.

    "Why is it even here?" Luca asked.

    "Hmm?"

    "The moon. I mean, imagine doing crunches with that staring at you."

    "It's pretty creepy, I know. Wait. It's on!"

    Luca pushed himself up and leaned against the wall beside me. There was an appropriate amount of space between us, yet I could smell him and his musky perfume, and it just smelled so masculine and it makes me want to f—

    Luca's voice made my head jerk slightly. "You okay?"

    I am never drinking again. At least, not when I'm around Luca nor if I end up being around him. Who knows what I'd do next time? Holy sith.

    I swallowed and forced my eyes to focus on looking at his eyes and not drop down. I flashed him a closed-lipped smile. "Yup." I told him. "Just remembered this insight essay I've yet to write."

    "Chill. It's only Friday."

    "You mean, Saturday. It's like, what, two in the morning?"

    "Four, actually."

    "No way."

    Luca showed me the screen of his phone. I wasn't even able to look at the time; his screensaver had taken my full attention. On the night of our impromptu sleepover, minutes after Diana had finally left my room, and Luca was passed out on my floor, I had decided to flood Luca's camera roll with parts of my face, and had changed his screensaver—a photo of these surf boards stacked on top of each other—to my face. My finger was pulling the corner of my mouth, and my eyes were looking at something over the camera. It's not exactly an attractive photo. And yet he had kept it. My heart skipped a beat.

    "Aw. You kept it."

    "The screensaver? Yeah. Too lazy to change it."

    "Cute, right?"

    "Very." His eyelid dropped to a wink.

    Why does everything he's doing turn me on? I'm probably still drunk. Right?

    "Have you watched the musical version of this?"

    I shook my head.

    "Maybe we should watch it sometime. I hear it's amazing."