Serial Dating

Nice Noods, Dude

Lee dropped his forehead on the note table attached to his lecture hall seat. An entire two days had passed and Lee was back in OChem with a Park Complex the size of Canada. He really couldn't fathom a reality in which Wednesday was real, and that he, Lee Asano, agreed to become "Gym Buddies" with USFC's star running back.

As if he could even keep up with a USFC athlete. USFC was a nationally accredited Division I university with the stats to prove their worth. Their athletes were the best in the game, and the fact that they were known to put exclusively seniors on the field made Park's all the more of a celebrity. A freshmen on the team holding his own against massive, beefy, hulking biceps and thighs. The lead quarterback, Roland Ball, had a pair of thighs that caused earthquakes in San Francisco and tsunamis in the Indian Ocean.

And Lee certainly didn't know this because he had fantasized about having his head annihilated by them.

Just as Lee brought his head up to hit against the desk for a third time, someone's knuckle rapped on the surface. Lee stared vacantly at closed notebook. Out of the corner of his eye, Rushil leant over into his vision.

"Hey... big guy... how're you holdin' up?" Rushil said as he took his seat. He sat on the edge of it, though, all of his attention and energy seeping into Lee's direction like the tendrils of a vicious beast, grinning smugly at him from the shadows.

He glowered at Rushil.

Rushil (bless his heart) offered an almost-pitiful grimace as he nodded in "understanding" and said, "That bad, huh?"

"I haven't slept in two days," Lee said. It was an exaggeration, but it was a direct reference to how he felt as a human being, existing in a bag of flesh, at that very moment.

Rushil gestured to his eyes and said, "I can... I can tell. You've got, uh, bags under your eyes today."

"It's my immune system rejecting this situation," Lee said, slumping back in his seat. He put his fingers to the bridge of his nose and sighed. "He's your roommate."

"We would have known this sooner had you just told me his name—" Rushil said.

Just past Rushil, Lee caught sight of Alex climbing the stairs. Once again, Alex stopped at the sight of them, and then at what they had managed to overhear from the situation. Alex hurried over, backpack swinging off of their shoulders and onto the floor behind Lee's chair.

"What happened? Why does Lee look like death incarnate?" Alex demanded.

Rushil cleared his throat as he prepared for the delivery of the best punchline of Lee's joke of a life. "Mystery Starbucks guy?"

"Yeah?"

"My roommate."

Alex fell back into their seat. They stared at Rushil, completely stunned. They put a hand to their heart and said, "You've done it. You've officially killed me."

"You're tellin' me," Lee huffed. "I've been dead for two days. This is just my ghost talking."

Alex leant forward to hiss, "Your roommate's Milo Park. As in, thee guy. The Guy who made the field as a freshmen. Didn't he get, like, a full-ride scholarship to Ohio State?"

Rushil nodded eagerly. "Yeah. Uh-huh, that's the guy. That is thee guy that sleeps three feet away from me every night."

"Wow," Alex said.

"I hate everything about this," Lee droned. "Leave me now or forever hold your knives, fellas, because I might just beat you to the chase."

"Well, you will if you stay awake any longer. Have you even been eating? Look at your face," Rushil said. He straightened with a gasp, snapping his fingers as he said, "Milo said you gotta eat carbs today. Like, a fuck ton of them. Like, grab yourself some Noods after this 'cause it all starts tomorrow."