CalPal

-36-

Chapter Thirty Six

The next morning, I woke up to the sound of Nick screaming through the laptop speakers. He repeatedly shouted my name until I jumped awake as well as Clay from beside me. I jolted up into sitting position and stared at the screen in pure hatred. I booted it back up from sleep mode and moved my cursor over the discord room we were in.

"Nicholas, I fucking hate you."

"You see, I'd believe you, but I know I'm your favorite," I could hear the smile in his voice. He's too cocky for his own good.

"I'm here too you know," Clay uttered from beside me, still half asleep.

"I know. I'm still her favorite."

"Honestly probably," Clay shrugged, letting Nick believe that. In all actuality, I don't have favorites, "I'm gonna go take a shower, I'll be back. Mom wanted to know if we'd come over to finish that puzzle. She's really excited about it."

I chuckled, "Of course."

"Alright. I'm gonna go get ready for the day," he leaned over and gave me a quick peck on the lips which followed up a gagging sound from Nick.

"You guys could've at least muted the mic!"

I laughed and Clay walked away wheezing as well. When he had shut the door to the guest room, I grabbed my laptop from the nightstand, "I need to get ready too," I told Nick. He just said a simple 'okay', but made no effort to get off the call. I ended up taking him with me into Clay's room to rummage through my clothes.

"Should I shower? I showered last night after coming back from our date."

"I think you're good."

I picked out another crewneck that I had thrifted with Karl and paired it with my white tennis skirt since I hadn't had the chance to wear that yet. It was a white sweater that said the word 'colors' on it in colorful font. I'm pretty sure Karl thrifted a similar one in a different color and calls them our 'friendship sweaters'.

"So when're you coming down to North Carolina?" I asked Nick as I changed into my outfit. We weren't on video call, so I didn't see a problem with changing.

"I don't know. I got an email from my school that we're moving fully remote this semester again. I might just come down after school's started and just chill there for a few weeks. You have classes too right? So we could do school work together."

"Yeah. We have hybrid classes this semester but I have a choice of going completely remote if I want to. I haven't decided what to do yet. I learn better in person though. With all my streaming and stuff at home, I feel like it'd be best to separate work and play. Plus, as far as I know, cross country is starting back up in the fall so I'll have to go to campus anyway."

"You don't room do you?"

I shook my head, "No. My campus is like five minutes down the road," it was silent as I twirled the band on my ring finger, "So yeah. If you wanna come down when school starts that's fine. I'll just be out of the house like three days a week for practice but it's only an hour long."

"Yeah, I'll do that then. I'll look into flights tonight and let you—"

I didn't hear the rest of Nick's sentence, but could easily piece together what he said. Clay exited the bathroom at that exact moment with another towel hat on. He was wearing some black jeans and a plain black pullover. I stifled a laugh and turned to Nick, "Hold on lemme switch to FaceTime I'll be right back."

I left the discord chat and closed my laptop. Then, I reached across the bed to grab my phone. Nick answered the FaceTime before the first ring was up. As soon as his face loaded up, I switched the camera and had it pointed at Clay. Nick burst out laughing and Clay whipped his head around to glare at the both of us.