Chapter 17

David
David had survived another week of school. He’d made the executive decision to quit going to the coffee shop after his runs. Not because he was embarrassed to have hooked up with Kat’s roommate, Yong. Rather, because when that happened, David realized he’d already decided on some level that he and Kat wouldn’t work.

On reflection, he’d initially pursued Kat because all the other guys wanted her, and for good reason. The Goth Barbie look was different enough that it caught attention. Doreen admitted that Kat made triple the tips any of the other girls working there did.

Frankly, David wasn’t looking for a girlfriend right now; he would just as soon hook up with someone like Yong—at least until he got a handle on college. He didn’t have the time to wine and dine someone, let alone work toward a deeper relationship.

On the other hand, he didn’t want to turn into the typical Hollywood type who randomly hooked up with girls. That had been the main reason he’d avoided the Baseball House.

For Kat, he’d been willing to make an exception. Unfortunately, the more David got to know her, the more he realized they weren’t right for each other. Her binge-drinking aside, they just didn’t have that much in common.

He’d stuck it out in the hope of finally getting her into his bed. In the end, he was happy he hadn’t. It would have complicated his life, and right now, he wasn’t looking for complications.

This was a big weekend: the baseball team would be playing their first game on Sunday, which wouldn’t really count because it was against their alumni. Next week, the team would travel to North Carolina to play Wake Forest for a Friday-Saturday-Sunday series. David was set to fly out Thursday afternoon, so he would have to avail himself of the athletic department’s nifty get-out-of-jail letters they sent to professors. Margaret, his tutor, had given him the information on how to go about it.

Tonight was their floor’s turn to host the weekly dorm party. Alex was excited and wanted the floor residents to put their best foot forward.

“Squeak will be here in a minute,” Alex said, referring to his sister, Natalia, who lived in the mirror image of their suite but at the other end of the hall. “She wants to know if you’ll take her to the store to get party supplies.”

David hadn’t seen much of Nat. She’d formed her own group of friends over the previous semester. Her absence, in general, was similar to Alex’s, except Alex spent the majority of his time with his buddies on the USC soccer team.

Right on cue, Nat walked in with her roommate, Silvia. David had seen Silvia around and had met her briefly. From what he’d observed, Nat and Silvia really didn’t spend much time together because of their age difference. Silvia was a senior.

When David met her, he’d put her down as a nice person. She had a ready smile and treated him warmly.

“Hey ... uh ... Allen,” Nat said, catching herself. “I haven’t seen much of you.”

“I’ve been getting settled in with school and trying to balance that with baseball. Ask your brother; doing sports and school isn’t easy.”

“He tells me that you have a car that can haul stuff,” she said, getting to the point.

“A small SUV.”

“That works,” Nat announced and all but yanked him out of the room.

He discovered why Silvia was with them: she was old enough to buy alcohol. David took advantage of her age and purchased his own liquor supply. While he didn’t drink much, when he did, he liked a nice scotch. He also knew that Lexi preferred wine, so he bought several bottles of her favorites to have on hand.

He had finally called Lexi and, as a pretext for seeing her, invited her to the party. She wasn’t thrilled when she heard the theme. Neither was he, but the girls had picked it. It was supposed to be a pajama party. Lexi had told him that she might come but wanted to see if she had any other commitments.

David didn’t take offense at Lexi playing her game. And it was a game; he knew her too well to be fooled. She was trying to assert some control over their relationship. He’d been the one to wrest control from her and bring things to a screeching halt when he’d sent her home after her declaration of love.

He would have bet his imaginary beach house that had Lexi been given a chance to rethink her gambit, she never would have played the ‘let me see if I can find something better’ card. She was smart enough to have known that tactic would never work on David. She’d heard enough stories about girls who’d tried to overtly control him, and how it hadn’t ended well for them. Before he cut her loose, Lexi had found other means to get her way without triggering his alpha-male tendencies.

When the group got back to the car, David had to lay down half of the backseat area to pile in all the party supplies. The Porsche Macan’s weakness was its cargo room. But it was a hell of a car to drive.

He was happy when they got back because Nat announced that he’d fulfilled his party set-up obligations by making the supply run. She did warn him that if they found they needed something else requiring a trip to the store, he was the man for the job.

Alex had set himself up as bartender in their room for what he termed a ‘pre-party.’ He’d invited a couple of his soccer pals, while David had asked Cassidy, Seamus, and Allard to come early. Seamus wanted to introduce them all to Irish pizza, so they’d ordered several from a place he’d found.

David shouldn’t have been surprised: it was made with potatoes, both as one of the crust ingredients and as a topping. One had bacon and leeks, and another had sauerkraut and corned beef combined with diced potatoes. They’d topped it all with aged cheddar instead of mozzarella.

As pizza went, it wasn’t as weird as some of the others he’d had in LA. Still, David was of the firm opinion that Californians didn’t know what ‘real’ pizza was. That was the only explanation for toppings like artichokes, bananas, red curry, and tuna. They were all foods he liked, but they shouldn’t be on a ‘real’ pizza.

He didn’t know how, but the conversation wound up turning to sex.

“David, what’s your go-to move when you just get done being busy and want to call it a night?” Alex asked.

“Fuck you too, roomie.”

“I know,” Cassidy piped up.

David doubted he would like this.

“Dang, look at you, Ms. Know-It-All,” Allard said.

Cassidy, mimicking David, spread her legs out like some bull rider with hemorrhoids.

“Welp,” she drawled out.

’Saying that, and nothing else, is frickin’ genius,’ David thought. It said everything and nothing at the same time if you wanted to make a quick exit.

“How can you be knowing, yeah?” Seamus asked.

David looked at Seamus with a bit of pity. If he and the other guys weren’t careful, they would find out that Cassidy could make them cry. She got a mischievous look on her face, which David guessed spelled trouble.

“Stand next to David. I want to see how much bigger he is than you,” Cassidy told Seamus.

“And let him go stark ravers on me, yeah?” Seamus said, shaking his head. “He has about four inches on me, if you must know.”

Cassidy looked right at Seamus’s crotch.

“I would have guessed more,” she said with a straight face.

“That’s bollocks,” Seamus fired back weakly.

It didn’t matter, though, because the others were all laughing at his expense. Plus, he knew anything he said would be repeated at baseball practice. David high-fived Cassidy. She was on a roll.

“And you,” Cassidy said, pointing at Alex.

“Play nice,” he said with a worried look.

She smiled, which made the poor guy even more nervous.

Lindsey, Jamie, and Kirk came in to stop the fun. What distracted everyone else was that they’d obviously missed out on the memo about what constituted ‘pajamas.’ The guys all had on either flannel pajama pants or, in David’s case, baggy sweats with a sweatshirt and robe. Even Cassidy had put on a goofy onesie. They’d all interpreted the theme to mean what you might sleep in.

Lindsey and Jamie were in what would best be described as lingerie.

David stood in stunned silence as he took in what he was seeing. He found Seamus and Allard on both sides of him.

“Tell me they’re single,” Allard asked plaintively.

“I take back everything I ever said about you,” Seamus added, not even glancing at David.

“I’ve had enough of this sausage fest. Let’s go to the real party,” David suggested.

David was more than a bit disappointed that Lexi hadn’t shown up. The women at the party were having an effect on him. It wasn’t like any of them had gone full-on slutty; all the important parts of their bodies were covered. But that didn’t mean some weren’t sexy. A couple looked like they’d borrowed men’s button-up dress shirts to wear and nothing else. Several had on satin dressing gowns that exposed a lot of leg. Then there were the short-shorts-with-skimpy-tops girls.

The theme did accomplish one important girl-goal: the guys didn’t disappear to play video games or talk sports. They all got off the sidelines and talked to the girls.

Then the townies showed up. Veronica and Lauren had gone shopping somewhere like Agent Provocateur and purchased matching outfits. On the outside, the two of them were beautiful women. Veronica’s mother was on a long-running sitcom and played the love interest, and her genes showed in her daughter. Similarly, Lauren’s parents had been models, and Lauren had been in a couple of Disney-like shows when she was younger.

It was evident that the girls had dressed their guy friends because, unlike the rest of the men, they were dressed in silk boxers and super-short robes that hung open. To David, they looked like what a MILF would dress her sex toy of a pool boy in. He didn’t think, though, that the two had any idea how silly they looked.

David predicted that the guys would be regretting their fashion choice before too long. He’d been smart enough to wear formfitting underwear to keep everything in place. If he’d worn boxers under his sweats, and the old bird dog, Mr. Happy, caught a scent and decided to point ... let’s just say it would be obvious.

The common room was crowded, and David didn’t know many people because he’d not been to the other floor parties. He immediately made a point of starting to meet everyone. Cassidy tagged along until she met a cute guy who didn’t set off David’s douchebag detector. When he was sure she didn’t need him to bail her out, he began trying to find someone who might interest him.