Chapter 54: He’s Living Rent Free In My Head
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The sound of her laugh was bright and unrestrained, coming out of her without hesitation, and it made me smile before I could even think about it, a genuine smile, the kind that arrives before your brain jumps in to weigh the situation.
See? This was nice. It was exactly what I’d told myself I wanted. Normal, warm, and simple, without any subtext lurking beneath every exchange waiting to trip me up.
Exactly what I should’ve wanted.
The movie turned out to be surprisingly good. In fact, it was funny, better written than the trailer had suggested, with a lead couple that had the kind of chemistry making the jokes hit just right instead of falling flat.
Melanie leaned over to whisper little comments during the funniest scenes, perfectly timed observations, and nudged my arm whenever something particularly ridiculous happened on screen.
I found myself laughing more than I expected. Relaxing more than I anticipated.
For about forty minutes, everything felt genuinely easy.
Then my brain, loyal as a cat and timing like a car alarm, decided to wreck everything.
A character kissed her boyfriend on screen, nothing dramatic, just a small, quiet moment between two people who’d been circling each other all film long...and my brain, without asking, summoned another kiss.
A different moment. Another pair of lips, a hand against a wall, and the strange, bewildering feeling of being kissed by someone you were supposed to be at odds with.
I groaned internally. No! Not tonight! We’re not doing this!
I focused on the screen with determination.
Five minutes later, Melanie’s hand brushed against mine as she reached for popcorn.
And just like that, my traitorous brain decided to compare it to the memory of Damien’s hand over mine by the salt shaker.
What was wrong with me?!
I was sitting next to a pretty girl who had willingly chosen to spend her Saturday night with a dumbass like me. A girl who laughed at my jokes and texted back quickly and hadn’t once given me a reason to feel confused if she liked me or was just messing around. This should’ve been enough. More than enough. That was the whole point.
Yet, a disloyal part of my mind kept drifting toward icy blue eyes, dark hair, and a laugh I’d only heard twice yet somehow had etched into my memory.
I hated it. I hated it with the intense focus of someone losing an argument with themselves and refusing to yield.
God...what is my life at this point?
After the credits rolled, Melanie hooked her arm through mine as we stepped out onto the street with the crowd, drifting toward the ice cream shop two blocks down, guided by unspoken agreement and the usual flow of an evening that didn’t want to conclude.
The air had cooled while we’d been inside, pleasantly so, carrying the scent of cut grass and distant food carts. Students filled the sidewalks in small groups, voices overlapping, music wafting from somewhere above us.
The streetlights had come on, casting everything in a warm amber glow, and the evening had that familiar vibe of a city settling in, easygoing and relaxed, glowing from below.
"See?" Melanie said, diving into her ice cream with the satisfaction of someone who’s been proven right. "I told you I was fun."
I pretended to consider her claim seriously. "The jury is still out."
She smacked my arm. "Rude."
"Accurate."
"You laughed multiple times."
"I laugh at lots of things. The threshold for laughter isn’t as high as you think it is."
"You laughed at me specifically."
I pointed my spoon at her. "That’s quite a bold statement."
"I have witnesses."
"You have a theater full of strangers who don’t know my name."
Her grin widened, bright and proud, nudging my shoulder with hers as we walked. "I like you, Oliver."
Those words came out easily, just the way she said most things, light and certain, free of any complications. No hesitation. No underlying layers. She liked me, plain and simple, as if stating a fact she was completely comfortable with.
And I stood there, ice cream in hand, feeling the strange weight of how simple that should’ve felt. How much easier everything would be if I could just accept that sentence at face value, letting it resonate where it was meant to land.
I wondered, not for the first time, if she’d still feel that way with all the details laid out. The hospital bills. The jobs I was quietly stacking. How some mornings I needed to take stock of what I could afford for the week.
The organized chaos of being Oliver Reyes, financially stretched, emotionally entangled, and apparently unable to sort out a normal feeling about my own roommate.
But Melanie looked genuinely happy I was there. Standing on a sidewalk, eating ice cream on a Saturday night, she regarded me like that was enough, like I was enough, and maybe sometimes that mattered more than perfect timing.
"I had fun tonight," she said as we approached Callington Hall, its stone facade looming above us in the dark, with all its elegant lines and old-money charm.
So she was another of the many elites of this school. God, I never really had a chance, did I?
"Me too." I really meant it. The night had been good...genuinely, honestly good. The catch was that good and simple weren’t the same as certain, and I couldn’t shake the feeling of the gap between them.
Her smile softened, becoming a bit shy, a departure from her usual demeanor that felt more impactful for it. "I’d...um, I’d like to do this again."
My stomach tightened. Not because I didn’t want to, I just couldn’t find that part of me that should’ve reacted simply, and its absence was painfully conspicuous.
"Yeah," I said, after what felt like a beat too long. "I’d like that too."
Her face lit up, the way it did when she was genuinely pleased about something, that immediate warmth radiating from her.
Then, before I had a chance to fully process the movement, she stepped in closer, close enough for me to catch the scent of vanilla and faint floral notes. Closer enough to see that smile still shining in her eyes.
"I really like you, Oliver."
And just like that, she kissed me.
It was soft, sweet...warm, in the uncomplicated way a kiss is supposed to be, gentle, present, and asking nothing difficult from either of us. The kind of kiss you see in the last act of a good movie, when everything has finally resolved and the audience exhales.
I kissed her back. Naturally, because it’ll be weird not to.
For a few moments, the world around us narrowed to just that instant. The cool air, the distant city sounds, the warmth of her hands resting briefly against my chest.
Then, with the worst timing possible, my brain brought Damien back into the picture.
Not subtly, not slowly or apologetically. Just... there, as if a song had gotten stuck in my head. Damien’s hand over mine at the party. The way his attention felt when it was directed at me. The sound of his laugh in the kitchen, rare enough that each instance felt like something I’d had to earn.
The way he’d looked at me that afternoon when I said I had a date, that brief flash of something on his face that he’d smoothed away before I could fully interpret.
The comparison dropped in before I could stop it.
And right behind it came guilt, arriving quickly and hitting hard, like guilt does when you know you’ve thought something you shouldn’t have.
What was wrong with me? Melanie was right here. She was kissing me. She was sweet and funny, genuinely interested in my average ass, and she deserved someone fully in the moment, not wandering back to a complicated roommate situation with no resolution in sight.
When she pulled away, her cheeks had a faint pink tint, her smile hopeful and soft, beautiful under the amber streetlight.
And I felt like the worst person alive.
"Text me when you get home?" she asked.
I managed a smile that I hoped conveyed more calm than I felt. "Yeah."
"Promise?"
"I promise."
That made her happy. She held my gaze for a second longer, still smiling, then slipped through the front door of the building. I stood alone on the sidewalk, feeling the evening air cool around me as I touched my lips and replayed everything that had just happened.
Then I overthought it. Then I overthought my overthinking, which honestly had become my most reliable skill, the one thing I could count on to do thoroughly and without cutting corners.
By the time I started walking back to Preston Hall, my head was a complete mess, cycling through everything in that frustratingly circular way it had been doing for weeks.
The evening had gone well, the date had genuinely been nice. Melanie was sweet and funny, and she liked me unconditionally. Any reasonable person would have walked away from tonight feeling light.
But instead, every thought circled back to the same person, the same question...one date with a girl who actually, genuinely liked me.
So why was it that a fleeting look from Damien that afternoon, two seconds, unreadable, smoothed away almost before it registered had done more for my pulse than the entire night?
I didn’t know.
But I was walking home through the dark, thinking about it, and maybe that was the answer.