“oh but supriya/sepideh/isa only spoke highly of nw and co if you actually read the article
“i’ll believe something happened on that set when one of the actresses says something”
3 women of colour - 2 of whom are very new to the industry vs 3 veteran white men who have the ability to blacklist and stop their careers
and if they had been angry a lot of you would be calling them unprofessional and difficult - not to mention the smear campaign that happened with tracy could very easily happen with them too.
also yall are being willfully ignorant because they were being shady as hell in a professional manner but you just have your fingers in your ears to protect your favs and avoid doing introspection
read your logan fic and i thought “wait this reminds me of a lovely steve fic” only to realize that you’re the author of that too!!!! the way you write these characters is so refreshing cause you see a lot of the same tropes on here (no shade). i hope you continue writing for off campus <3 i love your work!
Aw thank you! I assume you mean either "it's a feeling that's fine" or "we are not alone" since those readers are similar hehe <3 for now I'm wanting to continue the logan series so more to come! 🩷
summary: Three months ago, you and Logan quietly became something. You forgot to tell anyone. That was fine, it was yours, and you liked it that way. Then you found out your friends had started a betting pool on when you'd finally get together, and suddenly keeping the secret became a lot more fun.
or: four times someone almost caught you, and one time someone did.
notes: hii i'm back!! okay so this one is a little different from my usual so no angst, no parking lot confessions, no rain. also this pic of antonio is just so boyfriend that i had to write something. thank you so much for reading and please let me know what you think!!
warnings: swearing, implied intimacy, a missing bra, hannah being a terrible secret keeper and fluff.
word count: 6k
You and Hannah were not often scheduled to work the same shift at Malone's, for the simple reason that you two were dangerously prone to a severe case of the giggles that management had clocked early and worked around. But today was different, another server had called in sick and your manager had called you in a tone that left very little room for negotiation. You said yes, of course. You always said yes.
Arriving, you spotted Hannah immediately, weaving between tables with three plates balanced on her arm. You passed her on your way to the staff locker room and gave her arm a quick squeeze. She grinned at you over her shoulder.
The lunch rush was the particular kind of brutal that didn't leave room for anything except moving, table to table, order to order, the focused blur of a busy service. By the time it slowed down your feet ached and your ponytail had developed a life of its own.
Hannah found you at the counter, mechanically polishing glasses.
"So busy we couldn't even talk today," she said, sliding in beside you and stealing a glass to polish.
"It was genuinely awful," you agreed. "My feet are going to file a formal complaint."
Hannah laughed. And then the door opened.
Logan, Garrett, Tucker, and Dean came in with the energy of people who had just finished practice and were extremely confident about their right to exist in any space they chose. Garrett made a beeline for Hannah with the focused intention of a man who had one priority. Behind him, Logan drifted toward the counter, casually, like he just happened to end up there, and leaned against it, watching you serve a customer with an expression that was doing nothing for your professional composure.
You almost dropped the bag the customer was reaching for.
"Hi, Logan." You kept your voice completely neutral. "Do you mind not staring at me? I'm working, you know."
He laughed, low and unhurried. "No, I don't think I can manage that."
"You could try."
"Not when you look this pretty."
"This pretty?" You gestured at yourself. "My hair is dirty and I didn't even have time to put on makeup."
"Still the prettiest," he said, and winked, and wandered back to the table where his friends had settled in like they owned the place.
You looked back at the counter. The glass you had been polishing was now somehow less clean than when you started.
Hannah had materialized at your elbow with the expression of someone watching something inevitable unfold.
"When," she said reverently, "are you two just going to date like normal people?" She sighed. "I hope it's soon. I kind of want to win that betting pool Tucker made."
You put the glass down. "What betting pool?"
Hannah's expression cycled through several things in rapid succession.
"No betting pool," she said. "I meant a real pool. Tucker said something about you guys and a real pool. Can't think of what it actually was. Because it was so long ago."
You looked at her.
"Hannah Marie Wells."
"That's not my middle name."
"Tell me the truth right now."
She looked left. She looked right. She found no exits. She exhaled.
"All right. Tucker organized a bet where everyone has to guess when you two will finally become a couple. I said three weeks from the day the bet was made, which is actually — tomorrow — so if you two could maybe just —"
"I cannot believe you guys would bet on something like that." You shook your head. "Actually, I can believe them. But you, Hannah. I expected better."
"Allie too," Hannah offered, as though this was helpful.
"What does the winner get?"
"Pride and glory. Also we each put in twenty dollars."
You set down the glass and made a direct line for the boys' table. Logan spotted you coming and started to smile, that smile, the one that was specifically for you.
"Logan," you said pleasantly, "can you help me with something? The door on one of the staff lockers is jammed. Do you mind taking a look? Your bill will be on the house if you fix it."
He raised an eyebrow. "Yeah, sure." He pushed back from the table, nodded to the others, and followed you toward the back.
Dean watched you go with an expression of mild suspicion. Tucker didn't look up from his menu.
The staff locker room smelled like industrial cleaner and someone's forgotten lunch, which was not exactly the atmosphere you would have chosen, but it would do.
"So where's the door?" Logan said, looking around.
"There's no door."
He turned. "What?"
"There's no door. I needed to get you alone." You crossed your arms. "Your friends are running a betting pool on us."
"What do you mean there's no door?" He looked genuinely betrayed by the architecture. Then: "And they're your friends too."
"Not when they're betting on us. There's no door, Logan, I made it up. Focus."
He laughed and crossed the small room toward you, his hands finding your waist and pulling you in with the unhurried ease of someone who had been doing it for a while, not long enough that it felt ordinary, long enough that it felt inevitable.
"It's not a big deal, you know," he said. "The bet. They're just nosy."
"I know." He was very close, which made it difficult to maintain the appropriate level of outrage. You found yourself pressing small kisses to his lips almost without deciding to, punctuating your words between them. "I just — don't want — to make it — a whole thing yet."
Logan pulled back far enough to look at you properly.
"Yeah?" he said. Not pushing. Just asking.
"It's ours," you said, which came out simpler and more honest than you had intended. "For a little while longer. I just want it to be ours."
Something in his expression settled, warm and unhurried, the specific look of someone who understood completely and wasn't going anywhere.
"Okay," he said.
"Okay?"
"Yeah." He tucked a piece of hair behind your ear. "Okay."
You pulled him in by the front of his shirt and kissed him properly this time, the locker room and the betting pool and Hannah's guilty face all receding into irrelevance.
Logan pulled back.
"Wait," he said. "So no bill on the house, then?"
one — tucker
The thing about Logan's shirts was that they were extremely comfortable.
This was not a controversial observation. They were soft and worn-in and smelled like him which was a feature rather than a bug on cold Sunday mornings when getting dressed felt like an unnecessary commitment.
You had not planned to be at the house on a Sunday morning. You had planned to be at your own place, in your own bed, wearing your own clothes, like a person who had their life together. What had actually happened was that Saturday night had turned into Sunday morning in the way that it sometimes did around Logan, and now it was nine-fifteen and you were in his kitchen in his grey shirt making coffee while he was still asleep upstairs.
Which was fine. Which was completely normal and fine.
The house was quiet. Tucker's door had been closed when you passed it. Dean and Garrett weren't home, Logan had said. You were alone with the coffee machine and a comfortable Sunday silence and absolutely no reason to think anyone was going to come downstairs for at least another hour.
You had just found the good mugs when you heard footsteps on the stairs.
Tucker appeared in the kitchen doorway in a hoodie and the expression of someone who had not yet fully committed to being awake. He was looking at his phone. He walked to the refrigerator. He opened it. He stared into it with the vacant focus of someone hoping food would appear through willpower alone.
Then he turned around and saw you.
The silence that followed had a very specific quality.
Tucker looked at you. He looked at the shirt. He looked at the coffee you were making, looked at the two mugs, and something moved across his face that went through approximately six stages before landing on stunned comprehension.
"Hey," you said, with the casual energy of someone who was not wearing their boyfriend's shirt in his kitchen on a Sunday morning. "Coffee?"
Tucker opened his mouth.
"I stayed over," you said pleasantly. "The couch is really comfortable actually."
Tucker looked at the shirt. He looked at the mugs. He looked at the shirt again.
"...Right," he said slowly.
"He let me borrow this because my top had a thing. A stain. From last night." You gestured vaguely. "Very embarrassing, actually. Pasta related."
Tucker was still looking at the mugs.
You picked up both mugs, tucked them against your chest in what you hoped was a casual gesture rather than an incriminating one, and smiled at him.
"I'm just going to bring this up," you said. "You should have some. There's plenty."
You walked past him and up the stairs before he could say anything else.
Logan was sitting up in bed when you came back, hair doing something architecturally ambitious, squinting at the light.
"Tucker's awake," you said, handing him his coffee and sitting cross-legged at the foot of the bed.
Logan processed this. "And?"
"And I told him I slept on the couch because my shirt had a pasta stain."
Logan looked at you for a long moment.
"Did he believe you?"
"Absolutely not," you said cheerfully, and drank your coffee.
Downstairs, Tucker stood in the kitchen for another full minute. Then he took out his phone.
tucker: i just saw (Y/N) in the kitchen wearing logan's shirt
tucker: making TWO coffees
tucker: and she said she slept on the couch because of a pasta stain
dean: WHAT
garrett: what
tucker: I THINK I JUST WON THE BET
hannah: you didn't win the bet tucker. it was clearly just a pasta stain situation
tucker: HANNAH
allie: omg omg omg
tucker: do i win?? does the pasta stain story count as them getting together???
dean: i don't think pasta counts as confirmation tucker
tucker: I WILL NEVER FINANCIALLY RECOVER FROM THIS
two — hannah
The thing about Malone's on a Friday night was that it had exactly one staff bathroom and one customer bathroom, and the customer bathroom had been out of order since Wednesday, which meant that the staff bathroom had become public property by necessity, which meant the line for it snaked along the back wall and required a wait time that was genuinely unreasonable.
You had been waiting for four minutes when you remembered that you knew where the staff entrance was.
The staff hallway was quiet and dim, the sounds of the bar muffled behind the door. You had worked here long enough to know the code, and the bathroom was unlocked, and you were inside and washing your hands within ninety seconds, feeling extremely smug about the whole thing.
You were just reaching for a paper towel when the door opened.
Logan slipped inside, pulling the door shut behind him, and looked at you with the expression of someone who had just made the same efficient calculation.
"Oh," he said. "You had the same idea."
"Staff entrance," you confirmed.
"Smart."
"I know."
He crossed to the sink beside yours and turned on the tap, and for a moment you were just two people washing their hands in a small staff bathroom, which was either extremely romantic or extremely unromantic depending on how you looked at it. His shoulder was warm against yours in the small space. You handed him a paper towel.
"Tucker's texts have been unhinged this week," you said.
"The pasta shirt thing really broke him," Logan agreed, the corner of his mouth lifting.
"He texted me three times yesterday asking if I wanted to talk about my feelings."
Logan laughed. You loved the sound of it in small spaces, the way it filled them. You turned toward him and he turned toward you and you were very close, and he tucked a piece of hair behind your ear with the absent, habitual tenderness of someone who had been doing it long enough that he didn't think about it anymore, and you went up on your toes and kissed him quickly.
"Separate," you said against his mouth. "We should go back separately."
"Separate," he agreed, not moving.
You kissed him again, less quickly this time, his hands finding your waist, the paper towel entirely abandoned.
The door opened.
Hannah stood in the doorway.
The three of you looked at each other.
"The customer bathroom is out of order," Hannah said, very carefully, "so I used the staff code."
"Same," you said. You and Logan had separated with the practiced efficiency of people who had been interrupted before. "Just washing our hands."
"Both of you."
"It's a two sink bathroom," Logan said.
Hannah looked at the two of you. She looked at the very small bathroom. She looked at the single paper towel that was inexplicably on the floor.
"Right," she said. "Of course. I'll just —" she pointed at the toilet. "I'll just use this."
"We were just leaving," you said.
You and Logan filed past her. You did not look at each other in the hallway.
Behind you, you heard Hannah take out her phone.
hannah: ok so i just walked into the staff bathroom at malone's and (Y/N) and logan were BOTH in there
allie: WHAT
tucker: I TOLD YOU ABOUT THE PASTA SHIRT
hannah: they said they were just washing their hands
dean: both of them. in the staff bathroom. together.
hannah: there were two sinks
garrett: hannah
hannah: i mean it's a completely reasonable explanation!!
tucker: HANNAH YOU ARE LITERALLY DATING GARRETT YOU KNOW WHAT THIS MEANS
hannah: i mean. yes. but also. two sinks.
allie: hannah i love you but two sinks is not an explanation
hannah: i just think we should give them the benefit of the doubt!!
tucker: hannah you literally have twenty dollars on this
hannah: ...i said three weeks
hannah: from a month ago
hannah: i may have already lost
three — allie
Allie considered herself an observant person.
This was not arrogance, it was simply a fact, documented over years of being the person in any given group who noticed things. Who left early. Who had argued with whom. Who liked whom. The small social architecture of any room was, to Allie, essentially readable at a glance.
Which was why she could not understand why no one else was seeing what she was seeing.
It was a random week night, the kind that had somehow evolved from a study session into a full group hangout without anyone formally announcing it, and now there were seven of them spread across the living room , Logan and Dean on the floor with Tucker's terrible taste in television providing background noise, Garrett and Hannah on the armchair that was technically too small for two people but they had been making work for months, and you and Allie on the big couch with your respective laptops.
Normal. Fine. A completely normal Tuesday.
Except.
Allie had been reaching for her water bottle when she saw it.
Logan had said something to Tucker, something quiet, barely audible over the television, and Tucker had responded, and then Logan had looked across the room at you. Just looked. For maybe two seconds.
And you had looked back.
It wasn't a loaded look, exactly. It wasn't the dramatic eye contact of a romantic comedy. It was quieter than that, it was the almost imperceptible look of two people who were sharing a private thought from across a room. Easy. Habitual. Like a conversation conducted entirely without words by people who had been having it for a long time.
Allie's water bottle missed the table entirely.
"You okay?" you asked, looking at her.
"Fine," Allie said. "Totally fine."
She looked at Logan. He had gone back to whatever Tucker was saying. Completely normal. Nothing to see.
Allie looked back at you. You were typing something on your laptop. Also completely normal.
I saw that, Allie thought. I absolutely saw that.
She leaned over to you. "Hey," she said, very casually. "What was that?"
You looked up from your laptop. "What was what?"
"That —" she gestured vaguely between you and Logan. "That look."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"You and Logan just —" she did the gesture again, which in retrospect was not a very descriptive gesture.
"Allie," you said pleasantly, "I genuinely don't know what you're referring to."
You went back to your laptop. Allie stared at the side of your head.
I saw it, she thought. I definitely saw it.
She turned to the room. She needed a witness.
"Dean," she said.
Dean looked up from the floor. "What."
"Did you just see —" she started. But Dean had already looked back at the television. Tucker was saying something about the episode. Logan was responding. You were typing. Nothing was happening. The moment was completely gone, absorbed back into the ordinary texture of a Tuesday night, leaving absolutely no evidence.
Allie sat back on the couch.
I know what I saw, she thought.
Twenty minutes passed.
And then Logan got up to refill his water bottle in the kitchen, and on his way back he passed the couch, and his hand dropped briefly to your shoulder, barely a touch, a graze really, the kind that lasted less than a second and you didn't even look up from your laptop, just tilted your head toward it slightly, like a plant toward light, like the most natural thing in the world.
Allie's laptop slid off her knees.
"I SAW THAT," she said.
Everyone looked at her.
"Saw what?" Tucker said.
"Logan's hand — and her shoulder — they just —" she pointed. Logan was back on the floor. You were looking at Allie with an expression of polite confusion. "He touched her shoulder and she —"
"Are you okay?" Dean said.
"I'm fine, I just —" Allie looked around the room. Six faces looked back at her with varying degrees of concern. "Did anyone else see that?"
"See what?" Logan said.
"You touched her shoulder," Allie said, pointing at him.
"I was just walking past," Logan said.
"She leaned into it!"
"I have a stiff neck," you said.
"YOU HAVE A STIFF —" Allie stopped. Took a breath. "I know what I saw," she said, with dignity.
"Allie," Dean said carefully. "Have you had enough water today?"
"I've had plenty of water, Dean, I'm not —"
"Sometimes dehydration causes —"
"I am not dehydrated!" Allie said. "I know what I saw and what I saw was —" she looked at you. You were looking back at her with an expression of patient concern. She looked at Logan. He was also looking at her with patient concern. Both of you at the same time, with the same expression. "— you know what, never mind," she said. "Never mind. I'm fine."
She picked up her laptop.
Across the room, completely undetected, Logan looked at you.
You looked back.
The corner of your mouth moved. His did too.
Allie, who had her eyes fixed resolutely on her screen, did not see this.
She was choosing not to look anymore. For her own mental health.
allie: OKAY SO
allie: I JUST SAW SOMETHING
tucker: WHAT
allie: logan touched (Y/N)'s shoulder while walking past and she LEANED INTO IT
allie: and before that there was A LOOK
dean: allie we were all in the same room
allie: YOU WEREN'T PAYING ATTENTION DEAN
hannah: what kind of look
allie: the kind that MEANS SOMETHING
garrett: i mean they're friends
allie: garrett
garrett: what
allie: i love you but you have the observational skills of a golden retriever
garrett: ...fair
tucker: ALLIE YOU MIGHT HAVE JUST WON THE BET
allie: i can't win on a shoulder touch and a look tucker i need more evidence
tucker: THE PASTA SHIRT WAS EVIDENCE
allie: the pasta shirt was circumstantial
dean: none of us are going to win this bet are we
three and a half — garrett
It was a Wednesday afternoon, the house quiet in the way it got between practice and evening, and you had let yourself in with the key Logan had given you two weeks ago, casually, like it was nothing, tucked it into your palm and gone back to whatever he had been saying, and you had put it on your keychain without making a thing of it either.
You were in the kitchen making tea when Garrett came downstairs.
He was in sweats, hair still damp from the shower, moving with the unhurried ease of someone with nowhere to be. He went to the refrigerator, opened it, considered it, closed it. Then he leaned against the counter across from you and looked at the mug situation with the mild, unreadable expression that was, you had come to understand, just his face.
"Logan's still at the rink," he said. "Film session ran over."
"I know," you said. "He texted."
Garrett nodded. He picked up an apple from the fruit bowl. He looked at it. He looked at you.
"You should tell him about the Boston thing," he said.
You looked up. "What?"
"The conference. The one your professor forwarded you." He bit into the apple with the casual certainty of someone stating something obvious. "You've been sitting on it for two weeks. You should just tell him."
You stared at him.
The Boston conference was something you had mentioned exactly once, in passing, weeks ago, in the middle of a conversation about something else entirely. You had said three sentences about it and then moved on. You had not mentioned it since. You had not mentioned it to Logan because you hadn't figured out how yet because Boston was four days in February and it was a good opportunity and you didn't know what it meant for the thing that was still, technically, just yours.
"How did you —" you started.
Garrett shrugged. "You got quiet when someone mentioned February plans at dinner last week." He took another bite of the apple. "Logan noticed too. He just didn't want to push."
The kitchen was very quiet.
"He'll be fine with it," Garrett said, simply, like that was the part you needed to hear. "He's not going anywhere." He pushed off the counter and headed toward the living room. "Tell him about Boston."
He disappeared around the corner.
You stood in the kitchen holding your mug, looking at the space he had just occupied.
You had not told anyone about Boston. You had not told Hannah, who told you everything. You had not told Allie, who noticed everything. You had mentioned it once, in passing, and Garrett who had the observational skills of a golden retriever, according to Allie, according to everyone had filed it away and waited until you were alone to say the thing you needed to hear.
You looked down at your mug.
Then you took out your phone and texted Logan.
can we talk tonight? nothing bad. just something i've been sitting on.
His response came back in under a minute.
yeah. i'll bring food. what do you want?
You smiled at your phone in the empty kitchen.
surprise me.
four — dean
You weren't really supposed to be there.
You had come over earlier in the afternoon with the genuine intention of spending a couple of hours with Logan and then going home like a responsible person. What had actually happened was that Logan had been very convincing about the staying part convincing in the specific way that involved kissing you before you could finish your sentence and pulling you back against the mattress until leaving felt like a genuinely unreasonable idea.
So now it was late, and you were sprawled across his bed while he kissed your neck, his hands finding the hem of your shirt and pulling it over your head.
"I missed them," he said, with complete sincerity, cupping your chest in both hands, unclasping your bra with an easiness that frankly made you jealous.
You giggled and pushed his shoulders. "You idiot."
He kissed you again slow and soft, his tongue lazy against yours, the unhurried quality of someone with absolutely nowhere to be. You were certainly not going home now. You reached up and pulled his shirt over his head, and your fingers found a purple mark spreading across his stomach.
"What's this?" you said, tracing it gently.
"Practice got tough."
"Oh, my poor baby." You shifted, pressing a line of soft kisses across his stomach. You felt him shiver underneath you. "My poor, poor baby —"
The knock on the door made you both freeze.
"Logan?" Dean's voice, from the other side. Another knock. The sound of the handle being tried. "You in there, man?"
You and Logan looked at each other with the wide-eyed, frantic energy of two people who had absolutely no good explanation for the current state of the room.
Logan started moving toward the door.
"No," you whisper-screamed.
"Hide," he said, at the same volume.
"Where?"
You looked around the room in rapid, increasingly desperate assessment. The bathroom — no, what if Dean needed it. The wardrobe what if Logan opened it. The only viable option was under the bed, the duvet long enough to reach the floor and conceal the gap completely.
You rolled off the mattress and slid underneath it in one graceless motion. You heard Logan muffle a laugh by converting it unconvincingly into a cough. In your frantic scramble you had grabbed your shirt, clutched against your chest, but your bra was somewhere out there discarded, incriminating, absolutely in the middle of the room.
Fuck, you thought.
Logan opened the door.
Dean walked in. There was a brief silence of the kind that meant someone had immediately spotted something they were not expecting to see. From your position on the floor you had a very clear view of Dean's socks stopping in the middle of the room.
Then not moving.
You watched Dean's socks stand very still for approximately eight seconds.
"I need to borrow your charger," Dean said.
His voice was extremely, carefully normal. The voice of a man making a decision in real time.
Logan turned and retrieved the charger from the bedside table. "Here."
A pause. Dean's socks did not move.
"Leave, Dean," Logan said.
Another pause.
Dean's socks backed slowly toward the door.
He stood in the hallway for a moment, you could hear him through the door, just standing there, processing, and then his footsteps retreated down the hall. You waited until you heard his door close before sliding out from under the bed, pulling your shirt back on and looking at Logan, who was leaning against the wall with his hand over his mouth doing an extremely poor job of not laughing.
"Your bra," he managed.
"I know."
"It was just — right there —"
"I know, Logan."
He was fully laughing now, silent and shaking, and you threw a pillow at him, which did nothing to help.
His phone buzzed on the nightstand.
dean: dude…
logan: say nothing
You watched him type it, one eyebrow raised. His phone buzzed back almost immediately.
dean: i have twenty dollars on the line
logan: dean
dean: i'm just saying
logan: goodnight dean
dean: does tucker know
logan: GOODNIGHT DEAN
Logan put his phone down. You looked at him. He looked at you.
"He's not going to say anything," Logan said, with the confidence of a man who was not entirely sure of this.
His phone buzzed again.
dean: for what it's worth i called it from the beginning
Logan turned his phone face down.
You looked at him for a moment longer.
Then you retrieved your bra from the corner of the room where it had been sitting like evidence at a crime scene, and you got back into bed, and Logan pulled you against him with the easy, unhurried certainty of someone who had won the argument about staying a long time ago.
Down the hall, Dean lay on his bed staring at the ceiling, charger plugged in, feeling extremely vindicated about everything.
He did not tell Tucker.
He did not tell Garrett.
He did not tell Allie, who sent him three texts the following morning about the shoulder touch that he left on read.
He did not tell Hannah, which was the hardest one, because Hannah asked him directly at breakfast if he had noticed anything and Dean had looked her in the eye and said no.
He was, he decided, a good friend.
He was also, he decided, definitely going to win that bet.
five — garrett
The hit happened in the second period.
It wasn't malicious, just the particular physics of two large bodies in a confined space moving fast, the kind of collision that happened in every game, that everyone who had ever watched hockey understood to be part of it. Logan went into the boards hard and stayed down for a moment longer than usual, and the arena went quiet in a collective way that meant everyone was holding the same breath.
You were on your feet before you had decided to stand up.
He was moving. He was getting up, slowly, with assistance from a teammate, skating to the bench under his own power. The arena exhaled. You sat back down.
Your heart was doing something extremely inconvenient.
"You okay?" Hannah said, from your other side.
"Fine," you said. "Totally fine."
She looked at you for a moment. You looked at the ice.
Logan was on the bench. The trainer was with him. He was talking, responding, doing all the things that meant he was okay, and you sat in the stands and watched with the stillness of someone who was doing a very good impression of a person who was just watching a hockey game and not mentally composing hospital directions.
He came back in the third period.
You exhaled properly for the first time in forty minutes.
After the game the group filtered down to the corridor outside the locker room the way they always did. You went because you always went, because it was a group thing, because it meant nothing in particular.
The players came out in ones and twos. Garrett first, immediately absorbed by Hannah. Tucker departing with a couple of the other guys. Dean getting into a conversation with someone near the exit.
Logan came out last.
He had a bruise forming along his jaw and he was walking with the slightly careful gait of someone who had taken a hit, and when he saw you he smiled, that specific smile, the one that was yours, and something in your chest did the thing it always did, except louder tonight, turned up by forty minutes of sitting in the stands holding your breath.
You crossed the corridor and hugged him, which was normal, everyone hugged after games, that was a completely normal thing to do.
Except then you pulled back and looked at him, at the bruise, at the careful way he was holding himself, and you said his name, quietly, in the way that was only for him, and he looked back at you in the way that was only for you, and the thing you had been keeping quietly for months was right there at the surface, obvious and warm and entirely done being kept.
You kissed him.
Not a quick kiss. Not an ambiguous one. A real one, his hand coming up to your jaw, yours finding the front of his jacket, the kind that had three months of ordinary Tuesday nights and Sunday mornings and staff bathroom detours in it.
The corridor went quiet.
You pulled back.
The group was looking at you.
Tucker's mouth was open.
Garrett had an expression cycling through several things very quickly , and then it landed on something that looked, more than anything, like quiet relief. Like someone who had been waiting for a particular thing to resolve and was glad it finally had.
Hannah was smiling in the particular way of someone who had known something for a while and was very glad to finally be allowed to show it.
Dean looked, more than anything, deeply smug.
"Wait," Tucker said. "Are you two — have you been —"
"Three months," Logan said, still looking at you, the corner of his mouth doing the thing.
"THREE MONTHS?"
"We forgot to mention it," you said.
"YOU FORGOT TO —"
"Tucker," Logan said.
"I HAD TWENTY DOLLARS ON THIS." Tucker pointed at you both. "I HAD — the pasta shirt! I KNEW about the pasta shirt! Does the pasta shirt count? When was the pasta shirt? If the pasta shirt counts then I —"
"Who won?" Allie said. "Technically who —"
Everyone looked at each other. A rapid, chaotic calculation passed through the group.
"Garrett," Hannah said slowly. "Garrett said —"
"After a game," Garrett said, with the equanimity of someone who had never been particularly worried about it. "I said after a game."
"You said after a game," Dean confirmed.
Tucker made a sound that had no letters in it.
"So Garrett wins?" Allie said.
"Garrett wins," Hannah confirmed, and immediately turned to Garrett with an expression of pure delight. "You won, baby."
Garrett looked at Logan. Logan looked back at him.
"You've been together for three months," Garrett said.
"About that," Logan confirmed.
"And you didn't tell anyone."
"We wanted to keep it for a while," you said, which was the simplest and most accurate version of it. "It was ours. We just wanted it to be ours for a bit."
Garrett looked at you for a moment. Something in his expression was entirely unsurprised. He nodded once, like a thing confirmed, and then looked at Logan with the small, easy smile of someone who had never doubted the outcome.
"Okay," he said. "Good."
Tucker pointed at both of you. "I want my twenty dollars back."
"You didn't win," Dean said.
"I KNEW ABOUT THE PASTA SHIRT."
"Tucker —"
"THE PASTA SHIRT WAS EVIDENCE AND NO ONE LISTENED TO ME —"
Logan looked at you. You looked back at him.
"Worth it?" he said quietly.
You looked at Tucker, who was now gesturing with both hands. You looked at Allie, who was consoling him with the resigned energy of someone who had expected this outcome. You looked at Hannah, who was collecting twenty dollars from Dean with the serene satisfaction of a person who had always known. You looked at Garrett, who was watching all of it with the calm, unhurried expression of a man who had called it months ago in a quiet kitchen on a Wednesday afternoon and had simply waited.
"Completely worth it," you said.
Logan kissed your temple.
Tucker made the sound with no letters in it again.
tucker: I WANT IT ON THE RECORD THAT I KNEW
tucker: THE PASTA SHIRT WAS REAL EVIDENCE
tucker: I CALLED IT FROM DAY ONE
dean: garrett won tucker
tucker: GARRETT WASNT EVEN PAYING ATTENTION
garrett: i was paying attention
tucker: YOU HAVE THE OBSERVATIONAL SKILLS OF A GOLDEN RETRIEVER
garrett: allie said that first
allie: it's true both times
allie: okay fine. garrett wins. i respect it.
tucker: I DO NOT RESPECT IT
tucker: TWENTY DOLLARS. GONE.
garrett: worth every penny honestly
allie: okay fine it was very cute
allie: i still saw the look though
allie: i want that acknowledged
dean: acknowledged allie
allie: thank you
tucker: I WILL NEVER FINANCIALLY RECOVER FROM THIS
This was so damn good omg. The plot and dialogue were super engaging but along with that ur just a great writer <33
As cute as logan and reader were and as funny tucker was (poor guy, he DID have evidence), i was really charmed by how you wrote garrett. you captured his and logans friendship really well because even though logan didn't tell him, garrett just knew because that's how well he knows his best friend. and the boston thing, that was wonderful too! when it comes to people he loves garrett graham might actually have the observation skills of a bloodhound <3
Also this made me lol:
"What do you mean there's no door?" He looked genuinely betrayed by the architecture.
Everyone just sounds so much like themselves it's wonderful 🩷🩷🩷😌
People demand fans of colour to be soft & gentle & have articulate thought out criticisms at all times. Never be wrong never be loud never be mean you have to coddle White fans and creatives, otherwise you're part of the problem. Never mind that your whole experience in fandom has been one macroaggression after another. Never mind that fandom can never be your escapism, because the discrimination you face in real life is often present in both the media you love and the fandom you participate in. Never mind that even when you are soft & gentle & articulate people will still get angry. Just shut up and let White people go to their beautiful fantasy world where people like you don't exist
Summary: Weeks after Dean's party, you encounter Logan by accident when you're asked to take pictures of the guys during a hockey interview.
Pairing: John Logan x fem!reader
Word count: 5.1k
Warnings/tags: mentions of childhood bullying, parental issues, reader has food sensory issues and trouble understanding social cues. leaning hard into her being ND just fyi <3 dean and garrett being kinda annoying but they mean well. hannah being a cutie. photographer!reader. this is kind of a slow burn so nothing really happens tbh except logan being a nice young man :)
Notes: this is a series now? maybe?? i have no idea what's happening but thank u for all the support on the first fic! i guess if u guys are still interested, i'll keep writing these two!
i don't do taglists but you can follow @sanguinelibrary for all fic updates
the divider
“Yo. Hey, Logan. Loooogan. Dude.”
Logan peeks one eye open. Dean is crouched in front of him, at the side of his bed, shirtless, which is pretty much the last thing he wants to see ever.
Dean smiles with all of his teeth. “Hey, sunshine. Drain's clogged again.”
Logan grunts. “What'd you do this time?”
“Absolutely nothing. It was Garrett.”
“It was not, asshole,” Garrett says, strolling into Logan's room. He throws a shirt at Dean. “I just got home. Someone thought it'd be a great idea to pour bacon grease down the drain.”
“Why are you both in here? This doesn't feel like a conversation that requires a town hall meeting,” Logan grumbles.
“Well, I don’t cook, so it can’t have been me. Must’ve been Tucker,” Dean says.
Tucker walks in then, as if on cue. “If you're spreading bullshit about me, Dean, I'm here to defend myself. For the record: yes, I did make bacon, and there's a plate downstairs. But I was not the one who poured grease down the drain, because I'm not a fool.”
They all look at Dean, who bobs his head. Logan really wishes he had a stack of pucks to chuck at them right now.
“Yeah, I lied earlier,” Dean says. “It was me. I wanted to use the cup.”
Logan smiles flatly. “I already knew it was you, dumbass. You clog every drain in the house once a week. Vote time. Everyone in favor of kicking Dean out forever?”
The three of them say aye. Dean squawks like a big blond bird.
“Nay! It's not my fault. How am I supposed to know what to do with bacon grease?”
“Yeah, how's the little prince supposed to know?” Tucker says, rolling his eyes.
Then he bolts for the door, Dean on his heels. Logan sighs and lies back, staring up at the ceiling. He dreamt about you again. You were on the ice, skating with him, telling him how much you like Taco Bell. He kissed you.
Then Dean clogged the drain and woke him up.
“Hey, don't forget that we still have that interview at the stadium today,” Garrett says, typing on his phone. No doubt texting Hannah. Logan is proud to say that he no longer has a crush on Hannah Wells, as fleeting as that was. No, he has a crush on her friend, who is smart and beautiful and who probably hasn't given him another thought since the party three weeks ago.
He missed you in class this week. He even stayed behind and pretended he had a question in order to scan the room to check if maybe he didn't see you the first time. But you were nowhere to be found. And it's not like he can text you. He scoured Instagram, Snapchat, and even Facebook for your account, until he felt like a fucking creep and stopped, the search fruitless. Hell, Logan would write you letters if it meant talking to you beyond the two sentences you exchange in class.
You did wave at him last week. Usually, you pack up your things as fast as possible and run out of the lecture hall. So when you lingered long enough to smile at him… well, that was pretty fantastic.
“Yeah, thanks,” Logan says.
Garrett nods. “I'll see you there. Wellsy wants to study.”
Logan lets his head fall back against the pillow as Garrett leaves. He thinks what Garrett's doing with Hannah will probably end with one or both of them getting hurt, especially since they’re both so obviously such soft hearts. Logan saw Garrett listening to Hannah’s Instagram songs more than once. Garrett’s absolutely in denial about how much he likes her. But at least they talk to each other.
“Fuck,” he says to himself, palms on his eyes.
You lost your silica gel.
It's not terrible… no, it is. It's thrown off your whole week, actually. You've been on websites longer than usual, looking at fidget toys, sorely tempted. You're especially taken with a moldable squishy with beads inside. It's like the mother of silica gel, and your fingers itch with anticipation of how it would feel.
But you can't. It's eighteen dollars, which is certainly one reason why you shouldn't buy it, but it also would make noise. And even if you used it outside of class… what if someone found it or caught you using it? How do you explain that?
And you hate feeling like you need a toy to keep you grounded. Your stomach hurt so badly that you skipped class on Monday, which sucked because you didn't see Logan. But you were thinking about having to see your mother during the break and your upcoming finals and nothing, not even listening to music, helped the resulting pain in your stomach.
Your mother has always told you that it's psychological, and treats your anxiety like a moral failing on your part. If you would just try harder… but you don't know how to do that. You're already trying so hard. It's difficult enough to eat everyday, and go to class, and sleep enough, and not rot in your dorm.
Your mother would be pleased if you told her you went to a party. She'd dismiss the fact that a guy harassed you. She wouldn't believe you if you told her about Logan and his pretty curls and mouth. No man is looking to just be friends with you.
She was the one who wanted you to go away for college. You didn't mind staying local, but she said you'd never “grow into yourself” if you didn't move away.
Your nails have been bitten to stubs. You've been growing them for a month, and all your hard work is lost. The silica gel occupied your hands but now that it's gone, you've fallen back to nail biting.
Hannah said she would meet you at the stadium after her class this morning. Two days ago, you told one of the editors of the Briar newspaper that you bought a new camera. You've taken pictures for them before, but never during an event. Stupidly, you revealed your new purchase, and the editor excitedly asked you to attend an interview that some of the Hawks players were giving today, and take pictures for the paper.
If only you knew when to keep your mouth shut. Taking pictures of people is stressful. You hate it. They often want you to turn them into someone they're not through the camera lens. People can never just be themselves on camera. That's why you take pictures of birds or buildings or sunsets. They just are, and you can capture them in all their candidness. Most of the world doesn't perform for a camera—only people do.
Hannah is the first one to greet you when you get inside the stadium. You walk to the bleachers together, where a video crew is setting up.
“This is great,” Hannah says. “People are gonna see your pictures, as they should.”
You shrug. “I guess so. I didn't really want to do this.”
“Your photos are really good,” she says. “And getting them published in the school paper is huge. What are you worried about?”
You sigh. “I don't know. It's kind of scary when people see you through the camera.” Fourth wall breaks unnerve you for the same reason. “And what if the players hate the pictures?”
“Well, Garrett's doing the interview, and he wouldn't let anybody on the team say anything to you about your pictures. But it's only a few of them, I think. Do you want me to stand with you?”
You nod, the pit in your stomach loosening a little. Hannah always seems to know what to say.
She beams. “Of course I'll stay.”
But as everyone finishes setting up, Coach Jensen approaches you. Hannah explains that she's Garrett's tutor, and Coach tells her that she can stay, but only in the bleachers.
“I'm here to support my friend,” she says. “It’s her first time photographing for the team. Please?”
“Sorry. Only press and photographers can be here.”
She looks at you sympathetically. “I'll be right over there, okay? You'll be great.”
You watch Hannah go sit, wishing you had the silica gel.
Garrett is the first player interviewed. You take many pictures, so there are lots of options to choose from when you send them to the paper. He doesn't look at you once, which is splendid.
Next is Dean. He's fired up in his interview, swearing that Briar will crush the competition. Then it's Tucker, who seems a little nervous in front of the camera. You understand completely.
You lower your camera as you see Logan approach the local reporter. He shakes her hand and says something you can’t hear. Then he looks in your direction. He pauses, then grins widely, waving at you. You wave back, face suddenly warm.
“So John,” begins the reporter. “How is the team preparing to win the next three games? You’ll need three wins to keep Briar’s ranking.”
“Yeah, you know, we work really well as a team, and Garrett’s a great captain, of course, so I have no doubt we’ll win. We’ve been putting in plenty of hours of practice.”
He glances in your direction. Click. You’re not supposed to snap pictures when people are looking at the camera, but you can’t help it. You won’t send that one to the paper.
“How are you personally feeling about the season?” the reporter asks.
You take more pictures. Logan keeps glancing in your direction, so much so that the reporter eventually holds her hand up.
“John, sorry, but we really need you to look at the camera,” she says. “Is there something distracting you? A light? A noise?”
“Nope,” Logan says, standing straighter, shaking his head. “All good.”
He answers a few more questions. The reporter thanks all of them for their time and then the crew packs up. You put the lens cap on your camera and pack it up in its case.
“Hey.”
You look up from your case. Logan’s in front of you. This close, you can really take in his appearance: his swoopy hair, his azure jacket with the Hawks emblem on the chest. He smells like apples, as always.
“You’re here,” he says, before you can say hi back.
You nod, confused. “Um. Yes?”
“I didn’t know you were a photographer.” He’s smiling as hard as he does when the Hawks win a game. “I haven’t seen you photographing games.”
“I don’t. The paper’s editor asked me to take pictures for their article on the team.”
“Can I see?”
You hesitate. “I can’t retake pictures.”
“I know. I’m asking because I want to see your pictures, not ‘cause I care about how I look in them. You don’t even have to show me the pictures from today. Do you have more?”
“You want to see my other photos? They’re of birds and stuff like that.”
“I fucking love birds. And I mean that.”
You blink. “Oh. Okay. Me too.”
“I didn’t see you in class this week,” he says.
“I was sick.”
“That sucks, I’m sorry.”
You nod. You don’t tell him why you were sick. He doesn’t need to know. No one knows except Hannah. And speaking of, you can see her walking down the bleachers.
She stops next to you. “Hey! How was it?” She looks at Logan, and seems a little startled. “Hi, Logan. What’s up?”
“Hey, Wellsy,” he says. You try not to frown. It’s stupid to want Logan to have a nickname for you. Wellsy isn’t even his invention.
“Logan wants to see my photos,” you say.
Hannah raises an eyebrow. “Oh, really? I didn’t know you liked photography, Logan.”
“Oh, big time,” he says, looking at you.
Hannah widens her eyes at you. You have no idea why. She pats your back.
“You did great,” she says. “I’ll see you later?”
“I thought you wanted to get lunch together,” you say.
“Uh…” She glances between you and Logan. “I’ll catch up with you. I have to tutor Garrett anyway. He canceled on me yesterday.” She rolls her eyes. “Hockey players.”
“Ouch,” Logan says, nudging her.
Hannah smiles sweetly. “You and Tucker are the best players, and you can quote me on that.”
“Garrett will definitely be hearing that.”
“Good.” She squeezes your arm. “I’ll see you later, okay? Have fun.”
You watch her go, feeling lost. “She said we were going to eat lunch together. Why did she change her mind?”
“Oh, um, I don’t think Hannah meant anything by it,” Logan says. He chews his lip for a second. “Garrett’s such a diva, honestly—he’d probably whine about not studying today even though he canceled on her yesterday.”
You do know how important the philosophy midterm is to Garrett, especially since he’s currently failing. And Hannah has complained about how stubborn he is.
“I guess that makes sense,” you say. “I’ll go eat by myself then. It’s one o’clock, so it’s lunchtime.”
“I could come with you.” Logan clears his throat. “Uh, if you want, I mean. No pressure. You can say no.”
“Oh. No, I’d like that.” You smile. “And I can show you my photos, right?”
“Yeah,” he says, sounding breathless. “Please do.”
Logan has three chicken thighs on his plate.
“Hockey season,” he explains as he sits. He bought your food with one of his meal swipes. You told him he didn’t have to; he said he wanted to.
You sit opposite him with your own food. Nothing had seemed appetizing, but you have a headache, which is your body’s way of telling you that you really need to eat. Sometimes you don’t feel hungry, but logically you have to eat at least three meals, so you try to time eating around the same time, so you don’t have to rely on faulty signals that never arrive.
And when Hannah eats with you, it helps, because then you aren’t distracted by other things, like listening to music or watching a show. You can’t do those things in front of another person, because it’s rude. When you eat alone, you frequently forget you’re supposed to be eating. And by the time you remember, the texture or temperature of the food has changed, and it’s no longer appetizing.
“Eating that much chicken doesn’t make you feel sick?” The thought of eating that much meat in one sitting makes you want to vomit. Not to mention the chicken ick. Chicken is an extremely unsafe food—if you detect a hint of tendon or fat, you can’t eat it.
Logan shakes his head. “Nah, I’m hungry. Dean can easily tear up, like, five of these.”
He starts eating, scooping the chicken with the gravy, peas, and potatoes in one forkful. You watch, fascinated. Eating probably wouldn’t be such a chore if you could eat like that.
You were going to try and convince Hannah to go to Taco Bell with you today because that’s the only thing that sounds edible today, but since you’re with Logan, you can’t do that. Probably you can’t go to Taco Bell every time you see him… still, you’re tempted. Maybe you can just sit here until Logan’s done eating, and then you can go get what you want.
You take a deep breath. No, you should eat. You should eat like a normal person. You want your headache to go away—it’s too hard to talk to people when you have a headache, and you really want to talk to Logan.
You unwrap the foil your turkey burger is in. You take it out and remove the whole wheat repulsive bread, then put the meat on your plate. You cut it into small triangles with your knife and fork.
“Not a fan of the bun?”
You look up at Logan, hunched over the plate. You eye him suspiciously.
“This bread tastes like cardboard,” you say slowly, watching him for judgment. “I like fluffy white rolls only.”
“That’s my favorite too. Garrett’s always on me to eat more whole grains.”
“Maybe another brand would taste good. School food tastes like slop sometimes.”
Logan laughs. “Seriously. I think I’m spoiled by Tucker’s cooking. He’s a master chef.”
You squeeze a packet of mayo, then hot sauce, then mustard. This is your trick for when you don’t want to eat: you overdo it with sauces you like, to mask whatever you’re eating. At least you don’t have to taste the turkey burger, though that doesn’t dismiss the possibility of a bad texture.
You chew, staring at your plate. You forget you’re not alone until Logan taps your shoulder. You jump.
“Sorry,” he says. “Again. Seems like I’m always doing that.”
“I zoned out.”
“Yeah, you’re really focused on your food there.”
“I have to be, or I won’t finish it,” you say. “Nothing’s appetizing right now, so I have to make myself eat.”
You quickly finish the burger, which isn’t the worst, to be fair, but you’re not happy to eat like you were yesterday with the tater tot casserole the cafeteria served. They serve that once every two weeks, and it’s your favorite day on campus.
“Okay,” you say. “Now I can talk to you.”
Logan smiles. “Awesome. Can you show me your pictures?”
“Oh, right. Yes, I can.”
You get out your camera and move to sit next to Logan. He leans in to look at your camera’s screen, but he doesn’t touch you. You kind of wish he would. You bet he’s warm and solid.
“Wait, go back,” he says.
You were skipping through the pictures from today’s interview. You press the left arrow to go back.
“There! Oh my God, that’s so funny. Please use that picture for the paper,” Logan says, snickering.
It’s a picture of Garrett, mid-yawn. His face is scrunched, mouth wide open.
“That was a mistake,” you say, but you’re smiling too. You can’t avoid Logan’s infectious giggles.
“No, that was a gift from above,” Logan says, still laughing. “God, that’s perfect. If you don’t send it to the paper, please at least send it to me.”
“How?”
“Do you have Instagram?”
“No,” you say. “I deleted it. It made me feel bad about myself.”
“Honestly? Good for you. I’m not on it that much either.”
“The only people who I want to talk to have my number anyway,” you say. “So it doesn’t really matter. I don’t care about random students’ lives.”
“You rock,” Logan says. “Seriously. You’re my hero.”
You can’t take it when he says things like that. All you can do is look away, your face heating up.
“Well, uh,” he continues. “This might be presumptuous of me, but… d’you wanna exchange numbers?”
“It’s not presumptuous,” you say. “I like talking to you.”
He lights up. “Same here.”
You type your number into his phone.
Hi :) says the message on your phone.
Hi, you text back. You change his contact to Logan 🏒.
“I’ll send the picture when I upload them tonight,” you say.
“I’m gonna terrorize him with it in the group chat. Show me more pictures? You said you saw some birds.”
“I did.” You shuffle through the photos until you find one of a hawk flying low. It’s one of your favorites; you were so proud to capture it. It’s only a little blurry too.
“That is so fucking cool, whoa.” Logan scoots closer to look, his arm touching yours. You don’t move away. “You’re amazing at this. What else did you capture?”
You show him pictures of the nearby lake, sunsets, a deer, the Boston skyline. Logan loves them all, and tells you many times how good of a photographer you are.
“You could do this professionally, seriously,” he says. “Like, you should photograph our games. You could get paid for it.”
You shrug bashfully. “I don’t know. It’s not even my major. It’s just a hobby.”
“So what? You’re really good.”
You gnaw the inside of your cheek. “Maybe.”
“Yeah, think about it. I could talk to Coach, see what’s open.”
You and Logan are pretty much curled up next to each other by now. Your arm and thigh are pressed against his. He is indeed warm, and you can feel his muscles shift against you. You think of him in the gray sleeveless shirt at the party. You couldn’t stop staring at his biceps. You want to hold them, trace the veins on his forearms.
And when he turns to talk to you, he’s so close. Close enough to—
“Yo, Logan, you started without us?”
Raucous laughter breaks the moment. As soon as you see Logan’s teammates, you put a foot of distance between you two, shifting to the next chair over.
“Hey, man,” Garrett says, tapping Logan's shoulder. “I thought you said you were gonna hit the gym.”
“Plans changed,” Logan says. He doesn’t look very happy to see them. You’re puzzled.
“Hi,” Tucker says, waving at you, saying your name. You wave back.
And then Garrett and Dean seem to notice you. Dean grins, looking between you.
“Ah,” he says. “Plans changed. Got it.”
You don’t like the tone of his voice. You don’t like the way he and Garrett are smiling at each other.
“How do you know Logan?” Dean asks. “You a hockey fan?” He winks.
“I’ve only been to one game. Logan and I are in developmental psychology together.”
“You guys study together?” Garrett asks, glancing at Logan. The table shakes, and Garrett winces. “Ow! What the fuck, man? Why’d you kick me?”
“Because you’re both asking idiotic fucking questions,” Logan says. “Lay off. She’s not a suspect.”
Your skin itches. You don’t like being watched. And they’re watching you, you can tell. They’re studying you. Figuring you out.
“Actually, I should go,” you say, getting up. You try not to eye the others as you say it.
“Are you sure?” Logan asks, getting up with you.
“Yes, I have finals to work on.” You gather your things, putting your backpack over your shoulders. “Thank you for the meal swipe.”
“Yeah, anytime,” Logan says. “I’ll see you in class on Monday?”
You nod. “You will. I’ve taken two unexcused absences and the syllabus said that Dr. Jenkins will demote us by a letter grade for any more than that.”
“‘S not a real threat,” Garrett says around a mouthful of rice. “They have to put that on the syllabus, but a lot of professors don’t care. Dean was absent eight times in that class.”
“And I still got a B minus,” Dean says, fist-bumping Garrett.
Tucker shakes his head. “Yeah, and you failed the subsequent course because you missed so much of the semester, dude.”
“A win is a win.”
“So Dr. Jenkins lied?” you ask, brows furrowing.
Garrett shrugs, digging his knife into his chicken. “Kinda. More like a bluff.”
You squeeze your backpack straps, your chest feeling tight. “Why does everyone know the secret rules but me?”
All week you’ve been anxious about potentially missing a third class because of your stomach. You were prepared to chug as much Pepto Bismol to avoid that as you needed to. Has everyone else been living without a care in the world, not forcing themselves to go to class when they feel sick? You’ve gone when you were sure you’d throw up. You went to class in the throes of the worst gallbladder pain you’ve ever felt, right before you got it removed.
Garrett stops chewing, looking at you. In fact, they’re all staring at you. Fuck.
“Whaddya mean, secret rules?” Dean asks.
Fuck, fuck. You’re being weird. Stop it. Stop.
“Hey,” Logan says gently, drawing your attention to him. He moves so he’s the only person you can see, blocking out the rest of the cafeteria. “If you don’t feel well, you should skip, but you aren’t, like, losing out on some grand life experience if you miss half the semester. That’s what college is for. You’re doing the right thing. It’s not a secret rule, it’s just a loophole that some assholes like to exploit.”
Dean scoffs. “Excuse me?”
Logan ignores him. “So I hope you come on Monday, but if you feel sick, rest up, okay? Tucker’ll make you soup and I’ll bring it over.”
Tucker leans around so you can see him and gives you a thumbs-up in confirmation. Your breathing gets a little easier; your shoulders soften.
“Okay,” you murmur. You drift towards him, and Logan brushes your fingers. You aren’t brave enough to take his hand, so you touch and step back.
“Can’t wait to see your pictures in the paper,” Logan says.
You smile. “They’re of you.”
“Yeah, but you took ‘em. Who cares what they’re of?”
You duck your head, feeling shy again. It’s a residual shyness, but sometimes you get so aware of how nice and handsome Logan is, and the fact that he goes out of his way to talk to you. Not that you’ve ever cared much about the college social hierarchy, but you aren’t immune to the charms of a hockey boy who sings praises about your photography. You’ve been trying to shake this aching want for more ever since the party. You can’t.
“Well, um, bye. I’ll drop off your wings soon,” you say.
“Stop by anytime.”
“See ya around,” says Tucker.
“Yeah, see you,” Garrett says. Dean nods.
You mumble a short goodbye to them, still feeling flustered. You hope Logan won’t hold it against you.
Once outside, you take out your camera outside and flip through some of the shots of Logan. You’re not sure what he likes so much about your photos, but now you’re a little glad that the editor asked you to take pictures.
“Hey, wait up!”
You turn around. Logan’s jogging toward you.
“What are you doing?” you ask as he stops in front of you.
“Uh.” He puts his hands on his hips, breathing hard. “Um. Hm. Good question. I don’t know, actually. I just feel like we ended on a weird note in there.”
You frown, nodding. “I know. I’m sorry I was weird and freaked out in front of your friends.”
“What? You didn’t—”
“I did, Logan. I know I did. I saw Dean and Garrett’s faces. They thought I was weird. And I was, to be fair. I reacted too strongly to the absence thing. Sometimes I do that, and I don’t realize until someone’s really obvious with their face that I, you know, emoted wrong.”
“You did not emote wrong,” Logan says, shaking his head in disbelief. “You didn’t, okay? I promise that Garrett and Dean didn’t think that. They were probably just confused. You and Hannah are, you know…”
“Nerds?” you finish.
“Smart, studious, all that. And I know we keep it hidden, but we’re actually not winning any Nobel prizes in between practice. They’re not used to knowing people who worry about attendance. That’s all it was, I promise.”
You purse your lips, trying to figure out if he’s telling the truth. You can’t, so you just ask. “Do you mean it?”
“Yes,” Logan says. “I mean it.”
“It’s okay if you don’t. I wouldn’t hold it against you. Lots of people have thought I’m weird. Lots of boys. Lots of athletes. I was terrible at kickball in middle school, and people hated me for it. I would sit out early so they wouldn’t purposely kick the ball at me.”
His eyes get sad. That’s an expression you recognize on Hannah too.
“That’s fucking awful,” Logan says. “We aren’t all like that. I’m not, anyway, and the guys I hang out with aren’t either. Even if you are weird, it’s not a bad thing. Not at all.”
No one’s ever told you it’s okay to be weird. They’ve only ever denied that you are, even though you’re pretty sure you are. You can’t help it either. But Logan doesn’t mind. You’re still good. He still likes you. No one is going to kick a ball at you.
“Okay. Can you tell me how to get to the Hawks house? I’m going to drop off your wings before Monday.”
“Sure, so you’re gonna walk down this little path here, Cooper Avenue. Then you’re gonna turn left, onto Montgomery. Then you’ll walk all the way down till you get to Pickett Lane. It’s like a dirt path. And you’ll turn right onto that. We’re the first house on the left.”
You nod, even though you’ve already forgotten all that. You’re terrible with street names. “I’ll be there.”
“I look forward to it,” Logan says, grinning.
You start to walk away, then you turn around and return. “I actually don’t remember anything you’ve just said. I’m bad with streets and directions. Can you tell me in terms of landmarks?”
“I can absolutely do that,” Logan says softly. “Okay, you know the statue of the guy on the horse?”
“Yes, the famous horse wrangler who carried children on horseback to Briar’s first schoolhouse in 1846.”
He tilts his head. “How do you know that?”
“It’s on the plaque.”
“Huh. Embarrassingly, I’ve never stopped to read one of those plaques. I should do that.”
“He brought children to school for eighteen years. One of them ended up founding Briar University.”
“Shit, wow. That’s cool.”
“History is cool.”
Logan hums. “You’re cool. And that mentality is why Dean’s the loser for missing half the semester and you aren’t.”
You smile. “I guess so.”
“Okay, so, horse wrangler. Turn left when you get to him. Then you’re gonna walk past that student vegetable garden you photographed. Keep walking until you see that giant oak tree with the knots in the trunk. The one that students make out under. Or, uh… study?”
“Attempt to study, anyway.” You know the struggle well.
“There’s a path there, and you’ll walk until you see our house on the left.”
“Got it,” you say. “For real, this time.”
“Good. Then I’ll see you at some point, before class. If you want to stop by.”
You look at the cafeteria. “They won’t mind?”
“Nah, we always have people come over, don’t worry. Hey.” Logan bumps your arm gently. “They won’t bother you. And if you want, text me, so you’ll know I’ll be home.”
The sun is in his eyes. Speckled tree bark. Rich, black tea. You want to kiss him so badly.
“I really do like talking to you,” you say.
“Me too.” Logan steps closer. Your heart is in your throat.
“Okay, well, see you!” And you’re gone.
There’s a photo from this morning’s interview you took of Logan. He’s looking at you—well, the camera—smiling, a curl falling into his eyes. You don’t send it to the editor, even though it’s one of your best photos. Instead, you set it as his contact picture on your phone.
turnnoffyourmind
origamiaround
pixelskylines
stormborns
gummygunk
titsay
areudirty
