How to Date a Douchebag: The Studying Hours

by Sara Ney

  Oz: Shit, that actually makes me jealous.

  Jameson: Why?

  Oz: I kind of consider the library “our thing” now and you’re there without me.

  Jameson: Really? Because you’ve been acting really weird lately.

  Oz: I have? lol

  Jameson: I just rolled my eyes, are you happy? Yes, you have. Are you finally ready to tell me why?

  Oz: Yeah, but I’d rather do it in person.

  Jameson: Can you at least give me a hint?

  Oz: All right.

  Oz: It does have something to do with you.

  Jameson: Not THAT kind of hint! Be more specific.

  Jameson: Hey Sebastian? Can you actually call me to talk, or would that be weird?

  Oz: Yeah, I can call you. Since I haven’t seen you in a few days, how bout FaceTime instead?

  Jameson: *blushes* Yes, that works, too. Give me fifteen minutes to pack up and dash home. And fluff my hair. Haha.

  Oz: Fifteen minutes. Got it.

  Oz: And for the record, I love it when you say shit like ‘dash’. It’s so ducking cute.

  Jameson: LOL, ducking.

  Oz: Autocorrect won’t let me say ducking.

  Oz: Not ducking. Ducking.

  Oz: DAMMIT

  Jameson: I am laughing so hard right now.

  Oz: Lol. Starting the clock. Ready. Set. Dash.

  “Are you in bed?” I ask, hunching down in my seat, farther inside my hoodie, grateful to have the entire row to myself.

  “Just laying on it.” On cue, I hear her sheets rustle, and I imagine they’re crisp, clean, and smell like fresh air and sunshine.

  Heaven.

  Jameson looks back at me through the camera on her phone, long hair framing her face, all innocent eyed and sexy.

  “When will you be home?” She bites down on her lower lip timidly, like she’s just broken out with a case of nerves, like she’s embarrassed to ask.

  Those five little words and the way she’s asking—man, they do some unexpected and weird shit to my stomach, make it flip.

  I clear my throat. “They have us scheduled to pull in around eleven.”

  “Eleven isn’t so bad, early enough to go out and…or…what?”

  “Well.” I drag out the word. “Then I was hoping to see you.”

  Her eyes get wide. “Tonight? But it’s Friday.”

  “Right.”

  “Aren’t you going out? To party?”

  “I mean, we can. If that’s what you want to do.”

  “We?”

  “Yeah. You and me.”

  “Together?”

  “Unless you don’t want to. I just thought—shit.” I run a hand through my hair then drag it down my face. “Never mind what I thought. I’m an idiot.”

  “No! No. Sorry, I just. Gosh, Oz, I just assumed you’d be with your friends.”

  “You’re my friend,” I point out, giving her a lopsided grin.

  This pleases her and a smile brightens her face, one that makes me want to kiss her through the damn phone.

  “I am, aren’t I?”

  “You are,” I enthuse quietly into my phone. “Am I yours?”

  “Yes.”

  “I love it when you say yes like that and do it with an eye roll. So sexy.”

  Jameson laughs, tipping her head back until it hits the white pillow propped against her headboard. “I know you do.”

  “Know what else I love?”

  “What?”

  “I love your hair,” I blurt out.

  Her eyebrows shoot up, surprised, and she touches the long gleaming locks self-consciously while holding her phone with the other. “You do?”

  “Every time I see you, I want to touch it, run my fingers through it.”

  “You do?” She looks back at me apprehensively.

  “There’s a lot about me you don’t know.”

  “I can see that.” Jameson fidgets on the bed. “What else are you hiding from me?”

  I wanted to wait, tell her all this in person, but since she’s asking—and so fucking adorably—I reluctantly say, “Those dreams I was telling you about the other day?”

  “The nightmares? Yes, I remember.”

  “I wasn’t kidding when I said they were about you.”

  “Oh?” Her mouth forms a tiny circle.

  Clearing my throat, I glance around, checking the bus for anyone who’s awake, making sure my teammates are otherwise occupied before I continue pouring my damn black heart out into the small screen on my phone.

  “What was so horrible about them then?” she teases, attempting to make light of this tension-filled conversation.

  “I dreamed that you…” I exhale. “It was really fucked up.”

  “It’s okay if you don’t want to tell me Sebastian. I’m sensing it makes you uncomfortable, but it obviously changed how you’re seeing me.” Does her voice sound throatier than usual? “We’ve been off the past few days, and…if there’s something we can do to fix it, I’d like you to tell me.”

  “No, we’re fine—that’s just it. Maybe I don’t want us to be fine any more.”

  Jameson juts out her bottom lip, pouting. “I’m not sure what you mean. Are you breaking up with me?”

  “See? That’s just it. This is why I need to see you in person.”

  She furrows her brow. “Oz, you’re kind of weirding me out.”

  “It’s just not something we should be talking about over the phone.”

  “Right. That does me no good, because for the next few hours I’m going to be freaking out,” she says.

  “Don’t. It’s nothing horrible.”

  Jameson sticks out her tongue. “Says the only one of us who has a clue what the hell is going on.”

  “Can you come over later?”

  “To your place?” She tucks an errant hair behind her ear.

  “Yeah, my place.”

  “Um, yes. Of course.”

  Pretty sure a goofy grin crosses my face. “Great. I’ll text you my address.”

  “Okay.”

  “It’s two blocks from campus, a barf pink color—you can’t miss it.”

  She giggles. “Okay.”

  “I’ll be back around eleven thirty. We have to unload and shit when we get back to school, then I can take off. Give me a few to get home and change. How does eleven forty-five sound?”

  “Uh, sure.”

  “James?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Unless you want me to come to your place?”

  Is that crossing a line with her? The last time I showed up at her house, it didn’t work out so well.

  “No, your place is better. My roommates are nosy, and… I’m not sure what they’re doing tonight. Plus, Sydney was planning on staying home, so...I mean… Unless you want to see her.”

  Sydney.

  Right.

  Best to avoid that shit.

  “I don’t want to see her. I just want to see you.”

  Sebastian

  Jameson is in my house.

  In my room.

  On my bed.

  Planted near the headboard of my king size bed, she’s wearing a fitted white tee and a pretty pink cardigan. Tight skinny jeans. Her heels? Those are on the floor by the door.

  Heels from those sexy, petite little feet of hers.

  I watch her dangle them over the side of my bed, toes painted a neon purple, then tuck them under her legs when she curls up, moving closer to the center.

  She looks fantastic.

  She beams up at me from the bed, urging me to, “Sit down, would you? Your pacing is making me nervous.”

  “Sorry, I can’t help it.” I lower myself to the edge of the bed and wipe my sweaty palms across my jeans. The impulse to bounce my knee is strong. I crack my knuckles instead. “I have all this pent up energy from sitting on the bus all night.”

  “Do you want to go for a run?”

  “Do you?”

  Her nose wrinkles. “Um no—I was just trying
to be supportive.”

  “You would go running with me to be supportive?”

  “Um…no, but I would hold the stopwatch while you ran around the block, throw a cup of water on you when you ran past?”

  God she’s perfect.

  Clever and beautiful and smart. With perfect lips and perfect tits, she’s got me all kinds of fucked in the head.

  We’re friends and anti-lovers, with sexual tension chucked into one fucked up non-relationship relationship that’s all my doing because I said I couldn’t commit.

  I suck so hard at this.

  “Hey Jameson?”

  “Yes, Sebastian?”

  God, she’s been using my name nonstop lately, and I don’t think I’ll ever get sick of hearing my name slip from her lips.

  “I’ve…” I gulp down my nerves. “I’ve been dreaming of you.”

  Her face turns fire engine red in the same instant a sigh escapes her lips. “You’ve said as much.”

  “You cheat on me.”

  Her brows shoot up. “Say what?”

  My back hits the mattress and my arm flops over my face to conceal my eyes. “In my dreams, you’re my girlfriend and you’re cheating on me. With one of my roommates.”

  The room is silent except for the ping of a Facebook notification on my laptop.

  “Which one?”

  “Which one what?”

  “Which roommate am I cheating on you with? Please tell me it’s not that asshole Zeke or whatever the brute’s name is, because no way would that happen. Not even in a dream.”

  “It’s not Zeke.” My chuckle rumbles the mattress. “It’s Elliot.”

  “Elliot?” I hear her smiling. “Aww, he’s the quiet, nice one?”

  Aww?

  I uncover my face to peer up at her, eyes squinting. She’s sitting on the bed cross-legged, a shit-eating grin on her face. “You really need to stop referring to guys as nice. We hate that shit.”

  “Good thing I’ve never called you nice.” Jameson pokes me in the arm with a teasing forefinger.

  I scowl when she pulls away. “I’ve noticed.”

  “Are you pouting?”

  “No.”

  “’Cause it sounds like you’re pouting.”

  “Pfft. What do I care if you don’t think I’m nice? Like I give a shit.”

  Jameson goes radio silent, peering down at me with those big, blue eyes.

  Eventually, she says, “Liar.”

  I refuse to look at her. Study the ceiling that could use a fresh coat of paint. The fan covered in dust that could use a good scrub. The cracked drywall in the corner.

  Everywhere but at her.

  She nudges my bicep. “Why aren’t you looking at me?”

  Because you make me feel things I don’t want to feel. Feelings I don’t know how to manage, don’t know how to deal with.

  Get rid of.

  Keep.

  “Look Oz, just because you had a dream about me—that doesn’t mean anything.”

  That gets my attention. “You don’t believe dreams mean something?”

  “Do you?”

  “Yes.” I push myself up on my elbows and rise to a sitting position. “The whole thing is fucked. Up.”

  She scrunches up her nose distastefully like I’ve insulted her. “Why? Because I was in your dream instead of some blonde wrestling groupie? Someone with huge boobs who requires zero effort? Gee, sorry to disappoint you.”

  She’s still not getting it. “No James, it’s because I dreamed you were my girlfriend and you were cheating on me.” The words get stuck in my throat, bound as tightly as the mounting jumble of knots in my stomach.

  Goddamn knots.

  I’m gonna puke.

  “You consider it a nightmare that I was your girlfriend?” Her voice comes out slowly. Small.

  Hurt and confused, latching onto the least important detail.

  Typical female.

  I twist my torso to face her. “No. That’s not what I’m saying. The dream was fucked up because—shit. I don’t even know what the hell I’m saying any more.” She’s quiet so I fill the silence with more jabbering. “It’s the same, reoccurring dream: I come home from out of town and I walk in on you boning my roommate. Hard. We argue and fight, then you cry and I kick you out. The first time it happened, I was shaken awake on the bus by a teammate; he heard me crying like a goddamn baby. How fucked up is that?”

  “You were crying? Because I was your fake girlfriend who fake cheated?” Her head gives a tiny, confused shake. “Why would that upset you?”

  “Because it didn’t feel fake.” I’m whining.

  “I don’t understand. You don’t even like me like that—why would you dream about me?”

  Spoken like it’s something I can control.

  “Don’t you see? This is what I’ve been trying to tell you.” My eyes float back to the ceiling as a puff of air expels from my chest. “Maybe I do.”

  Those three little words ripple in the air, tension thickening the atmosphere.

  “But surely…not like that,” she drawls, sounding cautious and doubtful, uncertainty etched across her pretty, perfect brows. I glance at her sharply.

  “Why are you saying it like that?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “How can you not know?” I ask, genuinely curious. “Would it be the worst thing in the world if I did like you? I’m a great catch you know.”

  “You want the truth? Here it is: it bothers me sometimes that all you do is talk about sex. It’s a turnoff for me. Like, let it go already, we get it, you’re a walking hard-on.”

  “Is that your only impression of me?”

  “Are you being serious?” she deadpans. “You spend half our time together making sex jokes, and yet you expect me to take you seriously right now.” Jameson throws her hands in the air, mumbling to the ceiling, “What is it with guys?”

  Okay, but… “Seriously, you think that’s all I want from you? Sex?”

  Her chuckle is sarcastic and lacking enthusiasm. “What else is there? Do you honestly just want to be my friend?”

  “No, I don’t just want to be your friend.” Not any more; now I want to be her friend and I want to bang her. Repeatedly. “Do you just want to be friends?”

  “I did at first. I mean, you’re vulgar and kind of a pig. I’m not sure where to start with a guy like you. You’re like a set of Legos with a million tiny pieces and terrible instructions, and I’m not sure where to stick what. And then I end up stepping on the pointy edges in the middle of the night, which hurts like a bitch.”

  What the fuck is she talking about?

  “What I’m saying is…I think you’re really fun and great, but parts of you could hurt me.”

  I scratch my chin. “I’m not sure how to feel about being compared to a set of Legos.”

  “That’s why I haven’t slept with you.” She bites down hard on her lower lip. “But you’re growing on me and I hate it.” Her head shakes back and forth, eyes squeezed shut. “Hate it.”

  “So my pointy edges are…?”

  “Other girls.”

  I draw each word out slowly, carefully. “Sometimes sex is just sex, James, and that’s all it is for me. A physical act to relieve stress.”

  Jesus, even to my own ears I sound like a huge ass; I basically just compared sex to working out at the gym. I curse my mother for not teaching me better manners.

  And yet, it doesn’t faze her. “That may be true, Sebastian, but I’m not into sharing or constantly wondering if my boyfr—the guy I’m sleeping with has his youknowhat in someone else’s youknowwhat. It’s a deal breaker, and you said you weren’t into being tied down, so…”

  “Maybe I changed my mind.”

  “Have you told your fan club?” Her gorgeous pout makes my heart skip a beat and my pulse race, no fucking lie. It means she cares.

  “Jameson Clark, I never would have pegged you as the jealous type.” Even to me, my next question comes out sounding incre
dulous. “You’re not jealous of the other girls, are you?”

  Cause that would be great. I’ve had jealous, angry hate sex in the past, and believe me when I say, it’s the best.

  “Yes, I guess I am.” Jameson gives a careless shrug, shocking me with her honesty. “I just know that all the times you’ve said you want to fuck me”—she winces—“it pushed me away—no, that’s not the right word. It didn’t push me away, but it does make me feel…” She struggles with her next choice of words. “Common? Like maybe how all the others feel. The girl in the hallway with the red hair.”

  I glower. “You are nothing like those other girls.”

  Jameson rolls her eyes, and blurts out, “Duh. I know that.”

  This unexpected statement surprises us both, and the way she says it makes us laugh. I fall onto the bed, roll onto my side, and prop myself up on an elbow, studying her.

  I study her hard.

  “You are nothing like those girls. Nothing.”

  I want her to get it; I need her to understand. Using the only tool I have to communicate, I show her with my body. Stretching my large frame across the bed, I scoot across the bed, dragging her down so she’s positioned flat on her back. Balancing my elbows on either side of her face, I look down into her face.

  She is truly beautiful.

  I’ve always thought she was cute, but with her hair fanned out on my navy quilt, staring up at me all wide eyed and trusting, she’s a total knockout.

  I want to wrap the gleaming locks of her hair around my fist and tug, so I twirl some into a curl with my finger.

  “I’m sorry Jim. I don’t know how to do this.”

  “Do what?”

  “Ask you out. Date you. I would never treat you—” I stop, not knowing how to finish my thought. “Jameson.”

  “Sebastian.” Her lips twist into a patient smile.

  “Nothing about you is easy…”

  Her soft laughter fills the room. “Thank god for that.”

  “I can’t believe I’m fucking saying this, but for someone who started off as just a study partner, you’re all I can think about lately.” Her glossy hair slips from my fingers, greedy hands raking through the hair spread across my bed. “Night and day. Being on the road and not seeing you is killing me. That’s never happened before. Not talking to you was killing me. Dreaming about you—”