We're not in love. Our past is a dumpster fire. The best we are is friends with benefits... without the friends' part.
Jake Harrison, USC's star quarterback, goes through girls faster than jock straps. If that's not disgusting enough, he's my best f...
"Right." Dad clapped his hands together once the last of my boxes was loaded out of our carts and piled haphazardly under my lofted bed and over Li's furry pink rug. "Should we unpack first, eat, or try to hit up the bookstore?"
"Where are you staying tonight?" I glanced around at the now ridiculously smaller space. With the boxes we'd brought down in my and Dad's cars, we had one T-shaped walking path through what little floor space the room had.
"About that..." Dad rubbed one hand over the side of his neck a few times and dropped his gaze.
"You're not staying tonight," I stated, not asked, and he nodded sheepishly.
Legal duty calls.
A small part of me understood and I felt slightly disappointed but mostly concerned that Dad drove down here for more than seven hours, then a few hours later turned around and drove it back alone overnight.
"But I'm not leaving until we go get your books at the bookstore," he insisted with an apologetic smile. "And taking you to dinner, then picking up food at the grocery -"
"I'm not Ellie, Dad." I shifted my eyes toward the small microwave Li perched atop the smallest refrigerator I'd ever seen but wasn't sure if I even needed those. "And you bought me the meal plan, I'm good."
Just reading through Ellie's food blog, with Logan's five thousand calories, makes me tired.
"Harper -" Dad started in a stern voice, well stern for him. Based on Li's polite smile, he probably sounded like a mewling kitten to her.
"Let's do the bookstore, then dinner," I offered since no part of me wanted Dad's accidental hands on my 'tampons' box.
"I can show you down the dining hall," Li spoke up. "Feast is on the first floor, very good. And tomorrow I can show you where your classes are, if you want."
"Good plan." He nodded tightly, then extended one hand to my new tour guide. "Nice to meet you Li... Umm, good luck."
"Daaaaaad," I groaned quietly as Li giggled.
Poor girl has no idea.
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"You sure about this," I repeated to Dad as we stood outside Feast, the dining option inside Rieber Hall that Li directed us into.
While Dad and I gawked around like tourists, Li's small frame marched straight to a counter with an overhead sign that read 'Bruin Wok.' Cream colored floors and ceilings were broken up by redwood accents in the circular buffet-station-and-pay-at-the-end style dining hall on the ground floor of our dorm.
"Yeah," Dad's uneasy voice probably hadn't even convinced the people who worked here.
"It's Pan-Asian," I pointed out the obvious with a twirled finger. "You okay to drive after that?"
While I lived for spicy foods, Dad had the mildest stomach of anyone I knew.
