Untimely Love (Book 3)

♠Chapter 16♠

♠CHRIS♠

It had been a month, five days, and... a few hours since I last hung out with my friends. Or the ones who're in New York anyway. I'd missed them. Something I didn't realize until I walked into the sushi restaurant and heard them before I saw them.

  I was at the front desk, giving Thion's last name so the waitress could tell me what table they were at when they started the hooting and hollering from the back of the room.

  Back in the day, my face would heat up at the stares and glares that we'd get after being too loud. But all I could do was grin. It had been a long time.

  "Oh, look at you," Sean said, grabbing my hand and pulling me in for a hug. "Haven't seen you in forever- what the hell have you been doing?"

  I shrugged, smiling as I moved to give Julia a hug while dapping up Nate. Julia didn't have much to say because I saw her all the time. Even though NYU was right there, we all had our own lives these days. Different majors took up different times. I kind of buried myself in my work intentionally for a while though. I won't tell them that.

  It was Thion who said, "Avoiding us."

  I pointed at him. "You're exactly right." They'd take it as a joke anyway.

  He grinned and pulled out the empty chair next to him for me.

  "He's always so busy these days," Julia said. "Whenever I see him on campus, he has that damn heavy as hell camera."

  "That's cause I'm either doing my job or working on a project," I said, giving her a look.

  Julia ignored me and smacked the table. "Oh, and he's in BSU!"

  Thion turned in his seat to stare at me, his arm on the back of my chair.

  My face actually did turn red after that. I tried not to stutter when I corrected her. "I am not in BSU." I glanced around at them. Even Nate was staring at me with his eyebrows raised. "I take photos for them at meetings and events and stuff," I explained, reaching for the glass of water they ordered for me.

  Thion hummed. I shook my head, running a hand through my hair. I really needed to cut it.

  Julia nodded. "But you get paid to do it."

  I covered my face.

  "What?" she exclaimed.

  I dropped my hands, laughing. "But I'm not in the club, that would be weird. I don't have executive positions or anything. I'm just the photographer."

  "Yeah. I heard you're famous around camp," Sean said, successfully changing the subject.

  I waved in relief. "The photography club, I'm in."

  "How's that going for you?" Thion asked, leaning back in his chair. He tilted his head, his forest green braids framing his face.

  Nodding, I forced myself to relax. "Good. My history teacher's actually the administrator of BSU, saw my camera and asked if I could take some pictures for them—paid, of course. I did, and other places on campus started reaching out to me. Now I just... take pictures at events and stuff."

  "I might have to hire you," Sean said with a grin. "How much?"

  Pointing at him, I returned his look. "We'll talk about it after dinner."

  Thion waved over a server then and the night officially started. We talked about anything and everything that could be forced into a dinner that'll probably be around an hour and a half. We hadn't planned to do anything after but it wasn't something that we couldn't make happen if we were all down for it.