The Virgin and the Whore

Chapter 18

Chapter 18

I was in my bed in my penthouse trying to hype myself up, trying to convince myself that I should get up and do something useful.

My morning class had been cancelled. The professor had an infection and lost his voice, so I'd been able to sleep in.

I was scrolling through Instagram when my phone rang. There was no caller ID.

I answered right away.

"Hello?"

"Oh, hi, you picked up quickly," Esther squeaked.

I pressed my face against my pillow for half a second not to laugh. "I was holding my phone," I explained.

"Oh, okay, sorry. It's Esther."

I smiled even thought she couldn't see it. "I know."

Wait. Ugh.

I know? I know? What kind of answer was that? A normal one, I thought, but for some reason, it felt wrong.

For the love of god, when would I ever have social skills?

"I was wondering if you wanted to meet up so we could work on our project a bit, and maybe study for our test in two weeks since our class was cancelled," she asked in a rush.

I wanted to ask her to speak more slowly, so I could fully appreciate her voice, but that would definitely make me sound like a socially inept creep.

"I'm not on campus right now, I'm home," I told her.

"Wait, I thought you lived on campus," she said.

"Oh, I do. But my dad's place is close by, and Tyler, my roommate has been annoying me all week long, so I decided to hide from him. He needs to miss me a little, so he can stop being a little bitch," I explained and then slapped my hand on my mouth.

I shouldn't be saying bitch.

"So, you're playing hard to get?" she asked, sounding amused and not bothered by my swearing.

"Exactly."

"Okay, well sorry for bothering you," she said, like she was about to hang up.

"Wait, wait, wait," I said in a rush, "We can study and work on our project. I can be on campus in fifteen minutes."

"Are you sure?" she asked, her voice small. "It's really no bother, I just have time to kill before my next class and thought I should at least work on something for the cancelled one. You don't need to come to campus if you have no reason to."

Seriously, I should record her voice. It was so nice. I had no idea what it was about it, but I could listen to her talk for hours.

"I do have a reason, to study and work on our project," I replied.

"Okay... well I'll wait for you at the library," she answered, sounding happy about it.

I smiled alone again. "Perfect."

"Alright, see you in fifteen minutes then Sputnik."

I laughed. "Oh, still wrong, but you're getting slightly closer."

"Wait, really? How?" Esther asked, her voice rising. She hadn't expected me to say that.

I shook my head. "Nah ha."

"No, no you can't say that and then not say anything," she whined, sounding more amused than annoyed.

"See you soooooon," I just said an hung up.