Angel In The Centerfold

Chapter One

Fuck this entire day. Ben reached for the Red Bull inside the mini-fridge in his college dorm room. One more midterm, that's all he had left before he could go home. He was so over all of this. He was over studying, he was over football practices, and he was damn sure over girls. Popping the top on the can he took a swig of the sugary liquid and picked up his book bag, pulling his textbook from it. 

His phone chimed, and he ignored it. He was almost positive it was a text from Ashley. The Junior from New York he had been on again off again dating for the last three years. She was beautiful and fun but he knew there was no future there. He had found himself pulling away from her over the last month. He knew he needed to let her know it was time to permanently end things, but he really didn't want to hurt her. She wasn't a bad person, in fact, she was one of the few bright spots this college town had offered him.

Ben found himself deep in his studies when his phone rang about an hour later, sighing he picked it up. "Hello."

"Hey! Me and a few of the guys are going out for beers and maybe hitting up the club, wanna go?" Poe, his best friend, asked him. Knowing full well he wouldn't say no, especially on a Friday night when Ben only had one test left later that afternoon.

"Fuck yes. Sounds like a plan. I have this test at four then I'm a free man. I head back home tomorrow though. Speaking of, you should come home with me. Mom would love to see your sorry ass." Ben laughed into the phone.

"Not a fucking chance in Hell. You'll never drag me back to that town." Poe let out a barking laugh.

Ben rolled his eyes to himself, "It's not that bad Poe. Mom and Dad would both like to see you. Maybe we could see if anyone we used to hang with is gonna be in town?" Ben caught himself thinking about Rey, his high school crush. He wondered what she was up to these days; if she ever went back to their hometown in Minnesota.

"Nope, you're not smoothing talking your way through this one bud, I'll see you tonight.' The line went dead and Ben glanced at the screen checking the message from earlier. Oddly enough it wasn't from Ashley, it was Hux. Odd, Ben thought to himself. He hadn't spoken with him in over four years, literally since they had seen each other on the night of their graduation party.

He swiped his finger across the screen, his eyes scanning the text and his pupils getting bigger with every word. No fucking way. Closing the text without responding he pulled up the browser and typed in playboy.com on his browser; unsure if he wanted the text to be true or not.

Holding his breath while the screen loaded, his heart was beating erratically, he hit the home button effectively locking the phone and closing the browser. He didn't want to know, Nope. He deleted the text from Hux, double-tapped his home button and swiped up closing out the open browser on his screen completely too.

Glancing at the time on his phone Ben realized he needed to start heading across campus soon to get to his last midterm. He picked up his backpack, shoving the textbook from his bed into it before slinging it over his shoulder. Finishing off the Red Bull on his nightstand he tucked his phone in his pocket and started his walk to the opposite side of the vast campus.

Entering the biophysics classroom Professor Maz smiled at him when he entered, she was a scraggly looking older woman who always looked like she had rolled out of bed most mornings without brushing her hair. She also had the appearance of owning at least fifteen cats and not one lint roller, but she was always happy, so there's that.

He nodded to her and gave a quick wave as he took his seat, pulling out his phone and making sure it was on silent before slipping into his backpack and grabbing a black ink pen. Professor Maz handed him his test and whispered, "Good Luck," before she turned and walked back down to the front of the classroom.

After he completed his test he turned it in and told Professor Maz to have a good holiday then he headed out the door, his backpack slung back across his shoulder and cell phone in hand. Shooting a text to Poe to let him know he was officially on fall break and free he let out a sigh of relief, finally done with studying he was one step closer to being stress free. Fall break meant no more two a day practices, no more intense study sessions, and no more constant nagging from Ashley to hang out.

Fuck......Ashley. He needed to handle that.

He pulled up her name and hit call, it rang once before her always happy voice popped through the speaker, "Hey there gorgeous, whatcha doin'?"

"Hey, I was gonna see if we could maybe... talk?" His voice drifted off a bit and he knew she caught his meaning.

She sucked in a breath before answering. "Ah, yea, about that. Ben, there's really no need. I get it. We've been drifting. You don't owe me an explanation. I've been expecting it for a while now. I mean, I love you. I really do. But you and I both know neither of us are 'in love' with each other." her voice was sad, he could feel the emotion in it even through the phone. He saw a bench in the campus square in front of him and strode towards it, needing to find balance within himself.

He hadn't been expecting her to be so ok with everything, his emotions were spinning somewhat out of control. Was he even ok with this? "Ash?" was all he was able to say.

"Oh, shit. Was that not what this was about?" she said quietly.

He took a deep breath, "No it was, I just didn't expect it to hurt like this." He said the words, not realizing how true they were until they were out in the open. It hurt a lot. "I'm sorry, Ash. I'm sorry I don't have more to give you."

He heard her sob, "I know Ben, I know. We both tried this as long as we could. We both deserve to find our happiness. You're a good man. I love you. If nothing else you're one of my best friends."

"I love you too, Ashley." Ben stood up from the bench and started walking back towards his dorm. "You know what would make this easier?" He asked her with a slight laughter to his tone. "I think if you slept with Poe it would help." A small smile quipped up one side of his mouth.

She laughed through the line, "Ok, I'll get right on that. I'm sure he'll take one for the team. That man has slept with half the campus and has never once made a pass at me."

"Well that's because I was dating you, you'll be fair game now." He chuckled, the ongoing joke between them about Poe's secret love for her would forever be his favorite. "But I'll let you go ok? Let me know if you need anything?"

She let out a small sigh, "I'm not your responsibility Ben. But thank you. I'll talk to you later." The line went silent and he pulled the phone from his ear and hit the red circle, ending the call. No football, no studying, no girls.

LET'S GO GET DRUNK.