Page 6 of Fundamentals of Chemistry

Holy-fucking-hydrogen, he could cut glass with those cheek bones. There was a real-life Adonis in my hallway. I swallowed so I wouldn’t choke on my mouthful of saliva.

“Oh, shit, sorry,” he said. “I didn’t think anyone else was here yet.”

Of course, his voice was rich and deep—like I wasn’t already having trouble pulling my mind out of the gutter.

“Hello,” I squeaked, and lifted a hand to finger wave at him. Like a damned fool.

As he took me in, his face morphed through a series of expressions. Dark eyes, initially wide with surprise, narrowed until his brow creased. Then, as if someone had pressed an off switch, his whole face fell into perfect neutrality.

“Hey,” he said, voice oddly flat.

“It’s… uh… hot out there,” I said. The weather? I was seconds away from an aneurysm, and making small talk about the weather?

“Yep.”

“So… you decided to take a dip in the lake?” A joke. That was better.

“I was running.”

“But it’s hot out there!”

“Right.” He clearly thought I was as stupid as I sounded.

“Aren’t you worried about heat stroke?” I asked. He held up a water bottle that I hadn’t noticed. “Oh. Smart.”

The hallway Adonis just shrugged and lowered his arm back to his side, judging my inane comment unworthy of a verbal response.

A silence fell between us even thicker than the humidity. I could feel his eyes on me and was suddenly hyperaware of my gauzy top clinging to my body. But it didn’t feel like he was checking me out. I was intimately familiar with the crawling feeling of pervy appraisal. This wasn’t that.

He was seeing. He was judging.

The temperature in the hallway seemed to drop ten degrees, and a shiver inexplicably ran down my spine. His eyes flicked over my shoulder briefly before landing back on me.

“Excuse me,” he said, after we had been staring at each other for an awkwardly-long time. “You’re blocking the door.”

“Right!” I snapped into action, taking a hasty step backward. My sweaty bare foot slipped on the polished hardwood, and I started to go down. Oh, shit!

Flailing, desperate to regain my balance, I grabbed onto the closest thing within reach—a slick forearm.

“Ugh!” he exclaimed.

“Sorry!” I gasped, my eyes finding his face once I steadied. His mask of neutrality had cracked, eyebrows drawn together and lips parted. He did not appreciate being touched. I had crossed a line.

I released his arm like a hot pan and repeated, “Sorry,” more softly.

He closed his eyes for a moment and opened them again. “It’s fine,” he said, before brushing past me.

As I watched him stalk down the hall, I wondered how that whole interaction had been so painfully awkward. I was usually really good with people. The etiquette classes my parents had me in as soon as I could walk taught me to smile and sit up straight, but they hadn’t prepared me for him.

It bothered me to leave things like this, especially since the guy was my neighbor. He definitely worked on campus too, if he lived in the faculty residences. I would probably be seeing him often. I couldn’t let him go yet. Not like this.

“Wait,” I called after him, “if you have a minute, I could really use a hand bringing up my bags.”

The words were out of my mouth before I realized what I was saying. A favor? He already didn’t like me, and I was asking him to do shit for me? At least it would give me the opportunity to talk to him a little more. I could fix this. I had to fix this.

Hallway Adonis paused in front of his door. “Of course, those are yours,” he sighed, tilting his head back and running a hand down his face. “Sure, Princess.”

Once again, I got the distinct impression that he was judging me. I had been called “Princess” plenty of times over the years. However, something about the way he said it rubbed me the wrong way. I decided not to mention it as we made our way back down the stairs together.