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“Tess! What the fuck!”

It’s too late, she’s already running down the street and standing in the parking spot. She crosses her arms over her chest, glaring at any car that comes close.

“We’ve been circling the block for thirty minutes,” she yells at a car that slows down. “Let us get our shit in our room already!”

Just then, someone runs right past our hall. A runner in this area certainly isn’t surprising. The surprising part is the fact that there’s so much green skin on display. He’s completely naked. He’s got his head down, charging through the courtyard, his tail flopping in the wind as he goes.

Right. Welcome to college life, I guess.

As carefully as I can manage, I pull the moving van into the spot that Tess has claimed. We could have parked in a nearby parking lot, but that would have been a lot of walking with our things back and forth. This is right outside Poe Hall, the dorms we’ll be staying at for the year.

I put the van into park and turn it off, letting my forehead fall against the steering wheel. I can’t help but feel admiration and disbelief equally at my sister’s antics. Despite being twins, we’re very opposite. She’ll bully her way into the things she wants while I prefer to take a step back. She always jumps into things with both feet while I usually take the safer route.

I wish I was more like her, and she admits that sometimes, she wishes she was more like me. Maybe that’s why the universe decided to make us twins, knowing we needed the other for balance.

Tess jumps into the passenger seat, pushing me until I finally sit back up and look over at her. She’s grinning from ear to ear, her tusks decorated with pretty silver jewelry, her green skin lively with a faint purple hue to it from sprinting out into the road.

“I can’t believe we’re finally here,” she says, letting out a laugh that’s borderline manic. “We did it, Thane. We fucking did it!”

I can’t help but mirror her smile. “We did it. Only took us until we turned thirty but I knew we’d get here eventually.”

Tess reaches over and pinches my arm. “Woulda been sooner if someone trusted Blaire and Bax.” I pinch the bridge of my nose, letting out a deep sigh. “Stop sighing, you old man.”

“I trust them,” I say seriously. “I just hate leaving them.” Barely above a whisper I add, “what if they need us and we’re hours away?”

“They’ll be fine,” Tess reassures me, not for the first time and probably not for the last. “We’re their emergency contacts, they each have their own phone. We set up accounts for them so we can send them money. Plus, they have each other to lean on. If worse comes to worst, we can drive back home. It’s only a two-hour drive.”

“I know. By the monster gods, I know all of that. I still worry.”

“I know you do,” Tess says, yanking on my ponytail. “Now let’s grab our shit! I’m so excited to see our dorm rooms. This is going to be so fucking weird! We’re sleeping in a room without each other for the first time ever. It’s gonna be awesome.”

“Wow,” I say, finally getting out of the moving van and moving towards the back. “Thanks, Tess. Really know how to make a guy feel good.”

“Oh fuck off,” she says with a giggle. “We can finally jerk off without worrying about the other walking in!”

I feel my cheeks heat up and I look around, making sure no one heard her say that. “Could you stop?”

“Nope!”

We each grab an armful of things, making our way into the dorm. There’s a woman at the door holding a clipboard. She grins, showing off an impressive pair of fangs as she greets us. We tell her our names, show her our paperwork and then she marks us down and gives us our keys, explaining which floors we’ll be on.

Tess is on floor two while I’m up on floor five. We start unloading all of Tess’ things into her dorm. Her roommate hasn’t arrived yet so she gets her pick of which bed she’d like.

Being an orc comes with its perks. One of them being that we’re both really strong. It only takes two trips for us to carry all of Tess’ things to her room. Not that there’s much, but still.

I have even less stuff than she does. Two garbage bags filled with clothes, my pillow, a box that contains a desk lamp, some keepsakes from growing up, pictures and cards from Blaire and Bax, and of course, a box filled with all of my favorite books. The book box is the heaviest thing we have to carry but even so, we manage to grab everything all in one trip.

I carry the boxes while my sister carries my clothes. We make our way up the stairs and by the time we get to the fifth floor, we’re both out of breath. We find my room and get inside, tossing everything onto the floor.

“Huh,” I murmur, finding half the room already filled with stuff. “My roommate must be here already.”

The room is bigger than I thought it would be. There are two beds, two desks, two dressers, and two closets. There’s enough room between each side that we won’t be stepping on each other which is good because I’m a big guy. Being an orc means I’m almost seven feet tall. My shoulders are broad, my body strong even though I don’t really work out. I don’t want to get in my roommate’s way if I can help it.

“I hope he’s nice,” Tess says, her words cut off as the door flies open. Someone starts to pull something inside.

“Let me help you,” I say right away, standing up and moving towards the door.

My new roommate stops at the door, looking between my sister and I. “Hi,” he says, giving us a little wave. His eyes are multicolored, almost like little rainbows. His hair is short and bright blue, his skin sparkling like he’s covered in a thin layer of glitter, and his ears have a point to them. He’s really, really pretty. “I’m Simon, I’m your new roommate!”