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The two girls burst out laughing.
“I’m telling you,” Sarah sighs, “I’d like to find a little student for myself too. I’m tired of being in a relationship with the single life, if you know what I mean…”
“I thought you were seeing that guy from the baseball team?” asks Yeleen with a conspiratorial air.
Sarah shrugs a delicate shoulder as she pokes her salad with her fork.
“I still prefer to stay single.”
“I could change your mind,” TJ’s voice rings out right behind her.
“Shut up,” Yeleen growls, throwing a fry at him.
He catches the fry on the fly and stuffs it into his mouth with an amplified grunt. When he notices my presence, his eyes widen. “My best friend!” he shouts.
“Please stop with that,” I say, holding back a smile.
Sarah and Yeleen watch as TJ walks around the table and sits down next to me.
“You know that little prick?” Yeleen asks, laughing, after a few seconds.
“We’re best friends,” TJ says without letting me say a word.
I shake my head, silently articulating, “Not at all,” to the two girls.
TJ leans toward me. “I will behave, I promise. I don’t want to die.”
I raise an eyebrow at him. “Who would kill you?”
I don’t like the way he looks, but he doesn’t answer me. “So…” I continue, “are you three friends?”
They nod and Sarah answers, “I’ve been putting up with them for three years, much to my dismay—ouch!” she exclaims when Yeleen kicks her under the table. “We’re all part of the same gang.”
I freeze, trying to understand her words. The same gang of buddies? I remember TJ handing out flyers a few days earlier.
“You’re all part of the…Pack?”
They nod in unison, which is quite disorienting.
Damn, wait, I had to run into the Public Danger group? Am I destined to cross paths with Tucker for the rest of my education or what?
I finally understand the look a few people gave me when I sat down a few minutes ago, the envy in their eyes. They must be wondering what I’m doing here. And I wonder why TJ and Yeleen seem to welcome me so well when the seats next to them are supposed to be so dear?
I’m almost ready to grab my sandwich and make a quick escape when Sarah asks me a question. “What are you studying?”
“I’m a junior in psychology. I have to g—” I start by moving my chair back.
“Oh, interesting!” Sarah cuts me off. “Maybe you’ll help me to understand the behavior of my asshole of a father-in-law,” she says, laughing softly.
TJ leans in and puts his elbows on the table. “She has a criminal science class with Tucker.”
Sarah stops laughing and stares at the blond with a frown. “Oh yeah?” She then turns to me. “Do you two know each other?”
Her totally opposite attitude to the one she had a moment earlier gives me pause.
I choose my words, “Not really.”
But TJ intervenes, happy to add his two cents. “Actually, yeah, they know each other. Tucker had a flat tire the other day. She picked him up like a wounded little animal on the road.”
