Jake can be a pretty chill guy. He rolls with the punches, you know? You swing, you miss, and move on. No use dwelling on your strikes. Focus on your hits. But Jake has his own stubborn streak. Once he gets something in his head, it’s hard to shake it. And right now, he’s a hundred percent convinced that he needs Kyle to tutor him.

Just like he thought, Kyle gets good grades. He admitted as much after some hassling, and he admitted it with a lazy pride that told Jake he barely had to work for those grades. While a little jealous, it cemented Jake’s determination. He can’t say why he’s so fixated on Kyle specifically, but he just knows he is. Rolling with his gut instincts has rarely failed him before, so he figures he’ll go with it.

If he can get Kyle to say yes.

* * *

“What’s that?”

It’s Friday, marking the fourth day in a row that Jake has stubbornly put himself in Kyle’s path. They don’t even have a class together today, but Jake’s learned that if he hangs around in front of the Business Building long enough, Kyle is bound to show up. The guy looks young, but he’s in the Business Building a lot, and it makes Jake wonder if he even has any gen-ed classes.

He was waiting outside the building, two coffee cups in hand, when Kyle showed up. He initially thought Kyle would be hard to spot in a crowd. A wallflower type. But as it turns out, he’s pretty easy to find as long as you know what you’re looking for. He’s small, usually tense, usually frowning, eyes locked on the ground and moving fast. Kyle barely has enough time to leap up and cut him off before he enters the building.

Now Kyle stands there, blinking up at Jake owlishly. It looks like it takes him a moment to catch up to the moment, like he was too deep in thought to recognize Jake immediately. There are heavy bags under his eyes and lines around his mouth. He looks... tired.

Jake goes for his winning smirk: two parts playful and one part genuine. “It’s coffee.” He’d already been holding out a coffee cup toward him, but Kyle has just been staring at it like he’d never seen one in his life. Which... maybe he hadn’t. Jake’s taking a gamble here. He moves the cup a little more towards him. “It’s for you.”

Kyle’s eyes slide from the cup up to him, narrowing slightly as his lips purse. “Why?”

Jake shrugs, head tilting to the side. “’Cause that’s what friends do.”

Kyle seems to tense at that, lips pressing into a thin line. It might be a trick of the light, but Jake can almost swear his cheeks look a little pink. “We’re not friends.”

“Okay, no, maybe not. But we could be.” This doesn’t seem to be the right thing to say because Kyle’s frown deepens, hand on his backpack strap, tightening it.

“You don’t want to be my friend. You want me to tutor you.”

“Can’t I want both?”

“No.”

Jake feels his smile fading. If he’s being honest, Kyle kind of reminds him of a Chihuahua, or some other kind of small dog. Adorable and small, causing his instincts to protect and coddle to rise to the surface, but at the same time skittish, snappy, and wary. Yet despite how abrasive Kyle’s been with him, he can’t bring himself to resent it. It’s... kinda cute, actually. Mostly because Jake can tell Kyle’s not actually an asshole. Jake knows dudes who are assholes. Kyle’s seems more... defensive and wary. Jake’s just gotta get past those walls.

Jake sighs, letting his smile slip as his shoulders slump. “Okay, look. I’ll admit, I didn’t approach you to be your friend.” Kyle just stares, unblinkingly, slowly raising one eyebrow. Jake raises his hands, and thus the coffee cups, in a placating gesture. “But that doesn’t mean that we can’t be friendly. And that doesn’t mean we can’t become friends. I’m really serious about tutoring. I don’t need answers, I need like... to learn. So I can do this on my own. I don’t need to just pass economics. I need to pass everything. This year and next year.”

He can hear the frustration leaking into his voice, and he can feel his brows furrowing. He doesn’t know why he’s sharing all this. Kyle never asked for his baggage, but... he has a feeling honesty is the only thing that’s gonna get past those walls.

He looks back at Kyle, eyes pleading. “Look, if I don’t get my GPA up by two points, or close to it, by the end of the semester, I’m gonna lose my scholarship. I can’t afford to be here without it. Please, dude. I can pay you to. I’m not expecting this for free, and I’m not above begging right now. I’m desperate. I’ll get on my knees right fucking here if I have to.”

Kyle’s face is closed off and unreadable. His brows are furrowed, and his lips pursed as he scowls. His eyes are hard and narrowed as they search Jake’s face. They’re a striking shade of hazel. A greenish brown that looks beautiful framed by long, dark lashes and bronze skin— focus, Jake.

Kyle looks down, toe of his shoe idly scuffing against the concrete. Then he looks to the side, up and around to the building. And that’s where Jake starts to see his mask crack. He bites at his lip, brow pinching in a way that’s no longer wary, but more... no, it’s still pretty damn wary, but there’s an indecision there that Jake counts as a win.

When he looks back at Jake, his eyes are still narrowed, and his gaze is still hard, but there’s a defeat there. He nods toward the cup in Jake’s hand. “What kind of coffee is that?”

He blinks, then stares at the cup, his mind taking a moment to catch up to the unexpected question. “Oh, uh... a mocha?” Kyle raises a brow, and Jake shifts his weight. “I figured you might like something sweet? Something chocolatey?”

“You’re making a lot of assumptions about me,” he grumbles, but he reaches out and takes the cup anyway. Jake isn’t above noticing how soft his hands are when they brush, and he’s a weak enough man to attempt to prolong that contact. Kyle pulls back quickly, holding out his other hand. “Give me your phone.”

Jake scrambles to do just that, unlocking and slapping the device in Kyle’s waiting palm. He frowns as he enters his number, practically shoving the phone back into Jake’s hand before walking past him toward the doors.

“Text me when you’re ready to study,” he grumbles, refuses to make eye contact, and frowns like he tastes something bitter, but as Jake looks at the new contact in his phone, he finds himself grinning. He’ll take it as a victory.

He has his victory, but impulse convinces him to push it. “Hey!” He spins on his heel, grin still fixed in place as he spots Kyle paused, halfway through the door into the building. He looks back at Jake, an eyebrow raised. “Wanna come to a party tonight? You know, get out, meet some people, get drunk?”

He sees the conflict flicker across Kyle’s face, but there are far too many emotions to pinpoint them, and they’re gone before he can try. Kyle smiles, but it’s small, just a tilt of his lips, and it doesn’t reach his eyes. “No, thanks,” he says, and it sounds hollow.

Jake watches him disappear into the building, grin fading. There’s a strange ache in his chest, soft and barely there. Sympathy? Pity? He’s not really sure. Jake likes to think that he’s starting to scale those walls, but now he’s wondering what he’ll find beyond them. Kyle looks tired, but it’s more than that. He looks... sad. Just, generally. Like he carries a dark cloud with him that he can’t quite shake.

Jake gets it in his head that he wants to see Kyle smile. A real smile, bright and genuine. And he knows he’s stubborn enough to follow it through.

* * *

He spends the rest of the day thinking about Kyle on and off. About the hollow sorrow in his eyes when he attempts to smile and the conflict on his face when he decided to help Jake. About his hair, dark and messy, windswept in a way that looked wholly natural but also in a way that Jake can imagine it being spread out across a pillow as he throws his head back—

Whoa, okay. Wrong train of thought.

Jake shakes his head, running his fingers through his hair to clear his thoughts. He has plenty of time to dwell on his tutor later. Right now, he has a party to get to, a girlfriend to meet. Get drunk and probably fuck. The usual Friday night. He’s got his favorite jeans on, the ones that are comfortable and make his ass look great, and a fitted V-neck t-shirt. He looks good, he feels good, and he’s ready to forget the world of academia for a while.

The walk to Cindi’s apartment isn’t long, but he takes his time, letting the night air rush over him. It’s crisp and cold against his bare arms, and it feels good. The plan for the night is simple: pick up his girlfriend, walk to the party ten minutes away, get drunk, walk back to her place. Just like they have several times before.

The routine is already thrown when he finds her waiting for him in the parking lot of her building. Even more so when he realizes she’s leaning against one of her friend’s cars. He can see several of them piled in it through the windows, and he tries to ignore their stares.

“Hey, babe,” he says as he approaches, hands in his pockets, smiling despite the tension coiling in his gut. She looks up from her phone, but when he leans in for a kiss, she leans away. It surprises him, but he’s even more surprised by the hand pressed to his chest, keeping him arm’s length away. He looks down at it, then up at her.

She frowns, full red painted lips turned down at the edges, delicate brow furrowed. “Look, Jake, we’ve got to talk.”

He glances at the car, then at her, speaking slowly. “Oookay?”

He follows her as she leads him away from the car, turning to face her when she stops. One hand on her hip, she holds her phone in her other hand at her side. She looks determined but nearly bored. “Listen, I think we should break up.”

He can’t say he’s surprised to hear it. Not with how she’s been acting. He’s been broken up with before, and he’s learned to recognize the signs. He waits for the mounting tension in his gut to squeeze, to come to a head, to make him feel desperate and nauseous. But it never comes. Instead, the twisting knot relaxes, leaving him strangely at ease.

He blinks, slightly surprised. He had expected some sort of ache. If he’s honest with himself, he hasn’t felt much for Cindi in a while. Sure, she’s hot as hell and a damn fine catch, but the chase had been more fun than the relationship that followed. In the end, there were few things special about her, and he hadn’t felt a connection. Nothing to make his insides all jittery or sparks when they touched.

Still, it should hurt when someone decides they no longer want him. Even if it’s just for a second. Instead, he only feels relief.

He shifts his weight to one foot, shoving his hands deeper into his pockets, head tilting to the side as he frowns. “Okay,” he says slowly, eyes narrowing. “Can you tell me why?” Because despite lacking any sort of devastation, he thinks he deserves that at least.

She just shrugs, waving her phone hand around in vague gestures. “It’s just like... you’re a great fuck, Jake. You really are. But you’re not very... smart?” He snorts a short, humorless laugh, and she frowns, pointing a finger at him and jabbing it into his chest. “Laugh all you want, but it’s true. You even said you’re in danger of getting kicked off the team, and I don’t want to be the one who drags you down.”

He can’t help but roll his eyes at that. What a load of shit. If that were true, she would support him. Not ditch him. More like she doesn’t want to be seen dating the dropout. It’s bad for her rep.

She doesn’t seem to notice, gaze already drifting away. He can’t tell if she’s unable to make eye contact or if she’s just bored. “Besides, right now I think I just wanna like, have time to find myself, you know? Be me instead of being in a couple. That’s what college is about, right?”

More like she wants to find someone she’s not bored with, but he keeps that thought to himself.

“Whatever. Live your life, Cindi.” It doesn’t come out as cynical or bitter as he thought it might. If anything, he matches her indifference.

If she’s offended by his lack of devastation, she doesn’t show it. Instead she smirks, patting him on the shoulder as she walks by. “I knew you’d understand. Bye, Jake. Good luck with your grades, or whatever.”

He scoffs, practically rolling her touch off his shoulder as he mutters. “Yeah, you too.”

He doesn’t bother watching her walk away. He just starts off down the street, in the direction of the party. He hears her get into her friend’s car, hears it tear out of the parking lot and down the street, but he doesn’t look up.

He gets about halfway to the party before he stops. He’s not sad about the break up, per se, but he does feel strangely... hollow. It’s not the ache of a break up that he’s used to. It’s not a black pit in his chest and nausea in his gut. It’s just... a strange numbing. It feels like nothing. He stares down the street, gaze distant and lips pursed. He could go to the party alone. Drink until he feels something.

But... he’s surprised to find that he really doesn’t want to.

He’s even more surprised when a whispered voice in his mind offers an alternative.

“I can’t believe I’m doing this,” he mutters to himself even as he turns on his heel, stalking back toward campus with renewed purpose. He pulls out his phone, finding Kyle’s new contact and firing off a text. “Studying instead of partying. Who am I?”

But despite the sardonic tone of that thought, there’s a strange buzzing thrill that vibrates beneath his skin as he gets a text with Kyle’s dorm number.