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A girl is slinking towards the entrance of the frat house.
It’s not a new sight for Paxton, nor does he particularly care to judge.
His eyes flicker to the patch of sunlight cast upon the white countertops of the kitchen. This early in the morning, the soft and hazy morning light is a solace to anyone slipping out quietly. That feeling—the subdued, untouchability of the world in those moments—is partly why he doesn’t mind waking up this early to go swimming.
He screws the cap back on his water bottle and resigns to wait for the girl to leave first.
A small courtesy, of sorts.
Stopping just shy of the door, the girl—small, Asian, with mussed shoulder-length black hair—suddenly reaches up and bends an arm back. At the back of her skin-tight red dress, an elongated triangle of peachy tan skin is exposed from the zipper that sits a few inches below the top.
It appears to be in a spot where she cannot fully reach because she hops and shimmies awkwardly, curving one arm down at the same time that her other hand tries to push up against the bottom of the zipper. The futility of her efforts reminds him of those claw machines, where the claw barely scrapes against the stuffed bear before lifting only air.
He decides to forego the courtesy; put them both out of their misery so he can head to the pool.
“You want help with that?” His tone is neutral, straightforward, as he steps out of the kitchen towards her in the entryway.
The girl whips around, gasping loudly, one hand actually over her heart.
Just as fast, her surprise shutters into a glare. One heated expression, piping hot, a reprimand. It confuses him.
And then she flings open the door and stalks out, the back of her dress still partly open.
He can’t say that part usually happens too.
*
Her name, as it turns out, is Eleanor Wong.
Paxton finds out a few days later, after she barges into the study room at the library that Ben had reserved for them, her watermelon earrings spinning in orbit with the ferocity of the movement.
Ben barely stutters out her name before she starts yelling at him about someone named Devi.
Which is weird, because “David” was what Ben moaned out the previous night, crouched over the toilet seat after puking out his guts, the picture of a heartsick fool.
Ben takes it like a champ.
Which is to say, he wisely keeps his mouth shut, eyes wide and barely blinking, owl-like.
Trent snickers on the sidelines the entire time, intermittently snapping off bites of gummy worms and jabbing his thumb at the scene to Paxton. Like, can you believe this shit is going down?
Ben, the lecturer, being lectured. Not how these planning sessions usually go for their frat’s chapter meetings.
Paxton represses his own shit-eating grin.
When Eleanor finishes with passionately monologuing Ben into submission, she looks down and meets Paxton’s eyes.
Paxton lifts a hand in greeting, even though he knows what’s coming.
Her eyes narrow at him suspiciously, dark brows drawing together in a fine line.
Her lips purse into a darling rosebud.
But she, somewhat surprisingly, gives a jerky shake of her hand in return before huffing and strolling out the door.
“What the fuck Benji?” Trent says to Ben, immediately after.
*
An insistent pushing at his shoulder forces Paxton awake.
He opens his eyes to the sight of pale arms pulling away and the willowy blond from last night standing over him. Three sparkly gold triangles wink at him from the wall behind the girl, and Paxton considers pulling her—Lucy? he thinks that’s her name—back onto the bed before he takes in her expression.
The alarm in her wide blue eyes stamp out any notion of a Round Two.
“My boyfriend is on his way to my apartment. You need to go.”
Paxton blinks, but the scene remains the same. Real, not a dream.
“Now! Before my roommates see you,” Lucy hisses.
Paxton scoffs in disbelief.
Lucy crosses her arms defensively. “I mean… you’re Paxton Hall-Yoshida…always down for a good time?”
Her voice lilts slightly at the end, as if challenging Paxton to say otherwise.
He doesn’t dignify her with a response and lunges out of the bed for his clothes, tugging them on swiftly.
Anger, disappointment, and anger over the disappointment flood through his system.
These misplaced assumptions are getting old.
“I wouldn’t have slept with you if I knew you had a boyfriend,” Paxton bites out as he brushes past her.
He itches for a shower. The pool is a close second.
*
Rick and Morty flickers on the screen while Trent blows smoke rings from the bed, the blue glow of the TV casting the rings in a strange fluorescent grey in the darkness of the room.
Trent catches Paxton’s eye from across the room and lifts up his joint, but Paxton shakes his head. “Swim season,” Paxton reminds him.
He rips open a protein bar and idly watches the show from his bed. Ben straddles a desk chair in Trent and Paxton’s room and drains the rest of his beer before shifting his eyes away from the screen to sulkily ask, “How do you guys manage to juggle multiple girls? One is hard enough.”
Trent turns to Ben. “Your problem,” he takes another hit, “is you’re too serious, bro.”
Ben grimaces, and Trent laughs lightly.
“Tell me I’m wrong.”
Ben glances at Paxton.
“Not really ‘juggling,’ for me,” Paxton comments.
“Yeah, well, the rotation of different girls that come out this room begs to differ.”
“The real problem,” Trent snorts, “is you say shit like ‘begs to differ’ casually. What d’ya say to chicks before you put it in? ‘Madam, may I?’”
“Fuck you,” Ben snaps.
“Easy there, that’s a lil too on the nose for most ladies.”
“No, seriously, shut up.”
“Again—with being too serious.”
Ben rolls his eyes in irritation. “Paxton.”
Paxton shoves the rest of the bar in his mouth, chucking the wrapper at the trash can. ‘Casual’ is fine. Efficient. Physically satisfying most of the time. Impersonal, almost all the time.
“Honestly…you wouldn’t want it. Not in the long run.”
Trent leans forward and looks at Paxton. “Who cut off your balls, H-Y? Wanna talk about it?”
Ben furrows his brows. “Why? Are you saying it gets boring?”
Paxton pauses. Everything coming to mind sounds…fucking uncool, so he swallows the words he would have spoken if he were talking to his sister Rebecca instead. And shrugs. “I don’t know. Forget it.”
*
“I wouldn’t trust those mugs—hard to remember which ones the guys have pissed in.”
Eleanor shudders, quickly setting down the mug before casting Paxton a look of disgust.
“While drunk,” he clarifies, as if it makes a difference.
Her lips twist and her eyes flicker balefully toward the sink. “Today is the worst. I can’t believe I have to suffer thirsty.”
Paxton sets down his duffel bag and drags a hand through his hair, damp from the pool, before walking over to the cupboards near Eleanor.
He swipes a stack of plastic red cups sitting on the highest shelf and hands her a cup.
From the way Eleanor shifts from one foot to the other, it’s hard to tell if she plans to offer any sort of explanation or if she plans to bolt any moment.
“My friend Devi has the keys to our apartment, and I forgot to bring mine today, but she told me she’d be here with Ben. You know Ben,” she blurts out in a rush.
Paxton pauses and looks back at her.
Eleanor bites her lip.
“They’re dating. Officially, now. Finally.”
She muses about Ben and Devi some more, equal parts exasperated and fond.
He catches her saying “lovers” at some point.
“Beast with two backs” at another.
She is vibrant and bewildering and Paxton can only eye her, amused.
“—so I have to wait awhile longer.”
Eleanor checks his expression. “Not that I’m asking for your permission. To stay, or wait, or—anything, but I—”
“Eleanor, right?”
Her eyes widen before she confirms primly, “Yes.”
Eleanor fills the cup from the tap and drinks. Agitation translates from the way she fidgets with her rings and places the cup on the counter before picking it back up; how she blows out a harsh breath that causes her bangs to flutter. She keeps her eyes decidedly away from meeting his gaze.
“I’m sorry.”
He means to be sympathetic; the impulse had been grating against his brain with the image of her slipping out of this house unhappily that first time he saw her, playing on a loop.
A loop like a perfect circle, like the shape of Eleanor’s mouth right now, before she presses her lips together, and Paxton reflexively bites his tongue to prevent himself from speaking anything more.
But like one giant exhale, Eleanor’s body relaxes. She stops moving so much. Meeting his eyes, she says gently, “It’s fine.”
Tension eases out of him as well.
He wishes he could prolong how nice it all feels. The ease.
The front door bangs open, announcing the entrance of some of the brothers, and Paxton clears his throat.
“I should—go shower. I’ll try to catch Gross and your friend for you.”
She smiles sweetly at him in response.
It is the first time she has smiled at him, and it’s a smile without any heat, or coyness, or even expectation.
Her smile is guileless and simple and real.
The corners of his own mouth helplessly flip up in response.
*
After, Paxton recognizes Eleanor seemingly everywhere.
She pores over texts and books in the cubicle adjacent to his favorite cubicle at the library.
She happens to grab coffee every morning, around the same time, at his favorite café.
She chats exuberantly with others near the entrance of the gym, as Paxton leaves from a swim; and yeah, alright, he doesn’t have a claim on any of those places but noticing her now isn’t nothing.
He greets her. She smiles. It’s something.
*
“Back already for the water?”
Eleanor turns around and hums noncommittally when she realizes it’s Paxton.
He notices her clipboard.
“Or, uh, something else?”
“Where’d you say the stage was going to be set up?” Oliver Martinez grunts out as he trudges over towards the door leading to the basement, struggling with a stack of chairs.
What?
“Maybe you could help Oliver with the rest of the chairs…?” Eleanor asks. Directing her attention to Martinez, she calls out, “Backyard. The vendors will come set it up on Thursday—day before the performance.”
Was Martinez the one she stayed overnight for last time?
Irritation prickles unreasonably under Paxton’s skin.
He channels that wayward energy towards retrieving the remaining stack of collapsible chairs. “Vendors?”
“For my theatre group’s play? Didn’t Ben tell you? Our venue got canceled last minute and he kindly offered up the frat for hosting.”
Paxton processes that—"offered.” Ben and Eleanor aren’t acquaintances; they’re friends.
How did Ben manage that before him?
“Huh.”
Eleanor misinterprets the reason behind his response. “Don’t worry, we’ll mostly be out of your way.”
“What? No it’s not that—it’s… I’m down to help.”
She observes him appraisingly. “I mean it.”
“Me too. You need something, you let me know.”
“Ohhh she will.”
The remark drips of innuendo and floats from the staircase, where a girl with shapely brown legs peers interestedly at Paxton and Eleanor while being not-so-discreetly nudged forward by Ben.
Ah.
Devi giggles and ducks out of view with Ben.
Discomfort stiffens Paxton’s body, and he’s sure Eleanor notices too.
Thing is, the last thing he wants is to make her feel uncomfortable.
Did he imagine it? A flash of tongue wetting her bottom lip?
Eleanor is wearing a wary, polite smile now.
Paxton doesn’t do—this. Second guessing and overanalyzing. Especially not when it comes to someone he met only weeks ago, someone he hasn’t even slept with, someone who just happens to carry around a disarmingly nice, sweet, smile.
Someone who doesn’t seem to want anything from him.
There is nothing left to do but pivot and make his way over to the basement with the chairs clinking noisily under his arms.
Smooth, man.
*
A few days later, with a lumpy, overstuffed canvas tote slung over her shoulder; a thick, ringed binder flat against her chest; and a cardboard cut-out of a cartoon radish wedged underneath one of her arms, Eleanor cuts across campus.
Paxton could probably pick her out anywhere now.
She walks in the direction of the frat, so he strides up to her and nudges against her shoulder. He holds out his palms.
Eleanor hesitates.
Paxton keeps his hands outstretched patiently.
She offers a dainty thank you as she shifts some items over.
Other students brush past them amidst conversation and laughter, but the two of them walk quietly for a few moments.
Silence is fine.
Silence is golden.
Silence is...the last thing Paxton wants when it comes to being around Eleanor.
“Wanna tell me what this play for Friday is about?”
He asks about the right thing—the best thing—because Eleanor lights up immediately and speaks as if they have been speaking this entire time.
…cautious optimism, you know? she sighs dreamily.
…and that—that!—is the real work of the actors, she emphasizes…
…but oh, don’t get me started on the denouement, she begins conspiratorially.
Paxton listens and listens.
He startles when, after a pause, Eleanor asks about swimming and the frat and him.
She listens.
So intently, in fact, that Paxton wonders if Eleanor can hear the sound of remorse thrashing around in his joints when they arrive at the house and have to separate.
He wonders if she can hear all the unspoken words he doesn’t know how to dislodge from the back of his throat.
He wonders. But he doesn’t ask.
*
“So what’s the deal? You guys are hooking up, right?”
“Who?”
Trent rolls his eyes and pops his skateboard, quickly landing an ollie in the empty parking lot. “Ben’s girlfriend’s friend. Keep up.”
Paxton leans against the trunk of his car, watching as the sun dips demurely below the horizon. The crisp, fresh air sharpens his senses, and he doesn’t look forward to returning to studying for midterms.
“You seriously don’t remember their names?”
“Lil D. And her friend is…E.”
“Right, Eleanor. We’re friends.”
“Cute. Friends with bennies.”
“No. Like, actually, friends.”
As an afterthought, Paxton adds, “Probably better this way.”
Trent skids to a stop but says nothing.
Paxton turns to him.
One of Trent’s hands is closed into a fist over his mouth.
“…Why’re you looking at me like that?”
Trent dips his head and his shoulders shake with silent laughter.
When he recovers, he pats Paxton’s shoulder pityingly. “Ellie is cool, man. Try not to let on too early you’re an idiot.”
*
“Done.” Paxton wipes the sweat off his brows and leans back on his heels, inspecting the wooden panel dotted with rhinestones.
Rhinestones that he oh-so-painstakingly helped glue onto the backdrop as a last-minute favor for Eleanor before her performance tomorrow.
“W-h-i-p-p-e-d,” Trent had mouthed to him at some point.
But before Paxton offered, Eleanor looked on the verge of a breakdown—so what was he supposed to do? Just leave her like that?
Eleanor joins Paxton on stage, admiring the result.
“You have a good eye for design.”
“Wish I could see my sister’s reaction to hearing that.”
“Rebecca, right? You said she’s into fashion?”
He is pleased she remembers. “Yeah.” Paxton flexes his hand, stretching out his cramped fingers.
“Hey.”
“Hmm?”
“You’re wearing that look, like you want to say something but won’t let yourself say it.”
“Ha. What look?”
“Nice try, that’s my line.”
Paxton chuckles at the way Eleanor wrinkles her nose.
“Don’t, uh, take this the wrong way—just, what’s the point? This level of detail? Nobody might’ve noticed.”
Eleanor draws her knees together and leans her chin on top. “I was trying to follow through on my promise. To be true to the script.”
Paxton studies her. “And that matters a lot to you—following through.”
“It does,” she agrees. “And that others follow through too,” she tells him quietly.
Paxton tips his head at the obscenely sparkling panel. “Who’d you promise about this?”
“Me.”
Her self-assurance makes Paxton smile. “Fair. But—okay. The first time we met—what was that about?”
She shoots him a puzzled look.
“You don’t remember? You were leaving, this house—” he gestures towards the frat, “and like, your dress zipper was stuck so—”
“Oh my god! Oh my god.” Eleanor buries her face in her hands, sounding mortified.
Paxton bumps against her good-naturedly. “Well?”
Voice muffled, Eleanor says, “Nobody was supposed to see.” In a slightly ornery tone she adds, “The fantasy: charming heroine leaves unnoticed in a sexy exit.”
Paxton chokes out a laugh. Eleanor drops her hands, feigning annoyance, but laughter bubbles out of her as well.
Eleanor just barely catches the unspoken question lingering in Paxton’s eyes as their laughter fades and they both grow quiet.
Paxton glances back at the house.
“It’s late. I can drive you back to your apartment, if you want?”
It’s not the question he’d been thinking about; she knows.
Stop being so careful with me and just say it, she wants to say.
“That’d be great,” she says.
*
Trent grips Paxton’s shoulder and carts him aside, almost pushing him into someone leaving the afterparty.
“Bro, your girl—”
“She’s not my girl.”
“Shut up. Listen,” Trent puts his hands on Paxton’s shoulders and leans in, eyes intense. “Eleanor is wildin’ man. She fuckin’ told my two side chicks that they’re my two side chicks. That shit was told in secrecy! So, like,” Trent releases Paxton and waves his hands vaguely in the air.
“What do you expect me to do? I’m not her, like, keeper.”
Trent snorts. “Nah man, I definitely think you wanna keep her outta trouble. Keep an eye on her, yeah? Think she’s in our room.” He slaps his palms together, not waiting for a response before darting through the crowd of people; presumably to find one of his side chicks.
When Paxton slips into his room, Eleanor is sitting on the edge of his bed.
“Hello, you!” she hiccups happily. Her eyes are glassy from one too many celebratory drinks, and in the dimness of the room, she glows from the aftermath of the performance.
“Yes, me,” Paxton confirms warmly, pressing the door closed behind him.
He sits next to her on his bed and passes a plastic water bottle to her. “Water only from here on out.”
Eleanor pouts. “Boo.”
“You’ll thank me tomorrow.”
“You should be thanking me for an—awesome. Awesome performance.”
“So modest. You really did kill it tonight though.”
“Really?”
“For sure.”
She giggles as if he said the funniest thing. “Sweet. You’re a sweeeet guy; that’s what I told Devi.”
“Yeah?” Paxton bites the inside of his cheek, stifling a laugh.
“Yup! And. And. You know what she says? She says—” Eleanor hiccups again—“she says ‘even fuckboys can be sweet, El.’”
The old, bitter taste of upset expectations pools in Paxton’s mouth.
Does Eleanor see him that way too?
“And what do you think?” He tries to keep his voice level.
“I think…you’re sexy, and,” she raises her eyebrows, “mysterious--” she giggles. “But. What’s that candy—hard on the outside, soft on the inside? …That’s you.”
Her barely-sober assessment unnerves him, but he relaxes. “I am not soft.”
“Mmm mm mmh” Eleanor says, shaking her head in disagreement. Her dangling earrings hit against her cheek with the movement.
Paxton takes her hand and places it on his chest to demonstrate his point. “I am not soft,” he says again, meaningfully, but aware it’s a facetious response.
“No,” she sighs, and Paxton could swear her fingers twitch a little, “but you are smart...being thoughtful and always stepping in…and…and..” her lashes flutter close and she leans in.
For a second, Paxton thinks she’s about to kiss him and a confusing mix of panic and aching want flares up—not like this, he thinks— but then Eleanor’s head lolls forward onto his shoulder, her breathing slowing.
The weight of her head on his shoulder feels nice. Comforting. He could get used to this uncomplicated level of trust.
He only allows himself to indulge in a few more moments with the solidness of her head against him, little puffs of her breath kissing the base of his neck, before he lays her down gently on his bed.
As Eleanor lightly snores, Paxton rolls out a sleeping bag on the ground and lays down.
Sleep does not immediately come; he stares at the ceiling, his mind all foggy.
It only gets that way lately when he’s with her.
Too bad the pool isn’t open this late.
*
The morning after, Paxton wakes up on the floor to find Eleanor still in his bed.
She must have heard him stirring awake because she immediately says, “Campus breakfast stops in an hour. We should leave soon.”
They are walking to the main dining hall, past brick buildings with moss curled around edges, when Eleanor blurts out, looking straight ahead, “I need to know what this is.”
Paxton is groggy but alert enough to buy himself some time and clarity. He slows his steps. “This?”
He squints at the arched entrance of the building nearby. “Honestly…not sure. My classes are on the other side—"
Eleanor abruptly stops walking and pivots sharply to face him. “No, I mean us. What are we?”
Any sort of cool, unaffected response at the tip of his tongue is gone. Disappeared like powdered sugar on his tongue, leaving his mouth equally heavy with the residual aftertaste.
Paxton tucks his hands into his pockets, self-conscious. “I haven’t gone on a date in weeks with anyone else.”
Anyone else.
A blush blossoms along Eleanor’s face and neck, the blush light as cherry blossoms before deepening into a berry red. Paxton wonders if she blushes like that elsewhere, and an agitation builds in his chest.
Eleanor’s own chest is rising and falling more rapidly.
He had been waiting all this time for a signal, a sign, any sort of hint that he wouldn’t be diving into a bottomless pit.
Regardless of what is waiting for him at the end, he’s hurdling off the edge now.
“Y-y-you never even told me how you felt about me. You haven’t even—”
Paxton kisses her.
He follows through.
A lingering peck, tentative, lips curved like a question as he pulls back, and Eleanor—
Stiffens.
Stands stock-still.
The type of stillness that makes Paxton’s brain rush, his throat dry, because damnit he was taking it slow for a reason and that reason was her, and his pulse pounds in his ears and he feels a little sick, sick in the way he hadn’t been since the swim meet at Stanford where he forgot to monitor his salt balance, water intake, so he takes in a ragged breath and says, “I like you, only you—”
And then Eleanor presses her lips back against his.
*
Paxton scrapes the rest of the scrambled eggs into his mouth and finishes chewing, wiping his mouth. “So,” he straightens and leans back, “you think I’m sexy, huh?”
Eleanor gingerly sets down her cup of coffee.
“And—mysterious?” He adds, the corners of his mouth lifting even higher.
She juts her chin up at him, and arches an eyebrow, but she’s smiling. “Didn’t think that was the part that surprised you.”
“True,” Paxton says, dimples flashing as he reaches over and takes Eleanor’s hand in his.