Archive of Our Own ^beta

tomey 🔒 @tommybahamy
i’m back in the fucking building AGAIN
↳ tomey 🔒 @tommybahamy

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Amanda @lehancanto
Finally getting my space to a way I like it ❣️

↳ tommyyy @tomeybones

↳ court @co_freakin_mill

↳ angela! @anggiarratana

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ang 🔒 @gayrratana

senior year auditions and im still stressing abt it. whats even the point

↳ ch 🔒 @takeachanse

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tomey 🔒 @tommybahamy

got pokémon cards (cool) and talked to strangers (evil) at the game store. 

↳ tomey 🔒 @tommybahamy

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alexander i hardly know er 🔒 @alextrans

watching spencer talk to strangers makes me feel like a parent watching my toddler on the playground

↳ alexander i hardly know er 🔒 @alextrans

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tomey 🔒 @tommybahamy

WHY does auditioning still make me so nervous. it’s literally ian and anthony. who even cares

↳ ch 🔒 @takeachanse

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tommy @tomeybones

pre-semester coffee with my beautiful wife <3

↳ Amanda @lehancanto

↳ arasha @arasha_

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arasha @arasha_

girls night girls night!

↳ trevor @trevarts

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court 🤫 🔒@getweirder

no one tell arasha but we’re playing werewolf without her to get better at lying

↳ rash 🔒 @hotdiggitydog

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trevor @trevarts

im making tommy buy me all my pkmn cards from now on. full art pull lfg

↳ tommyyy @tomeybones

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tomey 🔒 @tommybahamy

didn’t get bought a single drink tonight btw. my depression is so off-putting i’m not even getting my pretty privilege

↳ ch 🔒 @takeachanse

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court 🔒 @getweirder

i cannot tell you my plans bc the haters will sabotage me

↳ shhhhhhayne 🔒 @ontopp

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ang 🔒 @gayrratana

CALLBACK FOR THIS YEAR’S SHAKESPEARE READING. EVERYONE CHEERED

↳ ch 🔒 @takeachanse

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spennce 🔒 @spensser

dude i forgot i’m a fucking TA for padilla this semester

↳ spennce 🔒 @spensser

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spennce 🔒 @spensser

LET ME IN!!!!!!

↳ spennce 🔒 @spensser

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Spencer paces the hallway on repeat while he waits. He buys a pack of cookies from the vending machine for himself, and an extra to give to Tommy (as long as he likes them.) Padilla’s syllabus is definitely not worth all this trouble, but Spencer’s not about to cause a problem on day one of being a TA. After a while of pacing, he decides to suck it up and sit on the hallway floor, laptop on his knees as he makes sure he has the most updated version of the syllabus and can hopefully be in-and-out.

 

He hears Tommy approaching before he sees him round the corner. At least, he hopes he hears Tommy, because he’s honestly a little embarrassed to be sitting here on the floor like a kid locked out of the house.

 

“Hey,” Tommy says, making eye contact from down the hall. He’s got the carabiner with the keys on it dangling from his fingers. Spencer leans his head back against the wall, relieved.

 

“You’re seriously my hero, dude,” he smiles. “Why the hell do you even have those?”

 

“I run the social media for the departments,” Tommy says, unlocking the door while Spencer gets up. “ And I was the last one to stage manage something last year, and they never took them back. A good reputation does wonders.” He throws a glance over his shoulder as the door opens, and enters ahead of Spencer to hold the door open.

 

“Good to know. So you’re who I should talk to if I have something to promote?” Spencer enters the computer lab, flicking on one of the awful fluorescent lights.

 

“As long as it’s school-appropriate, sure,” Tommy jokes, leaning against the open door. Spencer hums in response, putting his bag down on a chair and his laptop on the desk. “What’s Anthony got you doing here before classes start?”

 

“Printing out like twenty copies of his syllabus for Intro,” Spencer replies, one hand waving the task away dismissively as the other dips into his bag. “I’ve got something to thank you for your time.”

 

Tommy raises an eyebrow and tilts his head, forming an expression somewhere between confusion and amusement.

 

“I hope you like these. I didn’t want to ask what kind of coffee you liked or anything.” Spencer holds out the small bag of cookies, and Tommy can’t help but smile at how stupid and endearing it is.

 

“I do like these, thanks.” Tommy stashes them, dropping them into his tote bag. Inevitably, Trevor will probably be the one eating them, but the gesture is nice on its own. “You really didn’t have to, though. I kind of needed an excuse to leave my apartment.”

 

“Thought you said you were coming to campus anyway,” Spencer says, sitting down in the chair beside his bag and starting to log onto the desktop computer.

 

“Well,” Tommy shrugs, “my friend was gonna come to my apartment to rehearse, but I had to come here anyway for callbacks, so. What’s the difference?”

 

“You changed your plans to come let me in,” Spencer realizes, and looks at Tommy. Tommy looks away, clearly a little bashful at being called out about it. Spencer swallows whatever sentence was going to come after that. “I won’t hold you up any longer. Should I prop the door?”

 

“I got you,” Tommy mumbles, kicking the doorstop into place between the doorframe and the door. It’s not holding the door completely open, just enough to keep it from closing and locking again. “Good luck with Anthony.”

 

“Oh, he’s fine,” Spencer laughs. “Padilla is a pushover, especially in Intro. You think he’s so intimidating at first but he’s such a teddy bear of a guy.”

 

“Careful, Ian’s office is right next door.”

 

“If he’s here, he heard me pacing around for the better part of an hour and didn’t come out to help, so fuck that guy,” Spencer jokes, laughing a little at his own bit. Thankfully, it makes Tommy laugh too.

 

“Okay, I should go,” Tommy says, checking his phone. “Please make sure this locks again when you leave. I’ll get in so much trouble if something happens in here.” Spencer salutes, and doesn’t see the eyeroll-and-smile that it gets out of Tommy as he leaves.

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spennce 🔒 @spensser

i’m in.

↳ alexander i hardly know er 🔒 @alextrans

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alexander i hardly know er 🔒 @alextrans

his ass is NOT locked in

↳ spennce 🔒 @spensser

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tomey 🔒 @tommybahamy

callbacks ✅

↳ trevs 🔒 @lethimcook

↳ ch 🔒 @takeachanse

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shhhhhhhayne 🔒 @ontopp

If they don’t cast Angela in this, we’re burning this school to the ground

↳ ch 🔒 @takeachanse

↳ ang 🔒 @gayrratana

↳ Mandy 🔒 @moviemandy

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spennce 🔒 @spensser

padilla is so lucky that i like him and i didnt back out of TAing when he told me the class was at 9:30 this semester

↳ court 🤐 🔒 @getweirder

↳ ang 🔒 @gayrratana

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alexander i hardly know er 🔒 @alextrans

I LEFT MY LAPTOP AT HOMEEEEE .. the world is so cruel to me :(

↳ spennce 🔒 @spensser

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They don’t talk about it until Alex is home from class, while they stand in their kitchen together. Alex is making tea, while Spencer sips on his second Kickstart of the day. (He drank the first while sitting on the side of Intro to Film.) The caffeine shows as he taps his fingers anxiously on the counter.

 

“So, what’s up?” Alex breaks the silence, prompting Spencer. They lean back against the counter across from Spencer, forcing the two of them to have this conversation face-to-face, as much as Spencer is trying to avoid it.

 

“Okay,” Spencer starts, just to get himself talking, “do you remember when I told you about my ex, from the school I went to in Florida?” Alex nods, not giving Spencer the distraction of a verbal response. “I left out some of that story. It’s not, uh,” he hesitates. “It’s not fun.”

 

“I assumed that much,” Alex half-jokes, to break the tension. “You only have to tell me as much of it as you’re comfortable.”

 

“Yeah,” Spencer nods, acknowledging the space. “It’s kind of a long story, I’ll try to, uh, condense it, I guess.”

 

He feels like that version of himself, in this moment. A smaller, more scared version of himself, with wide eyes like a deer in headlights, looking up at a woman older than him that had him convinced that they were soulmates.

 

“I had a really hard time making friends my freshman year. Like, a really hard time. I wasn’t good at talking to people, and I had all my weird little niche interests,” he pauses, gesturing with his hands like the words will appear in his grasp. “People weren’t fucking with me there, is I guess how I’m phrasing this. So, when an older girl— not that much older, but, y’know, a senior when I was a freshman— when she wanted to be around me, I jumped at the chance. I was anxious and lonely and it probably didn’t help that I was desperately trying to still be straight, so of course I wanted to get to know her.”

 

Alex nods, trying to meet Spencer's gaze to keep eye contact, but Spencer can’t look up from the can in his hands. Spencer opens and closes his mouth a few times.

 

“Then she asked me out, which was, frankly, fucking insane! Looking back, it’s all so obvious that she was grooming me, manipulating me, all of that. Every part of it was obvious, but when you’re 18 and hours away from home for the first time,” he shrugs. “I was all in. And she had me wrapped around her finger, so I gave up on trying to make other friends, so I could prove myself to this older girl, and...”

 

He feels that anxiety in his chest, like he did back then. He can almost feel her presence in front of him, and it makes his face flush as he tries to recall the events and share them. It’s embarrassing, knowing he fell for this, and even more embarrassing to admit how much it derailed his life for the two years following.

 

“I was convinced that she was going to stick around where we went to school after graduating, ‘cause we were so in love. She told me a lot of times that that was the plan, that we could move in together and,” he swallows. “Anyway. She graduated, and obviously , she broke up with me right before I moved home for the summer. I had spent my entire freshman year focused on her, and she dropped me like I was nothing, y’know?” 

 

He spent that summer hiding in his bedroom, playing video games and repressing every emotion he felt about the situation. When he went back to school in the fall, it was even harder to make friends, so he withdrew from that school and took classes online for a year, which of course allowed him to even further close himself off from the rest of the world.

 

(When he transferred here, across the country, he was terrified that he’d never make friends here either. Alex was the first person to talk to him outside of class, and they hit it off right away. They’ve been best friends since the moment they met, really.)

 

Distantly, Spencer becomes aware of the fact that this is the first time he’s told this story to someone else, out loud, in full.

 

“So that’s that. Questions from the class?” Spencer makes a weak attempt at a joke, while Alex looks at him, taking in this version of his best friend.

 

“Spence, that’s,” Alex struggles to find the words, looking for the middle ground between pity and empathy. “That sucks,” is what they land on. “None of that was your fault. I’m sure you know that, logically and all, but it’s important to me that you hear someone else say it too.”

 

“Thanks,” Spencer musters up. “And I know none of that has to do with Courtney, or Shayne, or Angela, or,” he trails off momentarily. “I think maybe seeing them so happy makes me feel like I’ve missed something. I spent all of my college years kind of miserable. Not here, obviously, for the most part. You’ve done a great job of pulling me out of that, frankly. But I haven’t dated anyone since then, and you were like, kind of the first friend I’ve even truly made since then. It’s weird.”

 

“That makes sense,” Alex says, and he means it. “It doesn’t mean you can be a dick to our friends about it, but it does track.”

 

“I know. I need to apologize to Court,” Spencer admits, scrubbing his hand over his face.

 

“And Ang. She was really annoyed that you were being weird to Amanda the other night.”

 

“ Fuck ,” Spencer says into his hand, but doesn’t argue.

 

“Yeah,” Alex mumbles. He turns to lean against the counter next to Spencer, now standing beside him instead of across from him, and wraps an arm around him. Spencer leans into it, despite the fact that if anyone else touched him right now, he’d walk away. “Thank you for sharing that with me though. For real.”

 

“Thanks for being normal about it. I know it’s a bad story to be normal about.”

 

“It happens to people, dude. You’re not the only person in the world that that’s happened to. Literally the least I can do is be normal about that.”

 

Spencer chuckles quietly, and leans his head on Alex’s shoulder.

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chanse @phatchanse

senior year is all about being the world’s prettiest roommates

↳ court @co_freakin_mill

↳ tommyyy @tomeybones

↳ angela! @anggiarratana

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ang 🔒  @gayrratana

CAST LIST EMAIL

↳ ang 🔒 @gayrratana

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rash 🔒 @hotdiggitydog

EVERYONE CHEER FOR TREVOR RIGHT NOW OR I’M BLOWING THIS PLACE UP

↳ trevs 🔒 @lethimcook

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Tommy had decided ahead of time to hide himself in the computer lab after class. Sure, someone else could be in there, but nobody else is in the computer lab during the first week of classes. The only people who usually even have keycard access to it are people who have classes in there. After Senior Seminar, he hung out with Angela and Chanse for a little longer and then made some excuse about needing to print something so he could head off on his own, to be alone when the cast lists come out.

 

It would’ve made more sense, maybe, to go to his apartment, but then if it’s bad news, he’s truly alone. On campus, he has a reason to pull himself together enough to get home. He can get himself a treat or something on the way, and then he’ll be mostly fine, albeit more depressed than before.

 

He gets the notification to his email, and immediately feels his stomach churn. There’s an awful feeling in his gut, worse than when he knows he completely bombed an audition. His eyes scroll down the cast list for the reading of Much Ado About Nothing : Angela Giarratana as Beatrice, Shayne Topp as Benedick, Trevor Evarts as Claudio. Chanse is on the list as a swing. His name is the only one missing from their group of theater kids.

 

He finds himself thinking ‘ Shayne isn’t even a fucking theater student ’, and then feels awful about the jealousy of it all. He’s proud of Chanse, and really proud of Trevor. He’s happy for Angela— he doesn’t know her that well, but Chanse loves her, and Tommy’s always enjoyed her performances in the department’s shows. Despite all of that, he finds himself with tears clinging to his eyelashes.

 

“Fuck,” he mumbles, wiping his eyes.

 

Every part of this is mortifying. He’s a goddamn senior. He’s studying theater to perform professionally, as a job, and he can’t even get cast in a low-stakes reading. Plus, all of his friends are in it, and he gets FOMO like crazy even in the best circumstances. He won’t even get to spend time with his friends now that they’re back. He can’t even talk about how upset he is because he doesn’t want to take away from them.

 

As if on cue for the worst possible moment, there’s a knock on the computer lab door. Tommy wants to scream. He stays as quiet as possible, closing his eyes to try to ground himself, and hoping desperately that whoever it is will go away. He breathes in and out, imagining Amanda with him, guiding him through the breathing in the way she’s best at. He wants to call her, really, but she might be with Angela, and he’s sure that Angela is thrilled.

 

There’s another knock, although it almost sounds like it’s on the wall. It must be the next room over, on Ian’s office door. Shortly after, there’s one more knock on the computer lab. Tommy takes a shaky breath and wipes his eyes, pushing himself up from his chair. This is why he chose to be in here for the cast list, right? Someone else is waiting for the room, clearly, which gives him the perfect motivation to get the fuck out of here as soon as can pull himself together.

 

After a good few minutes, he gathers his stuff, trying his best to look at least presentable, and opens the door to head out.

 

When he opens it, he almost bursts out laughing, hysterical over the series of events he’s put himself in the middle of. Sitting there, back to the wall and phone in his hands, is Spencer. Spencer looks up, eyes lighting up as he realizes the door is open, brows knitting together when he realizes Tommy is standing there and looks, frankly, like shit.

 

“Whoa, are you okay?” Spencer says, before he can think to maybe ease into it. “Sorry.”

 

“Fuck,” Tommy breathes out a pathetic (but genuine) laugh. “No, I’m sorry. I’m the one hogging it. You can use it if you want, I’ll hold the door.”

 

“I appreciate it,” Spencer says, grunting mid-way through as he pushes himself off the ground, “but what’s up?”

 

“I’ll be fine, I promise,” Tommy makes an attempt at deflection and, due to an unfortunately timed voice crack, comes off closer to denial. “Well, I’m gonna go get myself a treat and then I’ll be fine.”

 

“Do you want company?” Spencer asks, eyebrows raising like he’s telling a joke, but voice too genuine to fool Tommy into thinking he’s teasing.

 

“What’s your deal?” Tommy says, and it comes out more defensive than he intends. “Sorry, not, like, what’s your deal , I just mean,” he trails off, unable to find the words.

 

He really can’t get a feel for this guy’s vibe, though. Spencer has an energy of nonchalance about him, like he doesn’t quite care about anything, but every time he speaks, Tommy can tell how genuine he is. It’s disorienting. Maybe he does want company. If nothing else, he can try to figure out what his whole thing is about.

 

“No, that’s fair. I don’t want to impose or anything, but it feels bad to just be like, ‘ Cool, sounds good. Enjoy that alone ’ when you’re clearly upset about something.”

 

“Damn,” Tommy laughs, scrubbing a hand over his face as if it’ll get rid of his rosy cheeks and puffy eyes. “Okay, yeah, I didn’t think I was that obvious. I was kind of hoping whoever knocked would be gone.”

 

“Oh, I’m stubborn. Good luck gettin’ rid of me.”

 

“Clearly,” Tommy jokes, voice a little dry. Spencer bristles slightly, and Tommy waves a hand between them. “No, like, you are, but not in a bad way. It’s nice of you to offer, but I don’t want to keep you if you need to work on something.” He gestures vaguely towards the computer lab, the door resting against his arm as he holds it open by standing in the doorway.

 

“Hey, I don’t mind. Could go for a coffee before I lock in,” Spencer shrugs, “as long as you don’t mind letting me back in when we’re done.”

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alexander i hardly know er 🔒 @alextrans

Hm...............

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chanse @phatchanse

biblically accurate bi4bi much ado

↳ Shayne @supershayne

↳ angela @anggiarratana

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court 🤐 🔒 @getweirder

does anyone wanna do trivia tonight b4 you all have to be in rehearsals??

↳ trevs  🔒 @lethimcook

↳ rash  🔒 @hotdiggitydog

↳ ang  🔒 @gayrratana

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tomey 🔒 @tommybahamy

been following this guy for four months, he hasn’t had one good day

↳ rash  🔒 @hotdiggitydog

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spencer @spennser

yall mind if a white boy play a little trivia tonight?

↳ angela! @anggiarratana

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court 🤐 🔒 @getweirder

WHAT THE FUCK

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Courtney feels like they’re about to lose it. They had a plan , a good plan, and of course his two dumbass friends had to go ruin it by already knowing each other. Shayne has a hand over hers under the table, the closest he can get to reassuring her about this while not giving away the scheme of it all. He’d leaned over subtly to show her the texts with Alex, despite the fact Alex was sitting on the opposite side of her.

 

On the other side of Alex was Spencer, with Tommy sitting directly across from him. The three of them had already been talking when Courtney, Shayne, and Amanda approached the host stand— and when Courtney promptly whipped out her phone to update their matchmaking groupchat before they could get to the table. 

 

(To avoid suspicion, Shayne was somehow delegated the role of texting the groupchat update, so Court and Amanda could mostly stay off their phones at the table. Thankfully, this didn’t last long before the rest of the group arrived in pairs.)

 

Angela took her seat next to Amanda, while giving Court extremely obvious looks between her and the two men of the hour from across the table. Chanse took the seat next to Angela, across from Shayne, and left the two seats at the end of the table open for Trevor and Arasha when they arrived.

 

When they arrive, Arasha leans over the back of Tommy’s chair to wrap her arms around him, and he leans back into her touch, closing his eyes. When she moves to sit beside Chanse at the other end of the table, he reaches for her behind the three seats between them and they both giggle. 

 

“Is he good?” Trevor asks, across the table from her, too low for the rest of the group to hear. Arasha nods, giving him a look that he knows means ‘we’ll talk about it on the way home.’

 

“I heard there’s a musical theater category tonight,” Court announces to the table. Chanse and Angela gasp, declaring that they’re locking in, and Spencer looks across the table at Tommy.

 

“Are you a musicals guy?” Spencer asks, feeling shaky on the category himself. Tommy laughs.

 

“I can be, depends on the musical. I’m more of a hyperpop, drag race gay than a musical theater gay,” he jokes.

 

“Dude. I gotta hear your hyperpop takes,” Spencer leans in, and Tommy happily starts to share. Amanda looks at Courtney pointedly, clocking this conversation.

 

With a ten-person team, an onlooker would think they’d be far better at trivia than they actually are. Chanse blames it on their buzzer not working right, while Shayne tells him to stop saying that so loud— people at other tables will start to shame them if they keep blaming the buzzer. Trevor and Arasha fully cheat on a couple, hiding their phones at their far end of the table. Shayne, despite being locked into the rules and etiquette of trivia, lets their cheating answers slide for the sake of their giant team of mediocre trivia players. He does not, though, tell Court that they’re cheating— she cares more about the principle of that kind of thing.

 

Spencer fills in a lot of video game knowledge for them. There aren’t a ton of video games questions this week, but he slam dunks every single one within a second of hearing the question. Tommy’s knowledge overlaps a lot with Courtney’s, but in such a way that questions relating to their interests can always be gotten correctly by at least one of them, if not both confirming that they have the same answer.

 

Angela is really good at the handful of musical questions, even with Chanse shouting at her for not letting him answer any of them because she always gets to the buzzer first.

 

Even with all of them in their specific areas of expertise, they still only get second. Spencer and Alex joke about how embarrassing that is, given just how many of them are playing. Second place only gets a ten-dollar gift certificate to the bar, which cracks Shayne and Spencer up. (“Hey, drinks on me,” Spencer jokes, holding up his hands to stop the rest of the table’s conversation.)

 

As they all prepare to go their separate ways, collecting jackets and such, Spencer steps behind Alex to talk to Court. The energy has felt weird all night, and he’s not sure why. Part of him is worried that his apology did more harm than good, and as weird as he feels about bringing it up, he’d feel worse if he found out later that she was still upset with him.

 

“Hey,” he mutters, nudging Court’s arm, “are we good?”

 

“What?” Court asks, and then laughs a little. “Oh, yeah, we’re fine, Spence.”

 

“Cool, uh,” he pushes his hands into his pockets awkwardly, “I just felt like you were annoyed about something and I wanted to make sure.” Court shifts at this, and Spencer feels like he made things more tense both by noticing and by bringing it up. Court looks past him, though he doesn’t know what they’re looking at.

 

“No, yeah, we’re good. Just got thrown off ‘cause,” she hesitates for a moment, then continues, “the friend I wanted to introduce to you didn’t show, and it messed me up. I’m good now though.”

 

From behind Court, Shayne hears this and, unbeknownst to either of them, pinches the bridge of his nose. Despite taking on his role as supportive friend and partner, he really doesn’t understand why they can’t just explicitly tell Tommy and Spencer what they’re thinking.

 

Spencer accepts this answer, relieved that he didn’t have to meet somebody new. The only person he hadn’t met before in their group was Arasha, the girl who showed up with Trevor, and he makes a mental note to ask somebody what that’s about later. 

 

Tommy, chatting with Amanda and Chanse as he prepares to head out, is thinking similarly. He, however, knows better than to ask about it while they’re still here, if at all. Maybe once he’s home, he’ll text Amanda and ask what happened to the guy he was supposed to meet. More likely, though, is that he’ll let it slide entirely.

 

He offers Chanse and Angela a ride home, but Amanda waves him off, telling him she’s got them handled. He turns the offer to the rest of the group, but everyone seems to have it figured out already, so he says his goodbyes— gets another hug from Arasha, and one from Trevor too— and leaves. Alex watches Spencer watch him go.

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tomey 🔒 @tommybahamy

i’m making friends, everyone be so proud of me

↳ Mandy  🔒 @moviemandy

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alexander i hardly know er 🔒 @alextrans

fake idgafer i saw u smiling at ur phone

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Shayne @supershayne

Being friends with all arts majors is ridiculous. I’m already writing papers and they’ve got “highlighting a poem” due at midnight.

↳ angela!  @anggiarratana

↳ spencer  @spennser

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spennce 🔒 @spensser

:/

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Spencer is, frankly, losing his mind.

 

He’s not sure what the root cause is, other than finally talking about his freshman year trauma. All he knows is that he’s been the most social this week that he’s been in years. He’s met new people, and spent more than an hour with them. He’s initiated hang-outs. He’s gone out of his way to spend time with someone other than Alex. It’s weird. It’s not like him. He likes it, kind of.

 

It all hits him on Saturday. The first week of senior year catches up with him, and he spends far too long laying in bed on his phone after he wakes up, with no energy to do anything else. He gets texts from people and largely doesn’t respond, but he likes the Tiktoks Angela sends him. Part of him— the larger part, the part that dominated his choices before about a week ago— wishes they weren’t hosting a giant game night tonight. Eight guests is a lot of people, and Spencer has already pushed his own social battery to its limit this week.

 

And yet, after laying in bed until noon (and getting “breakfast” with Alex no earlier than 12:30,) the two of them are cleaning up their apartment. Thankfully, it’s not too messy. They only moved in a couple weeks ago. It’s mostly a matter of organizing the things they’ve procrastinated unpacking and finding places for. They’ve got an impressive bookshelf of games forming, though, with board games all stacked together neatly. Their frequently-played video games are now living on a shelf underneath the TV, where they have the Switch hooked up.

 

Their living room itself is certainly not big enough for ten people to be seated comfortably, even with the decent amount of seating: there’s a couch, a loveseat, and a chair crammed into their relatively-small space, but some people will definitely still end up on the floor. Not that their friends mind much; Angela often winds up on the floor even in places with plenty of empty seats.

 

They do a quick grocery run before their friends come over, too, after sending out “what snacks do you like?” texts to all of them. It’s mostly the typical party snacks: a couple bags of chips, a bag of pretzels, some dips. Spencer grabs the ice cream that he likes, and Alex picks up a box of otter pops on a whim. (They’re on sale, presumably because nobody’s buying otter pops at the tail end of August. Except Alex.)

 

The other text that gets sent out to everyone is the time they should arrive. The time they’re sent, though, is about half an hour before they actually want people to arrive, which is Alex’s idea. Even though they aren’t this familiar with a few of their new guests, they know their typical crew well enough to know they’re always at least 20 minutes late to a function. So, they tell them 6:30, fully intending for guests to arrive around 7.

 

Suffice to say, a knock on the door at 6:40 startles both of them from their places in the kitchen, where they’ve been lingering for a solid half hour, talking about their new classes for the semester. Alex and Spencer look at each other with furrowed brows, before Alex goes to answer the door. Spencer lingers in the open doorway between their kitchen and the living room, watching them.

 

“Oh, hey!” Alex smiles wide, stepping aside and letting their guest come through.

 

Something in Spencer jumps when he sees Tommy. He’s nervous, all of a sudden; he keeps getting nervous when he’s with Tommy. He thinks it must be him overcoming his years of social anxiety and introversion; he wasn’t quite this nervous when the rest of their friends showed up to trivia. Thankfully, Alex knows him well enough to spot his anxiety, and he’s also a much better host.

 

“Hey, thanks for inviting me,” Tommy smiles at Alex as he enters, then turns to Spencer and gives a small wave with the hand that isn’t holding his tote bag up on his shoulder. “Where is everyone?” He jokes, and Spencer chuckles.

 

“Congratulations, you’re the most on-time friend we have,” Spencer says.

 

“And I thought I was so slick waiting to be ten minutes late,” Tommy admits, looking a little sheepish himself.

 

“Well, the rest of them probably won’t be here for another fifteen,” Alex adds, sticking one of Spencer’s boots between the door and the frame to prop it open. “Sorry that we misled you. If we knew you were prompt, I would’ve told Spence to tell you 7.” 

 

“Hey, now I know for next time,” Tommy smiles.

 

“Can I get you a drink or something? We’re about to set up snack bowls,” Spencer offers, gesturing to the kitchen behind him.

 

“I’m good for now, but do you want help?”

 

“You’re a guest, sit down,” Alex dismisses his offer, with a teasing lilt in his voice.

 

Tommy watches, then. He takes a seat on the edge of their couch closest to the kitchen, though the armchair is between them, and alternates between scrolling on his phone and looking at the two of them prepare for the rest of their guests to arrive. Spencer and Alex move around each other easily, even in the tight space of their narrow kitchen, and even though they’ve only lived here a few weeks. It’s less about the space, and more about their understanding of one another. They fall into a rhythm, Alex handing Spencer the bowls and Spencer filling them, then Spencer handing the bags back to Alex so they can put a clip on them.

 

Shayne and Courtney are the next to arrive, but true to Alex’s word, it isn’t for another fifteen minutes. By that time, Alex is putting out the bowls on their coffee table (which is far too small for the three different bowls, really,) and Spencer is setting up drinks on their kitchen counter. Shayne and Courtney enter without being invited in, just knocking quickly before they open the propped door. Court lights up at the sight of Tommy, and he stands to hug her.

 

Spencer pokes his head out of the kitchen, catching sight of their hug. Something in his chest tightens, and he swallows it down before greeting the couple.

 

Amanda arrives a few minutes later with wine, greeting her friends with hugs as well. She’s the first to come wrap Spencer in a hug, and he melts into it more than he intends to. Even though he knows Amanda mostly through Angela, she’s still endeared herself to him in a way he didn’t expect. It’s partially because of her outright way of speaking— she calls him attractive and isn’t afraid to tell him when his jokes are awful, even she’s laughing— but it’s mostly because of just how herself she is. She doesn’t care at all what other people think, something she has in common with Angela, and he admires it. He hugs her back, and she squeezes him a little tighter, like she can tell he needs it.

 

The four of them fill out the couch easily, with Amanda and Tommy on opposite ends, Shayne and Court between them. Alex takes their place on the armchair, which had sort of unofficially become the ‘host seat’ during their first game night. 

 

(It’s at around this time that Tommy gets a text from Arasha:

 

 

“Arasha and Trevor are running late,” Tommy relays to the group. Alex and Spencer share a look. This time, Tommy knows what they’re communicating.)

 

Angela and Chanse arrive with the amount of noise anyone would expect them to arrive with, announcing their presence with grins and shouts. Chanse brought some kind of fruity vodka seltzers, which Spencer quickly takes to set up on the counter with the other drinks. The two of them aren’t huggers, although Angela does quickly take a seat on the floor in front of Amanda and Shayne, leaning back against their legs comfortably. Chanse takes the spot on the floor next to her.

 

“Spence, can you grab the wine glasses I left here last week?” Amanda calls, while Spencer is organizing the drink counter. Tommy reaches over to grab her hand, grateful for her planning ahead. “One for me and one for Tommy.”

 

“Grab me one of the seltzers!” Angela adds with a grin, and Chanse gently smacks her arm. “Two! For Chanse.”

 

“I only have two hands, dude!” Spencer calls back with a laugh, then emerges from the kitchen with two glasses of wine, handing them to Tommy. He passes one to Amanda, and Spencer prompts the group: “Any other drink orders?”

 

Court also requests a seltzer, but Shayne insists that he’s fine for now, so Spencer goes to grab them while Alex starts soliciting first-game-of-the-night suggestions from the group. Tommy looks up at Spencer like he’s about to offer to help grab drinks. Spencer turns on his heel to go get them before he can do so.

 

“Well, usually we go for a Mario Party or Mario Kart, but there’s way too many of us for that unless we do some teaming up and swapping, so maybe we save that for later.” Alex is explaining as he brings the drinks out. Spencer stays standing near the armchair, leaning his elbow on the corner of it above Alex. “And I wanna save Werewolf for when everyone is here.”

 

“Jackbox while we wait? There’s eight of us right now,” Spencer offers, and Alex cranes his neck up to look at him and agree.

 

Spencer is happy to be the one moving around. Having something to do distracts him from the heavy rock of anxiety in his gut, and the unidentified feeling that’s twisting its way around his chest. He lets the others chat while he retrieves his laptop from his room and sets it up with the TV, giving them time to decide which Jackbox game they want to start on while it gets sorted. They decide on Trivia Murder Party, mostly because they don’t all know each other well enough for a solid round of Quiplash yet.

 

Still on his knees in front of the TV, Spencer turns over his shoulder to make sure everyone’s good to go. Alex pats the arm of his chair, then gestures to the open spot on the floor between himself and Tommy. Spencer rolls his eyes and scoots over to take that spot, then hits go on the game. He settles himself comfortably against the side of the armchair, in an attempt to fight his body’s instinct to lean back against the person behind him. 

 

They get about halfway through the game before there’s a knock on the propped-open door, and they hear voices outside:

 

“It’s literally open, Trev, just go in.”

 

“No, I wanna surprise them!”

 

“Just move, I’ll get it—”

 

“Rash—”

 

The door opens and Arasha comes in, smiling politely as Trevor enters behind her and stands in the open doorway holding a plate of cookies, covered with saran wrap.

 

“Sorry we’re late,” Arasha says.

 

“I made cookies!” Trevor immediately follows, with a beaming grin.

 

It’s funny, how different Trevor seems now than how Spencer perceived him when he was Shayne’s roommate. He’d only ever met Trevor in passing, except for a handful of times when they all watched a movie or played Mario Party together in Shayne’s dorm. Then, Trevor had seemed more lost. He always assumed it was the same thing he felt as a freshman: desperately wanting to fit in, and wanting to seem cool to people older than him. Now, though, he seems much more comfortable in his own skin. Spencer’s almost envious of the bright smile he has.

 

“You didn’t need to do that,” Alex says, mostly as a nicety. “Feel free to put them in the kitchen, I don’t know if there’s any more space on the table.”

 

“Heard,” Trevor responds, taking one hand off the plate to salute.

 

Trevor and Arasha take the remaining spots on the loveseat, clearly comfortable sharing each other’s space. Before they’ve even joined a game, they end up with Trevor sitting sideways, legs resting over Arasha’s. Spencer desperately wants to look over at the rest of the group and double-check that they’re all 100% sure those two aren’t dating. He tries to make eye contact with Court at some point, but catches Tommy’s eye instead. Tommy raises his eyebrows as if to say ‘ I know. ’

 

They end up breaking into groups after the game ends, splitting up to play multiple games at once: there’s a few too many of them to comfortably play most of the games Alex and Spencer own. Trevor and Shayne are dying to play Flip 7, though, so Spencer hands it to them from their games shelf. Chanse and Angela join them, and drag Amanda and Arasha into it too. They all settle into their side of the living room, clearing snack bowls off the coffee table to give them room to flip cards.

 

Spencer clocks Alex and Court sharing a look, which strikes him as odd, but he can’t place what’s happening. Court bumps Tommy with her shoulder and nods her head towards Spencer.

 

“Spencer and Alex made up a version of Mario Party where you try not to win, we should try that. There’s only four of us, we can actually play,” they suggest, with a glint in their eye.

 

“Oh, uh, for sure. It’s a good time, I can teach you,” Spencer offers to Tommy, looking up at him from the armchair-couch corner he’s formed for himself. Tommy smiles, and Spencer can’t help but return it.

 

“Oh my god, are you playing Don’t Win without me?” Angela pipes up from the other side of the table. Court turns his head towards them, and they promptly return their focus to the card game. Spencer feels like his head is spinning.

 

This time, Alex gets up to set up his Switch before Spencer can even move. He’s asking some question to Tommy about if he prefers a Joycon or a full controller, but it feels far away. Spencer knows something is bubbling, he can feel it both in the room and in himself, and he hates it. There’s something happening that he’s not privy to, and an emotion he can’t place. It’s freaking him out. Alex hands him a Joycon and he mumbles his thanks.

 

Spencer’s never put up a worse Mario Party performance in his life, even for Don’t Win. Tommy keeps leaning forward to focus on the minigames, and Spencer is putting all his focus into not getting distracted by someone he met a week ago being so in his space. Not just his personal space, but his apartment, which weirdly feels more vulnerable. He wasn’t anticipating this being the vibe of his senior year. He’s not sure where things shifted. It’s only the first week, he thinks. The first week is always the most optimistic version of the rest of the semester. This won’t last.

 

Tommy looks at him with a grin after he fumbles an easy loss, where everyone else ties for ‘fourth’ and Spencer gets ‘first’. Spencer forces himself to roll his eyes with what he hopes is a playful vibe.

 

“Sorry for kind of destroying you at your own game, in your own home,” Tommy teases, and Spencer feels his face get hot. Something about it kicks him into gear. He locks in on the game, doesn’t let himself look back at Tommy until he absolutely has to.

 

Before he knows it, that game is over. He mutters something about needing to use the bathroom and excuses himself. When he gets there, it’s locked, of course. He’s not sure who he missed from the other group getting up to go, but he stands there in his own hallway like it’s a public restroom. Amanda comes out a moment later, and barely gets the door open before her face shifts.

 

“You okay, Spence?” She asks softly, in a way that makes Spencer feel worse.

 

“Yeah, I’m good,” he lies through his teeth. Her eyebrows furrow.

 

“Do you want us to go? I can find an excuse if you need people out, I get it.”

 

“No, no,” Spencer says, too quickly. “No, I just, I have a headache. I’m gonna take some Aspirin and I’ll be back out.”

 

“You let me know if you need anything though, okay sweetie?”

 

“Alright.”

 

He locks himself in the bathroom and lets water run over his hands for just a moment before he runs them through his hair. One of his hands gets caught on a tangle and he sighs. It doesn’t need to be this serious. He doesn’t think he’s built for much analysis of what he’s feeling. It makes him feel nauseous.

 

He comes back out to Arasha and Alex setting up One Night Werewolf, and he scrubs his hands over his face. Of all people, Tommy catches his gaze and lowers his brows. Spencer makes some sort of noncommittal expression and movement, dismissing it, and Tommy nods. Alex offers to help run the game because there’s so many of them, letting Spencer actually play. In an attempt to push past whatever mental state he’s in, Spencer accepts, and takes Alex’s place in the armchair while Alex stands.

 

Conversation breaks out during the nighttime phase, though it starts with everyone taking turns imitating the voice coming from Alex’s phone. Court breaks into giggles when they all go around, taking shots at the deep voice’s “ Robber ” prompt. Spencer enjoys the excuse to sit with his eyes closed and just laugh at his friends— he’s just a Villager, which he suspects was curated by Alex, who know him well enough to have clocked that he needed an easy role.

 

As soon as they open their eyes, Arasha takes charge in a way that catches Spencer off-guard. He vaguely recalls Court and Shayne mentioning their “friend who’s really good at lying,” and only then does it click that this is her. Even if she’s telling the truth, she has an immediate leadership over the group, and Trevor backs her up easily.

 

“Wait, Arasha, what are you?” Shayne cuts her off at one point, after revealing that he swapped his own card for Courtney’s, making him one of the Masons.

 

“I’m the Troublemaker,” Arasha claims. Spencer looks at Alex, hoping to glean something from his expression, and then looks at Tommy when he gets nothing from Alex. Tommy is already looking at him, having established that the two of them both have very little helpful information— Tommy is still the Insomniac, and Spencer’s still a Villager (as far as he knows.)

 

“I don’t trust those two,” Tommy says conspiratorily, just to Spencer, gesturing at Trevor and Arasha. Spencer nods in agreement. Tommy turns to the rest of the group: “What trouble’d you make?” 

 

“I swapped Shayne and Courtney,” she says evenly, and Tommy leans back, making a wide gesture with his arms.

 

“Oh, how convenient that you swapped them right back.”

 

“It happens!”

 

“Trevor’s being real quiet,” Chanse points out, breaking through the argument.

 

The timer runs down and they almost unanimously vote for Arasha, who flips her card to reveal they’re correct. (“Did one of you tell Alex that I always end up being the werewolf? What the fuck is this?”) Trevor laughs as he flips his card over to reveal he was the Minion. (“I didn’t get a chance to mislead you guys enough, Rash is too good at taking charge.”)

 

The next round, Spencer feels more capable of actually playing. He forgot how fun this game can be with such a large group. Alex must’ve picked up on it, because he deals Spencer a Werewolf card, and does a heart with his hands when it’s his turn to open his eyes. When he looks for the other Werewolf, he’s amused to see Tommy with his eyes open as well. Even with the weirdness he feels about Tommy, he can’t help but feel like they’ll be a good team here. Tommy winks at him when they make eye contact, and Spencer smiles.

 

They’re not sure if they have a Minion, but Spencer’s pretty sure that Alex wouldn’t make a third of the players evil for their second round. That’s his advantage, here, is that he knows Alex so well; it’s easy to tell in what ways he’d curate the roles. Although, he does give Alex a side eye when Angela claims she’s a Mason with no other Mason. Alex gives a neutral shrug, and Spencer turns his gaze to Tommy, who’s already meeting his eye to agree on this unspoken plan.

 

“Okay, so that’s a lie. ‘Cause Spencer and I are the Masons,” Tommy announces to the group, and they all turn on Angela so quickly. Angela starts yelling immediately, but the group is already trying to decide if that means she’s actually the Werewolf or if she’s the Tanner because that was such a bad lie. Chanse jumps in to say he looked at Arasha’s card and she’s the Tanner. Trevor tries to speak up on that, but nobody lets him. They all decide Angela’s the Werewolf so quickly that the entire group is hysterical laughing at her defensive yelling. They even vote early, with everyone except Angela pointing at her.

 

“Oh, you bitches think you’re so smart, but look!” Angela shouts, flipping her card over. The room erupts when they see that her card is, in fact, the Mason. Seven heads whip around to look at Spencer and Tommy, who are sporting matching smug smiles. “I told you! I told all of you!”

 

“Dude, I didn’t even get a chance!” Trevor groans, flipping his card over to reveal the Tanner, which surprises Chanse and Arasha. He peels off into an explanation to the two of them, annoyed at how quickly the easiest Tanner game was stolen from him. Meanwhile, the rest of the group is shouting at Tommy and Spencer, who have revealed their Werewolf cards.

 

“Of course Alex made Spencer the Werewolf,” Amanda says, only half-joking, “they knew he’d run circles around us.”

 

“No way, Alex basically handed that win to us. Putting one Mason in the middle is evil, dude,” Spencer laughs, even though he’s riding the high of that easy win anyway. “Odds were stacked against Ang there.”

 

“Hey, I thought we did a good job,” Tommy smiles at him and nudges his arm, and Spencer finds himself leaning over the arm of his chair, into the touch.

 

The group comes back after another minute or two of figuring out exactly what else happened during the night phase, and teasing Alex for how easy they made it, before they hop into another round. They only play two more— it’s getting late, and a couple of them have work in the morning. Even then, it takes a good fifteen minutes for everyone to actually leave. They always get caught up in “goodbyes”, breaking up into pairs and small groups to catch up on little things before they head out.

 

Amanda heads out with Angela on her arm, and Chanse trails close behind. Shayne offers Trevor and Arasha a ride home, so both hosts and Tommy get a hug from Courtney before the four of them all head out together. Before they know it, both groups have cleared out and Tommy’s lingering in the doorway, first to arrive and last to leave.

 

“Really, thank you guys for having me. This was so fun,” he says, sincere. Spencer fights a magnetic pull.

 

“Anytime. Half this group will be busy in a few days, so. Let us know if you ever wanna come over and hang.” Spencer shrugs. Alex chimes in with some form of agreement, slightly muffled, from the kitchen.

 

“I appreciate it. I’ll definitely let you know.”

 

“Well,” Spencer starts, feeling slightly awkward and also wanting to have his home to himself again. “Get home safe. Text me when you get home.”

 

It’s a habit, mostly. It slips out before he realizes the implication. He picked it up from Amanda at some point, he thinks, because she’s always on top of where everybody is and who else is with them. Anytime someone leaves alone, somebody makes sure they’re getting a text when that person gets to their destination.

 

He’s not sure why it’s freaking him out that he said it to Tommy.

 

“I will,” Tommy smiles, cheeks slightly pink. “Night, Spencer.”