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A sudden slam of a book and a frustrated sigh pulled Tyler out of his own intense study session. Tyler looked over at his roommate. He had the heels of his hands pressed against his eyes and he was shaking his head. Tyler looked down at the now closed book on the desk: Introduction to Psychology. Tyler tried not to judge, since Psychology was his major, but how was Josh having such a hard time with Psychology? To Tyler, it’s the easiest subject in the world. Apparently, not to everyone, however.
Josh removes his hands from his face and looks over at Tyler, who is still worriedly looking at Josh. “This is bullshit.” Josh hollers, standing up from his chair and walking over to the mini fridge in the corner of the room.
“What’s wrong?” Tyler questions, turning his attention back to his laptop. Tyler can hear Josh opening up a can of beer, that Tyler knows they’re not supposed to have in their room since they’re underage, but Tyler fought with Josh about it for a week and he had just given up. If they were to ever get caught, Tyler would just act like he never knew the alcohol was in there.
“I don’t understand psychology,” Josh groans, sitting back in his chair and searching for the page he was on before throwing his book closed.
“It’s not that hard,” Tyler says under his breath. He hopes his already agitated roommate doesn’t hear his remark, but of course, he does.
Josh turns his head to look at Tyler, and Tyler doesn’t dare to make eye contact with Josh. “Easy for you to say, Mr. Stay in his room all the time and do nothing but study and do homework.” Josh mocks.
Tyler smirks and half shakes his head. “Far from the truth,” Tyler retorts as he scrolls down a webpage, looking for the author or the article to source in his essay. “I am in a few student organizations.”
Josh scoffs, turning back to his open book. “What psychology class are you in?” Tyler asks after Josh is quiet for a few seconds.
“Professor Wayne’s Monday, Wednesday, Friday class at 2:30.” Josh speaks, flipping through the glossy pages.
It takes Tyler to register, but that’s his intro to psych class. And he’s never once seen Josh there. “Maybe if you went to class once in a while you’d know what you’re doing.”
“How do you know whether I go to class or not?” Josh spits at Tyler.
“Because I’m in that class.”
Josh doesn’t respond at first. He just looks over at Tyler, biting his lip and running his eyes up and down Tyler. Tyler breaks his eyes away from his screen and looks over at Josh confused. “Can I help you?”
“Yes,” Josh smiles. “Maybe you can.”
At first, Tyler isn’t sure why his roommate is creepily smiling and staring at him. He realizes what Josh wants when he brings his hands together, interlacing his own fingers together, holding them in front of his chest and protruding his lower lip. “No—“Tyler waves his hands in front of him in Josh’s direction. “I am not helping you.”
“Why not?” Josh whines.
“You don’t even go to class!” Tyler exclaims, a smile tugging at his lips. “If you went to class it’d be a different story.”
“Come on, Tyler.” Josh begs before he actually gets down on his knees in front of the other boy. “I am literally so desperate.”
Tyler watched as his roommate literally begged on his hands and knees. Tyler felt slightly bad for the guy. Why? He wasn’t sure. They weren’t the least bit friends, the only thing they had done since they met three weeks ago was go to Wendy’s for fries at 3 AM when Josh was drunk. Tyler felt compelled to help him still.
He sighed and looks into Josh’s eyes. “Okay, here’s the deal,” Tyler began. Josh’s eyes filled with hope. “If I help you, you have to go to class from now on.”
Josh nodded his head feverishly and smiling wide. “I could hug you right now, Joseph!” Josh exclaimed., opening his arms and leaning towards Tyler.
Tyler rolled his eyes, his own lips forming a smile. He leaned back from Josh, however. “No, no. That’s fine. I don’t need to be hugged.”
Josh laughed, nodding his head and returning to his seat. “Can I sweeten the deal?” Josh suggested a few minutes later.
Biting his lip nervously, Tyler looked over to his roommate and nodded slightly. “What?”
“If I get a 70 on the next exam, you have to come to a party with me.” Josh challenged.
“Make it an 85 and you have a deal.” Tyler stuck his hand halfway between the two desks and waited for Josh to take it.
Josh hesitated, biting his lip and staring at Tyler’s outreached hand. “When is the next exam?”
“Two weeks.” Tyler quickly answered. “Come on, Dun. 85?”
Josh didn’t say or do anything for a moment. Finally, after what felt like hours, Josh took Tyler’s hand and shook it. Tyler smiled and pulled his knees to his chest, resuming working on his essay. “Can’t wait to see you in class.”
*
The two weeks quickly came and went. Josh kept up his end of the deal and attended class every day. The two boys had three study session in the library over the next two weeks, each session lasting an hour and a half. Tyler defiantly saw improvement in Josh’s work, but he wasn’t sure if it was worthy of a B on an exam, and boy, did he hope it wasn’t. The last thing Tyler wanted to be doing was attending some party at a stranger’s house or apartment or whatever with his party animal roommate. He could only imagine how that would end.
A week had passed since the exam. Tyler knew grades were probably posted, but he wanted to wait to check them with Josh. Tyler sat in the reserved area in the library for study groups where he and Josh met every study session they had. It didn’t take long for Josh to arrive, which made Tyler happy because knots were forming in his stomach as the anticipation of seeing their grades grew.
“Grades were probably posted today.” Tyler states as he navigates his way through the school’s website to the link were professors can upload their student’s grades. Out of the corner of his eye, Tyler could see the color in Josh’s face fade a bit and he began chewing at his lip nervously, indicating he wasn’t too sure about his grade. “Do you think you did well?”
Josh looks to Tyler’s eye and lets his lower lip slip out from between his teeth. He scoffs and leans back in his chair. “Fuck yeah. I aced that shit.”
Tyler smiled, rolling his eyes but still nodding his head. “You know, Josh, it doesn’t matter if you lost the bet or not. All that matters is if you tried your best and—“
“Yeah, yeah.” Josh waves his hand, leaning in closer to see Tyler’s laptop screen as the page that held their grades loaded. “Save all that for later.”
The page loads and Tyler checks his grade first. 92. Tyler was a bit disappointed with his grade, but he tried to not let it show because he knows Josh would probably kill for a 92 right now.
“Go to mine! Go to mine!” Josh pestered, almost taking over the scrolling from Tyler.
Tyler quickly scrolled to the D section and looked for Josh’s name. Josh pointed it out and followed across the screen to where his grade was listed among the other students.
86.
Tyler’s mouth hung slightly agape. Josh jumped up from his seat. “Fuck yes!” He shouted, throwing his hands in the air and tilting his head back. Josh laughed manically and clapped his hands together, while Tyler stared dumbly at the screen.
“This is amazing.” Josh stated, putting his hands on his knees. The smile was still glued to his face and he was pretty sure his cheeks were going to split open any second.
“This is…” Tyler’s voice trailed off as he tried to find the right words to say.
Josh, if it was possible, smiled wider and clapped Tyler on the back. “There’s a party Friday. We can go together. It’ll be great.” With that, Josh gathered his belongings and left the enclosed study room.
“This is bullshit.” Tyler curses to the empty room, minutes after Josh had left.