HAYDEN
The student lounge always carried the faint, familiar stench of cheap pizza and body spray, but you learned to love it after a while because it meant somewhere to crash, somewhere to unload.
Tonight it felt like home in the way only cluttered, loud rooms can be, messy, honest, and full of guys who’d seen you at your worst.
I opened the door with Coleen at my side. She looked small next to the sagging couches, with her fingers tight on the strap of her bag, a careful, curious look on her face.
For a second I had that stupid, protective impulse to steer her away from the boys, to shelter her from the noise, but she didn’t need shelter. She didn’t need me to fix her. She needed me to stand beside her. So I did.
“Hayden!” Jason called from the couch, where he balanced a soda can
