“Shut up, man.” Trey shushes me, punching my shoulder too hard, which he shouldn’t do because he’s sober enough to know his own strength.

Plus, he spilled my beer.

“Hey! We’re all thinking it,” I argue, looking around to the whole trivia group who are mostly smiling.

“Well, thanks for the game tonight, guys. Too bad we’ve got to be going,” Trey tells the table as he hoists me up.

“What? I don’t want to go home yet.” I try to push him off me, but I only succeed in stumbling over my own feet. “Zoey’s not there . . . hiccup . . . so why bother?” I slur.

“You are so fucking gone for her. Worse than I ever was with Serena.” Trey laughs as he helps me into the passenger seat of his car by shoving me in.

“No way. You were a mess over her. Remember when you wrote her a poem and played the guitar? You don’t even know how to play the guitar!” I laugh so hard it turns into a cough and my eyes tear up.

“I do play the guitar,” Trey replies grumpily.

“Not well.”

“Maybe,” he admits as he buckles his seatbelt and double-checks mine. But even drunk, I buckle up. I always buckle up.

“Serena, Serena . . . will you be my queen-a?” I sing loud and off-key.

Trey laughs. “Well, I couldn’t rhyme her name with hyena. I’d have never gotten laid.”

“Facts,” I deadpan, pointing my finger at him. “You’re smart, man. Tell me . . . what am I going to do?”

“It’s two more days, Blake. Not forever. And you’ve been texting the woman every morning and night.”

I shake my head, which is really not a good idea because the lights on the dash swirl with halos. “Not enough.”

“Phone sex?” he suggests, and I consider it for a long moment.

Zoey in her bed, touching herself as I tell her what to do, her voice in my ear telling me what to do as I jack off. But fuck, I’ve been doing that with my own imagination.

“I need to see her.”

“So sneak out and see her,” Trey says as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world.

“We should sneak out!” I say, just now coming up with the most brilliant idea ever.

“Good idea,” Trey says flatly. He doesn’t get how genius I am.

Tomorrow, Zoey and I are sneaking out because I need to see her, listen to her, hold her, taste her.

“Inner voice, Blake. Not your outside voice,” Trey says nonsensically.

Why’s he smiling?

* * *