I didn’t just shake or fidget, I vibrated. I became the caffeine.

When I finally came down from my caffeine overdose, I vowed again that I would never again consume the stuff. That vow lasted about four days, because my friends wanted to take a trip to Atlanta and tour the Coca-Cola factory. The tour ended with literal fountains of soda spurting across the room in joyful little jets that could land right in your cup. There was even a dispenser to try dozens of sodas from all over the world.

I folded my arms, glaring at nothing in particular. Fine. Maybe I needed to admit I didn’t historically have an impressive history when it came to swearing things off and sticking to it. But that didn’t mean I was going to fail this time. This time, I was going to succeed. There would be no overdoses on Slater cock, no matter how often he waved that thing around in front of me.

In fact, screw men. Screw all of them. I thought back to Eric and his feeble attempts to reach out and “apologize” a few weeks after The Crackening, 2022. Naturally, his apologies had come just a few minutes before he hit me up for money. Getting “laid off” had been hard on him, he said. I told him to try asking the other members of his harem, then hung up and went full Casper the Ghost on him, just like he deserved.

I was yanked from my thoughts when Dean opened the glass door with nothing but a towel wrapped around his waist. I felt like a pilgrim seeing color TV for the first time. The blurry version of him was frustratingly sexy enough. But the real thing? I wish I could say I did something smooth like casually look back at my phone. Maybe even averting my eyes to the side would’ve done the trick. Even some conspicuous cartoon-style “I’m not up to anything” whistling would’ve been better than what I did.

I shrieked and yanked a pillow up to cover my face.

There was a brief pause, then Dean’s deep chuckle. “Did I frighten you?”

“How much of a cliché can you be?” I asked through the pillow. “The old coming out in your towel trick? What is this, American Pie? Are you about to change into your JNCO jeans and go spike your frosted tips? Did you leave your chain on the bathroom sink next to your Pogs?” I was rambling, but I had to forgive my brain. It was currently being exposed to near lethal levels of sexy. Alarms were blaring. Little brain cells were smashing themselves into walls, deciding to end it all rather than face what was coming. It was pure pandemonium in my head.

He laughed. It was a genuine, heart-melting laugh that I pretended to hate. “Actually, I was thinking we should get our weirdness around each other out of the way. If we’re going to pretend to be dating, we should be comfortable. No matter the situation.”