“Not yet, babe,” Tess says, smiling into a bite of fry.

They’re an adorable couple, and I’m grateful that they keep asking me to hang out. Even tonight, they could have left after we finished the assignment for our ad, but instead they both ordered a pint.

In my experience, most people don’t love the company of quiet people like me. We don’t bring enough to the conversation. We take up space at your table when you could have someone louder and more outwardly fun. And maybe that’s just my insecurity because Sheetal and Tess don’t make me feel like an intruder. They actively want me here, even if I’m quiet.

Someone bumps into our high-top table, and with my free hand, I reach for the pitcher of beer before it spills.

“Sorry,” the guy mumbles before stumbling over to the bar. Barnaby’s is crowded, college students filled to the brim. We’re lucky we arrived early and snagged one of the high-top tables.

I return to my phone. “So the chips are definitely five out of five.” I text Daisy my review: Delicious. Pub food at its finest. My picture kind of sucks though. It’s all grainy and the dim lighting doesn’t do the chips any favors.

She quickly texts me back.

Daisy: They look superb! Wish you could mail them to me!!

Me too.

“Five out of five?” Tess snorts. “I’m going to need to taste test a few more to see what’s up.” She digs her hand back into the basket.

I pick up my beer stein and take a small sip, the top mostly foam. It’s so strange being in a pub with students as young as eighteen, all legally drinking. “I can’t believe I’m twenty and drinking in a bar,” I say my thoughts out loud.

“I know, right?” Tess nods. “America needs to get with the program and lower the drinking age.” She frowns. “Also, I’m just now realizing that by living here, my twenty-first birthday isn’t going to be as epic.”

“London has saved you from drinking the night away, getting bladdered, and smelling like a vomitorium,” Sheetal notes. “You’re welcome.”

“Bladdered?” I ask.

“Piss drunk,” Sheetal defines.

Tess grins and clinks her glass to Sheetal’s.

It’s another moment I wish Garrison were here. I don’t feel like a third wheel or anything, but I want my new friends to meet him. He’s so much a part of my life that it feels like I’m hiding something or omitting this essential thing.

I glance towards the bar. Salvatore leans a hip against it, bodies packed between him, but he’s focused on a brunette with skin as pale as mine, wavy brown hair, and a deep blue velvet minidress.

“Speaking of ages,” Sheetal says, capturing my attention. “I’ve been thinking about our little group.” She waves around the table, but her eyes are on me. “Tess and I are nineteen. You and Salvatore are twenty. We’re all the oldest in the class since we started Wakefield late, and I could see Professor Flynn grouping us off on purpose.”