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Chapter Text

The view of the road and the trees, and such other things out the window of the car was blurry. Ashlyn had been looking outside the aforementioned window of the car for much too long.

She had on music in a pair of headphones on the lowest possible volume, which still felt insanely loud when it was that close to her way too sensitive ears. She couldn't even picture how people listened to music on full volume with their headphones. Most of the time, she would never use headphones, but unfortunately, being in an Uber for getting driven to her new campus meant she didn't get to pick the music, and she wasn't exactly the most appreciative to people who listened to radios with only hit songs(a few of said hit songs were tolerable, but most of the time they were just excessive swearing as a song. Not to say that they didn't have relatively good melody apart from lyrics). 

Ashlyn's thoughts wandering, the next topic that came up in her mind was how she knew next to nobody on the new campus she was headed to. Was transferring theoretically an absolutely horrible idea when you factored that in? Absolutely. But, she did have Logan, who was going to have to show her around when she got there.

Though, the thought of Logan introducing her to someone, or even just meeting her dormmate sounded intensely panicking for Ashlyn's entire lack of social skills, which was a problem her (last) therapist had brought up.

On the subject of therapy, Ashlyn's parents had insisted on her getting a new therapist in town for when she moved. Since she'd been 12, she'd been going to therapy, which was entirely due to her parent's insistence. Her parents had said that they wanted her to always have the skill of "being in touch with your emotions." That was annoying on her parents' end, but she still loved them for caring about her emotions. She'd never really felt in touch with said emotions, nor had she with socialization.

The last(and literally last one she would be having with her past therapist) interaction she'd had with her previous therapist had been much more irritating and repititive than the other ones.

"Ashlyn, you have to start getting out there. You can't just avoid talking to people so often," Her therapist had advised softly. Ashlyn had really hated that tone.

Rather than expressing her annoyance with it, Ashlyn had ended up opting for a reluctant sigh. "I know, I know."

"You always say that 'you know', but I've never seen or heard about you acting on it."

"I'll..." Ashlyn had dodged the therapist's gaze. "...try to work on that too, yeah."

"Good. I'll see you here next week?"

"Yeah. See you never, Dr." She'd ended the conversation with before leaving.

Oh. It was raining now. Guess that's what happened when she zoned out.

Ashlyn could see her reflection in the window. Her hair was a little messy, but barely, just because she hadn't redone her double braids this morning. Her hair still looked fine, she guessed. Her freckles hadn't faded at all, which she supposed made sense since it was only September, and it was literally summer last month(Summer did end with August, right?). 

She looked away from the window at last, feeling the vibration of a notification from her phone. Just a text from Logan.

Logan

(September 2nd, 8:32)

Are you on your way yet?

Ashlyn

(September 2nd, 8:32)

yeah.

Logan

(September 2nd, 8:33)

Okay, I'll see you soon.

She ended up leaving him on read.

***

God, how many places does Logan know on campus? This is the worst form of torture.

Ashlyn had thought moving onto campus at college would be somewhat of a peaceful experience. But no, Logan just had to drag her around a campus that she was completely new to. For fuck's sake, Logan, honestly, use some common sense instead of telling her random facts about the campus' founders. 

She's been practically everywhere but the dorm she's assigned to. The library, the baseball field(where Logan ended up talking to some guy who looked like he hated being in the presence of literally every single person there except Logan(which, in turn, was odd), and she stood in silence at the side, just scrolling through an e-book she was reading without her memory retaining a word of it and texting back her extremely over-bearing parents), so on, so forth.

At least her and Logan were (hopefully) actually headed to the dorms at this point. Otherwise she would honestly just leave and wait another day to move in, despite technically not being allowed to do that.

Walking down the hallway with paced steps, she could definitely see the numbers on the doors that seemingly indicated this being a dorm hallway. A lot of doors, and a very quiet, empty hallway other than the sounds of her and Logan's footsteps.

And then Logan stopped, which consequentially made her stop. Right at the door that had the number 110 in silver. The number of the dorm she had been assigned to.

Ashlyn pushed the door open, since Logan was apparently not going to do that(ugh, honestly, Logan, come on). 

"Well, looks like your roommate's already moved in," Logan commented as he walked in after Ashlyn, pushing his glasses up his face.

"Yeah, guess so," she replied drily, setting a box of her things down on the mattress for the empty side of the room, or, rather, her side of the room is what she should think of it as now.

"So, that's about all I need to show you. You good if I leave now?"

Ashlyn looked back at him from the random spot on the wall she'd fixated on for quite literally zero reason. "Sounds fine."

Logan gave her a polite smile with a wave, and closed the door behind him.

From this spot of the room where Ashlyn was seated, she could see most of it. The lights were vaguely reminiscent of the florescent ones in schools. The walls were a clean white, the ceiling a matching color. The blankets on the other person's side of the rooms, and other cluttered trinkets were a stark contrast to just how...blank the room was.

Ashlyn's side of the room was practically equivalent to that of a loading website that you don't have set on dark mode(sue her, she sets everything on dark mode). She would probably leave it somewhat similar apart from her personal items. She doesn't have posters or lights to put up or anything.

Taking off her earplugs and setting them on the table, Ashlyn basked in the peaceful silence for a few seconds.

The door burst open, Ashlyn jolting at the immediate noise. She pressed a respective finger to each of her ears, the noise a little much for her to handle. She shouldn't have taken off her earplugs.

"Oh! You got here." The girl looked vaguely familiar to Ashlyn, with chocolate brown hair down to her short shirt sleeve(said shirt being one that simply read "yes."). She had a bright smile on her face. "I'm Taylor...Hernandez."

"Oh, I'm Ashlyn Banner. New roommate. Though, you already know that..." Ashlyn trailed off, somewhat mortified of herself.

"No, it's fine." This girl—Taylor— seemed to be able to shrug off anything with an easy smile at the ready. She also talked oddly fast. Just how social Taylor already seemed to be was terrifying Ashlyn in one way or another. 

"So, what's your major?" The question startled Ashlyn from her thoughts.

"Uh, Psychology." Fuck, Ashlyn was fumbling this social interaction worse than any other. She needed to hunt down Logan so that she would have a person able to handle speaking with people with her.

Taylor smiled warmly at her. (God, how does that girl have the willpower to smile so much and so nicely?) "That's cool. I'm in Engineering."

***

After talking to Taylor for a good twenty more minutes(how Ashlyn actually survived twenty minutes of conversation with a sane, nice person, she doesn't have the answer to), Ashlyn went to the library with noise canceling earplugs in, and a laptop in her bag(along with an iced coffee in her free hand. She just really likes coffee, and she rarely gets a good enough amount of sleep to not need it).

She took a seat next to some guy, the other thing to her side being...nothing, since it was a seat at the end of the table.

Cracking open a book, the library was actually a surprising amount of silent. The library at her high school had been nowhere near this good. Sure, Ashlyn could hear the faint murmurings of some whispered conversation in the background, but it was majorly dead silent otherwise. Probably, to people with less sensitive hearing(she hated her hearing, it was literally horrible), it was practically a legitimate dead silence.

Ashlyn was technically supposed to focus on the book she was reading, but she supposed it wasn't actually that interesting. Her attention was quickly disappearing, and she was kind of just looking over around the library out of pure boredom.

The school seemed excessively...proud of their logo. Or symbol(?). Whatever people called it. Ashlyn wasn't someone with a large vocabulary despite reading often enough to have a proper conversation about books. Or, more so, a useful vocabulary, she'd be more likely to know useless words like fatuous(No, that's not gibberish. It's defined as "silly and pointless) than what to call a banner(that's odd to think of when it's her last name). She did know the exact definition of extremely random old-timey words to insult people, but she didn't know what to call her school's logo(?).

They had banners around the library, and Ashlyn could take an educated guess that they had them in the hallways and such as well. Strewn all about the school in general, she supposed.

Though, she supposed they had reason to be proud. This university did have one of the most well known baseball teams in the state. Which was mainly due to Daniel Clark. Used to play as the team's quarterback, got into the big leagues. MLB and all that...sports stuff that Ashlyn knew next to nothing about(her father was more of a soccer guy. She played a little bit of soccer in her backyard with her dad at, like, two years old before she got into ballet). You get the gist.

Point is, the Phantoms(which Ashlyn had always thought to be an odd name for a baseball team) were probably the only reason the school was as prestigious as it was.

So, it was presumedly fair enough reason fo—

"Ash!" Taylor waved at Ashlyn from a bit farther from the with an excited smile, next to...Logan?

Ashlyn walked over as was customary(social expectations were killing her day by day). "Uh, hi?"

Logan turned his head to Taylor, raising a questioning eyebrow. "She lets you call her Ash?"

Taylor shrugged, unfazed by the questioning. "Nah. Just thought I would anyways."

"What do you need?" Ashlyn cut in bluntly.

"Nothing. Just thought you could join the conversation since you're here." Logan nodded in agreement to Taylor's words.

Ashlyn glanced back at the place where she'd been sitting moments ago, her things still in place. "And what's the conversation about, exactly?"

"Mechanics."

Ashlyn winced. "That'll be a pass."

(This interaction, for some reason, immediately makes Ashlyn think of her therapist telling her to socialize. God, she hated that therapist so much.)

"Ash? You kinda went...silent." Taylor's voice was a break in the spiraling thoughts.

Ashlyn shook her head, trying to shake off her incorrigible tendency to have literally no focus on conversation. "Oh, it's nothing."

"If you say so."

"Ash, if you don't want to talk about mechanics, which you do know literally nothing about, how about me and Taylor introduce you to some people?" Logan offered, whispering something to Taylor(likely the names of the two people he planned on introducing her to). Apparently everyone(see: Taylor and Logan) had started calling Ashlyn "Ash", which she had not gotten the memo for, and she didn't...hate it, she supposed.

"How many?"

"Two."

Ashlyn picked up the green hoodie still on the chair she'd been at, along with her other things(at least she'd finished her coffee). "Fine."

Taylor beamed. "You won't regret it."

***

"Here we are, Logan's dorm!" Taylor still has that happy smile on her face. "I'd like to introduce you to the wonderful being that is my brother, Tyler."

Taylor kicked open the door to the room, Logan standing next to her as he barely holds in his laughter. 

The view opens to a dorm with two beds, a scattering of colorful things among the otherwise blank room(Ashlyn's pretty sure that they all have the exact same rooms), and in the middle of the room is a thoroughly disgruntled boy who looks like a living gender bent version of Taylor(they're twins, right?) shooting a glare at Logan. 

Taylor turned to Ashlyn, who asks her, "So, that's your brother, I assume?"

"Sure is." Taylor turned back to her brother—Tyler. "And this, brother dearest, is Ashlyn Banner, my brand new roommate who's probably a lot cooler than you."

Tyler scowled in Ashlyn and Taylor's direction, but, on the reasoning of Taylor being his sibling, it's probably meant to be directed to Taylor. "Why do you feel the need to introduce me to her?"

"Because she's my roommate? Plus, Ty, I'm going to introduce you to people who I know despite the fact that you hate everybody-" Tyler may be actually valid for that. 

"Do not!" Tyler cuts her off indignantly.

"The only people you have reasonable conversations with are me and Logan. You've known Aiden for two years, and you still hate him very much, according to him, you, me, and Logan. Maybe everyone who's ever seen you two have conversations thinks that."

Tyler gasped. It's certainly dramatic. "You did not just bring up Clark!"

"I did," Taylor deadpanned.

Tyler's eyes narrowed. "I hate you." 

Taylor paused in feigned thought. "Same."

"Tay," Tyler pretty much hissed.

"Ty," Taylor mimicked mockingly.

"I'm done." Tyler closed the door to his(and Logan's) dorm. Taylor giggled.

"Isn't he just so friendly?" Taylor asked, sarcasm heavy in her tone.

Ashlyn didn't reply. 

"Let's keep moving," Logan said, pushing Taylor gently away from the door.

She replied with something that sounded vaguely like, "Absolutely no fun," and swatted at Logan until he relented.

Ashlyn honestly did not want a thing to do with meeting more people, but Taylor's damn insistent. So she kept walking behind her and Logan.

"Do you think he'll be as obnoxious as ever?" Now, in this case, Ashlyn does not know who the hell Taylor is referring to by "him", therefore making her comprehension of Taylor and Logan's conversation extremely unreliable.

Logan sighed. "When is he not?"

"You make a good point." Taylor looked back at Ashlyn, her expression a little curious this time. "So, Ash—it's fine if I call you that, right? I know I said earlier that I was just calling you it anyways or whatever, I kind of just like calling people by nicknames. Just want to check with you."

"Yeah," Ashlyn nodded. "It's fine, really. I don't mind at at all."

Taylor's shoulders relaxed, and she exhaled. Wow, she must hate even just annoying people that she isn't close to. "Okay, now that we got that out of the way, how are you liking it here?"

"It's nice," Ashlyn answered shortly.

Taylor looked ever so slightly disappointed by the bland answer. "That's all?"

Logan elbowed Taylor, who gasped in mock offense and hurt. These two seemed like pretty close friends. If Ashlyn had to guess, they probably met in freshman year. "Tay, give her time. She's only been here less than a day, how in the world would she form a proper opinion of the place in that short of time?"

"I don't know, I had my opinion figured out on this place after two days of being here!"

"Because you are literally incapable of hating people or places, ever consider that?"

"I hate you."

"Sure," Logan replied, with a clear skeptic tone.

Taylor stuck out her tongue at him before knocking on a door. 

Ashlyn felt indefinitely like a third wheel in this situation, no matter how many times she was involved in the conversation, it always got back to Taylor playfully bickering with some person.

"Aiden!" So, the name that Taylor was shouting at the door(well, technically at the person in the room behind the door), was presumedly the name of the person...in the room.

"Give me five seconds!" The person behind the door yelled back.

There were the vague noises of some shuffling behind the door before it opened to a boy(?) with bleach blonde hair(extremely messy), a grin wider than Taylor's(though the one that Taylor wore was more of a smile, this was more of an unsettling grin), and bizarrely red eyes(Ashlyn was 99% sure that they were contacts. If they weren't, that would be really quite concerning(Ashlyn, you are being an idiot, they are definitely contacts. Is it even biologically possible for a human to have red eyes? She was pretty sure it wasn't.)).

"That was six, Aiden," Logan said flatly, complete with a look that just screamed the words, "You're an idiot."

Somehow, he'd devised how to give someone a questioning look with a grin still on his face. "Why were you counting the seconds?"

Logan rolled his eyes. "Because you said to give you five?"

"Point made."

"I know. I always make good points. You don't," Logan replied. "So, this is Ashlyn Banner. You know, the one friend I've told all of you about?"

Aiden turned to Ashlyn. Eye contact, completely new and unsettling to her(she found she didn't hate it as much as normal, though. It wasn't as bad as it was with those people that always kept eye contact no matter what). But she must look utterly terrified. "Uh, hi. Logan already said my name and...well, you know."

"Aiden. Clark." Oh, as in— "Yes, as in my father is Daniel Clark." Aiden sighed(still with the grin, somehow?), adding, "I'm way cooler than him though. Probably not better at baseball, but cooler."

Logan glared at him for the dumb addition, Taylor merely snickered.

The only noise that Ashlyn got out was a simple hum of acknowledgement.

"Real cheerful, isn't she?" Aiden snarked.

"Yeah, the most." Ashlyn deadpanned, dry sarcasm incredibly obvious in her voice.

***

A break from socialization.

Finally.

Normally, Ashlyn would not like to let herself mindlessly scroll on her phone, but the entire day was an excuse in her mind for doing so. Just talking to people was fucking exhausting, worse than normal.

So, now, she was wasting her time. She liked wasting time. It was a nice thing to let herself do sometimes, alright? She'd pick up her book again in a little bit, maybe even go out to a coffee shop to read, unpack, do something productive, who knew?

So—

"Hey!" Ashlyn head's jerked up from her phone immediately at the entrance of Taylor through the door, and she gave a polite little wave to Taylor as a reply of her own. Ashlyn was pretty certain Taylor would get used to Ashlyn's avoidance of replying to things with her words, the verbal thing just came and went, you know.

Now would be a good time to go to a coffee shop and read her book there. Ashlyn looked back down at her phone, to check the time. It was...5:27.

Yeah, she could go to a Starbucks somewhere, though she'd prefer a local spot.

"I'm gonna go to a coffee shop, so bye," Ashlyn said to Taylor.

"Bye. Have fun."

Ashlyn picked up the book(if you were wondering, the book is Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury) on her end table, and pushes open the door. 

The walk was short, quick, the weather wasn't nearly as rainy as it was in the morning, thankfully. Ashlyn passed a lot of people. She had to start getting used to more people, this wasn't a small town anymore.

It was a nice place, she ordered plain black coffee, and got through a good chunk(48 pages) of the book. She spent about an hour there before a chance encounter with Aiden Clark occured.

He had approached her, with that grin she doubted she'd ever see drop from his face, and said, "Hey, you're Ashlyn, right?"

"Mhm." Ashlyn nodded, and replied with, "Aiden, right?"

She remembered his name completely fine.

Aiden nodded in turn. "Yup. You like it here yet?"

Ashlyn hummed. "Undecided."

Aiden raised an eyebrow. "Oh?"

"Nothing interesting, really, I just don't like...everything. Well, that's a lie, I do like dogs."

"You like dogs?"

"Yes."

"Huh."

"Yeah, I know, pretty boring, right?"

Aiden shrugged. "I don't know, you seem pretty interesting to me."

"Huh," she said, a reflection of words said mere moments, seconds ago. "I think I'm gonna go back to my dorm now." 

"Bye then," Aiden replied cheerfully as ever.

Getting up, she smoothed down the wrinkles at the top of her pants, and walked through the door, holding it open for another person. 

Aiden gave a little wave from behind the window. How did he always have that grin on his face? How was everyone here so happy? It was very odd.

Though, Ashlyn had seen Taylor's expression without a polite smile more often than not. Aiden was just...always smiling.

The walk back with her utterly confused thoughts spinning around her mind was quicker, there were less people out and about now.

Once she'd gotten back to the dorm, she settled down, and spent some time on her phone before Taylor got back, and by then, she was already asleep.

Chapter Text

Aiden's head hurt. Like, a lot.

He could not possibly care less that it did as he got up, turned on some aggressively happy music on his phone at a high enough volume that it wasn't actually disruptive, but it would wake Tyler up. Then Tyler would get like a pissed off cat, and, oh, how Aiden loved to make fun of him for it. His roommate was just about anything but a morning person.

Aiden and Tyler met when they were in freshman year, and, despite how they seemed to only bicker and argue, they were actually quite close friends. Tyler simply only showed affection through his normal way of showing any emotion, pure and utter annoyance. With Tyler, figuring out if he actually meant if he hated you when he said he did was nearly impossible(unless it was with Aiden, Taylor, or Logan). Aiden, on the other hand, showed love through being the person who annoyed. 

So, factoring in those two attributes of theirs was how their usual morning routine came to be.

Aiden turned on his specially curated obnoxious music, which woke Tyler up, who hurled either insults, a pillow, or both at Aiden, and then they went to their classes.

"Aiden!" Tyler hissed from across the room, right on time. "Turn the music the fuck down."

"No thanks," Aiden replied cheerfully, turning back to face Tyler with a grin.

Tyler groaned, moving his hand out behind him and chucking a pillow in Aiden's direction, who respectively dodged it. "Oh, I hate you."

Aiden snickered. "So you tell me every single hour of every single day."

Tyler scowled. "Because I do."

"I know."

"Stupid, annoying, psycho, idiotic, dumb blondes, ugh," Tyler grumbled, burying his head into one of the pillows.

"Hey, I may fit all of those, but-" Aiden pressed a hand to his chest. "-are you insulting blondes, Ty?"

"Yes. Also, you're a fake blonde anyway." Tyler deadpanned. "Stop calling me Ty, that's a nickname for Taylor only, and her only."

Aiden raised an eyebrow. "Oh, so Logan also doesn't get nickname privileges? Cause I could've sworn I heard him call you that just a little bit, not too long ag-"

Tyler's scowl only deepened. "Shush."

Aiden shrugged. "It's the morning, I'm obligated to yap until you get out of bed so that you aren't late for class."

Tyler scoffed. "No one said you had to do that."

"Right, but I'm being nice to you basically then," Aiden said mockingly as if any of that made sense.

"Annoying the hell out of me on a daily basis is nice?"

Aiden nodded dutifully. "Yes."

Tyler huffed. "I-Ugh."

Aiden hummed along to 'Party Rock' as it turned on from the playlist(named 'How To Annoy Tyler In The Morning(Always Works, Not Clickbait)') that was on shuffle. "You complain a lot for a person who I've directly heard say they hate when people do nothing but complain."

"It's too early for this bullshit!" Tyler stood up from the bed, and continued his grumbling for the rest of the morning.

In fact, Tyler ended up talking more than Aiden did that morning(an accomplishment for the ages), all of which was complaining.

***

"You sure?" Taylor asked for what was many more times the necessary amount, scrunching up her nose (she seemed to be contemplating whether she should trust Aiden on any subject at all, or something rude like his friends would do).

Aiden had a brownie in his hands that he was holding like a sandwich(as a menace to society would), and he took a bite of it before answering the question. "Yes, I'm sure that Tyler's team has a game on Thursday. God, I only messed up the date once, and now you ask me, like, three times in a row about the day definitely being the one I started it with. I literally have access to Tyler's physical calendar, we share a dorm. Do you truly think so little of me that I would get it wrong that often?"

Taylor nodded. "Pretty much. You probably would."

Aiden scoffed in faux offense. "Why does everyone hate me?"

(To be fair, not everyone hated him. Just his friend group.)

"Because you're..." Taylor eyed the brownie in his hands, and offered, "A menace to society?"

"I was thinking more along the lines of a moron, but that works."

Taylor shrugged. "Same difference. So, are you gonna go to that party next weekend?"

Aiden paused for a moment, trying to remember which one Taylor was talking about. "The one at that frat or the one at the bar?"

"I think it's the bar one," Taylor answered, pulling her hair into a ponytail to avoid getting it in her food.

"Maybe." Aiden replied, thinking about it a little bit. He supposed he would rather go to some random party than he would have to study with Taylor and Logan over the weekend. "Are you going?"

"I'll go if you go."

"But who would be the designated driver-" Aiden cut off as Logan took a seat next to Taylor(he was a few minutes late). 

Aiden and Taylor shared a glance, she looked back at Logan, and then nodded at Aiden.

***

Aiden flipped through the pages of his textbook as his mind wandered more and more, barely keeping his eyes open at this point. It'd be so easy to just fall asleep then and there, and it was way too late at night(it was only 11:30 PM)...or maybe not, he just hadn't gotten enough sleep last night.

The latter was unfortunately, most definitely the actual events that occurred.

Tyler was off practicing baseball again, or at some event, or something. Aiden didn't quite know, he'd always had a hard time focusing on what people said to him if he didn't find it interesting. That being said, he did try to focus on them. Just something...iffy about it.

The textbook was deeply boring, not a thing he would categorize as interesting in any sort of context. There were too many words on the paper, they just looked like they were moving sometimes. Aiden hated those words. Small print size, and some essay formatted font, all with sparse, sporadic pictures, that were rarely anything other than diagrams, graphs, etc. 

Textbooks were just stupid to him. Why not teach the material in the textbook in class? Then people would know the things in the textbook without needing to put themself through intense boredom.

He'd just study for another five minutes, at least, he should be able to get through that. If he really needed to study, he'd ask Taylor to come over or something. She made studying a little more enjoyable at least.

Aiden's attention was directed to the door as he saw Tyler walk through it, looking purely mortified, with some flush on his face from whatever had happened while he was out.

Aiden blinked twice. Tyler was blushing?? "You got a new lady friend, or something, Ty?"

Tyler scrunched his nose. "No."

"So who's the cause of the blush?"

"No one," Tyler answered too quickly.

Aiden's eyes narrowed, trying to figure out what Tyler was not admitting to. "Alright."

"Well, don't look at me like...that." Apparently Tyler was now also bad at verbalizing his thoughts.

"What am I looking at you like?" 

"...Whatever. Goodnight, Aiden. I am not having this conversation."

Aiden flipped through the pages of his textbook until he closed it. "Night."

Tyler clicked the lamp's light switch off.

Neither of them fell asleep for at least another three hours. Tyler seemed to be thinking about something(from what Aiden could tell) and Aiden was just on his phone for most of the time, procrastinating.

***

Aiden had noticed that friend of Logan's(her name was Ash, which he did indeed remember) was in one of his classes. She seemed like she'd be his type of friend. Aiden liked friends who he theoretically would never get along with more than ones with similarities to him.

So, when she slid into a seat near him in the class, he most definitely viewed that as just more reasoning for him to talk to her. When a person looked interesting, what else would he do than just talk to them? It was common sense.

When he started talking to her, she seemed pretty cold. However, Aiden was not easily set off. 

Now she would at least give him a snarky comment or two.

"Hey, Ash," Aiden greeted Ashlyn shortly, tilting his head to the side as he looked at the little earplugs in her ears. Maybe he'd ask her about those sometime in the future.

"What?" She replied drily.

"I got another, like, 'icebreakers for when you first meet someone' type of question for you."

"Which is?"

"Do you have any hobbies?"

He was met with silence before Ashlyn muttered, "I do ballet."

That definitely didn't fit with his image of her. "Huh. You don't strike me as the type. Cool, though."

"The type being?" Ashlyn questioned.

"I don't really know, actually."

"Then why would you-" Ashlyn let out a long suffering, under her breath, sigh. "You know what, doesn't matter."

After the painstaking time of class was over, Aiden was fully prepared to bother Tyler again, because he knew something was up with his roommate. The only reason he didn't immediately go to do that was because of a text from Taylor.

Taylor

(September 4th, 12:47 PM)

The gorup's meeting up 4 coffee in 10 at the cafe, u wanna come?

O also me n Logan are gonna darg Ash over 2

Aiden

(September 4th, 12: 51 PM)

lmao srue

Chapter Text

The baseball bat's swing blew a gust of air into Tyler's face, blowing it into his eyes. It's wood was a sandpaper texture, his hands gripping it tightly as to not drop it. 

The rough, red sands of first base scratched against his shoes. He barely noticed the sound and feel of it anymore. God, he hated this.

He actually barely noticed anything in baseball at this point. From some point in middle school all the way til now, baseball hadn't really been something for enjoyment and was just there to get him a better education. Maybe at one point he'd liked it, but it was just empty now. 

It'd been something with his dad before, it would bring a smile to his face. He had loved spending time with his dad when he was just a little kid. It had been his favorite thing of all, playing catch in the yard with a baseball glove when he was just 7. He was pretty sure that when his dad died, March 17th(a day he still hates), was when he stopped liking baseball.

He was only 11. His mother had cried for months, not speaking to Taylor and Tyler for a straight week after. She hadn't even functioned at that point. Tyler had to call her work for her to let them know she wouldn't be going. He'd done all the housework, made sure Taylor did her homework(along with him having to do his own homework), made sure they both left the house on time to walk to school since their mom wouldn't leave her room to drive them. After she'd come out of her room for the first time in three days, she'd look like she'd been starving. And the first thing she said when she saw Tyler wasn't something comforting, she simply asked, "Where's your dad?"

Like he wasn't already gone.

In his later teen years, his mother only got worse. If she ever went to a parent-teacher conference, or a school event, or any event of some kind, for that matter, she'd tell other people all about her lovely husband. Sometimes she would go out to a bar, and drink. Drink until she was able to pretend some other guy was his and Taylor's dad, and bring him home for the night. Drink until she stumbled back home muttering their dad's name, and calling his phone number on speaker only to hear his voicemail on repeat. Drink until she would call Tyler instead of their dad, and ask him to ask their dad to pick her up. 

Tyler was guilty of hanging up on her since it happened the seventh time, because he didn't want to hear about his dad anymore.

Sometimes Tyler resented her for it. He knew he shouldn't, he knew that people were supposed to process grief in different ways(or whatever psychology bullshit his sister had said she learned from her therapist), but a parent should still take care of their kids even with grief instead of making one of the kids act like they were the new parent. Tyler still loved her. He just wished things could have been different, so that his childhood wouldn't have been so emotionally damaging. But, hey, at least she was better now.

So yeah, he may hate baseball as he plays it now. Whatever. It still got him to college. That was what mattered, not if he liked the stupid sport. At least him playing baseball made some people happy.

Like his mom, she'd gone to one or two of his games. He wasn't sure if they really made her too happy, though. Maybe, like him, all she could think of during a baseball game was his dad. He knew she avoided channels with baseball games on TV. 

Taylor would say she loved he had a hobby he was so dedicated to, the only example of that being baseball, and she would always give him a bright, wide smile from the audience when he glanced her way, which she did at the current moment. And maybe baseball reminded Taylor of their dad too. And maybe the happiness was a front so that Tyler wouldn't worry over her like he'd had to all their childhood, so that he wouldn't have to take care of someone only a few seconds older than him again.

Logan would go to a few games with Taylor, and maybe he'd cheer when she did, maybe he'd be too immersed in some book of his to look up. Tyler found it a little endearing that Logan did do that. Who even brought a book to a baseball game?

Speaking of Logan, he waved, very smally, barely noticeably, to Tyler. Tyler couldn't really wave back, since he was stuck holding a baseball bat at the moment.

The cheers erupted from the side of the stadium filled with signs of the other team. 

Oh. They'd lost and Tyler hadn't even been paying attention. At this point, the team would be better off without him. Them losing was probably his fault anyways, since he'd been looking at Logan instead.

***

"How was the game?" Aiden asked, much too cheerful for anyone who was bringing up the subject of baseball, in Tyler's mind. He supposed Aiden was always cheerful no matter the subject. Tyler found it a little more than dumb for anyone to be that happy, but he still....somewhat liked his roommate.

"Fine," Tyler answered blandly. 

"Fine," Aiden mocked, mimicking Tyler's voice very badly, though Tyler suspected that part was probably purposeful.

Tyler sighed, rolling his eyes. He could swear this was the hundredth time they'd had a conversation like this. "What else do you want me to say?" 

"I don't know. Go find a dictionary or something. Literally anything would make your answers less damn dry." Ok, so maybe the reason why him and Aiden had conversations like this all the time was more his fault, but no way in hell was he admitting that.

Tyler crossed his arms. "It's a baseball game, I don't think there's a particularly exciting part of it, especially not an exciting part to a game that we lost."

"There's a detail at least," Aiden pointed out smugly. When Tyler was about to make an annoyed comment, Aiden added excitedly, "Oh! By the way, did you hear there's another transfer student who knows people here?"

"...If people are transferring colleges, wouldn't most want to go somewhere where they know people?"

"Eh. Whatever. Doesn't matter. Point is, she's friends with one of my friends, who is throwing a party, like, tomorrow. We should definitely go, you can meet her."

"Is this you trying to set me up again?"

"Uh-"

***

Taylor

(September 4th, 12:39 PM)

Heyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

Ty

Wana go get cofe with me n the froup at 1

Tyler

(September 4th, 12:49 PM)

I am begging you to turn your autocorrect back on

But yes

Taylor

(September 4th, 12: 49 PM)

Ty rhe auotcorrect is dead n gone

After a minute or two, Tyler grabbed his (varsity) jacket off the chair for his desk, grabbed his keys, shoved them, along with his phone, into his pocket, and opened the door, to start the walk over to the cafe. Taylor would probably be dragging Logan and Aiden over, along with their other friends(there were two of them, Charlie and Lia) already, maybe even her new roommate too...definitely that girl too, Taylor loved making people socialize with her friend group the moment she met them.

The streets were pretty quiet that day, but not too oddly quiet. Not empty, per se, just sparse. 

Once he got there, he was indeed correct about the people that were showing up to the group. Basically just the friend group plus Taylor's new roommate, Ashlyn, who might eventually become included in the term friend group when he thought of it. Not like he really cared that much.

"Tyyyyy!" Taylor sung happily, basically drawing attention to them in the cafe around people that acted sane during the day, at least. Tyler was sure that more than one person glanced up from their phone at the sound of Taylor's obnoxious tone with a judgmental look, a grimace, something of the like.

 Tyler sat down next to Taylor on the open end of the booth, the person next to the wall being Ashlyn, mext to Ashlyn on the rounded corner was Aiden, giving her a respectable amount of space(normally he would give someone that much space(Tyler wished he had gotten that much space from Aiden when meeting him), which meant she either intimidated him, or just made him nervous in whatever way for whatever reasons), then next to Aiden was Charlie, who had a coffee in their hands, next to them was Lia, talking energetically to Logan about some anime she'd watched recently, making the last person on the end of the booth Logan, across from Tyler, who was fully listening to Lia without a distraction. 

They made a split second of eye contact and Tyler immediately turned back to Taylor, knowing he'd likely been observing for too long...or something.

"Taylor, calm down. You saw me literally less than an hour ago," Tyler finally replied.

"And?" Taylor asked as if clueless to his annoyance(see: Taylor being one of the most annoying people Tyler knew). He rolled his eyes.

The waitress popped up then, ready to take their orders. Tyler had barely glanced at the menu, so he just let Taylor order for him.

He felt a buzz coming from the pocket his phone was in. 

Huh. Who even calls me anymore?

"I'm just gonna go take this call for a few seconds," Tyler excused himself curtly, the rest of the group muttering acknowledgements like, "Alright," and such.

He swiped up on the call and pressed the phone to his ear without glancing at who the contact was, he didn't really care.

"Tyler?" His mom's voice came through on the phone.

"Uh, yeah? What is it, mom?" His mom rarely called. God, he could not remember the last time she had called this year. Had she even called?

"I called Taylor just a bit ago, and she didn't pick up, and I, you know, was just wondering, do you know where your dad is? I couldn't find him when I woke up today, and I've been worried sick all day."

Tyler tensed the moment he heard the word 'dad' spoken so softly and calmly, by his mother of all people. He inhaled sharply. Was this another one of her episodes, or was she drinking again? "Uh, mom..."

Are you going to feed in to her delusions or tell her, Tyler? Admit it, you wish he was still here. Why not act like he is?

Don'tdoitdon'tdoit.

He ended up doing it, like the disappointment he was. "Uh, no, mom, can't say I've heard from him today."

"Oh..." She sounded heartbreakingly disappointed. He couldn't shake the feeling that telling her that may have been worse than telling her the truth. "...well, bye, Ty."

"Bye. Have a good day."

Her quiet voice muttered something he couldn't hear, and he didn't know if he quite wanted to hear it.

***

Aiden dragged him out to parties a lot, that was a constant in their friendship. Tyler had never seen the appeal in parties, if he was being truthful, but, hey, Aiden was persistant, and Tyler wasn't up for fighting against the little shit after being that emotionally drained by such a short conversation with his mom.

Aiden hummed along to the beat of a Disney love ballad from a princess movie. "It's gonna be great, you know?"

"Just don't set me up with some random girl," Tyler complained, standing by the door as he waited for Aiden to be ready for them to leave.

"What about a random guy?" Aiden piped up.

"No." Tyler said too quickly, and he knew it, but Aiden dropped it.

The music in Aiden's car blasted almost as loud as the volume Tyler suspected the basic pop at the party tonight would be playing, the specific song at the moment being Party Rock Anthem(Aiden's favorite song that Tyler had heard way too many times).

They picked up Taylor and Ashlyn first, then Logan and Charlie, then Lia. Apparently Lia also knew the new transfer student that Aiden was yapping about for a hot second. Tyler could honestly care less who this person was.

"Tyler, how's baseball been?" Logan asked from the backseat, Tyler craning his head back to look at him. The wind was blowing Logan's hair in his glasses, but he could still pull the look off like always. He should probably take the glasses off before his hair gets stuck in them...

"Good," Tyler shrugged, his enthusiasm and passion for the sport at the same level as usual.

Logan nodded.

That was one dry exchange of words, but Tyler had been the one to make it a dry one.

Oh, he really did not want to go to this party.

Aiden turned to him with a smirk(fully prepared to make a dumb comment),"Oh, Ty Ty, turn that frown upside down-"

Tyler swatted at the air vaguely near Aiden. "Shut up and look at the road."

"Yes, sir."

They went on bickering for the rest of the drive.

Tyler could already feel the headache to arrive as he glanced at the flashing lights through the window, Aiden parking the car in some parking spot on the block.

Aiden took Ashlyn's hand to drag her in with him, who already looked like she was going through some form of medieval torture from just looking at this environment, Taylor grabbed Charlie and Lia, though Tyler did catch the apologetic look she sent to Ashlyn. 

Leaving Tyler with Logan for a few seconds until Aiden came back(with Ashlyn in tow), saying, "Ooh, I do need to introduce you to the other new kid! C'mon, Ty!"

Tyler and Logan both shot glances at each other as if estimating whether they were actually going to follow Aiden along. They did.

The walk through the party was clamored, the smell of drinks crowding the house, and the stickiness of dropped unknown liquids from red solo cups sticking lightly to Tyler's shoes.

"So, this is Ella-" Tyler looked at the person Aiden was referring to, brain coming up blank as he faced an ex from ages ago, back in middle school. 

Chapter Text

Logan doesn't hate these kinds of parties that Taylor will bring him to, they're not always horrible. More often than not they were, but maybe he could hangout with Ashlyn this time. Logan knew fully well she also didn't love the party environment, probably just the social part in general, definitely more uncomfortable in this kind of loud, messy environment than Logan was.

Logan shot a sideways glance to Tyler when he saw him tense up out of the corner of his eye as Aiden introduced them to this person. Ella. 

She seemed pretty nice, returning the greeting. But she also looked at Tyler in some odd way.

Aiden obviously noticed this too. "Do you two know each other or is this some form of instant connection...?"

Tyler snapped out of it. "We, uh, we...dated, I guess, once."

"What?" Logan's shock showed in his tone, and he hated that it did. It wasn't that insane for Tyler to have dated someone in his mind, right?

"It wasn't serious," Ella piped in. Was Logan just now noticing she was pretty or did he only think it because at some point Tyler would've too? "It was in middle school."

Made sense.

"Well, Tyler never told any of us," Logan mused under his breath.

More importantly, we've gotta figure out why Taylor never told us about this. She had to have known," Aiden added, looking over the sea of people at the party to see if he could spot Taylor. Unsurprisingly, he didn't. 

"I told her not to tell you guys or else I would tell you guys about her old boyfriend-"

Taylor walked in, causing Tyler to immediately stop talking and act innocent.

"Hi!" Taylor said energetically, when she got a look at Ella. "Oh my god, I remember you. What was your name again?"

Aiden shot him a look.

Logan was trying to connect the timeline of how this would have all happened in his mind. How long had they dated? Did Tyler still like her or was he just looking at her so much because it was nice to see a friendly face? No, Tyler never thought it was nice to have to meet people in any context, whether again or for the first time. He was pretty antisocial, from what Logan knew of him. And he'd known him for two years. That meant he knew him pretty well, right?

Oh, well.

"My name's Ella. I remember you, Taylor, right? You were really nice back when I talked to you a few times. How have you guys been doing?" 

Taylor smiled at the compliment. Despite the fact that Logan was sure he had never met anyone who had a bad opinion about Taylor, even if someone did, he couldn't imagine someone being able to say it straight to her face.

"I've been good, hopefully Tyler too, as far as I know." Tyler nodded to agree with Taylor. "But I can say his dating life has been dry since you, which was in middle school, you know."

"Hey, that's uncalled for, Tay." Tyler scoffed. "Besides, I may be...less single than previously thought."

Since when?

Logan tried to consider any mention of someone from Tyler, especially as of recent. He cannot come up with anything.

Taylor looked actually excited at the thought of her twin brother finally dating someone. Logan had heard whine about wanting him to get a girlfriend to gossip with.

"Wait, really?" Taylor asked. She'd been nagging Tyler about this for who knew how long. "Who?"

Ella also looked pretty interested, whereas Aiden looked smug(Logan definitely remembered him guessing Tyler had been interested in some unknown person recently).

Tyler glanced out in the crowd as if looking for someone, then glanced to Logan. "It's Logan."

...What?

Logan might as well go along with it, he was sure Tyler had reasoning for this.

Taylor whipped her head towards Tyler, shock filling her expression. "Since when?!"

"Not too long," Logan answered for Tyler. 

Why am I going along with this? This is such a bad idea, Logan's thoughts voiced anxiously.

Tyler nodded in agreement, adding, "We just haven't told anyone yet because we weren't too sure."

An awkward silence filled the conversation until Ella spoke up with a simple, "Damn."

***

"So...what was that?" Logan asked Tyler a few seconds after the door closed behind them, not meeting his eyes out of embarrassment.

"Sorry, I just really needed a cover. It's, uh, awkward, you know?"

Logan nodded slowly. "So, is this gonna be, like, a thing? Because you can't exactly back out of saying that we're dating as a cover. I guess I could be fine with faking it for a bit, if you want to."

"Oh, uh..."

Was that too forward? Did Logan freak Tyler out? This was why he never spoke his mind. Why was Tyler being silent for so long? He definitely screwed up in some way, didn't he?

"Yeah."

Logan's brain short circuited for a second. This must be a really, really bad idea.

"Okay. How are we gonna go about this?"

"Well, we only really need to do it for, like, a month or two, right?"

"Yeah."

"And we need a story about how we started dating."

"We do. I guess we could say that we started dating about a few weeks ago, because you asked me out one day, and I said yes, because I also liked you. We've only gone on...three dates, we can say."

"And we decided to keep it quiet because we weren't quite sure if we wanted to tell everybody yet."

"Yeah. Okay."

This would be fine. Only for around a month and a half. Logan could definitely handle that, right?

"We might have to go on some fake dates to sell the whole thing, though. Like, I don't think either of us are good enough at photoshop to edit pictures of something, and we both know at least Aiden and Taylor will be asking for pictures constantly," Tyler pointed out.

"...True," Logan admitted, with slight hesitation. "We could just go one or two fake dates, and they wouldn't have to be too long. It's just like normally spending time together. Not a big deal."

Not that they really separately spent time together all that often.

"We could just go out to a coffee shop together for one of them, and we can figure out whatever the other would be later."

That wouldn't be all that bad, Logan would live.

"Yeah, sounds good."

***

The libraries at their school were always pretty quiet. Logan loved to spend time there over study halls, it felt like he could actually get things done in the library.

He was almost always done his work for class within half the time he spent in the library, today being one of those ocassions. 

More often than not, since he'd rather spend extra time at the library than go off his normal schedule, he just picked up a book, whether to do with his studying, or something interesting, like astrology. 

Today, he did go with Taylor, but he thought he might as well not distract her.

That didn't always take his mind off distracting thoughts, particularly the anxious, loud thoughts about his being stupid enough to agree to fake date Tyler.

Seriously, what the hell had he been thinking? There were just so many ways it could go wrong.

He could focus, he'd live through the whole mess, he shouldn't let it distract him right now.

He muttered back the words in the book in his hands to himself, in an attempt to focus on it. He didn't. At all.

Well. Maybe he should distract Taylor from her studying(or whatever it was), it'd be better at getting his mind off things.

Or maybe Taylor could do that for the two of them, he thought as Taylor questioned, "Logan? When did you and Tyler start dating."

Oh. Not that bad, just give her the story you two agreed on. What was it again...a few weeks, right? 

"A few weeks ago."

"You two are, like, definitely not a couple I would expect."

Maybe because they weren't really dating, and it was all just faking? No, Logan can't say anything like that. He had to keep his thoughts quiet.

"Well, I guess so. It kinda came out of nowhere, you know? I didn't expect it for us two either," Logan excused.

"Sounds about right." Taylor glanced down at her watch for a few seconds. "Shit, we need to leave. Library closes really soon."

Logan glanced at her watch over shoulder. "It's already that late? Damn."

He gathered his things off the table, heading towards the exit. Him and Taylor separated only halfway through the walk, since their dorms were in different buildings.

It was not surprising to Logan that thoughts about the whole fake dating mess bothered him for the rest of the night.