Chapter Twelve

Sophia I sat in class, but at the end of it, I could hardly tell what the lesson for the day had been about. It was unlike me, and I didn’t even care. The entire time, if I wasn’t peeking at my cell under the desk and texting with Elijah, then I was daydreaming about Elijah.

It had been a week since we got together, and I had to admit it to myself, I was going crazy over him.

The moment we could leave the room, I was among the first people jumping up to leave. Elijah was waiting for me, and I needed to stop by my dorm room first. We were going on another date, and because I thought it would be too dressy to put on date clothes and go with them on to class, I needed to change.

I got to the dorm to find our door unlocked and Dana inside.

“Oh, you’re finally here! I thought we were gonna be late.”

“We’re not, right?” I asked frantically, pulling my cell out to check the time.

Dana giggled. “No, but we will be if you don’t hurry up and get changed already.”

I looked through my clothes as she sat at her desk with a mirror balanced on some books in front of her, fixing her hair. I picked a summer dress that was tight at the top and flared out from my waist, reaching down to my knees. I hesitated for a bit, before putting on a pair of closed flats. I preferred my sneakers, but they were comfortable enough.

“Do you have any idea what we’ll be doing?” I asked.

Dana shrugged, looking up. “Logan didn’t say anything, just that we’d be out until evening. I’m getting a little excited. We don’t have many dates outside of campus.”

I sighed. Technically, it wouldn’t be my first date with Elijah where we went off campus, but the other time, I barely got to enjoy it because we weren’t quite together yet. I still blushed, thinking how I dragged him into my room and we fucked that night. Nothing had happened since, besides a few pecks here and there, but it hadn't been that long. If anything, I’d think we were moving too fast. But, it didn’t feel like it at all.

Just because I was dating Elijah, didn’t mean I’d suddenly warmed up to Logan, so while a double date was something new and something I thought would be nice since Dana and Elijah would both be there, I still wished Dana was seeing someone other than Logan.

It was a surprise, though, and even Elijah had admitted to it, just how close Dana and Logan were getting. And while their relationship wasn’t ending, Dana was stabilizing. She was slowly going back to being my friend, while still dating Logan and not letting him influence her too much. It was a welcome change, since she and I got to hang out more often, and Logan hadn't shown up to kick me out of my room the whole week.

With that much, I was happy.

“All right,” Dana said, standing up and picking up her purse. “I think we need to go now or we are going to be late. Who knows what they have planned? Or I guess I should say what Logan has planned.”

I rolled my eyes. “If you’re gonna complain, why are you still dating him?”

Dana smirked at me. “Oh, don’t get me wrong. I’m not complaining at all.”

I shook my head as I followed her out. I didn’t know what she saw in him, but it was her decision. If she felt so confident in it, I was going to back off with badmouthing Logan in front of her. Now that we were becoming close again, I didn’t want to start another fight between us.

Elijah told me to meet them close to the main gate since we’d be going out to the city. There were plenty of spots to hang out within the campus, even some cafes sprinkled around, but professors could use those just as well as the students, so everyone was more careful with PDA if it wasn’t in their dorm room or someplace hidden.

A few minutes later, the four of us met up. Logan barely looked at me, not that I cared because I didn’t spare a glance at him, either. Elijah smiled at me, silently holding his hand out to me, and I smiled shyly back, my face warming a little, as I took it. Logan and Dana met in a not so innocent kiss, and I knew only because of the sound. It wasn’t something I wanted to see. We didn’t wait for them to be done, Elijah pulling me behind him, leaving the two of them to follow after, which they did in a short while, lightly jogging as they giggled together.

Seeing Dana with Logan, she looked so…giddy, and I was starting to think she was actually in love with him. I rolled my eyes at the two of them, then turned to Elijah.

“So, what are we doing?”

“Well, Logan wanted to go clubbing, and we found this awesome place once. The atmosphere was good, not too noisy, even if it is a little pricey. There are alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks on the menu, not to mention some light meals.”

“We’re going to a club?” I asked, wrinkling my nose. I’d never been to a club before.

“Yeah. No one’s planning a party any time soon, and I wanted to dance with you.” He glanced over at me. “You don’t mind, do you?”

“Oh, no,” I said, dazed. He wants to dance with me?

It was late enough in the afternoon that clubs had started opening up. We walked all the way to the club Elijah mentioned, though he told me we’d be taking a cab back to campus.

“It’s not that long a walk anyway, and if it were me and Logan, we’d have gone with that, but it’ll be dark on the way back. Lots of other drunks on the road, too.”

I pursed my lips, thinking that there was no way I’d be drinking alcohol. I wasn’t typical in a lot of ways, and keeping to myself and not drinking alcohol or smoking were some of the ways. It gave me an image with other students in the school that could be either good or bad, depending on how you saw it; Ms. goody-two-shoes.

In about twenty minutes, Elijah led the way to the club. There was a doorway that I would have overlooked had I been walking around on my own. It led up a set of stairs with no light, but there was another doorway at the top where lights shone from, and I could hear the music. Two guys stood against the wall outside the doorway, and Elijah handed over his ID. I figured I’d need to as well, but he squeezed my hand to keep me still. The bouncers looked me over, then handed back Elijah’s ID, and we were let in. Logan and Dana followed right behind us.

“We’re sitting in the VIP lounge, right?” Logan said, raising his voice a bit to be heard over the music.

Elijah rolled his eyes at him, but instead of moving further into the room, already crowded with a bunch of people moving around, others were dancing, acting loud and drinking, we moved toward the left. There was another set of stairs against the wall, where two other bouncers stood, with an actual rope closing off the stairs. One look at Elijah and the rope was pulled aside for the two of us.

The VIP must be a big deal. When we made it to the upper floor, I realized just how true that was. The set up was the same as downstairs, only instead of the small tables and metal chairs, there were glass-topped coffee tables with comfy looking couches, love seats and single seats surrounding them, and fewer tables than I’d seen downstairs from just a glance.

“We get to order anything we want up here, and that guy will be getting a tab,” Logan crowed as he led Dana to a table with a couple of love seats.

“You can pay for yourself,” Elijah complained about it.

“But you wanted to treat us out, didn’t you? Be nice, just handle the tab, okay?”

“This is why you wanted to come along, isn’t it?” Elijah said flatly. “To mooch off me.”

“Of course not,” Logan said with a wide grin, not sounding convincing at all.

Elijah just ignored him, pulling me into the other chair, wrapping an arm around my waist, so I was close to him. A waiter showed up almost as soon as we sat and we gave our orders. Everyone else went with a beer, and I got a non-alcoholic cocktail. Logan and Dana started making out almost immediately after the waiter left, and I looked over the balcony at the people downstairs. I leaned against Elijah, feeling apprehensive about dancing since it wasn’t something I did often. Or, ever, really where people could see.

I didn’t get to worry too much about it when my cell rang. I pulled it out of my purse and saw my mom’s name. I chewed on my lip, but the music up here wasn’t as loud as downstairs, so I answered it, leaning away from Elijah a little. He looked at me curiously, and I held up a finger to show I wouldn’t belong.

“Hey, Mom,” I said, injecting some cheer into my voice. “What a nice surprise! I didn't expect you to call.”

“You’re doing something that’s going to make me yell at you, aren’t you,” she said knowingly.

I winced, then gave a sheepish laugh. “I could never keep things from you. But I swear I’m not doing anything bad. What’s up?”

Lucky for me, she went along with my attempt to change the subject.

“I just wanted to let you know that I’ll be coming to visit you soon, in a couple of weeks or so. It’s been a while, hasn’t it?”

I froze, then shot a wide-eyed, panicked look at Elijah. Mom and I barely ever talked much about dating, and I hadn't told her I was seeing someone yet. I hadn't even decided if I was going to tell her, and she was planning on coming by?

“What’s wrong?” he asked quietly.

I pulled the cell from my ear and spoke in a low voice. “My mom wants to come and visit. She’ll be here in a couple of weeks.”

“Do you not want me to meet her?” he asked, tilting his head a bit to the side.

I bit down on my lip. “That’s…not what I…”

“I’d love to meet your mom,” he said, cutting into my floundering. “If you don’t want me to, then I won’t meet her. No problem.”

I nodded slowly, then brought my cell up.

“Honey, hello?”

“Sorry about that, Mom. I’m here. I guess I’ll be seeing you in a couple of weeks then?”

“Sure. Would you like me to bring anything for you?”

“I’m fine, Mom, don’t worry about it. I’m out with my friends, so I’ll talk to you later, all right?”

“Oh! Sorry, I didn’t realize I was cutting into your time with your friends! I hope I get to meet them when I’m there, okay? Bye!”

She hung up before I could say more, and I groaned to myself. Now there was more for me to be anxious about.

“Don’t worry about it,” Elijah said, echoing me, wrapping an around my shoulders to tug me close again. “Let’s drink and have fun and worry about your mom later, okay?”

The waiter finally got back with our drinks, and Logan and Dana finally separated from each other.

As the night went on, I did relax a bit. We chatted around, mostly Logan and Elijah shooting jabs at each other, Elijah with slight irritation, though Logan looked like he was having fun. After a while, when the others had a nice buzz going, and I felt drunk off the atmosphere, we ended up downstairs to dance.

Though dance was overstating it a bit. It was a lot of grinding and swaying, there wasn’t that much space in between our bodies, with Elijah’s hands roaming up and down my back, over my ass, my sides. I touched him, too, my breathing growing heavy as I tilted my head up for a kiss that he gave me gladly.

When we went back upstairs, Elijah and I were all over each other. I felt like climbing up in his lap and letting him have his way with me, and Elijah didn’t look like he’d mind. It was nothing like me at all, and I loved it.

We managed to have a few drinks before Elijah lost control, grabbing me and tugging me up as he stood, so fast it made me yelp. But I tightened my hand around his and went along.

“Logan,” Elijah said, just before we left. “Spend the night at Dana’s, okay? Sophia’s staying over tonight.”

“Whatever,” Logan said with a wave of his hand, barely sparing us a glance, because he and Dana were all over each other, too. “Pay on your way out, would you?”

Elijah rolled his eyes, but didn’t object, pulling out his cell as he led us both out of the club.