Sleep came far too easy that night.

Derrick had driven me home before Ryan returned, which I was grateful for, seeing as I hadn't particularly looked forward to blushing as red as a firetruck under what would surely have been a knowing grin. Though when he pulled up outside my apartment, we'd spent another couple of minutes making out, hoping passersby didn't look too closely through his windows.

When I finally stepped inside, both exhausted and spilling with euphoria, I knew there was no use trying to be productive. I changed into my pajamas, tossed a bowl of leftovers into the microwave for a late dinner, and collapsed on the couch with a reality tv show on. And later, when I more or less melted into bed, my body still singing in satisfaction, I drifted off with a silly smile on my lips.

And there was no tampering the good mood I woke up with.

Not when one of my contacts fell down the sink, forcing me to wear my glasses for the day. Not when—thanks to the cold—my car wouldn't start, making me bundle up in extra layers to walk to meet my friends for our weekly Monday morning hang out. Not when the barista behind the counter told me they were out of blueberry muffins, recommending I go with their lemon poppy seed instead. And not even when I joined Esme and Harper at our usual table, and they tried to drag every last detail of the date from me.

"Tell me you guys banged." Esme watched me eagerly, impatient for a response as she turned to her own girlfriend. "She did, right?" She looked back at me, examining my features closely. "Please tell me you did."

Harper's irises sparkled with amusement. "Considering she's not denying anything, I'm assuming the answer is yes. She did."

"How about we talk about anything else?" I drawled, though I wasn't really all that bothered. They were my best friends, and if you couldn't tell your best girl friends about your Sunday sexcapades, who could you tell?

"We will, as soon as you give us something about your date," Esme countered. "Any small detail. Or big details, like how big was his—"

"Or," Harper cut her off with a bemused smile as I felt my cheeks heat, "you can just tell us where he took you."

"We went bowling."

There was a moment of silence as my response registered with them before they both burst into laughter.

"And how did that go?" Harper asked, eyes twinkling with mirth. "Did you swindle him out of house and home?"

A light laugh escaped me as I shook my head. "Not quite." Dropping my gaze, I cupped my hands around my to-go cup. "But we did go back to his place after."

Esme leaned forward in her seat, eager for the admission to come. "And...?"

"And—" I leaned in as well, dropping my voice to just above a whisper. "—we hooked up."

The squeal that followed was enough to shock me back to my side of the table, my eyes widening and face reddening as a slew of looks—both curious and annoyed—were shot our way.

"I knew it," Esme said, slapping the table loudly, not caring she had drawn in so much attention. "You just have that glow about you. A I-had-bomb-ass-sex-last-night kind of look."

"Let everyone know, why don't you?" I mumbled, shaking my head so that my hair created a make-shift wall, shielding my face from view.

"What?" Esme shrugged, taking a sip of her sugar-filled frappe. "It's nothing to be embarrassed about."

"I'm not embarrassed," I countered. At least not for having sex with Derrick again. That had been a great decision. The fact she was trying to blurt that out to the world, however, was a little embarrassing. Checking the time quickly, I continued. "But I am late." I cast a pleading look toward Harper. "Any chance I could get a ride to campus?"

"More car trouble?"

"Is it really that surprising at this point?"

"No, not really. Though this does mean you'll have to put up with this one's—" Harper hooked a thumb toward her girlfriend as we gathered our things. "—interrogation a while longer."

The corner of my lip ticked upward. "I guess I could grin and bear it."

And while she did indeed try to pester me for more details, I kept my lips sealed. Not every romp between the sheets needed to be revisited in a play-by-play break down, and honestly, I wouldn't even know where to begin if I tried. How did I put into words the kind of tension and animalistic need he seemed to bring out of me?

Impossible, that's what it was. Or at least for the time being. The last thing I needed was to be reliving these thoughts—of tangled limbs and sweaty bodies moving in tandem—while on campus.

That wasn't to say that my good mood went unnoticed, however. In fact, for a Monday morning at a university, my cheery attitude had me sticking out like a sore thumb. Professor Klein was quick to notice in our morning meeting, pointing out that I looked like I'd had a good weekend. Like I was refreshed and ready to work.

And when Miles popped into our shared office after he finished his morning class, he didn't fail to pick up on it either. Likely because I'd been humming as I made progress with my defense.

"Morning."

Grabbing my mug, already half-empty with my second cup of coffee that day, I spun around in my chair to face him. "Morning," I chirped in an echo.

He chuckled. "What's got you so happy?" His eyes drifted to the screens on my desk, my report and various data documents scattering the screen. "Did you finish the first draft of your report already?"

Snorting, I shook my head. "I'm organized, Miles, but I'm not Wonder Woman."

"Then what is it?" he asked, taking a seat in his own chair. "Did you have a breakthrough? Walk a student through a problem? Land a position with the university?"

That last one hit a bit close to home, being that there was definitely talk within the department that a lecturing spot was opening up earlier than expected. In the summer rather than the fall. Which meant if I wanted to apply, and I did, I needed to start thinking about that on top of my research, as well as pluck up the courage to talk to Professor Klein about it.

"No," I replied, shaking those thoughts from my head. For the rest of the month I'd focus on getting as much work done on my defense as I could, and hopefully, by the time a job posting went live in the coming weeks, I'd have time to dedicate to an application. "I just had a good weekend is all." He quirked a brow as a smile bloomed on my lips. "I had a date yesterday, and you know, it went well."

"Oh," he said, voice flattening as he crossed his arms over his chest. "Anyone I know?"

Thrown slightly by the apathy of his response, my forehead creased. "Uh, no, I don't think so." I paused before letting Derrick's name slip through my lips, not wanting to seem like I was bragging. But Miles and I were friends, and I didn't see an issue with telling him. It wasn't like he would blab it around town. "Unless you know Derrick Wellsley."

Without much thought, he began to shake his head, only to freeze with wide eyes seconds later. "The hockey player?"

I bit my lip and nodded. "Mhm."

"You're dating a professional hockey player?"

"I mean, I wouldn't call it dating exactly," I said, tucking my hair back behind my ear. "It was one date. Nothing serious."

Those two words were like a bolt of lightning for Miles, his expression immediately perking up. "Ah, gotcha," he replied with understanding. As though he took it to mean there wouldn't be another date, and that made him happy.

And to be fair, I didn't know if there would be another date. I had Derrick's number and he had mine, but we were both so busy, who knew what would or wouldn't happen?

Thrown slightly by his reaction, I didn't particularly want to go into any more detail on my end. And coupled with the small voice in my head whispering it was because he was actually interested in being more than friends, I felt the need to steer the conversation back toward a safer ground—our research.

After all, that was where my focus needed to be.

***

"Now, do I go white or red tonight?" Harper asked out loud, standing in front of her fridge, the door open as she surveyed the two bottles of wine.

"You could always jump ship," I suggested, holding up my own glass of rosé and pointing to the bottle I'd brought over. "Feel free to pour yourself a glass."

Her nose scrunched up in disgust. "No thanks," she replied, making me laugh.

The perfect pick me up after a dreadfully long week.

While most of the week had progressed normally with no real changes to my routine, I'd walked into the office on Thursday after class to see a note from Miles stuck to my computer screen. He'd found an error I'd made in my recent set of calculations, causing a handful of fully functioning genomes to appear to have small abnormalities and be unfit for further testing. And though grateful for the extra set of eyes, I couldn't fathom how I'd made that kind of mistake in the first place. I knew better, and yet I lost a full day in the lab, having to painstakingly rework my equations and rerun the simulations until I was sure the problem had been eradicated.

Thankfully, it had been, and after putting in additional hours this morning and afternoon to catch up, I'd given into Esme and Harper's messages, convincing me to come over for a Saturday wine night.

Which, funnily enough, would accompany their watch party for tonight's Knights' game.

"How about you go white and I go red?" Esme offered, cozying up next to her girlfriend before throwing a wicked smile my way. "I'm in the mood for something rich to accompany the teasing remarks that'll leave my mouth watching Lia's boy toy skate around all night."

"Boy toy? Really?"

I knew there'd be no way of avoiding the obvious elephant in the room while watching the game, but I hadn't expected the jibes to start this early. Especially because I'd already clued them in to the fact there'd been no progression on the Derrick front this week.

The team had been traveling, and other than a few miscellaneous texts conversations, there was no news to share on my end.

"What?" Esme replied innocently. "You have fun with him and—"

The loud sound of a phone ringing cut her off.

"It's not mine," Harper said, nodding to her phone on the counter as she grabbed the white wine from the fridge.

Feeling the accompanying vibrations in my back pocket, I lifted my hips off the couch to pull my phone out. "It's me," I said, only to freeze momentarily when I saw the name on the screen.

Which did not go unnoticed by Esme, as her lips turned into a knowing smirk. "Speak of the devil."

I felt the heat of a light blush rise on my cheeks, waving at them to be quiet before accepting the call. "Hello."

"Hey, how's it going?" Derrick asked, his voice rough through the phone.

"Good," I replied, running my free hand through my hair, a nervous tick despite him not being able to see me. My friend could, however, and when I flitted my gaze their way, they were watching me with amusement. "I managed to get a decent amount of my final report mapped out, so now I'm taking the night off."

"Any chance a hockey game is on your schedule for tonight?"

"Funnily enough, it is," I drawled. "And shouldn't you be getting ready? You know, smack talk, team squats, visualizing a win; all that fun stuff."

The responding chuckle shot down the line, causing a spark of tension to coil in my chest, only to be eradicated when my friends began upping their teasing. Mocking heart eyes, kissy faces, and an overexaggerated faint in which Esme fell back into Harper's arms that had me rolling my eyes.

"That's not exactly my normal ritual," he mused, "but I should get back to pregame warm-ups. I just wanted to see if you'd be interested in a ticket tonight?"

His offer put me on the spot, considering the plan tonight had been to watch and cheer from afar. The television was already on, though it was muted, with the broadcasters analyzing tonight's games and putting together their predictions. And when I finally broke the silence, all that came from my mouth were incoherent mumbles.

Thankfully, Derrick cut back in, taking the pressure off me.

"There's no strings, Lia," he affirmed softly. "We all get tickets to the games, and it's rare I put mine to use. So, if you wanted one, I could put it at the will call window for you."

"Uh, yeah, thank you," I said, still shocked at the turn of events. Though when I glanced back at my friends, who were now watching with interest, I bit my lip sheepishly. "Actually, do you happen to have two more?"

"I'm sure I can pull something together."

I grinned, watching as Esme and Harper's eyes widened. "Then great, we'll be there."

Albeit, we'd be late.

After downing the wine we'd already poured, scouring the apartment for Knights' apparel, and ordering an Uber, the puck had already been dropped. Though with less traffic than expected, we walked into the arena with five minutes left in the first period.

"You know," Esme started as the three of us wedged and twisted our way passed a row full of hockey fans to get to our seats, "I'm sorry for any teasing comments I made about you dating a hockey player. If this is one of the perks we get by association, I'm all for it."

"Would you hush?" I said, looking around surreptitiously to make sure nobody had heard her. Luckily, they all seemed to be engrossed in the game, or more specifically, cheering for Nyberg after he smothered a slap shot from the blue line. "The last thing I need right now is to be tossed into the gossip columns."

And while I could've reiterated the fact that Derrick and I were, in fact, not dating, I couldn't confidently say that was true anymore. After all, I'd agreed to come to tonight—which could, you know, possibly count as a second date if I saw him after the game—and there was no way we could backpedal into friendship territory. Not with the chemistry that seemed to ignite between us whenever we were in the same room.

So maybe, just maybe, we were dating. Casually.

And maybe I was okay with that.

a/n: remember to vote and leave your comments below!