Karlie's boyfriend worked out. This meant Nate could begrudgingly make conversation with him about the gym, pre-workouts, things like that. But he wasn't very sporty. Karlie had met him at the rock-climbing wall at their campus rec center. Rock climbing was the guy's thing, apparently. So, agreeing that coffee makes a great pre-workout was about as far as their similarities went. Nate never really got into climbing like his mom and Karlie did. And the boyfriend, whose name was Jeremy, politely and respectfully told Nate he had never seen the appeal of boxing.

"I'll never forget the first time I really got rocked in the face," Nate said idly. "Changed my perspective on life. Now it's my favorite way to reset my head if I'm too in my head." He waved a hand vaguely beside his head. The boyfriend followed the motion with an expression of disbelief.

"Dude, concussions are not a healthy way to reset your brain," he said.

Nate laughed. "Have you ever been in a fight?"

"Not like you probably," his eyes lingered on Nate's knuckles. "But I mean, I guess, yeah? More like wrangling drunk people and a scrape or two back in high school."

Back in high school, the kid said. As if he hadn't graduated only a year ago. Nate shook his head. He seemed like a good kid, though. He hiked and rock-climbed which meant he could keep up with Karlie. "Karlie could probably give you some pointers. She's a black belt in Jiu Jitsu."

"I know, she's terrifying," the boyfriend—Jeremy, Nate reminded himself—said with a faraway look in his eye. He reminded Nate a lot of Jared. Even their names were similar. If he stuck around, he'd probably have to put up with getting called Jared accidentally by everyone in their family. Their dad had already done it twice now.

"Hey Jeremy," the man in question called from the living room, getting it right this time, "Are you a fan of baseball?"

Jeremy scrunched up his nose before smoothing over his expression. Like Nate said, he wasn't sporty. He would probably prefer to watch a nature documentary or something. He wore a bracelet around one of his wrists that had a little metal sea turtle dangling from it. But he squared his shoulders and turned into the living room. "Not really, but I've been to a few Cubs games. You watching a game?"

Nate watched him get settled on the couch and then picked up another cheese cube from the appetizers that Karlie had put out on the dining room table. The house smelled divine because she'd had a pork shoulder in the slow cooker all day to make carnitas for tacos. She'd chased Nate and Jeremy out of the kitchen when they tried to offer to help her finish up dinner earlier, which had left them chatting awkwardly in the dining room.

He pulled his phone out of his pocket to check the time and saw a text from Bailey. It was a picture of an air conditioner on the shelf at a hardware store with a caption that read, "Can I have it, Daddy?" Nate snorted. They'd already talked about buying the damn thing, but Bailey had been getting a kick out of sending him pictures of almost everything he purchased lately, mostly coffees with cute little "Thanks Daddy!" notes.

Nate suspected he was doing that partly because he felt nervous since he'd ended his summer job and wasn't getting a paycheck anymore. He had a decent amount saved up and could buy his coffees, but Nate would be paying most of the bills in the upcoming months. It felt like Bailey was reassuring him that he wasn't spending a lot, which was unnecessary. They couldn't go crazy, but he didn't want Bailey to stress over money.

After sending a quick thumbs up, he typed up another reply telling Bailey just that, only to delete the message and shove his phone back into his pocket. That seemed like a conversation to have in person rather than over text. Besides, Karlie swept into the dining room at that exact moment.

"Can you help me carry everything in?" she asked.

Nate rolled his eyes. "I thought I'd just be getting in the way, but now you want my help?"

"You're in the way right now, standing around like that," she hip-checked him, then gathered the cheese and fruit tray to carry it back into the kitchen and make space on the table. Their mom had taken out her nicer dinnerware from the hutch to set the table. Karlie had placed trivets in the middle exactly where she wanted them, having measured with the serving dishes she planned on using and everything.

"Make yourself useful," she quipped as she passed him, going back into the kitchen.

He followed obediently. "Everything looks perfect," he told her. "And it smells amazing."

"Do you think so?" She set the trays down and grabbed a platter of the shredded, broiled carnitas to shove into his arms. "That goes on the two wooden trivets."

"I think that Jeremy had better appreciate all the effort you are putting into impressing him," Nate said.

"Damn right, he better," their mom said, as she pulled a plastic-wrapped bowl out of the fridge.

Karlie snorted. "I'm just having fun. When else do I get to host like this?"

"You didn't throw a dinner for me so they parents could meet my boyfriend," Nate complained.

Her jaw dropped. "They knew him before I was born, you ass. And you never said you wanted one! Now go put that on the table." She grabbed a towel and started winding it up like she was going to whip him with it. He yelped and scurried away before she could make good on the threat.

Their dad and Jeremy were already up and coming into the dining room. Jeremy offered to help carry stuff, either trying to gain brownie points or just genuinely trying to be helpful. Nate couldn't tell which. But he sat without fuss when Nate told him they had enough hands, which was a point in his favor in Nate's book. He never liked it when people insisted too much on helping.

And he got a few more points in his favor when he practically waxed poetic about how delicious everything smelled and looked. "Taco Tuesday was never this good in my house growing up," he told them excitedly as he grabbed a tortilla and started making a plate for himself. Taco Tuesday hadn't been like this for them either, usually. But Karlie had been the one to plan and implement this, not their parents.

"Anytime you wanna come over to my apartment and cook this semester, please do it," he continued, while spooning some elote onto his plate as well. "The guys would love you forever."

Karlie blushed. "Only if I don't have to do the dishes after."

Yuck, Nate thought as he grabbed his own tortilla.

"So," his dad asked in the most dad-tone possible, "You are renting an apartment with some roommates instead of staying in the dorms?"

The conversation moved naturally through talking about his living arrangements, to the state of the dorms, to the classes they would be taking, and whether they liked the college or not. Eventually, it got turned somehow to Nate and Bailey moving downtown into an apartment together. When Nate mentioned going into the trades, Jeremy launched into telling them about how his father had just retired as an insulator.

"Well," Karlie said as she, Nate, and their mom settled on the couch, while their Dad and Jeremy cleaned up and loaded the dishwasher. "Thanks for being nice to him."

"Did you think we wouldn't be?" their mom asked. She eyed the baseball game, then reached for the remote. Tragically, nobody in their house was a big fan of baseball except their dad. He was always complaining about them falling asleep whenever he wanted to watch a game with them.

"You all eviscerated Thomas when I had him over for dinner senior year," she pointed out, voice rising with indignation.

"That guy was an ass," Nate told her.

She pursed her lips and then shrugged. "Yeah, he was. So...you think Jeremy is not an ass?"

"He seems okay."

"Did she tell you about how he's been taking her free climbing at a state park near the college?" their mom asked.

"He's got the proper equipment, right?" Nate asked, visions flashing before his eyes of Karlie scaling a rock face with Jeremy standing below her, ready to catch her if she fell, trying to be romantic or just plain stupid. It was unrealistic because the guy was practically a pro climber, but Nate's mind always liked to exaggerate.

"He took me to buy actual climbing shoes, which means I don't have to borrow the ones at the rec center when I go there!" Karlie gushed. "And for my birthday, he got me my own chalk bag."

It was hard not to thaw a little beneath the brightness of her eyes. But still... "He has mats and stuff, right?"

She smacked his arm. "Of course!"

Jeremy and their dad came in a few minutes later, and they rearranged so that Jeremy and Karlie could sit next to each other. Only for Karlie to pop up and go into the kitchen to put coffee on because she'd gotten this idea from all her research on hosting that they should have coffee after dinner, along with the blondies that she had made the day before.

"So," their mom glanced from flipping through the stations to Jeremy, "What would you like to watch?"

Jeremy glanced at their dad. The baseball game was still on, but instead of trying to gain brownie points by saying he wanted to watch that, he shrugged and asked if there were any interesting nature documentaries on. Nate had to wrestle back a snort with all his might. His mom hummed and pulled her feet up onto the couch, resting her arm across her knees as she pointed the remote at the TV. Karlie might have gotten a little fancy for dinner, but they'd never been a family that wasn't at home in their house, even with company. Thankfully, it seemed to make Jeremy relax, rather than making him uncomfortable. Another point in his favor.

"Don't think so," she said. "We could stream something. Or...I think I did see that climbing movie. The one with...whatshisname, where they are...hold on, let me see if I can find it again."

Jeremy knew exactly what movie she was talking about before she even mentioned it, and as soon as the commercials gave way to the actual movie, he started pointing out all the technical inaccuracies regarding the equipment.

"This feels like they were filming a horror movie," Nate commented, chills crawling down his spine from the sheer height, let alone the filming cuts or music.

"They totally were," Jeremy said. "That's why they didn't care to make a lot of it super realistic, which is a shame because they could make it super realistic and still make it terrifying. Even more terrifying than this is everyone doing everything right and still getting stuck. Now, a good example of that is..." he kept rambling on about a couple of different movies, readily admitting that he would rather be out there climbing than watching a film about it. Nate shuddered. He didn't necessarily mind heights, but the things these climbers were doing bothered him.

"You don't do stuff like this, right?" he asked, slightly concerned for Karlie's safety.

"No, Jesus," Jeremy laughed, "Although there are a couple of places that I'd like to climb that are pretty challenging."

The rest of the night went just like that. Karlie served coffee and blondies. Jeremy went on about how delicious the baked goods were until she blushed, and any more would seem insincere. Nate's parents needled respectfully about what their lives were like at college. Before leaving, Nate drew Jeremy aside and put on his most menacing aura to let him know he better not put Karlie into any climbing situations above their level of expertise, or any other dangerous situations for that matter. The poor kid went pretty pale, but he didn't waver when Nate clapped him on the shoulder.

Later, when he got to Bailey's trailer, the lights were already out, and Bailey was tucked into bed with only the glow of his phone lighting up his face. He put it down and held his arms out to make grabby hands. "How was it?"

"Looks like I'm going to have to remember the kid's name," Nate sighed as he tugged his shirt off and stepped out of his jeans. He lifted the sheet and slid under it to gather Bailey into his arms. "He seemed alright."

Bailey hummed and hugged him back. "That's good." He kissed the top of Nate's head. They held each other until all the places where their skin touched were slicked with sweat, and then they had to separate to actually sleep.

"You got that air conditioner, right?" Nate asked, remembering that he wanted to talk to Bailey about not worrying too much about money.

"Yep."

But not right now. Right now, he wanted to go to sleep. "Good," he murmured, before shoving the sheets down around his waist and closing his eyes.