~All in my zone, all in my space,

Life is always in the way~

The day after classes began, Tuesday, Zayn walked to Grant's classroom after his late class, since that was when the two of them usually spend time together. Both of them had been building up mystery and intrigue as to what their gifts for each other could be - Zayn didn't actually have one when he said he did, and made him a cool drawing of a dragon to put in his office. He figured he could say that he was low on money, and wanted to make a homemade gift, which Grant would appreciate no matter what because Zayn was cute and soft.

"Zayn!" He exclaims as Zayn walks in with something behind his back. Setting it on a seat, he runs to him and jumps into his arms. "How was it? How was your break?"

"It was amazing!" He tells him, even though he stayed in the dorms for basically the entirety of it - save the trip to New York. "I can never thank you enough. I missed you so, so much." The warm arms wrapped around him made him feel safe and secure - right in the world again. After they were done greeting each other and kissing, Zayn was eager to receive and give him his gift.

"If you insist, you can go first," Grant closed his eyes and sat on the stool with his hands out as Zayn ran across the room to get the drawing that he had laminated. It was one of his best works, for being done so last minute. Not that the professor would ever know - he put the completion date on the back of it as 12/24. "Oh, Zaynie, I love it!"

"I had hoped you might," He said bashfully. After looking in-depth and the drawing and ooh-ing and ahh-ing, Zayn was forced to sit on the stool and a wrapped box was put into his hands. "Whatever it is, you shouldn't have got it for me."

"Stop it, I like to get you things. I like to see you happy." He held his hands on Zayn's waist as the wrapping paper was torn off - red and green spirals and ribbons now on the ground of the lecture hall.

Zayn almost stopped breathing when he saw the Apple logo and the picture and words saying that this was the newest MacBook Pro. "Hunter, no! No! This is too much money! You have to return this! Like right now!" He was already crying and hyperventilating - maybe he wasn't meant to be an appreciative sugar baby.

Hunter set the box on the desk and hugged Zayn tightly. "It's for you. I'm not returning it. You're a computer programmer, and you need a good computer. So I got you this one. It should last you years and years. You can put stickers on it and it has an amazing webcam so you could talk to your family, if you wanted to! Besides. I threw away the receipt because I knew you would want me to return it. So, it's yours now, Zaynie."

Zayn struggled to regain his composure. "Since I don't have another option...thank you, Hunter."

"Just think of this as your Christmas present, and a little slice of your birthday present too!" Zayn's birthday had been three days earlier - on Saturday. He was now twenty, and one year closer to being able to drink alcohol legally, and not on a hotel floor, straight out of the bottle.

"A little slice?" Zayn questioned.

Grant smiled, and put his hand on Zayn's cheek. "I have dinner reservations at a place in Dorchester, and a hotel room across the street." Zayn's curious look turned into a sly and excited grin.

---

Zayn had never taken a creative writing course, so he wasn't very good at coming up with a lot of fake details about his trip on the spot. So he kept to the basics, talked about seeing his family and gifts on Christmas, despite the fact that on Christmas day, he was at Adam's apartment watching all of the Home Alone movies with him.

Then Grant talked about skiing and lodges and dinner parties with his friends and wife, and then they were talking about school again, since it was the thread that they had in common. "I just have a feeling that this semester is going to be really great, don't you think?"

"Yeah, I think it will," Zayn laid a hand over Hunter's. The two of them were in the most secluded booth in the whole place - that was a perk of the calling ahead and reserving it. Not that it was the busiest place in the world on Tuesday evenings, but it felt special to them as they sat there, eating pizza, pasta, and salad.

"You're so amazing, Zayn. You're going to do great things."

Grant had appealed to his vanity and narcissism thread, which always buttered him up. "I want to do so much," Zayn started, swirling his fingers around Grant's hand as they sat there talking and eating. "Computer programming is my strong suit, obviously. And I want to travel, of course! Just like everyone these days. Just living on the east coast has opened my eyes to an entire world that's out there."

"And obviously you're also a little bit of an artist," Grant chuckled.

"I used to do graffiti back in high school," Zayn admitted. "Back in Virginia. Spray paint and a harness, hanging off of buildings. I loved it."

"Graffiti?" He questioned with an amused smile. "That's illegal."

"Oh don't start on me now," Zayn laughed, and then leaned in for a kiss. Spaghetti sauce and ranch mixed between their lips - a perfect balance of love and disgustingness.

---

It was the same old thing with Adam and Zayn, getting off of opposite buses early in the morning and doing the walk of shame to class or the dorm. This time, Adam seemed to be waiting for Zayn, sitting on the bench wearing jeans, comically large sunglasses, and drinking a normal coffee. He held the other one out for Zayn as he walked by, the laptop under his arm.

"I see the sugar baby thing is going nicely!" He yelled after him.

"Get to class!" Zayn yelled back. "But thanks for the coffee!"

Back in the dorm, Edwin wasn't there, but there was a countdown on the whiteboard, marking the number of days left in the ultimatum. But at this point, there was no way that he was going to do anything about it, either way. As he stood there, staring at it, his phone lit up and starting buzzing - a call from Mama.

Straight to voicemail.

Then he opened his beautiful new laptop to start working.