“Yeah, telling me you weren’t coming in last night. What were you up to?”
I dropped my purse. “I was with Max.”
She sighed. “Of course you were. Ruining your life, one step at a time.”
I climbed into my bed. “I don’t need your judgment, Hannah. I get enough of it from my parents. I know what I’m doing. And if you don’t trust that, then that’s your fault.”
“It’s not that I don’t trust you. I’m just worried. You missed your classes again. That’s the second time in two weeks you’ve missed an entire day of school for him. And for what?”
I slid under the covers. “Well, I don’t know what to tell you. I have it under control. So you can stop punishing me for finally getting out there. Like you wanted me to at the beginning of the semester, you jerk.”
“Fine. Whatever.”
“Yeah, whatever.”
And, despite the tension, I didn’t have any issues falling right back asleep.
* * *
When my eyes opened from my nap, it was almost dark out. The sun was setting, and it jolted me right out of bed. I practically rolled out of bed and crawled to my purse to yank my phone out. Holy shit, it was already past six o’clock in the evening.
How long was I out?
I scrambled to my feet and searched around for my books. I had to do whatever I needed to do to catch up for today. I frantically logged into my school account and found the lectures. My lucky day, apparently. Because both of them were already posted.
One absence in each of my classes. I can’t do more than two.
I flipped my calendar opened and started checking things off. I was ahead on my reading, so all I needed to do was refresh my mind with the questions at the back. I was already jotting down notes from my first lecture of the day, so I had that going for me. And thankfully, the material was still pretty easy.
Then my eyes fell to something in my calendar. Something that was circled in red. Written in green. And bolded with a highlighter, just so it was extra obnoxious.
“Oh, no,” I murmured.
I had a paper due tomorrow afternoon.
I turned the lecture off and shuffled things around. I pulled up a Word document and found the requirements for the paper. I groaned at the sight of a needed bibliography. Of course a bibliography would be involved. I’d be up all night pulling this off. Easily. And since I still had no idea what the hell I was writing for this paper, I still had to research and piece an outline together before I did anything else.
And of course, my phone started vibrating with a call.
“Not now, Satan,” I whispered.
The vibrating stopped, but quickly picked back up. Again, and again. Until I couldn't focus enough to do my research anyway. I groaned as I rummaged around for my phone. My hand finally settled on it and I picked it up. Great. Mom was calling. Which meant Dad wasn’t too far behind.
Such bad timing.
I put on my chipper voice. “Hi, Mom!”
“Well, there’s my little sweetheart. It’s been a while since we’ve heard from you.”
Dad chuckled. “Not drowning in those books yet, are you?”
If you only knew. “Well, I’m not going to lie. One of my professors is terrible with deadlines, so I’m scrambling to make some last-minute edits to a paper before I turn it in tomorrow.”
Dad sighed. “Ugh, I remember those kinds of professors. Don’t worry, they aren’t all like that. Just go with the flow as best as you can and take breaks when necessary.”
“Exactly, sweetheart,” Mom said, “don’t overdo it. I know you’re proud of your A’s, and we are, too--”
“Don’t make her compromise her good grades. That’s not the point of college.”