He walked over, heart hammering. “That’s not a beach read,” he said.
Zayn hadn’t come for that. He came for the engineering library, for the endless desert horizons, for the chance to be anonymous in a country where no one knew his family’s name. But the word laid stuck to him like burrs on a sock. It wasn't just about sex. It was about being placed . Being settled . Being known . Laid in America
He was laid, instead, into a story. Into the soft gravity of someone who saw him. And for the first time since he’d landed, Zayn felt like he was exactly where he was supposed to be. He walked over, heart hammering
“So why are you really here?” she asked, not looking at him. “In America. Not the party. The country.” He came for the engineering library, for the
“You talk in your sleep,” he lied. “Something about dark matter and a missing sock.”
Chad dragged him. “It’s a cultural imperative,” he said, shoving a red plastic cup into Zayn’s hand. The party was in a mansion off-campus, throbbing with bass and the smell of fake fog. Bodies moved in costumes: pirates, nurses, a terrifyingly realistic Slenderman. Zayn wore his regular jeans and a henley. He felt like a passport photo at a carnival.
She was sitting on a leather couch, alone. She wore a simple grey sweater and jeans, no costume. Her hair was a messy bun, and she was reading a dog-eared paperback by the light of a strobe. A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking.