Daisy

Last night and most of today had been a little rough. I'd spent all night cleaning and had taken a quick shower right before bed. I'd had one class this morning and then labs in the afternoon. Then back here for more cleaning and organizing.

I'm tired, sweaty, and starving. I'd forgotten to eat last night and grabbed a granola bar out of my snack bag for breakfast. Lunch had gotten lost in trying to find my way around and now I'm too tired to move.

But my growling stomach is telling me to get myself up and to the store. I had a mini-fridge thanks to Project Graduation so I could stash some food up here, but until I actually went and got groceries, I was SOL.

"Knock, knock!"

I glance up from where I'm sprawled out on the freshly made bed complete with my favorite comforter. Jenny is looking around a little awed.

"Oh my God, you did all this by yourself? I was going to organize the guys to come help you move all the boxes tonight."

I shrug. "My Gran always said don't put off to tomorrow what you can do today. I didn't want to find crawly things in my bed, so I moved things, set off a couple bug bombs and cleaned everything."

"Move things?" She looks around again. "You labeled sections!"

"There was a lot of broken stuff I set out on the back porch for you to go through to see if you wanted to try to salvage it or garbage it. I wasn't sure what to do with it."

"Hey, I found these at the party store and I thought Daisy might..."

Another girl I hadn't met comes upstairs and goes completely quiet when she sees the now very organized attic. Everything that was in boxes and totes took up a corner only. They had more broken things than anything else.

Jenny laughs. "I didn't recognize the place either. Daisy, this is Cara. She's one of our roommates."

"And I'm Dylan!" A very cute boy beams at me from behind Cara. "I'm this one's boyfriend."

They're not leaving so I force myself to sit up and offer a smile. Manners. I can hear my Mama screaming in my head about manners. Gran wouldn't be screaming, but she'd remind me of them.

"Hey, nice to meet you both."

"I thought you said this place needed a lot of heavy lifting. It looks great."

Cara smacks him in the stomach. "That's because Daisy did everything already. We were going to help."

"It's fine. I appreciate the offer, though. I had the time and a need to not have bugs crawling on me, so I just started in on it."

"Girl, you have to be stronger than you look." Dylan arches a brow.

"I grew up having to fix everything around the house and my keep my car on the road, so you learn to be a little scrappy."

"You know cars?"

"I wouldn't say that. I know YouTube videos."

He laughs. "Just as good."

"Come on downstairs. We just ordered pizza and from the looks of this, you have to be hungry."

"I was actually trying to talk myself into moving enough to go to the grocery store."

"Pizza first and then you can go shopping." Cara nods, her short dark hair bobbing with her head. "Besides, you need to meet everyone so you're not startled if you walk downstairs and into one of the guys."

Probably a good idea.

It's not until we hit the stairs that I notice the music playing. I'd been on the third floor with the door closed and heard nothing. Now that is a bonus. Maybe staying here isn't going to be such a hardship after all.

"The music gets cut off around eleven or so," Jenny says apologetically.

"I was just thinking I didn't even hear it until we hit the second floor. It's not a problem."

"It's all the extra insulation in the floors."

"And you know that how?" Dylan asks his girlfriend.

"Because my dad's a contractor, duh."

The kitchen is full of people I don't know and judging by the amount of them, its way more than actually live here, boyfriends and all. It must be a party. We're on fraternity row, though. What else did I expect?

"Not a party girl?" Jenny whispers.

"Not really, but I don't mind them either. I'm just really focused on school right now."

"I get it. I'll try to keep the idiots from bothering you too much."

"What do you want to drink, Daisy?" Dylan is already in the fridge rummaging around.

"Water?"

"Girl, we have beer, beer, and some kind of fruity wine cooler."

"There's water." Hailey shoves him aside and tosses me a bottle of water. "They don't know how to look past the beer."

"Not true." A guy slides his arm around Hailey and pulls her against his chest. "I don't drink during the season."

"This is Mitchell. He's the captain and quarterback of the football team." Of course he is because he's super cute. Dark blonde hair and eyes as blue as Hailey's with a body meant to made girls have midnight fantasies about. Been there, done that. Not doing it again.

Three more boys come over, yelling and joking. I sincerely doubt I'll remember everyone. These three all have dark hair and dark eyes and are just as cute as the quarterback. They're also football players.

"Is this like the football house or something?"

Dylan laughs. "You would think wouldn't you, but no. I'm on the hockey team. Jenny's boyfriend, Andrew, is also on the team. You'll meet him later. He stayed late to help a couple of the guys who have scouts coming to their game this weekend to watch them play."

That is a huge deal. If its scouts, then it means a professional team is looking at them. "Is it like the NFL but for hockey?"

"You a football fan?"

"I know football."

When I say nothing else, Mitchell frowns, but lets it go. "The national hockey league, or NHL."

"Shitz and Skittles?" Dylan notices my t-shirt for the first time. It's a rainbow literally throwing up skittles on the front. "Where did you get that?"

"My Gran bought it for my birthday."

"Please tell me you have more of these kinds of shirts?"

"Drawers full of them."

Jenny bumped his arm. "Told she was going to fit right in."

The doorbell rings and someone shouts pizza.

Jenny sidles up next to me while the boys go pay for the pizza. "We organized a cleaning party disguised as a pizza party. It's the only real way to trick them into doing what we wanted them to."

"And I ruined your plans."

"Or saved our ears from all the complaints we'd get!"

Another roommate I'm guessing. She's model tall, with heavy, thick sandy colored hair and hazel eyes. She smiles wryly. "I'm Blaire. You must be Daisy."

"Nice to meet you."

She points to the guy leading the way with a box of pizzas in his hands. "That's Jack, he's a shortstop on the baseball team and he's mine."

The look in her eyes dare me to try something. Little does she know I'm done with athletes.

"Alright, alright, move along, move along."

Now that voice sounds familiar, but I can't place it.

"Hutch!"

A roar goes up through the house and I wince at the noise. I have a headache and this along with the music is not helping.

Mitchell sighs. "The quarterback of the football team is supposed to be the most popular guy on campus, but it's this asshole instead."

"That's because you're in Minnesota, sweet cheeks." Jenny winks. "Football may be king in Texas, but hockey is king and queen here in Minnesota."

Sweet cheeks?

The guy actually blushes and I grin. I really want to know why he's blushing, but I have a feeling it's a private joke.

The proclaimed king of the campus enters the kitchen and even though he's smiling, he looks tired. Not so much in his physical appearance, but its his eyes. There's a strain there I'm not sure anyone else pays too much attention to.

He really is a gorgeous man. He has almost what I would call a baby face, but there are some hard angles to it that keeps it from being that. His light brown hair is a little shaggy around his ears, but it adds to his boyishness. If not for the very muscular body, I wouldn't even think he was an athlete.

"This must be Deliverance," another guy says, laughter twinkling in his eyes.

"Call me that again, and you'll see just how much like Deliverance I can be."

"Ohh, kitten has claws!"

"Knock it off, Brody." Hutch shoots the newcomer a warning look.

"Oh, no, please keep it up. I want to see our little scrapper beat his ass," Cara says, her eyes gleaming with an evil kind of merriment.

Brody glances at me and laughs.

Dylan shakes his head. "Dude, you have no idea. I'll put money on Daisy any day of the week. She's tougher than she looks."

None of them have any idea how right they actually are.

"Dude, move. These boxes are hot." Jack shoulders past Brody and places eight boxes down on the counter. "The guys are bringing the rest."

"I made salad with grilled chicken for those of us who are sticking to our training diet." Mitchell nods to Hutch and two other guys with him.

I hastily get out of the way of three more people all carrying at least seven or eight boxes of pizza each. How many people did Jenny think she'd need to clean the attic?

"You hungry?" Hutch asks from behind me.

When did he move over here?

"Yeah, but I think if I get in the way of the guys, I'll get stepped on."

"Wait here."

Before I can say anything, he grabs a paper plate from the stack on the kitchen counter and filches three slices of pepperoni pizza and then brings it back to me.

"Thanks."

He nods and goes back into the fray to find himself some food. He bypasses the pizza and instead heads to where several of the others are digging into the very large bowls of salad Mitchell made.

"That's new."

"What?" I ask Jenny absently.

"He got you food."

"So?"

"Don't get me wrong," she says softly. "Hutch is always nice to the girls, but he's never gone out of his way for a girl before and I've never seen him feed a woman before he feeds himself."

"That's just rude."

She laughs. "I agree, but look at the mess around here. Not even Dylan made sure I had food first."

"That's on you. If you let them treat you like that, then they will. Then again, its probably just the way I was brought up. Back home, boys are taught that you make sure your girl is first, not second. At least any guy worthwhile is like that."

"Hmmm," Jenny hums. "I never thought about it like that."

"I'm going to take this upstairs and eat and then head to the store. I have a headache and all this noise is getting to me. Not being rude, but I'm exhausted."

"No worries. You go on upstairs. We'll make sure no one goes up there. It'll be off limits during the parties."

"Thanks."

I give her a grateful smile and snake through the throng of people and up the stairs, making sure to close the door behind me at the top of the stairs.

Those people are loud.

I've been to louder parties, but I'm just not in the mood tonight. I want to eat, shop, take a shower, and then sleep like the dead.

And hopefully in the morning, the migraine will be gone.