This takes place prior to the events of Attention.

Movie Night

She opened the door slowly, still annoyed that the doors didn't have a goddamn peephole to prepare her for possible creeps. Upon opening it wide enough to see Dorian's simpering face, she sighed. "What do you want?" She said, a bit more forceful than she'd meant to be.

Dorian feigned hurt, but when the look didn't soften her face, he dropped the show all together. "Bored, Chaol's out. Movie night?" He pulled his hand from behind his back to reveal a bag full of DVDs.

"How exciting," she drawled, but then grabbed the bag and sauntered back into her dorm. Nehemia was at some frat party up-town, and she'd claimed that she wouldn't be back until the morning, something about sleeping at a friend's dorm or whatever. "Chaol's out?" She said, and she didn't wonder where he was, no way.

She dumped the bag on her bed and began searching for anything good as Dorian shut the door and entered behind her. Thank Wyrd Nehemia had brought a TV with a built-in DVD-player. "Yeah," Dorian said, sitting on her bed beside her. "I'd guess to a frat-party, but he doesn't seem like the type, ya know?"

It was true, Dorian's roommate was too studious to hit the bars on a Thursday night. Celaena briefly pondered where the aloof senior was, but then she pushed the subject away. Dorian was here, he'd brought movies!

When she glanced at the boy, he was untying his left shoe, the right already abandoned on the floor. This time when the thought of Chaol and how he always removed his shoes by the door and propped them out of the way arose—she ignored it. Chaol wasn't here, was he? Why did he even matter? She pulled a disc from the pile of DVDs at random, "This one."

Dorian was a lot closer than she expected, his hand was already pulling the disc from hers when she glanced up. "Good choice," he said into the barely-there space between them.

She tried not to blush, but her cheeks were dusted with pink before she could even think to force it down, instead, she looked away. She cleared her throat when he didn't seem to get the hint. From the corner of her eye, she watched him straighten then stand to place the DVD in the slot.

She tried to ignore him, really, she did. But, as the movie began, all she could think of was the space in between their hands, and was that smell him? Of course it was, she recognized his cologne. But…had it always smelled so good? He was watching her, she could feel his eyes on her. But what was she supposed to do? Normally she'd make some dumb retort up but she felt so small in this moment. She felt like a little girl, all insecure and flustered.

She took a deep breath, and turned to say something, but his lips met hers instead. She gasped into the kiss, but after a beat of kissing him back like a dead fish, she began to move. Sam used to kiss her much faster than this; he'd push her back and breathe her in like she was his only source of air. She wasn't used to the slow way Dorian kissed. She wasn't used to the gentle caress of his lips over hers, or how he held her face as if she was delicate.

She tried to push back; she tangled one hand around his neck and breathed him in, deepening the kiss and allowing his tongue into her mouth. Dorian almost seemed surprised at the motion, if the way his free hand stuttered on its way to her waist was anything to go by.

The movie was still playing in the background, but she could barely hear it over the sound of her heart pounding in her chest. Could he hear it? She angled his head with her left hand, her right firm against the curls of his dark hair.

He pulled back, and brushed his nose against hers, she hummed in delight. He kissed her cheek, her chin, her jawline. He kissed down her neck to her pulse, then back up again. She gripped onto his hair like it was her sanity—which she could feel slowly leaving her.

"Celaena," he whispered into her skin, "Is your roommate coming home anytime soon?"

The world tilted back onto its axis at those words. She pulled back, wiping her lips off on her hand. "Let's not," she said. "I don't think—This wasn't a good idea."

"That's a double negative," he said, sitting up, and reaching for her again.

She glared at him, and stood up. He tried to follow her, but she pushed him back to the bed with a finger. "Stop," she said. He pouted, and she hated herself for appreciating the way his lips looked when he did that but—she stopped herself. "I'm sorry, Dorian. We shouldn't."

This time, when he moved to stand, she let him. He didn't seem angry exactly as he laced his shoes back up, but how could he be happy when she'd just made out with him then turned around and rejected him?

"Dorian," she said as he grabbed the DVD bag. He paused at the door, back to her. "I'm sorry," she said again, "It's just a bad idea."

He seemed to lose air at that; his shoulders deflated like a hot air balloon with a needle-sized puncture. "Yeah," he said. "Yeah." He turned around and smiled at her, "I'll see ya later, Celaena."

"Bye," she lifted her hand in a half-hearted wave then immediately regretted it. She looked like a big dumb idiot. "Wait!" She called just before he closed the door behind him, "Text me when you find out where Chaol went." She grinned, but his smile just looked forced. "Knowing him, he's probably just pulling an all-nighter at the library," she forced out a laugh, and he mirrored the laugh.

"Yeah," he closed the door between them.

She locked the door behind him, and was about to grab her book back off the shelf when she noticed the movie still playing.

Movie night, she thought. How exciting.