Finn loved accessories and fine things. The average socialite preferred stealth wealth. They'd wear the right white shirt like a passcode into high society. If part of being accepted by the upper crust was looking boring, Finn wanted nothing to do with it. He'd already put up with years of homeschooling by his uptight grandparents, he couldn't imagine that being his whole life.

His heroes dressed in bright colors and sang about rebellion. It was a lifestyle he could really get behind. Though he hoped he could skip past the starving artist phase and get to the good part.

Until his bandmates could graduate college and tour, he was stuck pacifying his mother's side of the family. That didn't mean he couldn't rebel in smaller ways, like with his accessories to their stuffy parties. He'd cycle through them every week or so, watching as his family was forced to be polite to whatever girl he found that matched his outfit.

The latest heart he'd pulled was a little much to handle. Getting random texts at two am had been cute at first, but her obsessive behavior was growing more concerning. She'd thought taxidermy squirrels made for a great 'weekiversary' present for starters. He was counting on her irrational behavior to really stir up the coming Thursday's gala. Maybe she'd even bite a guest.

"I'm breaking up with you." She told him with a blank expression. Finn let his ice cream spoon plunge into the bottom of his dish.

"Why?" He watched helplessly as she fished through her purse to pay for her own ice cream. "I take you anywhere you want to go, I call you whenever you want, you're wearing the horseshoe necklace I bought you right now."

"But do you like me?"

"Yes." Finn said. Somehow, that wasn't the right answer.

"I dyed my hair pink just to match your jacket." She shook her head.

"I never said you had to dye it. You could have worn a hat." This couldn't be happening. He never got dumped. She got up to leave. "Wait!" She paused, her head tilted slightly toward him.

"This is the part where you're supposed to call out my name." She gave him a wild, tense look. "What's my name?" It started with an H.

"...Henrietta?"

"Unbelievable!" She stormed out of the diner. "You're the worst boyfriend!" She yelled pushing an innocent bystander out of the way. Finn sunk back into his chair, all eyes slowly turned toward him. Too many judgmental people to pick one and plead his case to. He shoveled as much ice-cream as he could before getting a headache and asking for the check.

She was crazy, he already knew that. So clearly, she just didn't know what she was talking about. He was the perfect boyfriend, right up until he was ready to be someone else's perfect boyfriend. They hadn't even gotten to that part yet. Why was she acting like he was the asshole? It wasn't fair.

Finn really didn't want to go to this house party. He was supposed to be here with his girlfriend so she could make a scene and embarrass his family on Instagram. It didn't help that what she said had wormed its way into his head like a bad jingle. Shad and Beatus had to practically drag him out of the house to come here. Trashy pop was blasting from every window as they rolled up.

"Quite moping, you hated her." Beatus shoved Finn's feet off the armrest to park the car. "You literally had an expiration date written on your calendar."

"You don't get it." Finn pulled up his headphones to drown out the host's poor choice in music.

"This party's gonna be good for the band." Shad rolled out of the car with his silk jacket over one shoulder. "We go in and remind the people who get gigs we're nice. Then it'll be easier to book in the future." Finn glared at him from the back seat. "It'll be fun!"

"One hour." Finn lagged behind them as they walked to the front door. "Then you return me to my misery." They entered the living room, colored lights dimly illuminating the wall to wall guests. Whenever Emet threw parties, everyone was invited. The bigger the better. People were swarmed around a trough of tequila mixed with god knows what. There was nowhere to sit. As long as he was here, he might as well nibble on a rice crispy or whatever passed as food. His friends had already run off to great people they knew from other classes. There were just too many people here to be the center of attention. It was going to be a really long hour.

A door at the back of the hall slammed loud enough for Finn to pick up over his headphones. He pulled his headset around his neck, halfway through a cookie. Someone entered from the back of the kitchen, his long dreads pulled away from his darkened face. He made no move to greet anyone as he heaved himself to lay over the bar to grab his bag. It gave Finn an eyeful of how high the boy's denim shorts could ride up. The other slid back onto his feet and pushed passed the other party guest to the living room.

"Wait, Harv!" One of what's her face's siblings shouted. Harv paused in the living room, still poised to leave. "It's not like that. You said you weren't going to be here."

"So you cheated on me?!" Harv wheeled around with a fury in his blue eyes. He was slightly shorter than his gangly partner, but no less intimidating.

"We never agreed to be exclusive." They tried to comfort Harv but he smacked their hand away. "I really thought you understood. I told you I was coming here with Melody. You said it was okay."

"I never said I was okay with you dating someone else. And you never-" Harv turned around to make his way to the door. "I'm going back to work. I don't have time for this."

"You never do!" They grabbed his arm. "We hardly even dated." Harv easily flipped them on their ass. All eyes in the room were on Harv as he bolted for the door. As soon as the front door closed, it was like a spell had broken on the crowd. People went back to talking amongst themselves and Finn could feel his heart beat again for the first time in minutes.

He had to know who that was.

"Okay Finn, we've made our rounds." Beatus lazily stepped around the downed ex-boyfriend to join Finn in the kitchen. "Shad's probably going to crash here again, so if you want to go-"

"Who was that?" Finn pointed toward the front door. "With the hair and the butt." Why was he so bad with names?

"Wow Finn, you've managed to describe everyone here." Beatus groaned. Finn pulled out his phone and texted Shad a broken description of what he saw. Again, nothing.

No one had heard of the guy before.

The guests had all seen him before, maybe in the back of class or walking around campus, but no one could tell him how to contact him. He wasn't on any social media. There were two group pics he was in on other people's pages, but none of them had him tagged in anything. He had the general campus he went to, but in a sea of thousands of students, it would be impossible to just pull up and ask people where he was.

"Hey... Finn?" Shad looked over his shoulder. "It's great you're feeling..." Finn was curled up in the back seat, looking almost gremlin like in the glow of his cellphone. "Better..." Beatus ignored them both, with an almost hostile air. "You, uh, think you'll be up for rehearsing our set tomorrow?" Finn grunted a reply. "...Finn?"

"Yeah, yeah; I'll be there." Finn said. "Does he not own a computer?"

"You're being creepy." Beatus said. He pulled the car into park next to Finn's front gate. "If you can't pull it together, don't come." Finn gathered his stuff as obnoxiously as possible.

"Sorry, my wounded heart is so inconvenient to you." Finn kicked open the door. "I'll keep that in mind next time you-" Beatus never went on dates. "Can't get a colored press of Bon Iver." Beatus shook his head as the gear shift clicked back into drive. "And I'm not being creepy!" Finn shouted at the van as it drove away. "I'm being perfectly normal!"

Finn flinched at the motion lights. His figure washed out as the front gate slowly creaked open. The shadow in the living room was too tall to be one of his cousins. A long winded lecture was waiting for him inside.

Harv returned to his dorm instead of going back to work. He had tried, but Bruiser insisted he take the night off. Either way, it counted as a sick call.

He certainly felt sick, coming home to a sink full of dishes left behind by his ghost of a roomate. All the lights were off, and the hum of the heater did little to comfort him. He threw his keys in a dish Puck made in art class. The outfit he spent too much time fretting over ended up crumpled in a heap of laundry he was supposed to do three days ago. He didn't dare look at his notifications before hopping in the shower, hoping he could turn his brain off long enough to stop feeling terrible. By the time he got out, he was drowning in notifications.

I'm sorry.

Can we talk?

Harv collapsed onto his bed and scrolled through a wall of excuses. Some so well crafted, Harv thought about texting back. He worked two jobs in addition to class, it wasn't fair that he didn't have a lot of free time to spare. His family needed the extra help, and he'd been so excited to find someone who understood that. Or at least, he thought they had understood.

Is it too much to ask to spend time with someone who's physically available?

Harv threw his phone to the side and buried his face in the pillow. His idea of taking things slow was Ambro's idea of going nowhere. After rearranging his whole schedule to go to a party he felt guilty for missing, he felt so stupid.

He'd have to crunch his essay in the morning. The sick call was going to cut into his paycheck. Next week's groceries were going to be slim. He might be able to stretch his meal plan by studying in the cafeteria and smuggling out leftovers in tupperware.

Right now he just wanted to sleep.

Warrior University's campus loved to advertise how walkable it was. A small, by university standards, gated community in a crummy part of town. Finn would be quick to argue that everything being forty minutes from the parking lot was not walkable, especially for the directionally challenged. All the dull grey buildings looked the same and their names were hidden in hard to read 'artful' places on the outer walls. He'd circled back to the map at the main round about one too many times trying to figure out the difference between the cafe, grill, cafeteria, and student lounge; all sporting the same brand coffee shop he was supposed to meet the band at.

He followed the main brick path with his hands in his pockets. If he stood still in the right place, he was bound to find them eventually. People mulled about on their way to class or lunch, unaware Finn was an outsider.

"There you are!" Shad ran ahead to where Finn had awkwardly taken up a table. "The biggest coffee shop is on the 3rd floor of the library."

"Those glass study rooms aren't sound proof," Finn said, "we'll be kicked out again if we practice there."

"Yeah," Shad said, "but the theater department said we could use the costume shop since they're in between shows." Finn got up, seeing Beatus slowly catch up to where they were talking. Across the circle, a couple of rugby players were on their way to the cafeteria, followed by the guy from the party.

Finn ditched his bag, unaware of his friend's shouts as he sprinted toward the stranger. He stopped just before running into them, lurching forward then coming back to stand on his feet. The guy turned toward him, wild blue eyes looking at him like he was an idiot, but it was him. He was real.

"...Hi." He was trying to talk to him.

"You're human." Finn said. Years of song lyrics and pick up lines sank to the bottom of Finn's mind, out of reach.

"Yes." Harv raised an eyebrow, almost amused.

"I'm human too." Heat rushed to his face as he fumbled with his phone, the smile on Harv's face growing by the second. "We should be friends." He offered Harv his smart phone with his instagram profile on it.

"I'm not online." Harv said slowly, almost like talking to a child. Finn's outstretched arm drifted.

"Oh." What did people do before the internet was in their pocket? "Phone! Do you have a phone? I could call you-" Finn was getting glared at by two ogre-like rugby players. He was pretty sure he dated one of their sisters. Maybe that's why they lied about not knowing his cinderella. "Or- uh- you could text me."

"FINN!" Beatus shouted at him from across the circle. "We're leaving! Hurry up!"

"One second!" Finn shouted back. He needed paper to write down his number. His backpack was a mess, and Harv was chuckling under his breath as he frantically grabbed the first somewhat blank page he could find. "Here!" He needed to put his phone number on it first. "Wait, no, here." He could see his friends start to leave without him. Once they were out of sight he'd have no way of knowing where to go. "I gotta go." He bumped into a table as he walked backwards. "But I'll talk to you later."

Harv was showing his chicken scratch to his friends and laughing a little. Finn turned around and to catch up to his friends. Beatus was half way down the path while Shad stared at him dumbfounded.

"What the hell was that?" Shad asked.

"I. Don't. Know." Finn hissed under his breath. "Everytime I see him, it's like my brain turns off. I probably sounded insane." That little prick of anxiety had him wheel around to shout across the quad. "I'M NOT A PSYCHO!"

"Stop talking." Shad grabbed him by his shoulders and pushed him toward the theater department.

"But-"

"You're just making it worse." Shad said. "For the love of god, stop talking."