You should have known better than to think you could ever escape Patrick fucking Zweig.

He'd told you that was really his middle name one time. You'd laughed. He'd nudged your shoulder with his. You'd blushed. He'd pointed it out. Asshole.

It had to have been... what, at least a year since the night? His hand halfway up your shirt when you'd finally realized that he was only flirting with you to get over her, and no, he was never going to actually ask you out. All of freshman and half of sophomore year wasted pining over him when you could've been pursuing the nice boys in your classes. Yeah, nice college boys. What a fucking joke.

So you'd sworn them, or more specifically him, off. Long time friendship be damned, it was one thing to be used to get over an ex. It was another thing entirely for the boy you'd oh so foolishly fallen for to use you to get over his ex and then not even succeed at that.

You'd spotted him a few times since then, always at some shitty, quickly thrown together party hosted by your fellow undergrads. Never on campus. But you'd been lucky (if you could call it that), always avoiding a mutual sighting. You never failed to scurry off to another room before he could notice you, under cover of red cups and confetti that never really seemed to stop falling on the eternally sticky floors.

However.

Yes, your inhibitions may be slightly down. Semester over, grades out, classes passed. You were game for ringing in the new year, even if it was surrounded by half-naked coeds and your friends that were determined to get their midnight kisses.

Not drunk yet, your eyes easily caught on Patrick. Leaning against a wall on the other side of the room, doused in... glitter? Fine! No biggie!

Except, by the time you wove your way through the crowd and into the kitchen, he had a hand on the counter, gaze locked on you. For the first time in over a year, he'd seen you too. And fuck, you just knew he was about to make it your problem. If not everybody else's, too.