For those who have read TGR, we're reuniting with another geek this chapter!

Place your bets on who it might be. ;)

(This person also gets a spinoff sometime in the future.)

That was the first time I'd dreamt about a man in a long, long time.

Once in a while—and we're talking in a while, like thrice every year—I'd have a weird sex dream featuring a faceless male figure, or some random college acquaintance that I had no intimate connection with. I'd read somewhere that the human brain can't generate faces, that every face we ever see in our dreams gets plucked from our haziest memories, which helped to explain the random features.

But I didn't have a sex dream about Quentin either.

No, I had brought him home to meet my family.

It was Christmas in my dream, which was months out in reality, and he wore a red sweater that brought out the red on his cheeks, the tips of his nose and ears. I'd driven us in my quaint four-seater to New York City and guided him up the stairs to our family's small apartment.

He was about eight inches taller than Mom, who was shorter than me, and I recalled her screeching for joy, pulling him down into a stooped hug and rattling off rapid-fire Mandarin at him. He responded good-naturedly, the red in his face rising. I'd never heard Quentin speak Mandarin in real life, but I knew he could speak a little bit of it from a previous conversation we'd had in the library. He scratched Mao Mao—our family cat, but he was Kevin's—behind the ear in greeting and my heart gave a weak splutter.

My siblings made conversation with him about Big Data, then Quen played Go with my father. I remember watching him laying down his white counters all over the board and beating Dad twice out of five rounds. And I remember my Dad looking over to me and giving me that stern nod he always used to signify his approval.

The dream flash-forwarded to after we'd had dinner, when Mom and Dad were packing away the leftovers, when I dragged him to the doorway of my old bedroom. There was mistletoe, and he'd draped a strand of my hair behind my ears before leaning down and pressing his lips—

"Then I woke up."

"Darn," Viv rolled her eyes at me. "You've got it so bad. I feel sorry for you."

"Hey," I responded defensively, "I can't control what I dream about."

Viv, Riley, and I slid our bowls of cereal onto an empty dining table and sat down. On Friday mornings, I actually got a full night's sleep. So we could all eat breakfast together before heading to our classes. It was peaceful, sharing a meal by the dining hall's tall windows that overlooked the residential campus. I could see green grass and feel warm sunlight filtering through.

"Viv's kind of right," Riley teased humourously. "Now I'll feel bad for you if things don't turn out well with Quen."

Each time something remotely insignificant happened, I went and spilled the beans to my best friends. They knew about all the times Quen had visited the VIP lounge at Topaz, and that he'd held my hand yesterday. Admittedly, it was for a whopping two seconds, and after he thought he'd upset me, but still.

Viv and Riley were great at humouring my romanticising.

I took my first bite of berry cereal and chewed. "If things don't turn out, I'll feel plenty bad for myself, thanks. By the way, Viv, he's not sexist. He's a scientist."

"The horror."

"Yesterday, he spoke only about being factual, or abiding by FDA standards, or living up to the moral code."

"It would be something geeky like that," Riley giggled. "He has some logical points. I knew he would."

"I think he's a great guy, even if we don't agree."

"Fair, I guess," Viv conceded. "But just because he's decent, doesn't mean he's boyfriend material. Decent is the bare minimum. You're letting yourself get swept away by the bare minimum."

I didn't bother arguing with Viv. I knew her standards for men were sky-high and her patience with them paper-thin. As her best friends, her picky attitude naturally extended to us—or even amplified—because she thought we deserved only the best.

But she was wrong. Quen far exceeded the bare minimum. He was approachable, friendly, and articulate. We had great conversations, whether sober, studying in the library, or drunk sitting in a booth in Topaz. He didn't ogle my work clothes the way many boys did.

And he held my hand.

Squeal. Surely, he wouldn't do that for me if his feelings were only platonic. I was feeling more confident asking him out now.

I offered, "Then I'll just have to dig deeper till I hit gold, right?"

"Go crazy, girl. But I can't believe Quen got to hang out with you at a club more recently than we have," Riley pouted.

"I was at Topaz for a shift. He just showed up." I omitted the part about me drawing him away from his friends and chatting with him the whole night. "Plus, I still haven't forgiven you all for exposing Drunk Kris on Wednesday. Why would I want to party with you guys and give you more ammo?"

Viv placed her mug of coffee down on the table and smirked. "Because it's fun to get blackout drunk and look at the videos the day after. Drunk Kris is the reason I still have hope in you."

"And my staff liquor discount," I added.

"And that," she agreed with a nod so solemn that Riley started laughing. "But, it's hilarious. You seem all goody-goody. Except I know there's a party animal underneath that sweater. When she's ready to come out and play, come knock on my door."

This spiel was very familiar. After Viv recognised that pressuring and begging me to party didn't work, she would always switch to a conciliatory tactic. She said if I ever had the slightest whim to party, I need only tell her and she would immediately join me. Anytime.

I teased, knowing I wouldn't be taking her up on her offer in the near future, "Anytime, right?"

"Anytime, anyplace, baby," she confirmed. "I'm always ready to rave."

The second time I saw Quen on Friday, he was with an unfamiliar friend of his.

The first time was, of course, waiting for me outside the lecture hall for Biophysics. We'd dutifully taken notes throughout the lecture, and afterward gone to the library for our regularly scheduled study session. I called it a study session, but it really was the opposite for me. Those hour-long periods were my daily dose of Quen, and I was the most unproductive I'd ever been when he was around. Like, ever.

The library had a few isolated study rooms for group study, each equipped with one computer and one wall-mounted whiteboard. Whenever Quen and I snagged one of those rooms, we just ended up talking, debating, and making each other laugh. Today I'd shared with him my love of Zuko. Darcy. Ben Solo. Byronic antiheroes-turned-heroes. He had argued vehemently against their glorification, his irritation rising each time I refused to abandon my icons.

That had been in the morning. Now it was about five in the evening, the sunlight caramelising and the campus falling into a more subdued pace. "Hey, Quen," I greeted the pair as I crossed them walking in the quad. "Hello, Quen's friend."

Quen, with a gentle smile on his face, turned to face me and his friend paused to acknowledge me. "Krista Ming." The friend smiled wide. "Was wondering when I'd get to meet you in person."

I immediately slipped into my influencer mode. Silky voice, glittery eyes, and all-around friendliness. I cocked my head to the side and smirked, "My reputation precedes me."

"I'm Callum."

He extended his hand in a very gentlemanly fashion, but the cheeky tilt to his lips gave him away. Callum had ash blonde hair that was short at the sides and very unruly on top. The way it poofed on his head made me wonder if he'd spent the afternoon plastered to a Van de Graaff generator, and I almost hesitated to take his hand for fear of being static-shocked.

But when I took his hand, I felt nothing but a warm grip. I mirrored the cheekiness in his grin. "Hello, Callum. Nice to meet you."

"A charmer, huh, Quen?"

Quen rolled his eyes, in the good-natured way between close friends. The way that ended in a smile. The way Viv rolled her eyes at me. "Stop it, Cal," Quen said. "We're going to be late."

"Late? Aren't you guys finished with lectures for the day?"

The only reason I was still on campus was that I'd camped out on the highest floor of the Science 1 building, finishing the Biochemistry lab report that sat neglected during my talk-to-Quen session in the library. I wondered if the badminton team also rehearsed into the evenings, but the worn twill rucksack on Callum's back and his black Timberlands didn't exactly scream athlete.

"We are," Callum informed me. "But now we have a band rehearsal."

My eyebrows raised in pleasant surprise. "You didn't tell me you're in a band."

"Well, it's probably not the sort of band you're thinking about," Quen lifted his hand to rub the back of his neck as I peered curiously at him. "It's the marching band."

If it had been anyone else, I probably would have written the marching band off as cute, if a little stale. But this was Quen, who had already proven himself smart and athletic and down to earth. Throw in an instrument and I didn't know how much more I could take of his many wonderful qualities.

Callum noticed my obvious intrigue and piped up, "You should come to watch the rehearsal. It's not drill today."

Perfect! Now I had a way to tag along without being too invasive. My lips were already parted, ready to accept Callum's invitation when Quen cleared his throat.

"Ahem. It's alright, you don't have to," he smiled reassuringly at me. Then he turned to Callum. "Krista probably has a lot of studying to do. She's Pre-Med."

"Ouch," Callum mock-winced. "But there's no need to stay long. At least stay for the 'Selections of Star Wars' tribute piece we're rehearsing today."

"Oh, my God, I love Star Wars!" I said truthfully. "I'd be happy to hear that."

"Settled then," Callum beamed at me, then Quen.

Quen looked like a deer in the headlights. His eyes had frozen as startled round orbs, his deep brown irises flickering between Callum and me.

"Thanks for offering, Krista," he said eventually. Then he turned to face Callum, shifting his body language to make it clear his next words were not directed to me, "I'm not sure the other band members will appreciate an audience, Cal. The pieces aren't anywhere near performance-ready."

Callum still had that cheeky smile on his face, but he conceded easily. "Alright. Next time then. I'm just going to fill my water bottle up," he told Quen, swinging his rucksack to the front of his torso to grab his bottle. "Better head over without me, since you've got more warming up to do."

Giving a lingering glance between Callum and me, Quen eventually sighed and said, "See you in there. See you later, Krista."

"See you, Quen."

I was going to head back to the dormitory. Then Callum swiped his nose with his thumb and gave me a meaningful waggle of his eyebrows.

It seemed he had something further to say to me. So instead of leaving, I drifted to the side of the pathway. Pulling out my phone, I pretended to be occupied while he filled his bottle at the water fountain a few yards away.

When Callum returned, he proudly told me, "Perks of playing percussion on non-drill days, the assembly and warm-up process is much shorter. Anyways, Quen's such a buzzkill today, though I don't know why. But we rehearse in the Arts' Choral Hall. Do you know the back entrance coming from Science 4?"

"Yes," I nodded. "I took an interpretive dance course in freshman year, and we'd sneak in through there all the time."

"No way! Interpretive Dance was my favourite elective," he said enthusiastically. "The easiest A I've ever gotten. What did the choreographer used to say? You're not ready—"

"—to be spaghetti!" I completed it. It was the choreographer's mantra to warn against overstretching before class, because we hadn't warmed up enough. Our limbs were uncooked pasta. Unready to be spaghetti.

"Ah, good times. But that's the door you should use if you still want to watch," Callum said clandestinely. "You can get into the mezzanine seats from there, and Mr. Buzzkill won't have a clue."

I much appreciated Callum helping me sneak into the band rehearsal, but a part of me wondered why I even had to in the first place. Why wouldn't Quen want me to come to watch their practice? And why did it have to be his random friend who offered me a way in?

"Thanks, Callum," I said gratefully, charming as ever on the outside. I dropped my chin to slip out a wry reference, "I just can't pass on 'Cantina Band.'"

A laugh erupted out of him at my obvious fangirling, but he was still all cheeky smiles and good-natured eyes. "I cannot believe Quen found someone who knows Star Wars as well as him."