I stood at the end of Easton's bed as he struggled to figure out why every single device we owned got booted off our WiFi network. He was sitting on the edge of his bed, a pair of blue light lenses perched on the edge of his nose. The only sources of light were his laptop screen and the open bedroom door. In our rush to figure out what the fuck was going on, we omitted flicking on the light-fixture overhead.

Standing by the foot of the queen mattress, I scrutinised the coding posters that Easton had stuck to his wall. This was not how I imagined spending my night. I wanted to laugh at the absurdity of it all. Here we were, hosting one of the biggest parties of the year so far, and we had no music.

"Are you sure this isn't a service issue?" I asked as Easton's fingers flew across his keyboard. My hands were clasped behind the back of my neck, trying to resist the urge to call a technician out. Stat.

He shook his head. "No," he replied, brow furrowed as he read the pop-up on his screen for the third time. "This definitely isn't a server issue."

Easton shimmied weight onto one leg, digging his phone out of his pocket. I waited for him to elaborate—fill me in on the reason he thought our party had been left without music. Instead, he wordlessly scrolled across his phone screen.

"Then what's going on?" I asked when I couldn't take the silence any longer.

"I don't know, but whatever it was, it shut the WiFi and is making it so that I can't reconnect. I'm going to have to hotspot my laptop to see if I can get back on."

"Does this mean someone purposefully locked us out? This isn't some sort of fluke?"

Easton's dark eyes met mine for a moment, the glare from his laptop reflecting in his glasses. "It's a script. From what I can tell, someone used it to override our network and issue a reconnect packet every five seconds which makes it impossible to log back on."

"I'll pretend like I know what that means," I muttered.

He gave me a blank expression. "You click connect. Big rectangle pops up."

I rolled my eyes, folding my arms across my chest as Easton went back to trying to rectify the problem. All of that was way too technical for me—definitely something I was sure Charlie knew nothing about either. Yet I had a sinking suspicion that her name was written all over this little problem we were having. The corner of my mouth twitched in amusement.

"Got it!" Easton exclaimed, just as my brain started to short circuit from trying to make sense of the coding memes on the wall.

"Thank God," I sighed.

But the relief was short-lived. As soon as Easton announced his victory, the speakers exploded with an unfamiliar—unwelcome—sound.

It hit me like a slap-shot to the face. Our usual playlist had been replaced by high pitched children's music that blared through the Hockey House. A rumble of annoyance could be heard from the main floor all the way up to Easton's bedroom.

"Seriously, man?" I asked, my voice barely audible over the crap coming from downstairs. "Who's fucking playlist is that?"

Easton shook his head again, eyebrows pulling together. "I actually have no clue."

I rubbed at my templates. The song about baby sharks was thirty seconds in and already giving me a headache. "How did we even lose control of the speakers?"

"They probably took control once everything dropped."

I clamped my palms over my ears. "Make it stop!"

"Zhang," Maverick's voice bellowed from the open door. His dark hair was dishevelled and sticking up at odd angles. Clearly this music wasn't the vibe he and the girl he had in his room were going for. "What the fuck?"

"Turn off the speaker!" Easton shouted back.

Chaos. Utter fucking chaos.

I couldn't help but chuckle. This had to be Charlie's doing. Shaking my head in amusement, I pulled out my phone and texted her.

Well played.

Once again, the girl next door had impressed me—she definitely knew how to keep things interesting.

The goofy tune came to an abrupt halt, signalling that someone had enough sense to hit the power button.

Relief washed over me, allowing the tension to dissipate from my shoulders. I turned my head to Easton. "Can we reconnect now?"

"Just give me a minute," he replied, still tapping away. "Right now there's nothing stopping whoever locked us out the first time from doing it again. If I can get some sort of—"

I waved my hand at him, shooing away the long winded explanation. "I don't need to know the technical shit. I trust you."

I flopped down on Easton's mattress, positioned like a starfish. If he wasn't nose deep in the task at hand, I was sure he would have lectured me about making a mess of his once-flat duvet.

I closed my eyes, welcoming the hum of conversation over the preschool show tunes. A wave of exhaustion washed over me and I wondered if I had drifted off to sleep. One second the clacking of Easton's keyboard filled the room, the next he was nudging me awake.

"Go ahead," Easton said as I blinked my eyes open.

"Can I connect now?"

He nodded, eyes trained on the wall of script that filled his laptop screen.

With my back still pressed against his bed, I dug my phone out of my pocket. The usual go-to party playlist popped on my phone, but before I could press play a cunning grin took over my face.

"What are you doing?" I could hear the concern in Easton's voice.

"I'm thinking we should play something with a little more... edge," I replied, switching to a playlist that I reserved for working out and the pre-game locker room.

The squeal of an electric guitar squealed through the house, ripping upstairs from the main floor. Cheering followed close behind and for a moment I considered the consequences of turning my living room into a mosh pit. But none of that mattered because when I closed my eyes as I pictured was the adorably angry face of Charlotte Webber.

"You really want her to hate you, don't you?"

"Hm?" I responded, peeking one eye open.

Easton's laptop clicked shut. "Charlie."

"What about her?"

His bottom lip rolled into his mouth. "If you like her as much as we think you do, you've gotta lighten up with her."

"Lighten up?" I asked, feigning innocence. "I'm just having a bit of fun."

"Fun for you maybe. I'm sure it's more like torture for her. " Easton offered me an empathic look. "You know she probably hates you right now."

Hate was a strong word. While Charlie and I liked to poke at each other, I was sure she didn't hate me. Right?

"Have you ever thought of being nice to her?"

I looked at Easton as if he had just threatened to stab me. "Nice to her? I'm perfectly nice to her. I invite her to our parties all of the time."

He held up his hands in defence. "I'm just saying that maybe you should reconsider your strategy. You know... actually try to get to know her instead of finding ways to piss her off."

I did know her. I knew how she always—without a doubt—had paint under her nails. I knew how she never left the house without a pair of headphones in and how nine-times out of ten her hair was up in that messy bun I loved so much. I knew how her brown eyes melted into honey when she laughed at something her sister or roommate said. I knew how her cheeks flushed when I made her angry. But most of all, I knew how much she had intrigued me the moment we became neighbours.

Charlie was elusive and stubborn to a fault. She didn't let too many people into that circle of hers. And I knew for a fact that she wouldn't spare me a second glance if I didn't occasionally pop over to her house and get her blood boiling.

I glanced down at my phone, a small smile tugging at the corners of my mouth. The message I'd sent Charlie had been left on read. She was going to be cursing my name all night.

I hummed a reply, dropping my phone down on the dark duvet. "Wanna go join the mosh pit downstairs?"

The corner of Easton's mouth quirked up into a smile. "I might need a few shots first."

_ _ _ _ _

author's note:

Easton to the rescue! We didn't get to see much of him in Shutout, but I can honestly say he's starting to grow on me. Who doesn't love a hot-hockey-playing-nerd?

Tell me what your type is and I'll tell you which Falcon would be the perfect fit for you ;)

Happy reading!