Page 190 - The Love Hypothesis

Chapter Thirteen

HYPOTHESIS: Approximately two out of three fake-dating situations will
eventually involve room-sharing; 50 percent of room-sharing situations will be
further complicated by the presence of only one bed.

There was an Airbnb twenty-five minutes from the conference center, but it

was an inflatable mattress on the floor of a storage room, charging 180
bucks per night, and even if she could have afforded it, one of the reviews

reported that the host had a penchant for role-playing Viking with the
guests, so . . . No, thank you. She found a more affordable one forty-five

minutes away by subway, but when she went to reserve the room, she
discovered that someone had beaten her to it by mere seconds, and she was
tempted to hurl her laptop across the coffee shop. She was trying to decide

between a seedy motel and a cheap couch in the suburbs when a shadow
cast over her. She looked up with a frown, expecting an undergrad wanting

to use the outlet she’d been hoarding, and instead found . . .
“Oh.”
Adam was standing in front of her, the late-afternoon sunlight haloing

his hair and shoulders, fingers closed around an iPad as he looked down at
her with a somber expression. It had been less than a week since she’d last

seen him—six days to be precise, which was just a handful of hours and
minutes. Nothing, considering that she’d barely known him a month. And

yet it was as if the space she was in, the whole campus, the entire city was
transformed by knowing that he was back.