Letters of Love (Lessons in Love)

by Clarissa Carlyle

“Shouldn’t you open that letter first?” Ashley eyed the letter from across the room, noticing how Alex had yet to read it.

  “Urgh, I don’t want to,” Alex admitted.

  “Best get it out of the way, fast and clean like ripping off a Band-Aid.”

  “Nice.”

  “It might not even be that bad,” Ashley said hopefully.

  “And it might be awful,” Alex countered.

  “You won’t know unless you open it.”

  “Fine.” Alex sighed and picked up the letter before gently ripping into it. She retrieved a crisp piece of white paper from inside, unfolded it and began to read.

  Across the room Ashley waited patiently for the outcome, noticing the frown of annoyance that distorted Alex’s beautiful features as she read.

  “Everything okay?” Ashley asked anxiously after a long pause.

  “Not really,” Alex scoffed angrily, throwing the letter to the floor. “I’m on academic probation.”

  “Ouch.”

  “It’s a joke!” Alex shook her head. She was angry. Not at the letter but at herself. She knew she should have been working harder. The letter was confirmation that she was failing, which meant that she was letting people down. She was disappointing Mark, her family and, most importantly, the memory of her father. Alex just wanted to crawl into her bed and hide beneath the duvet and avoid her problems. She felt overcome with regret.

  “What do you have to do?” Ashley asked gently.

  “First I need to go and see Miss Dunne. Then I need to maintain a certain grade point average throughout the next year or else I risk expulsion. Oh, and I get to have weekly check-ups with teachers too. Fun!”

  “I guess we need to ease up on the partying a bit this year,” Ashley said quietly, shouldering her own guilt over their excessive social activities the previous year.

  “Yeah,” Alex agreed sadly.

  “Junior year means the end of freshman fun,” Ashley mused.

  “Urgh!” Alex protested.

  A sharp knock on the door caused both girls to glance towards the corridor. A tall girl with porcelain skin and short, jet-black hair cautiously entered the room. Her name was Sophia, and she was another new initiate into the sorority.

  “You guys coming to orientation?” she asked, her voice soft.

  “Wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Ashley answered sarcastically.

  ****

  The following day Alex awoke earlier than her roommate to prepare for her early morning meeting with Miss Dunne. The previous night had been anything but quiet with Kappa Pi throwing a welcome party for all the new sisters. Alex had tried to excuse herself early but without much luck. It had been two in the morning when she eventually crawled into bed. Now it was eight a.m., and she was standing beneath one of the communal showers, desperately trying to wake up. But the cool stream of water did little to wash away her fatigue.

  The campus was eerily quiet as Alex made her way towards the building that housed the faculty offices. There was still another week of induction to go before classes commenced, so most students weren’t yet up and about so early. Alex saw maybe two other people as she wandered in the early morning sunlight, shivering beneath her hooded top at the cool fall breeze, which had arrived early that year.

  Finally, she entered the building and began walking up the mahogany staircase towards the second floor and Miss Dunne’s office. Her footsteps echoed all around, as there was no other sound to muffle them. Alex wished she was still in her bed, sleeping blissfully. As she rounded the corridor to the office, Alex stopped short, surprised to see a figure sitting hunched outside the office she was headed for, a mess of dark hair obscuring their face from her.

  Suddenly feeling self-conscious, Alex tried to make her footsteps softer so that she didn’t sound like an elephant in boots as she approached the mystery figure.

  As Alex drew closer, the person sitting in the corridor looked up at her from beneath their mane of wild dark hair to reveal intense brown eyes, which regarded her with subdued interest. The faint shadow of stubble framed chiseled cheeks, and Alex felt herself blush as she sat down on the vacant seat opposite.

  The intriguing guy grunted slightly to himself and then resumed looking down at the floor, having seemingly lost interest.

  “Are you waiting to see Miss Dunne?” Alex asked nervously, both out of genuine interest and also as an opportunity to strike up a conversation with him.

  He looked up at Alex and smirked as though humored by some private joke.

  “Yeah, sure.” He shrugged, his voice resonantly deep and laced with the hint of a Bostonian accent.

  “At least I’m in the right place,” Alex chirped a little too happily; he was making her nervous.

  She played with her hands as an empty silence settled between them, a silence which made Alex even more uneasy.

  “I’m Alex,” she offered by way of introduction, certain that the guy opposite wouldn’t even care who she was. “Alex Heron.”

  He didn’t respond.

  “What’s your name?” she pressed him to reply.

  The guy sighed wearily before answering. “Oscar.”

  “Nice to meet you, Oscar.” Alex smiled sweetly.

  “Is it?” Oscar challenged, yawning and stretching in his chair, uncoiling his long legs so that they filled the corridor.

  He straightened, showing an impressive physique; Alex estimated that he was easily over six feet tall. He wore distressed denim jeans and a faded band T-shirt, though Alex didn’t recognize the band emblazoned across his chest.

  Oscar’s hair was a tangle of black curls, which came down to his shoulders. He looked a mess, but there was something incredibly alluring about that mess. He felt Alex’s eyes on him and held her in his own intense gaze. His brown eyes were so soft yet so alert, Alex wanted to lose herself in them.

  “Have you been waiting long?” Alex enquired gently, aware that around them the campus seemed uncharacteristically quiet.

  “Too long.” Oscar groaned, glancing up and down the corridor.

  “I hope Miss Dunne shows up soon,” Alex noted nervously.

  “What did you even do, sorority girl?” Oscar asked, scrutinizing her face.

  “Do?” Alex was puzzled. “What makes you think I’ve done anything? And my name is Alex not…how do you even know I’m in a sorority?” She was growing agitated by Oscar’s demeanor.

  “Firstly, you only get early morning office visits if you’ve done something wrong,” Oscar informed her in his sultry tones.

  “Secondly,” he continued, “you scream sorority whore. You’re blonde, slim and your eyes are bloodshot, which hints at attendance at those lame house parties they throw. The tiredness could be attributed to late night study sessions, but since you’re here so early, I think not. You’re a pampered princess who has partied too hard, like everyone else I meet in this corridor.” Oscar waved a dismissive hand at Alex as though tired of her presence.

  “You don’t know me,” Alex said defensively, internally seething at having been called a pampered princess. The image of the trailer back home glared in her mind, a stark reminder that she was anything but pampered.

  “So you’re not in a sorority?”

  “No, I am in a sorority.” Alex felt flummoxed by his brash hostility towards her. “But I’m not pampered,” she quickly added.

  “House dues are pretty expensive,” Oscar mused sarcastically. “How do you pay them if you’re not pampered?”

  Alex was incensed by this stranger who was judging her so harshly. She wanted to scream at him that her life was anything but a bed of roses. The privileged life he believed her to lead couldn’t be further removed from the truth. She wanted to tell Oscar that the only way she could afford to be in a sorority was because her best friend had taken pity on her and paid her way out of kindness. And that the only reason she was even at the college was because she was on a scholarship program after a teacher had taken pity on her.

  Mark. Thi
nking of him sent a surge of guilt through her body, reminding Alex of how much time had elapsed since they’d last spoken.

  “See, you’re a dumb princess, just like all the others,” Oscar remarked, sounding self-satisfied.

  “How dare you judge me!” Alex was suddenly enraged. “You’ve no right to put labels on me, especially incorrect ones. And what makes you any better? You are just some spoiled rich brat who is wasting the opportunity he has here by being a pothead and a waster!”

  Flushed and alert with adrenalin, Alex tried to calm herself as Oscar regarded her with calm interest.

  “You think I’m a pothead?” he asked her coolly.

  “You look like one,” Alex retorted. “Your clothes are dirty, your hair is a mess, and you are in desperate need of a good shave. Either you are too high to care or homeless, but I imagine it’s the former.”

  “How rare, a sorority girl with a sharp tongue who judges someone by how they dress,” Oscar said drolly.

  “You judged me by that same standard,” Alex seethed.

  “The difference is that I was right,” Oscar quipped, but before Alex could retaliate, their argument was disturbed by the sharp clip of heeled shoes upon a hard floor as Miss Dunne came strutting down the corridor.

  Miss Dunne completely ignored Oscar and looked down at Alex.

  “In my office please, Miss Heron,” she ordered, her voice cold. “I’ll see you next, Mr. Deloitte,” she addressed Oscar but didn’t even turn to face him.

  ****

  Alex fidgeted nervously across from Miss Dunne as she watched her professor putter around her desk for a few moments, placing down the cup of coffee she was carrying and restoring some files to their respective drawers.

  “Do you know why you’re here this morning?” Miss Dunne eventually asked.

  “Because I’m on academic probation?” Alex asked, her voice small and mouselike.

  “Exactly.” Miss Dunne took out a file that had Alex’s name typed at the top and sighed.

  “Your grades have been slowly declining,” she noted as she reviewed the file, “along with your attendance, which really isn’t good enough.” She looked up at Alex with sad eyes.

  “Most scholarship students grab the opportunity to study here with both hands and really embrace it. You’ve worked so hard to be here, Alex, why would you risk throwing it all away?”

  “I…I don’t want to throw it away,” Alex mumbled a response. She felt miserable at being faced with the questions she had been trying desperately to hide from.

  “Well, it doesn’t look that way. It looks like you don’t really want to be here. Your transcripts are poor, Alex, really poor.”

  Alex lowered her head in shame.

  “Academic probation is a chance for students like yourself, who are sliding, to redeem themselves. If we don’t see an improvement in your work, the next stage would be expulsion.”

  Alex felt herself stiffen upon hearing the word.

  “It may seem dramatic, but this isn’t high school anymore,” Miss Dunne continued. “You are here to learn, not to mess around. At Princeton you get back as much as you put in.”

  Squirming beneath the lecture, Alex shifted in her seat. She suddenly felt like a child, seven years old and being scolded by her mother for making a mess in the kitchen. She felt foolish and out of her depth and didn’t like how it felt.

  “You’re lucky to have been given this second chance,” Miss Dunne said, her unpolished nails drumming against the now closed file before her.

  “Most people wouldn’t be afforded such an opportunity to redeem themselves. However, the school board was lenient because of your past history.”

  “You mean my dead father?” Alex released the words the instant she thought them and immediately regretted it.

  “Your personal circumstances are, of course, a factor.” Miss Dunne nodded, though her face didn’t soften with pity, which was the usual response Alex had seen in her old teachers back at Woodsdale.

  “But your circumstances are not exceptional. The world is a much bigger place than Woodbrook.”

  “Woodsdale,” Alex corrected, but Miss Dunne didn’t seem to hear her.

  “Here, there are many, many students with many problems of their own. The key to making it in this world is to learn to manage your problems, not to let them define you.”

  “I don’t think my father’s death defines me.” Alex shook her head.

  “Doesn’t it?” Miss Dunne asked, her voice open.

  “I…” Alex didn’t know what to say. She felt so confident that all her troubles had been left back in Woodsdale.

  When Alex failed to answer, Miss Dunne stepped in for her. “You’re out partying excessively, your attendance is poor, and your grades are barely passable. This sort of behavior, this inability to focus and commit to your studies, could be seen as a form of grieving, but given that your father died,” Miss Dunne briefly glanced into the file for the desired information, “a number of years ago, I’d say you’ve long since spent the free pass it gave you for bad behavior.”

  Alex was speechless; she’d never before been reprimanded for her conduct in the face of losing her father. She’d assumed that such a topic would forever be off-limits, just too awful to discuss.

  “Don’t let it define you,” Miss Dunne said sternly. “Princeton will help mold you into the woman you will become. Let go of the child you once were and begin to think like an adult.”

  “I’ll certainly do my best,” Alex managed to reply meekly.

  “Do you need to talk to anyone about your grieving issues? We do have a college counselor on site.” Miss Dunne was already seeking out the contact details to back up her offer.

  “I’m…I don’t need to talk to anyone.” Alex shook her head, but Miss Dunne was already writing down the number for the counselor and passing it across the desk to her.

  “If you need to talk to someone about your feelings, call them.” Miss Dunne nodded at the piece of paper. “If you need to discuss your studies, come to me.”

  “Okay.”

  “I don’t want to see you in here again under these circumstances. Do I make myself clear?” Miss Dunne asked curtly.

  “Yes, crystal clear, Miss Dunne.”

  “Apply yourself, Alex. Don’t dwell on the past; look instead to the future.”

  “Okay, thanks.” Alex rose up out of her chair and made to leave the office.

  “One more thing,” Miss Dunne called, and Alex turned back to face her, one hand lingering on the door handle, eager to escape.

  “Yes?” Alex asked expectantly.

  “Don’t associate yourself with Mr. Deloitte. He wouldn’t be good for you.”

  Shocked by the warning, Alex found herself blushing profusely.

  “I only met him this morning,” she explained, her words jumbling together. “And he was very rude. I’ve no intention of associating myself with him!”

  “Good, just keep it that way.”

  ****

  Flummoxed, Alex opened the door and stepped back out into the corridor. She took a moment to clear her thoughts when she spotted Oscar looking up at her with renewed interest, his dark eyes sparkling seductively.

  “That bad?” he asked.

  “It was okay,” Alex tried to sound flippant but failed.

  “Dunne just loves to cut the umbilical cord. Did you say how you’re here to learn not to feel?”

  “Pretty much,” Alex admitted.

  “Well, now she’s warmed up on you, she can go to town on me.” Oscar sighed.

  “Is she mean to you?” Alex asked, her face wrinkling with concern.

  “Most women tend to be,” Oscar replied cockily.

  Unimpressed by his bravado, Alex turned to leave, but Oscar called her back.

  “Where you going?” he asked her.

  “Back to my sorority house, so I can continue whoring myself out there,” Alex replied sarcastically.

  “How about you wait here for me instea
d?” Oscar countered.

  “And why would I do that?”

  “Because I thought we could go grab a coffee or something.”

  And in spite of Miss Dunne’s warning, Alex found herself feeling compelled to sit and wait for Oscar to endure his verbal thrashing, intrigued by him and keen to learn more about him.

  ****

  “You’ve been hanging out with that guy a lot,” Ashley noted as Alex sat at her desk, using her vanity mirror to help her style her hair. She was going for a loose bun, but it wasn’t quite working.

  “What guy?” Alex asked, playing dumb.

  “The guy with the black hair. What’s his name, Ortis or something?”

  “Oscar,” Alex corrected.

  “I was close.” Ashley shrugged. “Anyway, you keep blowing me off to see him. Are you guys dating or something?”

  Ashley stood poised in the center of their shared room, eager to hear her friend’s response. She was already dressed to impress for the party she was headed to that night, decked out in dark skinny jeans and a neon pink top that accentuated her skin tone.

  “No, we’re not dating, just hanging out,” Alex quickly explained. In contrast to Ashley her outfit was much more subdued; she was wearing denim cut-offs and a university branded hooded top.

  “You’re hanging out with him a lot.” Ashley overemphasized the last two words.

  “He’s interesting.” Alex tried to appear nonchalant.

  “Mmm.” Ashley pursed her lips thoughtfully. “Do you like him?”

  “He’s a nice guy, yeah.”

  “No, don’t be coy with me, Heron. I mean, do you like him, like him?”

  Alex blushed beneath her friend’s scrutiny and nervously tucked a lock of stray blonde hair behind her ear.

  “No, it’s not like that,” she began explaining, unsure if she even could since in her own mind everything was a confused mess.

  “We just enjoy hanging out together. I mean, I guess I do kind of like him, but I don’t think he’s into me, so…” Alex hung her head sadly. It was the first time she’d vocalized exactly how she felt about Oscar, even to herself.

  “Have you told him that you like him?” Ashley sat down on the bed so that she was closer to Alex. Her mascara framed eyes were narrowed in concern.