by M. K. Claeys
Bobby grinned. “And what did you say that was so rude to Jaykob Mitchell?”
“I called him a voyeuristic pervert,” I said, hanging my head in shame. It had been an awful thing to say, but Bobby just laughed.
“I don’t think that counts as being rude. I think he deserved to be called a voyeuristic pervert because that’s exactly what he was being.”
I nodded slowly. “Yeah. I guess he kind of was, wasn’t he?”
“Right,” agreed Bobby. “What about proud, then?”
I thought hard again. I tried to think of every situation in my life where I ever could have acted high and mighty and tried to assess whether I had been.
“No. I don’t think I’m that either. Although my opinion might be a little biased,” I added, smiling.
Bobby laughed again. “Well, if my opinion on the matter counts, I don’t think you’re arrogant. You’re a very nice girl—no, an exceptionally pleasant and kind young woman—and I think that anyone would be lucky to have you as a friend.”
“Thank you, Bobby,” I said sincerely. “It’s very kind of you to say that.”
“And I meant every word.”
But there was still one more thing that was worrying me.
“Bobby?”
“Yeah, Mitz?” he asked.
“What if they think I’m stupid?”
Bobby turned away from the road to look at me, and a resounding honk came from the Suburban behind us as we edged a little too close to his lane.
“What?!” he cried, swerving back. “Are you serious?”
I nodded. There. I’d said it. I’d voiced my biggest fear aloud. And I wasn’t feeling any better for it.
“Mitzy, seriously.” Bobby sighed. “You don’t need me to tell you that you’re not an imbecile. You know you’re not. For chrissakes, you have an IQ of a hundred and friggin’ seventy!”
“One fifty-seven, actually,” I mumbled, staring at the floor.
“What?”
“My intelligence quotient,” I said again, speaking a little louder this time, but still to the floor. “It’s only one hundred fifty-seven. Not one hundred seventy.”
“Exactly! You don’t even need to exaggerate to sound impressive. Mensa started sending you letters before you were twelve. You were valedictorian of a private institution, for crying out loud.”
I just kept staring at the floor. Bobby grabbed my chin with his free hand and made me look at him. He was smiling at me, and his eyes showed nothing but love for his sister and kindness for a friend.
“Mitzy, you are not stupid. Or ignorant or uninformed or dense or brainless or any other derivative of the word unintelligent. And anyone that thinks you are must either have severe head trauma or be so incredibly intoxicated that they couldn’t tell the difference between a cow and a camel.
“So no, I do not think you’re stupid, and if you won’t take my word for it, you’ve got the test scores and the scholarships to prove it. All because you aren’t stupid. And anyone that says you are does not even deserve for you to care about it, all right?”
I smiled. But just a little. “Thanks, Bobby.”
He ruffled my hair. “What are big brothers for?”
I cranked up the radio. We had about twenty minutes until we reached my residence hall, and by golly, I was going to have fun with my brother one last time because I wouldn’t see him again after this until Christmas.
* * *
Oh, Lord. We were there.
I knocked on the door, and Mama leaned in behind me. It seemed that although my roommate was here, she wasn’t…here.
“Well,” said Papa, beginning to unload my laundry cart, “I guess we don’t have to worry about which side of the room is yours.”
I nodded. Mama left to go grab more things from the Trailblazer just as Bobby crashed through the door, my bedding piled in his arms to the point where he could barely see over the top.
“Where do you want me to put this, Mitz?”
“Bottom bunk, please,” I answered immediately.
Bobby smiled knowingly but didn’t say anything. He just walked over to the bed as I waited by the door for the next load of my stuff.
“Um, Mitzy?”
I poked my head in from the doorway.
“It looks like the bottom bunk is already taken. What do you want me to do?”
I walked into the room to look, praying to the Good Lord Almighty he was kidding. He wasn’t.
I hate heights. Ever since I was four and we went to New York, I’d been petrified of heights. We’d toured the Empire State Building. Papa had picked me up so I could see over the edge, and I had a complete conniption. I had screamed, jumped down from Papa’s arms, and run crying to one of the telescope viewing stations on the back wall. I had wrapped myself around it and refused to let go. When I was sixteen and we went to Paris, I wanted nothing more than to go up and see the view from the Eiffel Tower, but when it came down to it, I wouldn’t get off the elevator. Heck, it took me nearly an hour to even get on the elevator. Bobby had tried to reassure me that it wasn’t that great anyway, but I think he was just trying to make me feel better.
“Mitzy?” Bobby interrupted my thoughts, and I took a deep breath before I focused on him.
“I guess just put it on the top, then.”
He smiled sympathetically at me. Bobby knew all about my vertigo—after all, he had been there. Bobby had tried to take care of me ever since.
“I’ll set it up for you, sugar,” Mama offered.
“You know, I’m sure if you just talked to your roommate, she’d be willing to help you out with whatever you need.” Papa was trying so hard to be helpful without making me feel inadequate that I just couldn’t help but believe him. Of course my roommate would help me out. This was an extreme situation.
“Maybe, Papa. But maybe now’s a good time for me to learn how to, um…”
“Be more flexible?” Bobby offered, handing my pillow up to Mama, who was tucking in my sheets for me on the top bunk.
“Sure,” I said, starting to set up my computer, which was difficult, seeing as my hands were shaking. “Flexible works.”
Not another word was spoken about my sleeping situation.
After my family helped me finish getting everything unpacked and moved in, I walked them out to the cars to say goodbye. It was after seven, and I was really glad they didn’t have to drive all the way back to the farm tonight. Looking around the grass in front of my residence hall, I noticed almost all the cars were gone. It seemed as though everyone that was moving in today had already finished and their families had left.
And yet I still haven’t seen hide nor hair of my roommate.
I kissed my mama and papa goodbye. “Thank you for all your help! Call me when you get back to Aunty Jo’s so I know y’all are safe, okay?”
“We will,” said Mama, climbing into the passenger seat of the Trailblazer.
I hugged Bobby before he got into the Jeep. “Thanks for coming, Bobby. I really appreciate everything you said to me in the car earlier.”
“Of course, Mitz. Oh, and I left you a present in your computer drawer, okay?”
“A present? Bobby, you didn’t have to do that.”
He shrugged. “I know. But I’m sure you’ll get good use out of it. A little something to remember home by.”
“Bobby, you didn’t!”
He grinned devilishly at me. “Oh, I did. Share it with your new friends. Just pick wisely.”
I smiled. “All right, Bobby. I’ll make sure the whiskey doesn’t go to waste.”
“That’s my sis!”
“Bye, sugar!” called Mama from the Trailblazer. “We’ll miss you!”
“Study hard!” added Papa, fastening his seatbelt.
“Have fun!” yelled Bobby as he started the Jeep.
I waved as they pulled out of their spaces and didn’t stop until I couldn’t see them anymore. As I walked back to the building, a spot of red and silver on the pavement caught my
eye. A student ID.
Auraelia Formosus.
I scanned the front steps—there! Going up the ramp was a girl pushing a laundry cart filled with her stuff. I checked the picture. It looked like her.
“Hey,” I called. “Auraelia!”
I ran after her to return it.
4
Auraelia
I woke up to the sun blazing in my face. My car was sweltering, and I had no idea what time it was. I grabbed my cell phone to check the time. Shit. After eleven!
I stabbed the keys into the ignition and pushed all four of the window buttons down at the same time. I had only meant to sleep for a few hours, and I had slept for five. Oh well. I pulled up to the center station so I could use the bathroom and buy a quick snack from one of the vending machines. If I were lucky, there would be something remotely healthy. Nothing was really catching my eye, other than the crackers.
I plunged my quarters in the slot, retrieved my crackers, and jogged back out to my car. I started the old Dodge, and then turned on the ventilator fan to try and remove some of the sticky, sleep-filled air from my car. It didn’t help much, but it didn’t matter. I would be on the highway soon, and that would suit me just fine. Checking my map app one last time, I started down the entrance ramp. I had something like six hours left to drive, and that was counting in speeding, a fast-food snack, and no traffic. I’d be lucky to get there by six.
More than six hours, two Red Bulls, a spicy chicken sandwich, and a Coke later—salads are too hard to eat while you’re driving—I was finally on the outskirts of Illington. The downtown area was bigger than the entire town I had come from. There were dozens of stores, at least three cafes with sidewalk seating, even a Starbucks!
I turned onto the campus drive, and there were people everywhere! Some were sitting on blankets having picnics or reading in the gardens; there was a group playing Ultimate Frisbee in an open field and even some people passing out flyers advertising and protesting God only knew what by the rock. It was amazing. Fifteen minutes later, I had pulled up to my dormitory—my new home of brick and mortar was co-educational and absolutely perfect.
There were at least a dozen people sitting on the steps smoking—they seemed nice enough. I wondered if my new roommate might be among them. It appeared as though I had missed most of the move-in crowd—it was after seven, thanks to my five-hour nap. But the fact that everyone would already be finished moving all their stuff meant only one thing to me: more people to help me out.
I parked my car and went inside to the registration table to check in. The guy who signed me out the laundry cart to move all my stuff upstairs in was pretty cute, so I gave him a wink before I grabbed said cart and headed back out the door and down the ramp to my car. I loaded up my cart to bursting and began to push it up the ramp again, giving an awkward wave and a smile to my potential new friends on the front steps.
“Hey! Auraelia!”
I stopped dead and almost lost my cart back down the ramp. No. This was not happening. No one from my high school had applied here. I knew that because I had checked the listings in the office of where everyone had reported they would be attending in the fall before I applied. For that matter, no one I knew from any of our competitor schools had applied here either.
“You dropped this.”
At least that’s what I thought she’d said. It had sounded more like “Yew drahped thiyus.”
“Sorry, what?”
“Your ID. You dropped it.” Yer aah-dee. Yew drahped ihyut.
Holy accent, Batman. She seemed nice enough. Nice enough to chase after a person she didn’t even know to return an ID, anyway. How did she know I wasn’t some crazy psychopath waiting to abduct her?
God, she was so nice, I could just feel the kindness radiating from her. How could anyone hurt her? She was beautiful. She was about five foot eight with medium-length, light-blonde hair, tan skin, a flawless complexion, and enormous blue eyes. And those baby blues were filled with concern for the person who had already lost their ID on the first day of welcome week. She was absolutely gorgeous; I just couldn’t help staring at her. And I could tell that everything about her was natural, unlike the Becky Jackson-types from home that paid hundreds of dollars a month on tanning, highlights, and color contacts.
I think the reason she was so pretty was because of the way she was dressed. It was conservative but still flattering, not at all like the tramps from Evansdale. I bet the blonde bombshell in front of me didn’t even know she was a knockout. This girl had a big-city bone structure with a downhome personality, and the floral-patterned, white cotton skirt with black tank top and matching sandals were definitely working for her. I must have been staring at her with a stupid look on my face because she checked the name and photo on the ID again before she spoke up again.
“This is you, isn’t it, Auraelia Formosus?” Thiyus is yew, isuhn’t ihyut, Uh-ray-lee-uh Fer-mo-siis?
I blushed, taking the ID from her. “Yea-uh, um—” I blushed even harder. I hoped she hadn’t caught me mimicking her accent. “Yes, I mean, that’s mine, or rather, that’s me, I mean. Thanks.”
“Oh good! Golly, I thought I had the wrong person there for a minute.”
“I’m Rae,” I said, offering my hand to her. I was here to make friends as well as study, and it wouldn’t hurt to start here. She positively beamed at me.
“Hi, Rae! No wonder you looked so confused if no one calls you by your full name.” She walked up the ramp with me and held the door so I could push my cart through and then helped me tug it from the front to the elevators.
“Yeah,” I said, hitting the elevator button. “Which floor?”
“Five. I’m Mitzy, by the way.”
“Me, too. I mean, I’m on the fifth floor, that is, not that my name’s Mitzy. But you already knew that.”
Oh, God. I’m babbling. I could possibly be ruining my chances at friendship right here and now.
“You wouldn’t happen to be my roommate, would you?” I asked. “Hopefully?” I couldn’t help but add.
“No, sorry. My roomie’s name is LaTasha.”
Her accent was killing me. I didn’t even care that she wasn’t my roommate; I just wanted her to keep talking.
“Damn,” I muttered, once the fact registered that my roommate was still a nameless and faceless entity. “I have no idea who my roommate is, then, although I can bet her name isn’t Mitzy.”
Mitzy laughed. “Actually, my name’s not really Mitzy.”
“What?”
She blushed. “My name’s not really Mitzy. It’s a nickname. My real name’s Bonnie, after my mama, but I’ve always been called Mitzy so it wouldn’t get confusing.”
“Oh,” I said, heaving the cart over the bump and out of the elevator with Mitzy’s help. “That makes sense, and it’s still a nice name.”
“You won’t tell, will you?”
There went those baby blues. God, how could I deny this girl anything?
“Of course not,” I answered earnestly. I could completely relate to having an embarrassing name that I didn’t want being announced to the public. “I’ll keep your real name a secret if you keep mine,” I offered.
“You’ve got yourself a deal, Rae!” she grinned, shaking my hand.
“Thanks, Mitzy.”
“Well, here’s me,” she said, taking out her keys. “Room 504. Stop by later, will you?”
“Sure!” I answered, giving her a smile.
“Let me know if you need any help unpacking, all right, Rae?”
If I needed any heylp unpahking, I definitely would. “Will do. I appreciate it, Mitzy.”
I pushed my cart down the hall and found my door on the left-hand side, right next to the stairwell, and across the hall from—
Well hel-lo there handsome! Aren’t you looking beautiful in your baseball cap? Seeing that every morning? Oh yeah. That I can definitely get used to!
I smiled to myself and turned back to my door. There was a note on a white board wai
ting for me. I read it and laughed. Ryn and ?’s Room! Nice. I grabbed the dry erase marker and wrote Rae in the empty space where the question mark had been, so the board now read Ryn and Rae’s Room! At least our names looked cool together.
“Hey!”
I peered down the hall.
“Hey! I’m your roommate!”
“Ryn?”
“Yeah! Oh cool, I’m so glad you’re here! I didn’t want to pick a bed without you, you know? I mean, in case you had a gimp leg and didn’t do ladders or something.”
I laughed. This girl certainly wasn’t lacking any energy.
“Nope. No impaired limbs here, so I don’t really care where I sleep. I’m Rae, by the way, Rae Formosus. Do you care about top or bottom?”
She thought for a moment as she helped me unload my stuff into a pile in the center of the room. “Not really, although I supposed I should take the top. It might help me get out of bed easier in the morning if I know I have to climb all the way down to hit the snooze, just to climb all the way back up again to take advantage of it.”
I nodded. “Good call. I’m going to go get my last load; want to come?”
Ryn gaped at me. “You only had two carts full?”
I shrugged. “Wait till you see my car. That might explain it for you.”
Ryn grabbed the cart and pushed it into the hallway. As we rolled down toward the elevators, I poked my head in Mitzy’s open door.
“Hey, Mitzy! I found my roommate. Ryn, this is Mitzy. Mitzy, this is Ryn.”
“Hi, Ryn!” called Mitzy, all smiles from her desk. “It’s nice to meet you. Cool skirt!”
Ryn twirled for her. “Thanks! I made it myself!”
I grinned. It was a very cool skirt. I wondered if she might let me borrow it, should I happen to get a date with Beautiful Baseball Cap Boy.
“We’re just getting the last of my stuff,” I explained. “Come by later with your roommate if you’re not busy!”