by Paula Mabbel
“Are you seriously leaving all of your shit in the middle of the room?” Lea called after her.
Adaline stopped in her tracks and turned around. Lea was looking at her from down the hall and their eyes met. She could feel a sickly sweet smile playing over her lips as her temper started to take over the rational side of her brain that was reminding her to play nicely. “I’m going to let you sort it out. I mean, you wouldn’t expect a princess to do all of that heavy lifting, would you?” Adaline said with her eyelids fluttering.
She didn’t give Lea a chance to reply as she returned to the path she had been taking, and she didn’t stop until she was standing outside of the building. It was almost unbearably hot outside and the air was sitting still, weighing down on those people who dared to leave their air conditioners in the pursuit of outdoor activities.
Adaline could feel a thin film of sweat starting to rise up on her skin as she walked out into the open sun that was sitting sinfully high in the sky. She headed over to a cluster of trees and stopped when she stepped into their shadows. It wasn’t really any cooler, she found, but at least the direct sun wasn’t making it any hotter.
She could feel her entire body shaking after the confrontation she’d just been in. She hadn’t expected to like the person who she was sharing a room with, but she hadn’t expected her roommate to dislike her first. Everybody liked Adaline. She was the most liked girl in school. She’d been voted prom queen, for god’s sake.
Her phone vibrated against her leg and pulled her out of her thoughts. She reached into her pocket quickly and answered it.
“Cee Cee, it has all gone to shit,” Adaline said with a seriousness in her voice that might imply that the world was ending or an epidemic was about to hit.
“What’s happened, babe?” Cee Cee said quickly with a voice full of concern.
Adaline felt the familiar smile that came from being worshipped played across her lips. She took a deep breath before explaining the whole situation to her oldest and most loyal friend. “My dad’s put me in a shared room and I’ve just met my roommate. She’s a total bitch. I mean, I don’t even know what I’ve done to her, but she hates me. Can you imagine that? This girl who knows nothing about me hates me and she’s giving me a load of shit. I just want to go home, Cee Cee. I just want to pack it all in and go back home. At least I have my own room there, do you know what I mean?”
Cee Cee didn’t reply for a minute. Adaline could feel her patience getting worn out as she waited for her friend to process all the information she had just given her. Adaline had known Cee Cee for almost ten years and she’d almost gotten used to the fact that Cee Cee was abnormally slow for a person with the kind of brains that she had.
“Oh, that’s awful, Adaline. You know you can’t quit though. College is all about living it up and going to parties. There’s no one back home until the holidays. What would you even do? You just need to tell this girl to chill out.”
“I suppose so,” Adaline said, but the solution wasn’t making her feel any less angry about the way Lea had treated her.
*******
Adaline spent the rest of the day taking a tour of the campus. It hadn’t been her plan to learn every inch of the large buildings, but it seemed better than going back to her room and being attacked by Lea. The campus only had so much to offer, though, and Adaline wanted to go back and sleep. She’d been so excited about starting college that she’d hardly slept the night before, and it was only the heavy makeup she had put on that was hiding the dark circles of truth that were underneath her eyes.
She pushed open the dorm room door expecting to see the huge pile of boxes she had left earlier, but they were nowhere to be seen. Adaline walked into the room slowly and scanned every inch of the small space, until she was sure that everything of hers was there. She couldn’t help but feel a little bit triumphant as she realized that Lea had unpacked all her boxes for her.
“So you’ve decided to come back then, huh?” Lea said as she lifted her head out of the heavy-looking leather-bound book she was reading. “I was kind of hoping you’d call your daddy and get him to move you.”
“What is your problem?” Adaline asked in a short, snappy tone.
“I don’t have a problem,” Lea said as she shrugged and then pulled the book back over her face.
“Don’t just go back to reading,” Adaline snapped again. “Since you got here all you have done is attack me. What have I actually done to you that is so wrong?”
“I think you’re being a bit sensitive there, princess. What’s the matter? Aren’t you used to people telling you the truth?”
Adaline looked at the girl in disbelief. Who did she think she was talking to? She shook her head and walked over to her bed without saying another word. The girl lifted the book back up to her face and for a moment there was silence. Adaline let her eyes glance across Lea’s bed and noticed how her raven-black hair seemed to spill from her head like a cascading waterfall. It passed her shoulders by a great deal and seemed to settle in small springs of curls against the mattress.
Lea was pretty. That was what Adaline found most frustrating about her. If she’d been nice then Adaline would have been, too. She wouldn’t have been able to help it. She was a sucker for a pretty girl, but Lea had ruined it. She’d declared them enemies before they’d even had a chance to introduce themselves to each other and now the tone was set for their entire relationship.
“Can I ask you something?” Lea said as her face reappeared from behind the book she was reading.
Adaline took the moment to really examine her face. She knew Lea was pretty, but she hadn’t had a chance to really work out why yet. She had big, sky-blue eyes that seemed pale against her jet-black hair. Her skin seemed to be the same color as golden treacle, but Adaline could tell from the sprinkling of freckles across her small nose that it was due to being out in the sun and not her natural skin tone.
Lea narrowed her big eyes at Adaline when she realized that she wasn’t getting any answer. “Don’t you know it’s rude to stare?”
“Well, you’d know all about being rude,” Adaline said dryly, as she pushed herself up from the bed and walked over to the small window that overlooked the campus. She had been hearing shouts and laughter coming from the open field behind her room for some time and she was starting to wonder whether there was a party going on.
“Whatever,” Lea said as she threw her head back down onto the pillow.
“I’m guessing you don’t have a lot of friends?” Adaline snapped at her. She couldn’t help it. There was something about Lea’s attitude that was rubbing her the wrong way. Lea was pretty, but that didn’t mean that she could talk to Adaline like this.
“No, but I’m betting you have more worshippers than you have friends,” Lea countered Adaline’s dig with her eyebrows rising.
“You don’t know anything about me,” Adaline said with her head shaking. She’d reached the window and she’d been right about the party happening in the field behind their room. She glanced over at the piles of clothes that Lea had put at the end of her bed.
“Sure I don’t,” Lea said with her eyes rolling. “Just like I don’t know that you’re going to change into something slutty and go down to that party.”
Adaline took her eyes away from the piles of clothes and looked at Lea with a warning shot in her eyes. “Listen, I don’t know what your problem is, but you better sort it out. I’ve been nice until now, but I could make your life hell.”
“I have no doubt,” Lea said without any trace of fear or worry in her voice. “Well, shouldn’t you be plastering on some makeup for the party?” she asked when Adaline didn’t move and continued to stare at her.
“It might surprise you to know, Lea, but I don’t need to make myself look slutty for people to like me,” Adaline said as she started to walk straight for the door.
“Sure you don’t,” Lea called after her as she opened the door and headed down the hallway. “You just need that award
-winning personality, princess.”
Adaline didn’t stop to reply. She could feel every fiber of her body searing with anger. She thought about calling her dad and demanding that he get her an apartment somewhere close to the campus, but her earlier conversation with him didn’t give her much hope for a victory. She stopped when she reached the double doors that led out into the still overheated air and then pushed them open to find the noise of the party screaming in the air around her.
*******
Adaline opened her left eye slowly and then shut it again quickly. Lea had opened the curtains in their tiny little room and the hot, bright sun was pouring in straight onto her bed. She grimaced with the pain of the brightness and the heat that wasn’t helping her dehydration. She frowned with her eyes shut and deep lines spread across her forehead, causing the dull aching that was happening inside her brain to worsen.
“You awake, princess?” Lea said from somewhere in the room.
“No,” Adaline said as she tried to turn over so that her face was on the pillow, but found her whole body starting to turn green under the queasy feeling it brought.
“Do you want a coffee?”
“Have you poisoned it?” Adaline asked without opening her eyes.
Lea snorted, but it wasn’t in an angry way. “No, poison’s expensive. I wouldn’t waste that on you,” she said brightly.
“That’s good to know,” Adaline said as she finally found the strength to push herself up without vomiting. “Can you close the curtains?” she asked when she dared to open her eyes slightly and found the pain was still as intense as before.
“I could, but I’m not going to. You’re welcome to do it yourself, though,” Lea said in the same bright voice that was starting to get on Adaline’s nerves.
“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?” Adaline asked Lea with a face full of seriousness.
“Maybe just a little bit,” Lea grinned and pinched her fingers together in the air.
“Why do you hate me?” Adaline asked in a whiny voice as she fell back against her pillows. She was too hungover to play the guessing game and she was in too much pain to pretend to act cool about the whole situation.
“I don’t hate you personally,” Lea shrugged with a conflicted look in her eye as she glanced over Adaline. The coffee maker beeped and she turned her attention quickly to filling up two mugs with the steaming dark liquid.
“Thanks,” Adaline said when she passed it over. She didn’t really know what to say about Lea’s previous comment and she certainly didn’t understand what she meant by it.
“Can I ask you something, since I’m your savior this morning and made you coffee?” Lea asked.
Adaline looked over at her and noticed that her light blue eyes were sparkling as she waited for an answer. “What do you want to know?”
“Well, obviously you ditched out on unpacking your stuff yesterday, so I got a chance to rifle through all of your crap. By the way, you have a lot of crap. I mean a stupid amount. What exactly are you planning on doing with seven cocktail dresses at college?” Lea asked with a bewildered look on her face.
“So, we’re back on the insults already?”
“No, sorry,” Lea said quickly, as she looked over at Adaline’s face and saw her patience slipping. “When I was unpacking one of your boxes I noticed that you have a killer book collection. I mean most of them are first editions and really hard to find. I was just wondering where you got them from? I mean you don’t really seem like the kind of girl who reads,” Lea trailed off.
Adaline frowned at her. It seemed that even when she wasn’t meaning to, she managed to fit an insult into what she was saying. “I don’t seem like the kind of girl who reads?” Adaline repeated, but in a questioning way.
“I didn’t mean that as an insult,” Lea said with her head shaking. “I just mean you’ve got some pretty heavy stuff in there and you seem more like a Cosmo kind of girl,” Lea finished with a shrug.
“Right, and that’s not insulting.” Adaline nodded her head slowly and sarcastically. “If you really want to know, my grandfather gave me them. He said that they were some of the most essential books I’d need to see myself through college. I tried to tell him that I already had a ton to pack, but he wouldn’t listen, and so they’re here.”
“So, you don’t intend to read any of them?” Lea asked with a look of shock on her face.
“Are you like crazy into books or something?” Adaline asked with a look of bewilderment on her own face. She couldn’t imagine any of her friends back home looking so shocked over books being left unread.
Lea didn’t say anything; she just gave this kind of casual shrug that said “whatever” without it having to be said aloud.
“If it’s that big a deal to you then you read them,” Adaline said without a second thought.
“Seriously? You’d be okay with me reading them?” Lea asked as though Adaline had somehow set up a trap that she couldn’t see.
“Sure, whatever, they’re just books.” Adaline lifted the hot cup of coffee to her lips and let the smell waft up her nose. Her brain seemed to instantly relax as the smell of coffee mixed with its taste. The dryness in her mouth disappeared and she could feel the hangover’s grip on her start to loosen. “That’s some good coffee,” she said when she had taken another mouthful.
“I live off the stuff. I mean there aren’t enough hours in the day as is and I’m meant to waste almost half of them sleeping?” Lea shook her head as though it was an absurd idea.
“Right,” Adaline said, but it wasn’t because she agreed. In fact, the more Adaline was getting to know Lea, the more she was getting confused as hell by her. Lea was smart and beautiful, Adaline had no doubts about that, but she could tell that even underneath her coffee gesture, she harbored some deeply ingrained grudge against her and, for the life of her, she couldn’t understand why.
*******
Adaline could hear the buzzing noise of her cell phone in her dreams. The noise was drifting through the air on her private beach. She tried to ignore it so that she could stay in the one piece of paradise she had left. The noise wouldn’t allow it, though. It continued to play through the air as it disturbed the calming waves and distorted the flow of the palm tree leaves.
“Adaline, if you’re going to get calls at 6 a.m., then can you at least answer them?” Lea’s voice cut through Adaline’s dream and woke her up.
“What?” Adaline asked in a state of confusion as she opened her eyes and found herself being attacked by sounds and words.
“Your cell phone is ringing,” Lea said moodily before she turned over and put the pillow over her head.
“I thought you said you never slept,” Adaline said quickly. She felt a smug sense of pride swell up in her chest over how quick her wit had just been, before Lea interrupted her sudden good mood.
“Well, I never will if you don’t answer that phone.”
“I’ll take this call in the hallway,” Adaline said as a peace offering.
“Oh, how nice of you,” Lea said with sarcasm dripping off her words in a fermented ooze of bitterness and resentment.
“Right,” Adaline said, as she took her phone and pulled herself out of bed. The floor was cold beneath her feet, but she didn’t stop to put anything on them. She could feel the angry energy rippling off of Lea and she wanted to leave it as quickly as she could. “Hello?” she said into the phone when she’d closed her dorm door and answered the call that had been the cause of the entire grievance.
“You’ll never guess what!” Cee Cee said excitedly on the other end of the phone.
Adaline frowned. “Cee Cee it’s 6 a.m. How are you so…so…perky?” Adaline asked when she managed to find the right word.
“Well, it’s because I’ve got good news,” Cee Cee said in a singsong voice that told Adaline it might be a while before they actually got into the news.
“And this news couldn’t have waited until later?”
“Well, it could h
ave done, I suppose, but then I’d have been really bored,” Cee Cee answered quickly. “Anyway, I’m going to need you to come out to the front of campus and let me in. The security guard here seems to think that I might be a murderer or something and he wants to talk to you.”
“What?” Adaline asked, because nothing that Cee Cee had just said made any sense to her.
“I’ve come to visit you because you sounded so down on the phone the other day, but the guards won’t let me through. I wanted to knock on your door and surprise you, but apparently years of loyal friendship mean nothing to these people,” Cee Cee said with a pointed voice that was clearly meant for the guards who were listening to her phone call.
“Give me two minutes and I’ll be there,” Adaline said quickly, and then she hung up. She looked down at her bare feet and then to the dorm room with its closed door. She wanted to go in and get changed quickly, but she knew that, in the process of doing so, she’d probably wake up the angry dragon that seemed so dainty and sweet on the surface. She sighed as she realized that she was making the trip across campus in her sleep shorts and vest top and then headed over to let Cee Cee out of the fake prison she had managed to get locked up in.
Adaline got to the small security cabin and knocked on the door quickly. She’d managed to get across campus without being seen, but she knew that would change when the door opened. She held her breath as it started to creak, and plastered a smile on her face. The security guard who opened the door eyed her with curiosity.
“You know, you could have gotten changed before you came to collect your friend. She wasn’t in any real trouble, although if you could hear the things she’s saying you would have thought that we were locking her up for life,” the guard said wearily as he stood to one side so that Adaline could walk into the cabin. She walked in without giving the guard second glance and was immediately attacked by the arms of her excited friend.