Lessons in Love (20 page)

The only piece of décor Alex had added to her room was a Radiohead poster that she’d hung proudly above her bed.

“I’m from L.A.” Ashley smiled, looking beyond Alex at the poster on the wall.

“Did you put that up?” she asked suddenly, pointing a bright pink nail at the poster.

“Uh huh.”

“Urgh, I
hate
that band. They are, like, the kind of music you listen to when you want to end it all.”

“They’re not so bad,” Alex replied defensively.

Ashley shrugged dismissively and began to haul her luggage in, one piece at a time. Alex went to help, surprised by how heavy it all was.

“You carried all these in yourself?” she asked, panting beneath the weight of a particularly large Louis Vuitton bag.

“No, my dad brought most of it up, but I didn’t want him to come to the room with me. He can be kind of overbearing. Guess most dads are like that.”

Alex squirmed a little at the topic of fathers.

“What’s your dad like?” Ashley asked as she continued to pull her luggage towards her side of the room.

“My dad’s dead,” Alex replied simply, deciding that she wanted to start her life at Princeton being honest and upfront. There was no more hiding from her past, no more denying who she was.

“Oh, shit, are you serious? I’m so sorry!” Ashley dropped everything and ran to hug Alex.

“I had no idea, and here’s me moaning about my dad!”

“It’s okay,” Alex answered.

“How utterly horrid for you!” Ashley continued sympathetically. “What happened?”

“He was shot at a 7-Eleven.”

“That’s brutal.” Ashley looked down at the floor, the mood in the room falling to quiet contemplation, the elation of their initial meeting eclipsed by the revelation about Alex’s father.

“I detest the second amendment!” Ashley suddenly declared fervently. “I’m here to major in politics, run for congress, and one day be America’s first female president. My entire campaign will be built on the notion that guns have got to go!”

“You sound like you’ve got it all figured out,” Alex noted, admiring Ashley’s life plan and passion.

“Sure have. And my dad is a millionaire, so no issues funding my campaign!” Ashley laughed. “But no more sadness. Today is a good day, the start of our new lives as college students! Tonight, I say we go out and party like the young hot things we are!”

“I guess.” Alex felt reluctant. Back in high school she’d shunned the social scene, favoring a life of relative anonymity.

“Come on, it will be awesome. When I got here, some cute guy from the building next to us told me about a party that’s being thrown for freshman at one of the fraternity houses down the road. We so have to go!” Ashley beamed.

“Unless there’s a guy back home you’re pining for?” she suggested, sensing Alex’s initial reluctance.

Alex considered telling Ashley about Mark but decided against it. While she was able to accept being the girl whose father had been shot, she wasn’t sure she wanted to become known on campus as the girl who dated her math teacher. She wanted to be popular, not infamous.

“No, there’s no guy back home.”

“Great!” Ashley sounded overjoyed. “Then it’s settled. Tonight we go out and we celebrate being young and alive!”

****

Alex excused herself to go and shower while Ashley finished unpacking. When Alex returned to their room, her blonde, wet hair was wrapped firmly in a towel, completely transforming her look.

Strings of fairy lights hung above both beds and across the window that looked out on to the main campus. Ashley’s bed was now covered in bright pink bed linen and dozens of scatter cushions in matching hues of the same shade. In the center of the room was a white, faux-fur rug, and all over the walls were pictures of anything and everything from Disney Princesses, to Hello Kitty to Maroon 5.

“I’m sorry if I’ve gone a little overboard,” Ashley said nervously as she noticed Alex taking in all the changes. “I was just so nervous about being away from home and wanted the room to feel familiar.”

Alex took it all in, the chic girly touches and scented candles lined across the windowsill. The beauty and femininity of it all reminded her of her old bedroom.

“I love it.” Alex smiled. “It feels like home.”

“Yay!” Ashley embraced her new friend. “I’ve got to go shower and get ready for the party. Be back in a bit!”

In her new, improved dorm room, Alex sat down at her desk. She noticed that on Ashley’s desk there was now the latest model MacBook. Alex didn’t have a computer; she’d have to rely on using the computers in the campus library.

All she had were notebooks and paper. Seizing the moment alone, she took out a blank sheet of paper and decided to write to Mark. He’d been at the forefront of her mind ever since Ashley had asked if she had a man back home.

Dear Mark,

I hope you
’re okay. I’m just settling in here at Princeton. My new roommate, Ashley, is from L.A., and I anticipate that she will be a whole lot of fun! She’s already turned our dorm room into a certified pink palace!

I’m scared of what awaits me in college, but thanks to you, I’m ready for the challenge. I owe you so much that sometimes it overwhelms me.

Everything and everyone here is new. It’s a chance for me to be my real self and embrace my past rather than hide it.

Thank you for coming to the train station. I wish I’d seen you sooner, before I’d boarded, so we could have properly said goodbye. But seeing you is better than nothing.

Know that I miss you, that I think of you almost every moment. It pains me to be away from you. But in the grand scheme of a lifetime, four years really is nothing.

Don’t forget me, and write back soon!

Love,

Alex

Xoxo

P.S. My roommate
hates
Radiohead, so I may have to invest in some headphones!

Alex shoved the completed letter into an envelope and sealed it shut. She paused for a moment, looking at it and the address she’d neatly written on the front, wondering whether she should send it. She wanted Mark to believe she was having fun and settling in, she didn’t want to come across as clingy.

Before she could reconsider sending the letter, Ashley burst through the door, her hair tied up in a towel as Alex’s had been earlier.

“I do not like sharing showers!” she declared, her exposed skin beyond the towel she was wrapped in still glistening with moisture.

“There was someone in there singing away
, and they sounded like a dying whale! Honest to God, Alex, a dying whale!”

Alex couldn’t help but laugh at the description. Both girls began laughing hard until their jaws ached.

“I’d tell you to go listen, but I shouldn’t expose you to that horror.” Ashley coughed as her laughter subsided, wiping at the tears that formed in her eyes.

“Was it really so bad?” Alex asked.

“Horrific!” Ashley declared.

As Ashley stood dripping on her fur mat, she spotted the letter on Alex’s desk.

“You got a letter to mail?” she asked innocently.

Alex flushed as she looked down at the white envelope on her desk, but Ashley didn’t notice her reddened cheeks. She was preoccupied within the closet that was now bursting at the seams, barely able to contain their joint clothes.

Alex had hardly anything, but Ashley had mountains of clothes with her. All of them designer and exquisite.

“We’ll mail it on our way out.” Ashley waved her free hand as she used her other to flip through the rail of outfits before her.

“What are you planning on wearing?” she asked Alex without turning around.

“I don’t know,” Alex admitted. “Maybe jeans and a T-shirt?”

“This would look great on you!” Ashley turned, clutching a dark blue shirt-dress that looked expensive.

“I can never really pull it off, but you’ve got such gorgeous, blonde hair, you’d set the blue off perfectly!”

Alex eyed the dress being extended towards her. It was beautiful and just her style. She went to touch it but then pulled her hand back nervously.

“I can’t wear your dress,” she answered, getting flustered.

“Of course you can!” Ashley almost ordered. “It’s one of the perks of being roommates! We get to share everything!”

Ashley threw the dress across to Alex’s bed, refusing to take no for an answer. She’d also noticed as she unpacked her wealth of belongings that Alex had next to none. In the closet she’d lined up a few items of clothing, not even taking up a quarter of the space. Ashley had grown up wealthy, always having whatever she wanted, from the latest designer handbags to backstage tickets to see her favorite band.

But growing up privileged hadn’t desensitised her to plight of those less fortunate. If anything, it had made her more determined to use her position in life to help others; it was a big part of her desire to go into politics. Ashley had been lucky, but many people weren’t. She could quite clearly see that Alex did not come from money, and Ashley had made it her personal mission to help her roommate in any way she could.

“Thank you, it’s a beautiful dress,” Alex replied gratefully.

“And you’re going to look gorgeous in it!” Ashley said with conviction. “Now let’s go get ready to party!”

****

The girls could hear music pulsating out of the fraternity house before they could even see it.

“Can you hear that?” Ashley giggled excitedly. She looked stunning in denim cut-offs and a designer white T-shirt. Alex felt self-conscious in the dress she’d borrowed from her new friend, despite numerous assurances that she looked gorgeous.

“It’s loud,” Alex mused. She didn’t recognize the sound that was being belted out, but Ashley seemed to and was already humming along.

“College is meant to be loud,” Ashley said knowingly. “It’s meant to be loud, crazy and mad!”

“And educational,” Alex added.

“Yeah, I guess a bit of that too.” Ashley laughed.

They rounded a corner and saw the fraternity house, where the party was already in full swing. Alex was amazed by what she saw.

The house itself was easily as impressive in grandeur as her old home had once been. The entire street consisted of giant houses set back on immaculate lawns, all adorned with various Greek letters stating which sorority or fraternity resided within.

People swarmed in and out of the party house like ants, the front door permanently left open. Everyone seemed to be holding plastic cups of what appeared to be beer and were dressed relatively casually.

“Apparently, before school starts, there is always one massive party on campus,” Ashley imparted her knowledge to Alex, having to raise her voice to be heard over the music as they drew closer to the house.

Girls were dancing drunkenly on the front lawn as guys smoked and laughed nearby. It seemed similar to the parties held at high school, which Alex had avoided, yet she didn’t feel as distant from it all as she had then. Perhaps because she was now her true self she could partake and enjoy the whole experience.