Writings

Laura made her way across campus, avoiding the looks of other students, students who were properly dressed for 10:00 on a Sunday morning. At this moment in her young life Laura was experiencing the most undignified of rituals, one familiar to many college girls before her—the walk of shame. Walking back to her dorm room in the same clothes she wore out to the bars the night before.

The night before. That had been something. Vodka…rum…tequila…
Ugh, tequila. Her head pounded. Whose bright idea was it to try tequila shots?
The whole night had been a blur, and before she knew it it was 10:00 a.m. and she had woken up in a strange bed on the top floor of a despicably filthy frat house. The owner of the bed nowhere to be found. At least she still had all her clothes on.

Awesome, at least I’m not a total tramp. She rolled her eyes. Visions of two or three different guys she had made out with danced through her head. She blacked out after that point, so there may have been more. Add up every weekend for the past three semesters…well, she didn’t like to think about that. All she knew was that every weekend was the same, only the guys changed. But really, in all honesty, were they not always the same too? The usual smorgasbord of frat boys, meatheads, and jerks. She pulled her sunglasses from her bag and put them on. God I hate the sun.

Dragging herself up the crumbling steps to her dormitory she fumbled for her student I.D. and swiped it several times through the card reader. No action. With one last desperate yank, and a few choice words, she nearly fell over backwards as the door buzzed and unlocked. She made a pit stop in the ladies room to vomit.

Oh God. Why am I such a loser? Giving in to a few minutes of hangover induced introspection, she hung her head on the side of the toilet, dizzy and teary eyed. I need my bed. She pulled herself up and staggered to the stairwell. She was almost to the top when a figure bounded past her, laptop swinging from his shoulder - more awake and energetic than Laura could stomach on a Sunday morning.

“Hey, Randy,” she yawned . “Where you coming from so early?”

“I had a study group at 8:00.” He made great effort to look anywhere but at Laura’s outfit. “How about yourself?”

She looked down at what she was wearing—black stilettos, sequined tank top, body glitter.
“Yeah, me too, studying…” Laura shifted uncomfortably. A gold sequin fluttered to the floor.

“Cool. Well I’ll catch you later.” He gave her a wink and walked into his room, not bothering to close the door behind him.

Laura dragged herself into her own room and flopped down on the bed. The door hadn’t completely shut and she could still see Randy across the hall, various pieces of computer equipment whirring to life as he touched them. With only a few yards of worn dormitory carpet between them, she could hear him mumbling quietly to himself as he moved about the room.

Randy. Laura lay there staring at the ceiling thinking, for reasons she was not quite sure, about him. He was a geek. He spent his spare time hiding in his room playing real time strategy games on his computer. Wizards and dragons, that was his life. What did she know about wizards and dragons? Nothing, nor did she want to. Still, he was kind of funny. One time he had come over to fix her computer and he made a pretty funny joke. Not a dumb one like the guys she usually hung out with, but a smart one. Really smart, and really funny. And she had laughed.

Laura laughed out loud laying there on her bed, remembering what he had said.

Still, he was a geek. The other day she heard him in the cafeteria arguing with another geek about who would win in a fight—Gandalf or Darth Vader. Who was this Gandalf? And why were they fighting?

Whatever. She rolled over and buried her face in a furry pink pillow. The sound of laughter in the corridor made her look up in time to see a girl stop in Randy’s doorway. “Call me,” she heard her say, before tossing her hair and continuing down the hall.
That’s right, keep moving. Find your own tech support guy.

An odd sinking feeling settled in her stomach, one that had nothing to do with her hangover. She closed her eyes. A few weeks ago she had seen him coming out of the men’s room after a shower, wearing nothing but a towel. Not bad for a geek, she had thought to herself, giggling.

What is wrong with you? She punched her pillow, sending a flurry of pink fur into the air, before drifting off to sleep. You must still be drunk.
***
Laura woke suddenly, sitting straight up in bed. Half laughing, half flustered, she could not believe the dream she just had, and who, of all people, had been the star.
***
Randy walked into his room shaking his head in amusement at the girl he had just run into in the stairwell. Laura.

She’d better be careful around those jerks. One of these days she’s going to get hurt. He looked at himself in the mirror before turning on his computer, thinking back to the day Laura had seen him coming out of the men’s room wearing nothing but a towel, like he thought he was Tom Brady or something. What was I thinking?

“Would it kill you to get to the gym once in a while? Or at least venture into some sunlight?” he muttered to his reflection, flexing a pale bicep.

A twinge of jealousy hit him unexpectedly. Sure, the party scene wasn’t for him, he had known that for years. Nothing was further from his idea of a good time than testosterone fueled meatheads pouring beers down their throats. But he could imagine all the fun Laura must be having, going out every weekend, meeting guys. And there he was, up bright and early on a Sunday morning because all he drank on Saturday night was four cans of Mountain Dew.

“You’re in college, you loser,” he said to the mirror. “You should be going out and getting wasted, meeting girls. But no, not you, you hide in here every weekend. ‘Hi, I’m Randy, I go to college so I can study hard and die alone!’” He laughed. No matter how much he mocked himself, he knew he could never be one of those guys. He and Laura were just from different worlds. Case closed.

He sat down in front of the computer, logging in as DrgonSlayer88. In that world, if not this one, he was a hero - a man among men. If only she knew my awesome screen name. He snorted. Still, there was that one time he had helped her with an Internet problem. He made a joke about something, and she had laughed. But he could tell she was only being polite. He didn’t make jokes about how much he could drink, or how much he could force other people to drink, like the frat boys she hung around with. That was more Laura’s style. It was a shame, really, she was awfully cute.

He sighed, took a sip of Mountain Dew, and drifted away into his game.
***
Several hours passed. A knock at the door.

“Hi,” said Laura shyly, much unlike the girl Randy thought he knew. “Whatcha doing?”

She peered past him into his room. Randy backed up and tried to close his game before she could see, before the extent of his geekiness could be confirmed, before…

“No, that’s cool, my brother’s into that one too. Care to teach me?”

She had showered and changed her clothes. The stilettos and body glitter replaced by jeans and a sweatshirt. The smell of alcohol replaced by coconut shampoo. Randy caught the scent as she pushed past him into his room.

At a loss for words, he silently thanked God and closed the door.

Beth Labonte was born in Salem, Massachusetts and received a B.A. in Sociology from the University of Massachusetts Amherst in 2001. Currently working as an Administrative Assistant, she has taken to writing as her creative outlet in an otherwise mundane workaday world. She hopes to someday write full-time, because it is more fun.
Beth resides in Grafton, Massachusetts with her husband and two cats. Website: dookiecigar.blogspot.com

Share This Article »