For the twelfth time in just over four years, it’s my first day at a new school. This time, though, everything’s different. I finally made it out of the wasteland of high school hell and am starting my first day at the University of Texas at Austin. I’m so used to that sick, scared feeling of walking into a crowded space and being stared at by a bunch of curious strangers who eyeball me from the safety of their cliques and their friendships, it takes me a second to realize it: everyone’s new. No one here knows each other. Maybe for the first time ever, I don’t have to feel like I’m crashing someone else’s party.
I stand in line at the registration desk, which is outside on the crowded green. I’m wearing baggier clothes than I need to, but people still stare at me. I’m used to it. I know what I look like. Maybe I should have dyed my hair like I thought about doing.
People are already starting to cluster into groups and talk to each other, but I keep to myself. As usual. It’s not the first time I’ve wished I wasn’t such a complete introvert. I wish I was capable, like the girl in the next line, of starting up a bubbly conversation with some random stranger and not feeling all self-conscious about it or turning red or stammering over my words like the biggest loser in the world. Shyness is a curse.
It probably didn’t help that I moved schools so much when I was younger. Or that my parents basically abandoned me by dying and left me in foster care which turned out to be as close to hell as a person can get. But all that’s behind me now. I’m eighteen. I’m a college student. From now on I can live my own life and not have to rely on anyone else. It’s just about the best feeling in the world.
So I try to smile when the guy next to me looks in my direction, eyeing me from head to toe. I pretend I feel confident and ready to take my new world by storm. At least if I look like I know what I’m doing, people might actually think I do.
There’s a band playing in the middle of the green and a group of loud, muscular jocks are throwing a football around. Even a misfit like me might actually enjoy college. And with my small scholarship and my art commission, I can actually almost afford college.
It’s nice out. The sky is blue and the scene is busy and inviting. The college green is full of the usual mix of preppies, nerds, hipsters and so on, but everyone looks cool and somehow collegiate. Nearby, a cluster of pretty girls are eyeing up the football jocks. These are the kind of girls who used to make my life hell in high school: the beautiful, try-hard cheerleader-types who make an art of flicking their hair and hiking up their already-miniscule skirts. They hate people like me: loners, who – God knows why, since I avidly try to avoid it – get people’s attention. And it’s always the kind of attention I wish I wasn’t getting.
I do my best to avoid the cheerleaders. Maybe things will be different in college.
I’m next in line. The guy handing out the paperwork introduces himself as Joe. He’s a senior, he says. He gives me my list of classes and does his intro about the orientation schedule. Then he winks and writes his phone number down on my course book. “Call me later,” he says. “Tonight, if you want. I’ll show you around.”
Sure.
Like I’d have the nerve to do something like that. Besides, there’s no way I’ll have time for a social life. The university’s commission for my sculpture will take at least twenty hours of work a week. Then there’ll be my full course load and all the studying that goes along with it. I’ll be lucky if I meet a single person.
I smile and tell him I will, even though I know I won’t. “What’s your name?” he calls after me, but the crowd is already closing in, so I escape without telling him. I take out my map and start following it to find my dorm.
I’m mortified when one of the jocks starts walking over to me. Calm down, I tell myself. Act normal. He leans his shoulder up against a tree, blocking my way. He’s huge, like he might be a linebacker or a heavyweight wrestler or something. He could break me in half if he decided to. I’m so intimidated I can hardly breathe.
“Hey,” he says. “You must be a freshman.”
I wish I could beam myself to an alternate universe, I really do. I’m so not good at this kind of thing. Stop being such a timid freak. You’re a college student now. You can handle this. I attempt a smile. “Yeah.”
“You’re fucking gorgeous,” he says.
I don’t know how to reply to that so I try to just keep walking but he walks along with me.
“Where’re you from?” he says.
I don’t want to chit-chat with this oversized stranger. I want to be left alone. But being rude will only make things harder in the long run, that’s one thing I learned in high school number seven. “Galveston,” I say. And before that: Plano, Abilene, Fort Worth, Waco, San Antonio and a whole bunch of other places. But there’s no point telling this colossal jock my pathetic life story.
“Well, Galveston, you and me should get to know each other.”
One of the cheerleaders catches up to Linebacker. She slides her fingers over his hulkish bicep. As she does this, she shoots a few daggers out of her eyes at me before turning back to him, softening. “Jared, can you walk me to my dorm? I don’t know where it is.”
I take that as my cue. I turn left and keep walking, hoping they won’t notice me leaving.
“Lookin’ forward to seeing you again soon, Galveston,” the jock calls out to me as I walk away. I blush and give him an awkward little wave as I retreat.
I finally find Houston Hall. As I search for room 217, I do my best not to feel the heat of all the endless sets of laser-beam stares of the people around me.
It doesn’t take me long to find my room.
A pretty girl with long red hair is sitting in the large open window that looks over the green, checking her phone. Her bag sits on one of the beds. She smiles widely at me as I walk into the room, like she’s actually happy I’m here. My roommate. “Hi. I’m Piper.”
I smile back at her. It’s impossible not to. She’s genuinely nice, you just get that feeling. “Skye.”
“I hope you don’t me claiming the bed next to the window. And the bigger closet. Your desk is bigger, though. And you have an extra bookshelf.”
“No, that’s fine.”
“I saw you talking to that football player and his groupie,” she says.
“Oh. Yeah. I think I’ve already made at least one enemy.”
“Those girls are fine as long as you stay away from the football team.”
“You know them?”
“I know their type. My brother was the quarterback at my high school in Phoenix,” she says. “My other brother was a wide receiver. And my other brother was a halfback. We had girls like that camping out on our doorstep all the time.”
“Wow. Well, I’ll definitely be staying away from the football team,” I assure her, remembering Linebacker. “As far away as possible.”
“There’s no way we’re not going to the game tonight, though,” Piper beams. “That’s half the reason I came to this school. To watch the Longhorns.”
I laugh a little as I put my bag on my bed and start unpacking it. “I’ll probably skip the game.”
“No way, roomie, you can’t bail on me! I don’t know anyone else here yet. You have to come with me.”
“I’ve never really been that into football,” I tell her. I watch it sometimes, but only because those are the memories I have of my dad so long ago: watching football. Telling me all about the players and the plays and I would nod and climb onto his lap and pretend I was as into it as he was, even though I was too young to understand. But that was a long time ago.
“What are you into?” Piper has copper-red hair and a smattering of golden freckles across her nose. Her face is open and sunny, like she’s actually interested and not just asking to make small talk. So I find myself telling her.
“I’m a sculptor. I make stuff out of clay, metal and basically anything else I can get my hands on.”
“That’s so cool! Are you majoring in art?”
“Yeah, it’s how I got in. The university commissioned some of my work and I get a partial scholarship once it’s completed. So I’ll be spending most of my time at the art building for at least the next few months.” I’m excited about the sculpture I’m planning. It’s going to be an abstract impression of a longhorn bull (the admissions committee’s idea, but I’m running with it).
“That’s so awesome. God, I wish I was artistic. I’m about the least artistic person I know. I’m studying psychology.”
I smile, putting some of my stuff into drawers. “That sounds interesting.”
“Yeah, just be careful: I might start psycho-analyzing you any minute.”
I smile. “I’ll watch out for that.”
“Any time you need some therapy just let me know. You can be my first patient.” Her phone pings and she’s busy for a few seconds. Then she says, “So, what do you say? Kick-off’s at seven.”
“I’ve never actually been to a football game before,” I admit. “I don’t even know the rules.”
“I’ll teach you,” she says. “Who knows, you might actually enjoy it.”