The Disaffected

CHAPTER III

My inability to come up with a sufficient excuse is why Morgan and I ended up walking to the dining hall together. The walk was mainly her pointing out various guys and letting me know what she would like them to do to her. I quickly discerned that there wasn't a particular pattern amongst the set of boys she preferred, other than them being as tall or taller than her. As we walked into the dining hall she roughly elbowed me in my ribs, "Okay stop, what about that one? He could punch me in the face and I would say thank you."

Gripping the left side of my rib cage, I looked up to see her gesturing towards a vampiric figure eating at a table with four other students. The vampire suddenly looked our way and Seb gave me a friendly wave and smile.

I smiled back, still grimacing from Morgan's jab.

"Shut up, you know him?" She gawked at me.

"Not really, I met him in the parking lot."

Still staring at him, but speaking in my direction she loudly whispered, "Okay, judging from how he's crouching over sitting at the table and, oh wait there he goes, he's standing up," she started gripping my shoulder, "Wow okay I wanna say that he's like 6'4, shut up, shut up! He's coming towards us!"

"Hey Freya," Seb smiled at me and politely nodded towards Morgan.

Morgan's hand was still on my shoulder and she squeezed it so tightly when he looked at her that I felt her nails dig into my skin.

Seb opened his mouth like he was about to continue when Morgan interrupted him, "Coming to the party at Theta tonight?"

"Uh, don't think so, haven't heard of it," he looked back at me as Morgan's face visibly fell, "but my brother's frat is throwing something tonight. You should come," his eyes flicked back to Morgan and he added, "you should both come."

"We are there!" Morgan beamed and did a little jump in the air.

"Okay cool," Seb raked his hand through his hair, and I caught the glimmer of a gold signet ring on his left pinky. "It's the house on the corner of First and Holly, see you guys there," and he walked back to his table.

The moment he turned around Morgan grabbed both my hands, squeezing tightly. Her hands were warm and damp.

"Can you believe that just happened?"

I gave her a wry smile. I wondered if Seb thought Morgan and I were friends. I don't know why, but it mattered to me that he didn't. In fact, it mattered to me that nobody thought we were friends. How many people were in this dining hall? How many students saw me and Morgan in this frenzied hand holding pose and thought, "Wow, look at those two unlikely friends."?

I wriggled my hands from her grip and instinctively brushed them on the back of my jeans.

"I'm actually going to finish unpacking," I looked around the room uneasily, certain that everyone was looking at us. Of course, nobody was, but amongst the fluorescent lights and dinner chatter and Morgan's sweat on my palms, the dining hall was becoming overbearing. "I'll see you later for the party," I continued, and nearly ran back to our tiny dorm room.

Back in our room, I set up a makeshift vanity on my desk by balancing a tabletop mirror on top of a stack of plastic covered textbooks. Placing my elbows on the desktop and chin in my hands, I studied my reflection in the small mirror. A few years ago I had decided I was attractive. I was not beautiful or sexy, but believed myself to be attractive.

I arrived at this conclusion based on a culmination of experiences - random, decent looking men flagging me down on the sidewalk to ask for my number, snippets of gossip from high school boys on the lacrosse team, and self-conscious, one off compliments from my friends.