Authors: Ava Michaels
“How’s
it going?” he asked. He had a smooth voice when he talked. It reminded me of
the guys who recorded relaxation videos. Something my grandmother bought.
I
looked up smiling. He grinned. She glared. Well another beautiful girl that’s a
bitch… Probably a slut too… I looked away.
“Just
going to my apartment,” I sighed.
“Me
too,” he said, pausing. “So what’s your name?”
“Um,
I don’t tell strangers my name. What’s yours?”
“Stranger
danger,” he said and then laughed. “Just call me No Name then if you aren’t
going to dish.”
“And
just call me Elevator Girl,” I replied sarcastically.
Total
cheesiness...
The
elevator door opened and I walked forward and slammed right into the edge of
the elevator. I shook and rubbed my head. If you think nothing is impossible,
try slamming into an elevator…
“You
okay?” he asked.
I
didn’t respond and walked directly into the hallway without looking at him. I
was mortified.
………
As
I made my way down the hallway I couldn’t help but wonder what they were doing
in an apartment building that’s full of mostly college students. He looked too
wealthy to be one of the nonstudents in the building.
As
much as I wanted to avoid him, I would see Mr. No Name every day for the next
week. It was the same elevator but different girl each time. Talk about playing
the field. He was not the kind of guy I wanted to sleep with.
………
I
opened the door to my bedroom, hoping Jess and… Gaines… Weren’t doing things
that…
Uh…
Weren’t supposed to be done…
To anyone…
TO ANYTHING!
"Um
... Jess?" I said softly.
I
waited until I heard her grunted reply before I stepped all the way in the
room. Can you say traumatized? It was 7AM, I had work and class all day, and I
had been awake half the night listening to the sounds of the ice machine
dumping its load while Jess was being mauled by some Phi Mu Delta ape in our
room. The box of chocolates I had eaten in the hallway during the beginning of
the ordeal had also left me feeling bloated and cranky. I thought they were
supposed to make you feel better but I felt like I was having my period.
They’re a bloody waste of time…
I
thought I knew Jess a little, but really? Was this how she was going to be all
year?
"Jess!"
I
sat on my bed and threw my pillow as hard as I could across the room. My aim
was true and Jess bolted upright immediately. Her breasts were totally exposed.
They had been a source of jealousy for me since we moved into the apartment.
Our bodies were as different as the two sides of our apartment bedroom. Hers
was as pink as it gets, and a mess too. Channing Tatum, Nikki
Minaj
, Usher, and (to my dismay) Bob Marley surrounded the
bed she never, ever made, and her "assets" seemed to always be at
attention and on display. She was slender and pert in all the right places.
Jess’ pear-shaped ass, I'm sure, had every guy that passed by her "at
attention." I didn't have "assets" as much as diamonds in the
rough, and that was putting it kindly. I tried to keep a semblance of order on
my side of the room, and I had papered my walls with vintage perfume
advertisements and pictures of Clara Bo and Louise Brooks. We had only been
apartment roommates a couple of weeks and still Jess had managed to ask me
three times who those "black and white bitches" were. Such was our
relationship.
Probably
the closest relationship I had developed at Dartmouth, sad as that may seem.
"Gross - put some clothes on!" I yelled, even though I wasn't really
mad, just tired, tired as hell.
Jess
struggled to open her eyes and giggled at me before flouncing out of bed and
yanking on a nightie. Nice, it really must be nice to have the time to change
into a nightie in the morning.
She
did a sort of fast tip-toe across the bedroom floor with a big grin on her
face.
"Jess,
check your face," I groaned.
She
flopped onto my bed, and I responded by climbing out of it. I needed to get
ready for work, and I really wasn't in the mood for this. I knew that I big O
needed attention, and bad, and the last thing that I needed from Jess that
morning was a play-by-play. I had heard the most of it through the door. It was
mixed in with Tiffany’s moan that sounded like a dying goat.
"Guess
who had an incredible night?" she said.
I
was digging through my bureau for a pair of socks hoping my blatant disinterest
would be an indicator that I wasn’t really in the mood to hear all the gory
details.
"Your
make-up is super smudged," I said. She stood up and looked into a tiny
hand held mirror.
"Oh yeah.
That’s a good
look!" she said running her fingers under her eyes.
”Rode
hard and put away wet,” I said as I was pulling up a pair of jeans. I couldn't
help smiling back at her. Maybe I was jealous in a way. She did seem happy even
if it was in a Happy Hooker sort of way.
"Okay,"
I said, flopping back onto her bed while she stood pulling on a baggy t-shirt
and a pair of green boxers I assumed were hers but couldn’t be sure. "Tell
me all about it.
But...
I can only give you five
minutes. Some of us have to WORK."
Jess
giggled and pulled me close.
"Well,
it was AMAZING!"
"Yeah,
I think that the boys over in Dunbar probably guessed that too, Jess," I
said, glaring at her. Dunbar was a frat house on the other side of the campus.
If they didn’t hear Jess herself in the throes of passion last night, this kind
of gossip travels fast. Frat boys were worse than women the way they gossip and
hen pecked. You’d be surprised.
"Ok,
MISS KITRIDGE," she rolled her eyes. "Do you
wanna
know about it or not?"
"What
was his name, anyway?" I asked.
"Um...
Gaines."
“Was
that his first name or his last name?” I was pushing the envelope asking all
these questions. Sooner or later I’d hit that nerve and I’d have a pissed off
roomy. If I wasn’t careful I’d spend the rest of the semester sleeping with one
eye open.
She
buried her face in a pillow as she giggled.
Good
for Jess. She had hooked up with a meathead. Never mind his name sounded like a
laundry detergent.
"Well,
did you like, like him or anything?"
”Well,
yeah. He was sweet. He brought me chocolate…I think.” She looked around the
room for the box of
Stovers
I devoured in the hallway
then shrugged her shoulders when she didn’t immediately see them lying around.
As
much as I was disgusted, a small twinge of jealousy just wouldn't leave my
stomach.
“Will
you see him again, preferably in his room?” I couldn’t hide the snarky tone in
my voice.
"I
hope so. It was fun,” she said while examining a cuticle. Poor Gaines was
already a memory being pushed aside by a hangnail.
I
stood up and slid into a tight brown sweater. I was done with Jess for today.
"You
are aware that no one is going to buy the cow if the milk is free?" When
did I transform into my mother? I sounded so much like her I turned to look if
she had walked into the room and made that comment.
She
wiggled around on the bed and laughed at me.
"It
could be worse. It could be like Alisha and that chick down the hall... Not
only was that totally lesbo, but it was totally room-
cest
."
I
had heard over and over about Alisha’s experimental exploits with her
goth
roommate, as had the whole
campus.
"Yeah,
I guess at least it wasn't like that," I said as I looked around the room
searching for something to help that comment make sense.
"Don't
give me that smart mouth this early in the morning, young lady," she said
indignantly, but with a smile.
"Okay,
okay," I said. "Maybe he was kind of cute. I was really just trying
to say, Jess... That you're so beautiful you could have had any guy on campus
you wanted. Why settle for just some ‘sweet’ dude who brings you stale
chocolate candy?”
This
perked her right up. Jess rolled herself back on the bed, grinning, almost
purring with pride until she put one and one together.
“Hey,
did you eat my chocolates?”
I
rolled my eyes at this.
"Good
luck with your day, Jess," I said with a smile. "Catch up
tonight?"
She
had already materialized back on her side of the room and was fiendishly
Facebooking
while wiggling around. Yeah, we'd catch up
later tonight with the cheap bottle of white wine we'd split, and a box of
Cheese Nips.
Freshman
year, this was turning out to be a major drag.
----------Chapter
3----------
I
got out of our apartment building and the cold, sweet fall air greeted me. The
campus was perfectly manicured and it seemed like the fall leaves coordinated
themselves to achieve maximum beauty. Purple leaves flowed elegantly into red
ones that popped and set off the yellow and brown foliage like splattered
paint. No matter how lousy I felt this was too pretty to just grumble by. It
was clearing my head and waking me up a bit, which I definitely needed before I
got into work. I certainly didn't want to be falling asleep at my desk and
daydreaming about all the sex that has been on my mind recently.
Hanover
was a nice little town to live in. My work was only a twenty minute walk down
East Wheelock Street. I worked part-time for We Can Do It! which was a crowd-sourcing
fundraising firm which financed projects relating to women's issues. The
company facilitated the gathering of funds through calling, outreach and public
investment on its website. Each project creator would choose a deadline and a
minimum amount of funds needed to work the project.
Sometimes
there were projects that I really felt for, like the project to start a women's
magazine that the profits would then go to helping provide water sources in
African villages. But then there were projects that I thought were maybe a bit
on the ridiculous side, like helping create a new line of clothes or shoes,
which was hardly what I would call Nobel Peace Prize worthy.
It
might sound a little snobby but it was the greatest feeling when the Office
Administrator said I could work part time in their accounting wing before or
after class. I had worked with my dad in his small business, selling computer
parts online, so I knew more about accounting than the average eighteen year
old. But I soon realized it wasn’t what you know but who you know. Some people
treated me like I didn’t belong there. My supervisor was someone like that.
Betty Barkov.
She
hated me from the first day I set foot in that office. It was my second day of
work and I felt like making a good impression, so I wore my power suit that my
mom bought me for job interviews. A navy skirt suit that just screamed to
everyone in the office that I was a serious working woman ready to make not
only a positive impression but a serious impact on the entire staff of We Can
Do It! Unfortunately, my eagerness screwed everything up.
That
day, Betty zeroed in on me and made sure I knew I was the lowest rung on the
totem pole. There I was, an hour after I got there with my hair back in a
ponytail, my shirt hanging messily out of my skirt waistband and a run in my
panty hose filing papers in the annals of We Can Do It!.
So
this morning as I rounded the corner to the office building, I noticed
Battle-Axe Betty's car and took a deep breath. No way am I going to let her get
under my skin today.
I
walked in through the doors to the office, which was designed by one of the
former Dartmouth students when the office was first opening up 3 years ago.
Inside the office the designers left the brick wall up, from when the building
was a factory many years ago. Along the walls were framed posters of the
women’s magazines they had made, the people they had helped, and the companies
they had started.
The
office had a creative department, working on press releases and copywriting as
well as designing websites. This was tastefully decorated with light green mesh
desk chairs that had rocking bases, cubicles separated by a refashioned brick
wall that had English Ivy, Jade Plants, local ferns and I suspect Betty's
favorite: Mother-In-Law's Tongue growing from the top.
There
was a green inside the middle of the building for the employees to relax and
eat lunch on a nice day.
I
was over in the accounting office. The higher-ups unfortunately gave the Iron
Lady control over the design in this part of the office. So it was office grey
with filing cabinets, soul-wrenching white walls with pictures of cats saying
"Hang in there" and shit like that.
Betty
had no taste.