Running Out of Time

Chapter Fifteen

"Well, shit." Sophia said through a mouthful of snacks as she munched on the food I'd bought earlier after I finished recounting what had happened to her. "She must've seen me and my blatantly gay ass and gotten jealous."

"Yeah." I sighed tiredly. I sat at the edge of my bed, my appetite nowhere to be found. I fiddled with the hem of my shirt and picked at a thread on my jeans.

"You should go hunt her down on campus tomorrow evening. Maybe you can stalk her Instagram—you've still got her Instagram, right?—and find out her dorm or somewhere she goes frequently."

I raised an eyebrow at the suggestion. "As tempting as that sounds, I'm probably not allowed on their campus."

Sophia frowned. "That's right."

I pulled out my phone. "Maybe it's worth a try." I tried to convince myself, clicking on her Instagram profile. I still followed her, and she still followed me, but we didn't correspond frequently. The few times we'd tried were awkward and stiff and unnatural. The last time I'd DM'd her was the end of junior year, nine months after the end of that fateful summer.

Clicking on her profile revealed an array of posts. Most of them were pictures of her food in some café. In one image, I squinted harder and noticed the logo emblazoned on the napkin she was using, which seemed to be the name of a small coffee shop owned by Meyer University. That seemed to be her regular haunt, so if I was able to locate the shop, I'd be able to find her.

I told Sophia my plan, and she seemed to think it was as good as any plan, and I went to bed that night with the cruel squeeze of hope around my bleeding heart.

The next morning, we explored the museum. It was pretty interesting, and I listened with rapt attention as the professor walked through the history of each of the individual paintings. After lunch, we were free to roam around in the museum wherever we wanted, and when evening fell, we were released back to our hotels.

I immediately pulled up the address of Meyer University. I told Sophia where I was going, grabbed my wallet, and set off.

Meyer University seemed to be a pretty good university. The campus was large and rich, and I signed in as a visitor. The lady at the front desk seemed to be pretty sympathetic to the desperate but hopeful look on my face and didn't ask too many questions. I asked for a campus map, and after a little wandering, I was able to get my bearings and set myself on the direction towards that mysterious little coffee shop.

I saw her before she saw me. She was crossing the lawns, heading away from the coffee shop, her laptop and a textbook clutched under her arm. I took a brief moment to inspect her. Her walk seemed to be smaller, less confident, and there was a slight hunch to her shoulders. I wondered how she was doing.

Then, she saw me. She froze in shock, and managed to react in time to catch her falling laptop. Her textbook clattered to the grass, falling open.

I picked it up, dusting it off for her. A couple of the pages were crinkled, and the cover read: "Understanding Computer Science for Advanced Levels". I handed it to her, expecting her to accept it. She gaped at me instead.

"How are you here?" Her voice was just the same.

I blinked. "I signed in at the visitor's office."

She took me in, and then seemed to remember what she'd thought she'd seen yesterday, and drew into herself, regaining her composure. She took the textbook from me.

"I mean, why are you in California? Where do you go to college?"

"Seattle. We had a field trip down to San Francisco." I answered.