Four letter word

5. Roommates.

The snow had gotten even stronger. You could barely make out the outlines of the world in front of you, just the white snowflakes falling heavily from the sky.

"And then he fired you?" Riley asked, frowning.

They had walked far away from the supermarket and were heading down a random street that had few people on it.

"Yep" Lindsey answered and sighed. She rubbed her arms and looked down at the ground, "I'm so stupid. Who goes to a party and gets high when you have work early the next day?"

"Why did you go?" Riley asked, snapping Lindsey out of the conversation which she had started having with herself.

"I don't know... I guess I just wanted to be included. I don't get invited to this things a lot and I got really excited when my teammate called me. I wasn't even thinking... I do that sometimes. Act without thinking..." she said, embarrassment mixing in with her tone.

"I guess I understand that" Riley shrugged. Her hands had frozen so she put them into the pockets of her jacket and kicked some piled up snow out of the way.

"How can you? You're always at the top of the guest list. You're friends with the popular kids" Lindsey said.

"I wouldn't say I'm friends with them... plus we're in university, Lin, who cares about popularity anymore. It's not high school" she said, trying to hide her irritation from Lin's previous comment. She definitely wasn't friends with the popular students. She just... sort of... had a thing for one of them.

"I know I shouldn't care, and popularity isn't even the thing I'm after... I just wanna get along with people and make friends, but they don't seem to want the same thing..." she sighed, feeling stupid for whining so much and regretting not keeping her mouth shut.

"...I'm your friend"

The words made Lindsey raise her head and look directly at the person walking next to her. Riley was looking back, with a small smirk on her face. Lindsey grinned as well and instantly felt that a heavy weight had been lifted of her chest. Riley Towers was her friend. Not her sort of a friend. An actual friend.

                                              ~•~

"Oh, Cherry, it was horrible! I'm so embarrassed!" AJ whined and rubbed her head with her hands as she lay on the floor in front of her cat, who seemed to not have a care in the world. She just licked her tail and ignored her human.

"And she was so friendly too... and pretty" she mumbled the last part, "she must think I'm a loser" AJ said and rolled onto her back, "but... why would she think anything of me... I'm just another awkward costumer. She probably doesn't even remember me... oh, god, that's even worse" she rolled onto her stomach again and the cat glanced at her and continued to wash herself.

AJ stayed quiet for a while and laid on the floor with her head buried into her arms. Then she got up and decided to go check if she had received any mail. Taking her warmest coat, she left the apartment and hurried down to the first floor. There she saw an old lady taking mail out of her box. The building was full of elderlies, minus a few exceptions, her being one of them.

"Hello" the stranger said and AJ greeted her back. She opened her box and checked inside. There was in fact a letter left for her, which she took and hurried back upstairs. The letter was sent from the university. She quickly sat on the floor and opened it, starting to read out loud for her cat.

"The room has been filled and I can now move into the dorm" she said to Cherry, "great... I'm getting kind of nervous now..." she said and pressed down on her heart. The idea of finally getting to move back to her dorm was appealing, but she was hella anxious about meeting her new roommates. She was dreading the moment, but she needed to start packing.