This Side

Three

The rest of my week passes by quickly, but I can't keep counting.

Tuesday Sam brushed my right arm as he readjusted his seat position.

Wednesday he asked me for an answer to the previous night's check-in, and cursed at me when it ended up being wrong.

And Thursday, he showed up to class.

With a girl.

In my seat.

"What the hell?" I said audibly, but not loud enough for anyone close enough to hear me as I shoved my way through door 405. I stomped my way up to where she was sitting, and then realized I couldn't make her move even if I wanted to. This is college, right? It's not kindergarten. We don't have assigned seats. With an exasperated and frustrated sigh, I marched back around to the seat behind Sam and sat there instead.

I never considered how different the view was. It was slightly higher today, and instead of seeing the side of Sam's... everything... I could only see the back of his head. How boring.

But what I could also see was the back of her head too. I could see from a different point of view how they talked, laughed quietly at jokes they shared with each other, and him softly touching her hand with his every couple minutes. Maybe a gesture she didn't recognize, but I did. And it made me sick.

I tried to focus on taking notes from my boring professor's daily physics lecture, but my eyes uncontrollably drifted to the people in front of me about every two seconds. Anger boiled within my stomach every time I did. I wanted to slap him, but for what? I didn't even know him. Or her. Not personally. My stomach turned more and more, nausea caused from jealousy overtaking the temperature in this room, and my vision almost started to cloud until a sudden ring of a bell jolted me from my seat. Again, snapping me out of a trance, but this time it was a rage-filled one.

After I was finished packing my bag, I stood up and turned to where I could now see Sam and his little girlfriend exiting the room. I quickly followed, turning out the door, determined to get to my second class of the day as fast as possible. But to my absolute horror, I became face-to-face with Sam in the hallway... kissing this new girl.

She was small, almost too small for his tall, lean build, but by standing on the tips of her toes she managed to meet her lips to his. I watched with horror as he reciprocated a feeling of attraction towards this mystery woman, digging his hands into the back pockets of her jeans and palming her ass.

God, I wish that was me.

Wait, what?! What was I thinking? I wiped away invisible envy from my face and continued to stride down the hallway, passing the couple obviously having a moment, and continued to my next class. And though nobody could see, my heart was in my shoes, dragging my feet to the ground harder and harder with each step.

A familiar beep of the Honda Civic I drive filled my eardrums before whipping my keys from ignition, per usual. I glanced at my phone in hand. 8:13 p.m., it read. I shut the door and marched my way back up the three floors to my dorm, then jiggled the keys through the lock a little before opening it. But, to my surprise (and disgust), I flipped on the light to find Andrew at the kitchen table.

"You're early," he remarked matter-of-factly.

"Yeah, I always am. Not like you'd care to notice." I slipped off my boots and trudged to my room, almost through the doorway before he mentioned something that barely came as a shock to me.

"I'm throwing a party here tomorrow. Don't care whether you approve or not, because I am. But you can either stay or leave for the night." He turned back to his phone as if my response couldn't matter, but I made it matter.