Incendiary Hearts

Chapter Two

Kevin was a bundle of nerves as he pushed open the door and stepped into the room. Thankfully, it'd been rather easy to find the correct lecture hall, partly thanks to the orientation they had previously, and partly because he'd memorized the hell out of the map of the entire school. But this was the first real class, and so, for obvious reasons, he was nervous.

The room was already buzzing with chatters amongst the young students gathered there for the same reason. The same purpose, really. Likeminded people, Kevin thought, hoping that would turn out to be the case. He carefully walked down the stairs, not wanting to make a fool of himself by doing something stupid like falling, and went for a seat in the middle aisle. He stopped next to a girl. "Is this seat taken?"

The girl, who'd been talking to a guy sitting on her other side, turned to Kevin. She had unruly curls of black strands and square glasses on her nose. Her plumb lips soon smiled brightly. "No, it's not taken. Please take it." The smiling girl used her index finger to push her square glasses higher up her nose. "I'm Savannah, by the way," she continued, offering her hand.

Kevin shook it. "Kevin."

"And this is Scott," she said, pointing at the guy sitting next to her, who gave Kevin a short wave of the hand and offered a friendly, "hello."

"Nice to meet you," Kevin said as he sat down, still all jittery.

"So, where are you from, Kevin?" Savannah asked as Kevin pulled out his laptop from his backpack.

"Oh, pretty close. I'm from Wilmington, Delaware."

"Must be nice to have your family so close by."

"Yeah, it is, actually," Kevin smiled, meaning it. "What about you two?"

"Oh, we're both from Durham, North Carolina."

"Wow, that's quite the trip away!"

"Yeah, it is. But this is a really good school and we're lucky we both got accepted! We've been friends since high school," Savannah explained. "We've both always known we want to become doctors. I guess that's why we became such good friends to begin with."

"Sounds nice," Kevin smiled, realizing he didn't hang out with anyone from high school. He hadn't had many friends to begin with, mostly just school friends he hung out with at school. In his free time, all he'd wanted to do was to hang out with Michael and Jonathan.

Savannah was about to say something more, but the teacher started to talk and silenced her attempts at further conversation. The teacher, Miss Miller, welcomed them all to the course of Molecular and Cellular Foundations of Medicine and started by introducing herself and her impressive background. She continued to talk about this course's syllabus, upcoming assignments and exams, as well as her expectations on her students. And they weren't low, by any means. But it was just what Kevin had expected. And he was looking forward to it. Getting accepted to this school meant one step closer to fulfilling his long-term dream of becoming a doctor.

"This course sounds so interesting, don't you think?" Kevin said after Miss Miller had ended the lecture, and Kevin was gathering his things, still riding the high.

"Yeah, it does. But it's probably gonna be even more interesting with you here," the girl, named Savannah, winked.

Kevin stopped mid-movement and looked over at the brave, young girl. He blinked, opened his mouth, then closed it again.

"Don't mind her," Scott chuckled, "she's just trying to flirt with you."

"Oh," Kevin mumbled and scratched his nose. "Um well, thank you," he continued, meaning it. "I'm flattered, but, unfortunately‚ I'm gay," he explained with a small smile and a shrug of his shoulders. "If I wasn't, I'd totally go for you, though. I'm mean your obviously smart and totally gorgeous!"