Roommates [lucaya]

4. Free Day

I wake up to the smell of pancakes and bacon. Almost like I'm at home, but it's not because if I were home I'd be smelling burnt oatmeal. Seriously, Mom, how can you burn oatmeal?! I bounce out of bed, combing my hand through my bed head a couple of times, and decide to slip on some white, fuzzy socks. As I walk out into the kitchen I see Lucas focusing on sizzling the bacon, and I notice that some of the pancakes are getting a little burnt. I slip beside him silently and flip the pancakes off of the griddle and onto the pancake plate. He jerks his head to the side, obviously surprised at my presence.

"Morning." I chirped and beamed at him.

"Uh, morning." He replied, taken aback by my unusual morning happiness.

To be honest I don't even know why I'm so happy this morning. Maybe it's the feeling of freedom, or the fact that I'm about to have the first real breakfast I've had in a long time, or maybe just the fact that I have one of my best friends here beside me on a beautiful New York City morning. 

Ten minutes later we were sitting at the little table in the main room and eating our pancakes and bacon.

"Where'd you get all these supplies, Ranger Rick?" I ask after a bite of crispy bacon. Lucas shrugs and points to the cupboards.

I laugh at him. He looks confused and runs a hand through his messy, brown hair. I smile slightly at his naïvety.

"That's the room's cupboard." I explain. Lucas, evidently, is still slightly confused because he furrows his eyebrows at me. I giggle. "That means the hotel owns those things, you have to pay for them in order to use them." Lucas' surprised look fades into an Oh-My-Gosh-I'm-Such-An-Idiot face. I laugh and fall backwards onto the couch.

"Whoops." Lucas chuckles and rubs the back of his neck with his right hand.

I was about to respond when a knock came on our door, I rushed to answer it before Lucas could even stand up.

"Good Morning, Mr. Matthews." I greet and open the door wide, gesturing for him to come in to our humble abode. I laugh out loud at my own thoughts, causing Mr. Matthews and Lucas to send me curious looks. I shrug them off. "What's the news, Matthews?" I return to my normal self.

"Well, Miss Hart, the college classes aren't quite, we'll say prepared, for almost a thousand students today. So today is your Free Day. Use it wisely." Mr. Matthews announces and starts to leave.

"And you're going around knocking on all the freshman doors and telling them this?" I ask.

Mr. Matthews sighs and nods tiredly.

"Then wouldn't it be easier just to send an all text to let everyone know instead of doing it the hard way?" I giggle.

Mr. Matthews' face turns red and he slaps himself in the forehead, muttering under his breath. I laugh and shut the door lightly as Mr. Matthews exits the room.

"So what do you want to do on our 'Free Day'?" Lucas asks me, using quotation mark gestures when he says Free Day. I shrug and look out the window-wall. The city is just waking up but there are early birds out for walks and coffee strolls and what not. "How about we go to the big toy and candy stores on..." Lucas pulls out his phone and starts typing away. "Fifth avenue and L street?" He suggests.

I grin and nod my head vigorously. He smiles and walks into the other room to change. I quickly walk in, grab my outfit for 'outside day' as I labeled it in my suitcase, and dash to the second bathroom.

When I reemerge from my land of makeup and clothes I see Lucas standing there, clicking on his iPhone 6, in a fluffy sweatshirt, jeans, and his black beanie that I had returned to him the day before. He looked up and stared at me for a couple seconds before awkwardly coughing and looking away. I blushed. I didn't think my heavy winter coat, exercise leggings, Ugg boots, and white beanie were that attractive but apparently I was, at least, slightly wrong.

"Shall we go?" Lucas gestured for the door. I laughed at his proper grammar and started walking forward.

"We shall, Huckleberry, we shall." I laugh, continuing to walk forward. Suddenly, I stop, holding my hand up to halt Lucas with me.

"What?" Lucas asks, looking mildly concerned.

"I forgot something." I say quietly. I face Lucas, smile wickedly and yell. "HA-HURRR!!" And with that I walk out of our room and into the hallway, not even bothering to see if Lucas was behind me. I knew he was. He had always been there for me. And there wasn't a doubt in my mind that he always will be.