First Comes Friendship

Chapter 1: First Encouter

It was a cold Thursday night in January during my sophomore year of college. It was the type of night when you can hear the snow crack under your feet as you walk and when the wind seems to go right through your warmest jackets. Passerbies were in a hurry to get to their destination, almost running to avoid being outside for any longer than they had to. The sky was crystal clear, there was not a cloud in sight, and despite the fact that we were in the middle on the city, I could still see the stars which was a nice treat. I found myself starring at them when I was waiting for my friend Sam to arrive, trying to find the Big Dipper. No such luck there.

I did not like to wait. I had never been a patient guy and Sam was definitely testing me tonight. As I stood on the corner of my street shivering, waiting for him to arrive, I was cursing his name for not being here on time and wishing I had agreed to be his roommate after all, because I would not be in this position right now.

When Sam had asked me if I wanted to share a place with him at the end of our freshman year, to his disappointment, I had decided that I would be living on my own so I had to turn him down. Although living with him could have been nice, I had wanted my own space. You see, I was always a very private person and after living in a dorm for a year, I was ready for some quiet and alone time. I was now living in a small (small did not begin to describe how minuscule my place actually was) one bedroom apartment near the university. The rent was pretty expensive, and the place was not in the best of shape, but it was better than taking public transportation to school every day and waking up to a the sound of your roommate having sex with yet another random date!

Sam and I had met during our freshman year. We shared a dorm room and we got along instantly and became good friends. Sam was the type of guy that you could always count on, although from time to time, he had troubles with punctuality. He was frank, honest and had a great sense of humor. Even if he was a good looking guy – the tall, dark and handsome type, he always had a hard time picking up girls. He was shy and he often lost his cool when speaking to women, but that had never stopped him from trying to or for volunteering to be my wingman when I needed one, which was quite often to be honest. He was also pretty good at understanding hints and he always knew when he had to make himself scarce, and when he needed to find a place to spend the night, if you know what I mean.

After waiting for a good twenty minutes, I saw him rushing towards me. He was out of breath and had obviously been running the whole way here. I was ready to put money on the fact that he had been playing video games and had lost all notion of time, again. Video games were like a drug to him, once he started he could not put the controller down for hours. When we used to share a room, it was not uncommon for me to wake up and realized that he had never even gone to bed, still playing his video games. I could never understand the obsession myself, but to each their own I guess.

"So sorry man, I got cut up in a game and totally lost track of time" he said out of breath.

I knew it!

"No worries, I know how it is! It's good to see you man!" I said to him, trying my best to hide the frustration in my voice.

We gave each other a quick pat on the back and started walking towards the campus bar.

"It's good to see you man. So, are you ready for a great night of partying?" he sounded excited.

"Of course, don't you know me at all?" I said to him with a wicked grin on my face.

We both laughed because I was known never to miss an occasion to go out, regardless of the night of the week or of what I had to do the next day.

We walked through campus towards the student bar, and exchanged a few words about our holidays as it was our first day back. The line-up outside was particularly long that evening, wrapping around the building, as classes had just resumed and no one had exams to prepare for or papers to write.