You Can Run To Me

One

"Just a minute, Mom," yelled Natalie, pulling the brush through the tangled ends of her brown hair.

Her bag was already packed, breakfast done, makeup.

A choice swearword slipped out under her breath. How could she forget her makeup? A moment's pause. Did she really need makeup?

She ran down the stairs just as her mother began to call her for – what – the third time. Natalie smiled at her, but her lips felt tight and her eyes betrayed her anxiety.

"Ready?"

Natalie's nod was just as uncomfortable as her smile. Her dad stooped through the doorway. He kept his face carefully blank. Natalie shot him a glare, and his face split into an abrupt smile. She gave him a sarcastically lopsided grin, hardly impressed by his sense of humor.

Her mom glanced pointedly at her watch, her face stern. Natalie's heart skipped a beat. She wasn't ready to go. Couldn't she just...

No. She was doing this. She'd been working for it long enough. High school had been tough, but it was all for this. Well, not for this but the bit afterwards, but anyhow this was important. She was doing this.

She could feel the stares. They were all staring, right? They must be. Who was late on the first day? Well, besides her, obviously. She felt her shoulders creep up to at least her ears, and she was sure her face must be about the colour of coral. Bright red coral.

She tried to shut the door quietly, then peered around the room. Where could she sit? It didn't look as though there were any spaces left. Wait. Surely she wasn't in the wrong lecture hall again. Once was enough.

But there was one vacant seat, third row four along. To the left of it, some unfortunately acne-riddled girl with bright purple hair. To the right, a boy who looked like he couldn't be any older than twelve; his feet didn't even make contact with the floor. It would have to do.

Two steps, three, four. She was sat down in barely half a minute, her bag thrown down onto the floor with a soft thud. The people between her and the empty seat looked up at her blankly, shifting their knees to the side to make way for her. No one said a word, and she was glad.

She pulled out her laptop from her bag, trying and failing to zip it quietly. She glanced around self-consciously, but everyone was looking ahead, where the professor was still enigmatically talking with the untamed excitement reserved only for... well, the sort of people who'd want to spend every day teaching the same thing over and over.

Suddenly she realised he had stopped talking. She looked up.

"And you would be?" And the coral was back in vogue. He was talking to her.

"Natalie Birn, Sir. Sorry I'm late but-"

"Did I ask for an excuse?"

Natalie winced.

They were actually staring at her now. Fifty faces like Skittles, all unique and all with a variation on plain irritation printed in lines across them. Not exactly the first impression she wanted to make. In fact, she had wanted to be as unnoticed as possible. Like all well-made plans, it had been foiled, and Natalie didn't dare to say anything in response. She sank down in her seat and waited for the storm to pass over.

But this wasn't high school. The professor said nothing more. He had already turned back to the old-fashioned chalkboard and was talking about the syllabus. Natalie tried to concentrate. She opened up a new Word document and typed "Introduction to psychology" along the top of the page in big bold letters. She ran the cursor over them and clicked the underline icon.