Call Me Hopeless, But Not Romantic; h.styles

Chapter 2

          Addie

I couldn’t think of any work more tiresome than unpacking. And, with that being said, you could definitely describe my first few days at the dorm as tedious.

I didn’t think I owned too many things – until it came down to going through all of it and finding a place for it to belong. That was especially hard considering the quite compact space I had to work with – and only half of it was for my use.

One good thing came from spending day in and day out in mine and Marina’s room: I had learned, and rather quickly, how to tune her out. Although, I wouldn’t have had to if she had more than one topic of interest: the first party of the year. It was on Friday night and that was all she seemed to talk about.

I was worn out from all of the physical labor and, reluctantly, I found myself nearing the edge insanity. Needless to say, it eventually became too much, “Will you quit talking about the God damn party? I get it, first party of the year. Whoopty fucking doo.”

I didn't mean to bite her head off but I was getting tired of hearing about the sure to be lame ass party. I had come to learn, all parties were the same. No matter how many times people said, “No, this one’s different. This one’s gonna be awesome!” they never were and I had partaken in more than my fair share of drinking, loud music, and pointless drama.

Marina stood motionless, lips pressed closed, looking at me like I had just killed a puppy. I had clearly surprised her. Which made perfect sense -- we had spent nearly a week together and yet we still knew next to nothing about one another. It wasn’t by my doing though. It wasn’t like I was trying to avoid getting to know each other – I would have gladly talked to her about anything as long as it wasn’t that damn party.

           

“Yeah, I'll quit talking about it,” she nodded her head stiffly and pretended to busy herself with putting clothes into her small, five drawer, chest.

I silently cheered and high-fived myself -- if I had known that was all it took to get her to forget about the party, I would have said something ages ago.

“Under one condition,” her lips held a sly smirk and her eyebrows were raised, screaming of something devious. A groan of utter annoyance fell past the recesses of my lips. I should have known she wasn’t actually letting it go. If I had learned one thing about my roommate in the short seventy-two hours I had known her, it was that she was nearly as hard headed as I was. “You come with me on Friday.”

“No,” I deadpanned, “I’m not going to the fucking party. Why do you think I asked you to quit talking about it? It’s because I’m not going.” End of story.

Marina threw her head back and let out a menacing chuckle, “God, please tell me they didn’t stick me with one of those lameos that only spends their time studying and getting their assignments done early,” her head snapped up and she looked me in the eye as if telling me she was directly addressing me with her next comment, “Addie, we're in college. We're supposed to be going to parties and drinking and messing around. Why didn’t you just take online classes if you aren’t going to take advantage of the full college experience?”

“I never said I was staying in,” I scoffed, “I just said I wasn't going to the damn party.” If only she knew... I was far from being one of those “lameos” she thought I was. I had reason to want to stay as far away from those parties as physically and geographically possible: I wasn't looking for a repeat of what happened after Alex left.

She seemed to drop it after that…