Our Chances

Two

I wasn't that excited and all about my schedule for my classes, though I was supposed to be excited about joining theater club for the rest of college. Basically, I was excited for my dorm roommate.

Yoana had always told me that my dorm mate was someone we both have known a lot and my roommate was someone she trusts and someone I'd trust. She didn't tell me exactly what the gender was. She told me that my parents already knew who would my roommate be. It was like Yoana had my life set in the university, like she wanted to make sure I'd be safe with this roommate who'd watch me sleep sound.

I never knew who my roommate was until, of course, I went in.

Room 416 that was. I took the key out of my pocket after I placed all my bags on the floor. It was a hard-to-break knob, I could tell by its appearance, but thankfully it unlocked as quick as I twisted the key to the right. I twisted the knob and opened the door, bringing all my bags as I went in. For a second, I thought maybe she is already inside, so for all due respect, I slowly closed the door and walked softly. I still couldn't see the room since there was a mini hall inside, so I walked past it.

As I started to speak, I looked on my pocket as I placed the key in it. "Hello, I am-" and I looked up to see how my roommate looked like and, "WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING HERE?!"

I was in complete, perfect shock.

"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING HERE?!" He exclaimed but not as much as I did.

"This is my room, why the fuck are you here?!" I was confused and angry and a whole lot of lost about what I should do or what I should say and what I should feel. 

"This is my room, why the fuck are you here?" He stood up from his bed as he walked to me. I could tell by his face that he didn't know what was going on. His eyebrows furrowed.

I felt my face crumpled like it would not be possible to draw it. He was like four feet far - or near - from me and I swear, our faces were the closest to puzzled and all its synonyms.

There was an awkward silence, but our faces managed to remain like that.

I was really baffled but I managed to look into his eyes, again, like I always used to. I hadn't looked into them for a year since he left college, but I was glad that I was able to look into them again, with no one else but us in this four-walled room where only him and me could stay together twenty-four/seven, day and night, through dusk and dawn. His eyebrows, damn, they were like one of the prettiest things I've seen, but not as much as how precious I find his eyes were. Dark, thick eyebrows, with his long eyelashes and big brown eyes, were still the ones I have known for as long as I could remember.

His eyes struck mine and I wonder if he had seen how I thought about seeing him again.

Oh, snap. I went back to reality. I realized that I should be angry, mad, annoyed, after ending up to live in the same room with him which was both a dream and a nightmare to me. But it was much more of a nightmare for some reasons. I broke the silence.

"Claude, this is my room," I said calmly. I recovered my face from all the anger, though I was still quite mad inside.

"Like, seriously?" He raised his hands as he shrugged. His face hadn't recovered, still. 

"Seriously." I shook my head. We still looked at each other.

"Maybe you got the wrong key, and the wrong room number. You gotta check." He walked away and went to his desk.

"So now you're thinking I am stupid that I got the 'wrong' key and the 'wrong' room number? Well, to tell you, I've known my room number for a month and don't get me wrong about this because I am always  careful and always right unlike you." My voice was half-shouting and half-normal-talking and we all have been there. I wanted to walk out. I wanted to get the shit out of the place. But he didn't reply a reply that would trigger the action. 

He was busy typing for something and acted like he didn't mind.

I hope he really didn't.

"Make yourself at home," he spoke like we didn't argue. He was facing straight to the screen of his laptop. It seemed like he didn't even blink. "I cleaned your area already."

I looked over to my bed, my side table, my desk, my shelves. Everything was clean, indeed, except his area. I did not know what to say about this. Should've I said "Thanks" or "That's very kind of you"? 

Instead, I remained silent. I tried to cool down but failed. I went to my area and arranged my bags, but not my stuff yet. And I immediately, quickly ran outside, ran downstairs, and got a bicycle from the rack and I know I just borrowed it because afterward, I'll return it anyway.

I swear that as I cycled my face was so red because I was so angry that why of the many people in this institution I got to be in the same room with Claude. Claude Collins. My best friend's cousin. My crush for the entire high school. My confidant, my sentinel, my adviser, my very close friend long before I told him I liked him before he went to college.

I knew that Claude would be in this university, too, and that was sort of why I wanted to study in this uni, as well. As much as I knew, we'd cross paths again, and be friends  with him again, but everything that I planned things to happen didn't go the way they should be. I actually planned to join the theater club because Yoana told me he joined to club as well. I planned to pretend that I never wanted to be here anyway, and it is by destiny that we've met again. I planned to appear kind and lovely and less awkward in front of him than I was every time we met back in Binghamton but the way I thought everything was different from what I never thought would happen.

The way we both started our school year together wasn't good. Or fresh. Who between us would've had thought we'd be roommates? Who would've had thought that we'd be angry just by the sight of each other knowing we were going to live together? Neither of us, I suppose, because neither of us expected either of us in the same room.

I kind of hated it, of course. I knew I wanted to be friends with him but I couldn't live with him yet, in that situation, when everything is ever-so-awkward and I never knew what to do to kill it. Awkwardness can not be murdered as quick as you step on ants. It is a long process, and that was what I thought of, that regaining our friendship would erase this uncomfortable line between us. But the 'friendship' I had always wanted to be did not start well and would never go on the way that friendship should have been. But I had nothing else to do. What happened happened. I couldn't undo everything like how easy it is in Microsoft. I couldn't un-boil myself. 

Everything about him and me went on in my head that I didn't realize I had been roaming the entire university a couple of times for about an hour and I never even paid attention to how beautiful the place was.

I stopped cycling and felt my sweat against my shirt, so I decided to sit on the bench. I pulled my phone out of my pocket and bam, I got like a thousand messages from Yoana.

She was like "How's first day?" and "How's your roommate?" and "I can't believe you are now in the same room with Claude!" and "How does it feel to be with Claude?" and "Are you and Claude going well as roommates?" and "Ooooh this is a start of romance!" and Claude and Claude and Claude and Claude and Claude. 

Damn, I had read and thought of his name so much that day that I couldn't just tear his name apart from my head like how easy it was to delete all these messages Yoana sent me all about Claude.