Flowers and sunsets.

Clogged shower pipes

Even art class can't manage to cheer me up. I zone out of mostly and my drawing ends up being a bunch of meaningless doodles. Mrs Hailey can tell and suggests that I finish it by next week instead. I agree reluctantly and walk outside to take a well-needed nap.

However, Anne's voice stops me.

"Hey Ruby! I forgot to text you but I might as well ask now, when can you help me with the assignment?" She asks sweetly. She looks happy today. She's wearing a red woollen dress this time and her hair is in loose waves. The wind is picking it up and the strands fly all around her face. She makes a face and tries to pull it back down but the wind is persistent.

I laugh at her and answer her question.

"This was my last class for today. Tomorrow I have a full day of classes but the day after works too."

"Is today okay? That way we can start on it and if I have more questions or get stuck again, I could ask you later?" She offers sweetly. She keeps smiling while struggling with her hair.

"That's fine, I need to eat lunch and take a nap first though. Could you come over in like, 2 hours?" I suggest.

"Yeah, that works. See you then!" She smiles while walking away.

I buy a subway on the way to my dorm and eat it before falling asleep. I wake up half an hour before my meet up with Anne, to the sound of my phone. It takes me a moment to find it and see a missed call from Anne. I quickly call her back.

"Hey"

"Oh hi! Sorry to bother you but I lost track of time completely. I had to call the student administration and it took way longer than I expected. I was wondering if it would be okay if I come over later? I wanted to go jogging still and our shower is clogged so I have to use my neighbours' shower, but they won't be here for another two hours. It's all really annoying." She huffs.

"I won't even have time to study." She complains angrily.

"Look, what if you jog to my dorm, which is about 20 minutes right? Then you can shower here and change, and study here aswell. You won't need to think about neighbours and clogged showers and shit." I reason. I hate dorm showers so I get her annoyance. In my dorm last year they would get clogged every other week because this girl named Alysse had to shave her legs every damn day and use all these fancy shampooing things that clogged the pipes. Luckily in my second year I moved to a better building.

"I mean, if you feel comfortable with that of course. My roommate is never here so I basically have this place to myself." I explain.

I hear her sigh and think for a few moments before she agrees. She hangs up the phone soon after and I start cleaning up my dorm a little.

Picka is sleeping in the corner which makes it easy to clean and make a pot of coffee. I'm in a better mood now, after that small nap.

I hear a knock on my door. I quickly open it to a sweaty-looking Anne. She's breathing loudly and her hair is sticking to her face a little.

"Hi! Thankyou so much for letting me use your shower! I would've had to sit there waiting two hours to ask my neighbours and they're already annoyed with me." She sighs.

"I could even leave earlier now and take a detour to really do a work out." She laughs, out of breath.

She walks in and drops her bag on the floor next to a chair. She sits down and unties her running shoes. She's wearing dark blue tight pants and a sweater in the same color and fabric.

"Do you want a glass of water?" I offer after closing the door. She smiles and nods her head yes. Her ponytail moves along and I realise I've never seen her with her hair like this. She usually let's it more loose.

I grab a glass and fill it from the tap. When I turn around to hand it to her, she takes off her sweater to reveal a dark blue sports bra. Fuck.

I clear my throat and put the glass down next to her. She greedily drinks it all.

I really need to hook up again with someone 'cause this is getting out of hand. Maybe I should call Megan....

Anne demands my attention again by grabbing her bag, standing up and looking at me curiously.

"What?" I ask, still trying to focus on her face and no other.... body parts. I can see her shiny waist in the corner of my eye and it's hard not to get distracted by it. I feel like a hormonal teenager again.

"Where is the bathroom?" She smiles at her obvious question. I brush my hand through my hair to collect my thoughts and then walk to the door opposite of the kitchen with Anne following behind.

I quickly explain the basics to Anne and then leave her alone in the bathroom. I browse through my emails to distract myself until she's done. I think back to Anne bursting in here looking like she ran a marathon. My reaction to her sports bra might just have been because I was surprised and didn't expect it. I'm not really used to girls being that comfortable around me.

I knew from early age that I'm gay, and had a hard time hiding it from classmates in high school. I developped my own, less feminine clothing style and wore beanies a lot which I guess made it obvious that I was gay? Either way, a lot of girls felt uncomfortable getting changed or undressed for gym with me around so I always went in super early and got dressed before they could so there weren't any confrontations.

Anne comes out with her long, wet hair thrown over one shoulder wearing tight jeans and a green sweater. At least this outfit isn't as distracting. I wonder if Anne even knows I'm gay, should I tell her? Maybe she'll be weirded out.

She grabs her laptop and a bunch of papers and sits down next to me on the bed.

"Hey thanks again for letting me use your shower, it was great not to feel guilty for using it." She smiles while starting up her laptop.

She shuffles some papers around and opens up a document on her laptop.