Finding Me

ii

               Considering, it was only the second day of university I was impressed with myself for waking up fresh and on time, when it suddenly hit me that I had slept through half of my first lesson, of course I had set up the alarm for 7:40 pm instead of am. Genius.

         After stumbling over a few couple of times and sighing in between I got ready and ran towards my lecture hall which was thankfully nearby my dorm. It was 8:30 am now and I was 30 minutes late, I entered the hall from the back door and quietly slid in the last row which was surprisingly not full, people really did love Prof. Blu, our professor for Modern Arts. He was still reviewing the syllabus from the previous lecture which made me relax a little and gave me the time to take out my phone to check the expected notifications of my mom's bajjillion missed calls and Ashton's text message which said "Where R U!!??", after texting my mom, I replied to Ashton to which he said "Meet up after lecture tho!!"; me:"cya at the back door near the wending machine:)"; Ashton "Focus!!!". His excessive use of exclamation marks made me smile.
          Minutes passed and I was still on my phone, it was hard to focus today, I couldn't snap out of my sleepy mode, I was so zoned out that I laughed out loud at a joke I read on instagram and saw a few heads turn towards me, one of them belonged to Zane, who looked at me like I was some kind of crazy while he was the one wearing black glasses inside the lecture hall, not going to lie they looked cool so it was easy not to judge. Fully embarrassed, I turned off my cellphone and turned towards the teacher now fully determined to listen to him rant about the Renaissance Art period.

"Wake uuup, class is done now you can wake uuuup" It was Ashton, who was shaking my shoulders and screaming, kind of, trying to wake me up.
Which made me realize that I had really, actually, fully, fallen asleep and was one of the few people who were still sitting in class.

Yawning and not believing myself, I rubbed my eyes open "C'mon its only the second day dude" Said Ashton

I know right? How irresponsible and clumsy of me.
"Lets go get something to eat"
"preferably coffee" Ashton added in to which I smiled.

We were sitting in a balcony of the student's centre, where we could see the autumn leaves falling off, and sipping on our coffees. It felt great to have a company, someone who could wake me up and drag me out of a lecture hall. Thank God for Ashton, I thought thinking to myself and smiling.

I only had one class today, which was good based on the fact that I couldn't function properly today, but on the contrary Ashton had another lecture after an hour for his music class. Even though, more than 30 minutes were left in his class his phone was buzzing with messages from his band member.

"You never told me you were in a band let alone play an instrument"

"You never asked, I mean yeah we still have a lot of catching up to do" He said smiling

"That's true, so what do you play?"

"The guitar, and I know some of the piano"

"That's amazing, I've personally always wanted to perfect in at least one music instrument" I told him.

"Well maybe, someday I can give you some lessons" He offered.

"That sounds great, but looks like someone else urgently needs you right now" I said laughing and pointing towards his phone.

He sighed and said "I know, I should get going, cant keep Zane waiting"

"Zane from Art History?" I asked him

"You know him?" Asked Ashton

"um no but I remember him from the ice breaker activity" I told him

"Yup, the dude in all black, also my band member, anyways I got to go, see you around and oh please get some sleep" He added in and I laughed

"I will and best of luck" I said as he rushed away.
     After Ashton left, I decided to stay at the balcony for a while and admire the beauty of fall, I've always loved how leaves danced in the slow swifts of the breeze and found their way down on the ground, still fully alive in their colors, until stepped on. In some ways, fall represents the frailty of humans, how sometimes the world is too cold for us, how sometimes we lose grip and just decide to go with the flow. But we must chose to pick ourselves up before we get stepped on so that we don't lose our colors.

"Isn't is funny how fall is so beautiful even though the leaves are dying" A voice sliced in my thoughts, I turned around and saw Zane standing with his hands in his pockets and his stare locked on the orange leaves falling off from the trees.
  I was so taken back by his presence that I forgot to reply

"Do you mind if I sit here?" He said

"Yeah, sure" I replied to him

Wasn't he suppose to be at the band practice? I thought to myself.

"Didn't feel like going to class, fall is too beautiful to ignore" He said, as if trying to read my mind.

"I know, the colors are so beautiful" I said

"And the cold" He added.