Wonderland

❅H6❅ College Is No Joke

Chapter Six

Heather

College Is No Joke

 

September 26

First day of classes, and already, I had a lot of studying to do. People weren’t kidding when they said that college was no joke. I have two classes with Brayden, CSE 142 and Math 126, which were great, because now, we could help each other out.

Since our last class together so-happened to be math, we decided to go over to the Odegaard library to do some studying together. An hour into our session, though, Brayden surprised me by looking up from his math notebook and asking, “Am I a mean person?”

Surprised that he was asking me such a thing, I said, “It depends. You can be a real jerk sometimes, but other times, not really.”

“Huh, okay…” He chewed on the eraser of his pencil, a frown evident on his face.

“Is there a reason why you’re asking me this?” I cocked an eyebrow, closing the math book in front of me. I’ve had enough math for today. I’m getting tired of vectors already, and this was only day one.

“Berkeley’s not talking to me,” he said, glumly.

“Isn’t that a good thing? You said she annoys you.”

“Yeah, but, I feel like a dick.”

“How…?” Wow, so Brayden admits he’s a dick… That’s very rare.

“A few days ago, she asked me if I wanted to have breakfast with her, but I responded in a rude way and I guess that really hurt her.”

“Well, duh. I’d hate to have asked someone nicely for something, but then only have them respond to me in a rude way.”

Brayden covered his face with his hands. “This is why I have no friends,” he groaned.

Such lies. Unless he somehow pissed off all four of his friends back home, then I’m sure he still has friends.

“Why don’t you just go apologize? It’s really that simple. All you have to do is go up to her and say, ‘Hi. I’m sorry for having been such a dick to you. Please accept my apology.’”

Brayden uncovered his face and gave me an ‘are-you-serious’ look.

“What? It was just a suggestion,” I muttered.

“Clearly that’s going to work,” he said, sarcastically.

“See what I mean about you being a jerk at times?”

“I can’t help it!”

“There should be a tutorial book about un-becoming a jerk.”

“You’re not helping, Heather.”

“What are you talking about? I told you to just apologize to her. Here, I’ll help: I’ll go up to her later this evening and apologize in your place. Of course, you’d have to be next to me in order for the apology to take effect. Then, you’ll ask her out to dinner, and you two will be friends again.” I smirked.

“And to think you were the nice, shy girl,” Brayden sighed.

“I’m not shy all the time!” I argued. “I’m improving, aren’t I?” To be honest, I was really shy as a child—I would literally refuse to talk in large groups of people, and I would shut down every time I’m doing group work.  However, as I got older, all that started to change—for reasons I don’t want to get into right now.