The Upside of Heartbreak

So Over

Super speedy update this time! Honestly though, I just spent the last week and a half writing some very intense chapters for TWoB, and my brain was in serious need of a light-hearted break. Hopefully it doesn't sound too rushed and terrible...

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Astrid woke up on Monday morning feeling wonderfully well rested. Donning her favourite jogging shorts and lycra crop top, she stuffed her earbuds in before heading out for her morning run. Of course, she could just use the gym at the university, but she wanted to take advantage of the nice weather while it lasted instead. There were only a couple more months until winter started to close in after all, and Archipelia winters sucked. Hard.

As she jogged, Astrid thought over the new year ahead of her. It was only the first day of first semester of her junior year. Already, she felt like a completely different person. This would be the first time since 10th grade that she didn't have a boyfriend. Didn't have to mingle with the 'cool' kids for Scott's sake. Attending every one of his practices and games to show support, while trying desperately to cram in all her homework in the after hours. Her grades had always been good of course, but they weren't as good as she knew they could be.

That was going to change this year, Astrid decided resolutely. Her feet slapping in a steady rhythm against the night cooled pavement as the sun bloomed over the distant mountains. Beating the familiar path of streets, Astrid let her mind wander. The girly pop playlist she had on was great to run to and great to dance to, but it certainly didn't keep your brain busy. Letting her mull over her other problems instead.

Her physics mark was admittedly her biggest issue. Bewilder Wildlife Conservation only accepted the best and positions were extremely limited. That meant only those that were flexible enough to work in both the lab and the field would even get considered. She had already finished her two year vet tech course last year, so this year was devoted to mostly tidying up the lab side of things. Something that was daunting, even at the best of times, but at least she would have more open study blocks.

Wanting to pump up her resume as well as push herself, Astrid had gone for the 3 year PhD course in Applied Physics rather than taking a lesser two or even one year course. It was an excellent bridge course between all the other sciences, and Astrid had always enjoyed physics class in high school. Unfortunately that didn't seem to transfer over to university level courses. Last year, she had barely scraped by.

It wasn't her fault though! Professor Broyd was just a terrible teacher. All the students thought so! Heather and Rachel had barely managed to wrangle a pass last year either. Even with all three of them helping each other.

Broyd was ancient, stuffy, and had zero personality. With puffy white hair, unreasonably wide and staring eyes, and coke bottle glasses, he looked like a mad scientist. The combination of white lab coat over baggy grey 80's trousers that he wore everyday making it clear that he wasn't the exciting type of mad scientist either. He may be eccentric and prone to emotional outbursts, but his lectures were about as dry as the Sahara, and he rarely let the students take part in interesting labs. Preferring to make them watch laughably old VHS tapes of other people performing the fun experiments instead.

That's why the students were so awful to him. Playing pranks every other day. Just trying to get him to retire so they might get someone else. Of course Broyd was smart. He had to be. He just had no idea how to break complex ideas down into layman's terms so that everyone could start to understand and he would get violently upset when they couldn't figure it out. Often storming out of his own classroom mid-lesson.

This was her last year at Berk U though, and Astrid was going to finally achieve a good grade in the class. Even if she had to find a private tutor to help her. She would even get a part time job if need be just so that she could pay them. There was just the problem of actually finding a science major who was specializing in advanced physics and also had any free time they were willing to give up. Also one that wouldn't be simply offering their help in trade for the chance to sleep with her.