Arcadia [h.s.]

Chapter 7

Tell me who I have to be, to get some reciprocity
-
Arcadia

Today, Noel agreed to have lunch with Damien. "You owe me for avoiding me the past week," he laughed when he approached her in the cafeteria and placed two salads on the table. She supposed that even if she laughed it off as a joke, she didn't have a choice as to whether or not she even wanted to eat the hideous looking salad. She was a vegetarian but not that kind of vegetarian.

She supposed it wasn't the worst timing, though. Her dad would be visiting in less than a month and she had nothing to convince him that her life was great. She already considered her life to be pretty great with the money she made, the friend she had, and... well, that was it she supposed. But, that didn't mean there wasn't time to make things better. She'd been here for almost two years, she wasn't sure if she needed anything more than what she already had.

Maybe it wouldn't have been the worst thing to let her dad think Damien was her boyfriend or something.

"So, how does one get a job here as a journalist without a degree?" He asked her after drenching his salad in Italian dressing. Noel was in the midst of taking a forkful or the bitter salad in her mouth and practically gagging. She held her finger up as she chewed.

"Well," Noel started when she swallowed that green stuff that tasted like raw collard greens, "I did an amazing two years as an intern in high school back in Cleveland and they didn't want me to leave. They said they'd pay me more to transfer here if I wanted to," she shrugged.

"So, what, you were just naturally a good writer?"

"God, no. Everyone's a good writer, you just have to perfect the craft any way you can and then take risks from there."

"And how did you perfect your craft without college?"

"I snuck into lectures at the local colleges, read the AP style handbook front to back, wrote for my school paper, got close to my English teachers and followed everyone at the Cleveland office around until they told me to go away," Noel giggled, remembering the time she'd almost walked into a bathroom with one of the editors.

Damien's eyes widened, "wow. You amaze me, you truly do. I wish I could have been brave enough to take risks but here I am with my seventy thousand dollar film degree, barely making enough to pay the rent and eat."

"There's always time for risks," Noel smiled and reached over to palm the top of his hand where his knuckles were, briefly. She realized what she was doing and quickly pulled away.

Damien just gave a brief smile and at the same time, a chuckle. He noticed her obvious discontent.

"You're different, you know," he noted and Noel almost laughed.

Actually, she did, "I assure you I'm the same as every other girl who's ever existed... Ever."

It was true. Maybe she was different to him, but she wasn't "different" in a universal sense.

"Prove me wrong, then," he smiled, a dimple appearing only in his right cheek and it reminded her how Harry had one in both. Then somehow her disgusting brain thought it was okay to just remember how when she was sucking him off, how he pursed his lips in a tight line and both of his dimples popped out before he gripped her hair even tighter in his hand.

Noel grabbed the edges of her ponytail, clenching her thighs. She needed to stop and now.

"Well, you know, I'm insecure most times," she nodded, "I secretly love the attention of people," this made Damien roll his eyes humorously, "and I've watched every rom-com that came out after 1980."