Tragic and Wonder: An Un-Fairytale [On Hold]

Chapter 4- Let the Semester Commence

I was able to get all the furniture that I needed and set up my apartment to my liking before Freshman Orientation and classes began. It was nice to have my own quiet space. Growing up in the house of chaos, there was rarely a moment of quiet, and now I had it. Peace and quiet. It was amazing. I was able to fully relax and prepare for the new chapter of my life.

At Freshman Orientation, I was able to find both Amanda and Casper. We sat together until it was time to find our group leaders. The group leaders were upper-class students who were to be mentors for us. They were there to answer our questions and give us a look into our schedules. They gave us pointers on which professors to avoid at all costs and which ones were easy credit hours. As an off-campus student, I had a smaller group. The group leader was a senior named Ben. He was a business major. Apparently, they tried to group like majors together in the groups, so most of the people in my group were business and marketing majors. It was nice hearing from an upperclassman on the classes that we would be taking. He told us that one of the most difficult professors in the business department was Dr. Loren. Ben said that if you could make it through all his classes, then you would be set in the business world. Dr. Loren had the tendency to be hard on students. He wanted to push them to their extremes. If a student could not handle it, they typically switched majors. It seemed like he was the professor to watch out for; the one who would make or break you. I suddenly had a sinking feeling about this. The only classes I had signed up for this semester were business classes and Dr. Loren was teaching both classes on my schedule this semester. I decided to not let it bother me and if I found myself struggling, I would reach out to Dr. Loren to see what I could do to rectify my short comings.

Amanda and Casper each had a great time in their groups. In fact, they seemed more encouraged from the group time, which was the complete opposite from how I left the group time. Amanda was a science major and she knew exactly what her next few years would look. She had it mapped out, literally. She had a well laid out plan of how the next few years of college would look, including what classed and which order she would take them in. She even had the next 3 years' worth of breaks scheduled out. She was determined to finish these four years in three and get accepted to Harvard. I had no doubt in my mind that she would.

Casper was a computer science major. He wanted to go into programming. He was into games and thought that he wanted to be a game developer. Casper was the kind of person who could accomplish anything if he put his mind to it. I had no doubt that he was going to succeed if he did not slack off. I knew that he would put schooling first though. It was one of the many stipulations that his grandparents made when they offered to pay for his schooling. Casper did not mind. He was getting a great education, in a great field that had lots of opportunities, and in his own words: "I get to go to school with my best friends. Why would I mess that up?"

The first week of class arrived. Amanda was already working ahead in most of her classes. She was thoroughly enjoying the challenge that college was providing. She excelled under academic pressure. Casper said that his classes were great. He was enjoying his professors and the biggest thing that he was excited about was that he was going to build his own computer, how he wanted it. I was not sure that I had ever seen him "geek" out about anything quite like he had with that. He was so cute. I could not help but feel butterflies in my stomach, looking at him when he was so excited. He had the biggest smile on his face and his eyes lit up like the sun was spotlighting each of his bright green orbs. They sparkled like the stars on a clear, dark night. Then, I remembered that Amanda liked him and looked at her. She was smiling as she looked at him. From the look in her eyes, I thought that she loved him. I had to stop feeling this way for him. I could not do that to my best friend.

My classes went better than I thought they were going to go. As it turned out, Dr. Loren was the professor whose class I sat in on when I came to visit Adler U. He was very approachable. I went up to him after my fist class with him and asked if we could sit down and talk about concerns that I had with the semester. He gave me a look like Oh great. The semester has just started and I am already going to lose a student. I quickly told him that I wanted to discuss my situation as a pay as you go student and the concerns I had for keeping a tight schedule for staying on track to graduate with a business major. He seemed to understand what my blubbering mouth was saying and asked me to email his secretary to set up a time to meet.

The meeting with Dr. Loren was indescribably helpful. He had a genuine passion for what he did, he was extremely knowledgeable, and wanted to see all his students succeed, even if they chose a different major later. He expected the best of everyone, while maintaining the thought that each student had a different best. He was the ideal professor. I was so thankful that he was willing to meet with me. He put all my fears to rest in that one meeting. I knew that whether I kept my major in the business department or not, Dr. Loren would be in my corner. I could not thank him enough for all his help already.

As the semester rolled along, I would find Amanda at my apartment more than her dorm room. She told me that her roommate was not exactly a nice person, and though Amanda tried to be as nice to her as possible, her roommate still managed to be mean and have guys over all the time. Amanda was not at all comfortable with that. She told her parents and they agreed that as soon as the first semester was over, Amanda would be able to live off campus with me. I was ecstatic to say the least. I just had to make sure that Mrs. Gable was alright with it.

Mrs. Gable had met Amanda before when I first took her into the bookstore. Amanda and Mrs. Gable instantly bonded over all genres of books, so when I asked Mrs. Gable if I could add Amanda to the lease at the start of the new year, she was more than thrilled to have two responsible girls leasing her apartment. She had told me before that it was hard to find good tenants for her apartment. She said many of her renters had been wolves in sheep's wool. She had been taken advantage of so many times that she had just about given up until my parents and I looked at the place. She told me I was welcome to stay in the apartment as long as I needed, even if it was after I graduated (which at this rate would be another eight years). Mrs. Gable was not one who was afraid to voice her opinions, as I was beginning to find out. I loved Mrs. Gable. She reminded me very much of my grandma.

My small apartment was our new favorite hangout spot. It did not have the games, food, or comics that Com-Cade had, but it had our friends. We had study dates, game nights, and we had lots of good times. I gave Amanda and Casper, each a key to the apartment so that they could use it as a quiet place to study if they did not want to stay on campus. The only stipulation I had was that they text me if they were going to be there. They were there probably 75% of the time that they were not in class or sleeping. And aside from the library, they did not spend time elsewhere. It was nice to have my friends around. It made the transition to being on my own much easier than I thought it would be.