Chapter Text
Hannah tried to take deep breaths as she navigated the narrow and busy hallways of her new dormitory, Carmichael Hall, at the prestigious Tennyson University in Upstate New York.
College was something Hannah had been looking forward to for years. Not only to begin a new and exciting chapter of her life, but because it also meant putting some distance between her and her father and stepmother. The relationship with her stepmother, Paula, had always been tense, but her relationship with her father really began deteriorating when she started reconnecting with her birth mother and changed her name from Agnes to her birth name.
Hannah glanced back when she heard Garth, her father’s driver who had been tasked with helping her move in, grunt and struggle with the box he was carrying.
“Almost there,” she said, trying to be encouraging.
“What could you possibly have in here?” he replied, his voice strained, as he tried to shift the weight of the box from one side to the other.
She ignored him, and her heart began to race as they neared room 520. She heard laughter flowing out from the rooms that they passed and hoped her first meeting with her roommate would be just as easy. All she knew was that the girl’s name was Rebecka Grove, and that she was from Philadelphia, liked music, and she was attending on a full scholarship.
“514, 516, 518,” she murmured under her breath as she passed by the mostly open doors. Hannah glanced into the rooms and they were all mostly disaster areas with opened boxes and clothes strewn everywhere. “520,” she said a little louder once she made it to what would be home for the next year.
The door was cracked open, and she could hear murmuring coming from inside. Hannah pulled out her phone and frantically scrolled through her email, scared she had the wrong room. Garth huffs behind her, and she hears the box shift again, but she ignores it, too scared she is in the wrong hall or got her dorm number completely wrong. But the email confirmed room 520 in Carmichael Hall.
Hannah shook her head, immensely annoyed that her anxiety was getting the best of her. She had Garth helping her move in; it made sense for Rebecka to have someone in there with her as well. She knocked lightly on the cracked door.
Almost instantly, a girl with curly brown hair thrown up into a messy bun opened the door fully. Her brow was glistening with sweat, and she was clad in a maroon sports bra and a pair of running shorts. Behind her on the bed sat a girl with dark hair and bangs, who hadn’t bothered looking up from scrolling on her phone.
She wiped the sweat from her brow. “You must be Agnes. Come in, come in. I was just putting together a cart I got us to put snacks on or whatever. She came over to help me put it together, but you can see how helpful she’s being.” She gestured towards the girl on her bed, who promptly gave her the middle finger.
Before Hannah could correct her on her name, the girl darted around her. “Whoa there, buddy; you’re about to lose this.” She grabbed the box Garth had been struggling with ease and set it on the empty side of the room that Hannah had worked out was hers.
Garth’s cheeks flushed with embarrassment, and the girl on the bed clasped her hand over her mouth in a futile attempt to hide her laughter.
Hannah scowled at him when he didn’t bother to say thank you so she felt the need to do it for him. “Thank you so much, and I go by Hannah. You must be Rebecka.”
A soft smile crossed Becka’s lips, and her gaze lingered on Hannah’s face for so long that Hannah could feel her own cheeks grow warm. “You look like a Hannah. And you can call me Becka.” She then gestured behind her. “That’s my friend Shunamite, or Shu.”
Shunamite gave a small wave, and what to Hannah looked like a fake smile. Shunamite instantly made her nervous. She reminded her of the popular girls at her private school who snickered behind her back during class and refused to let her sit with them at lunch.
Garth shifted awkwardly next to her, and Hannah suddenly remembered she hadn’t introduced him. “This is Garth.” She left it at that. Explaining to them that he was her father’s driver would only make her sound pretentious, and that she had no one unpaid willing to help her move to school. While that was true, it was depressing and not the type of first impression she wanted to make.
Becka eyed him up and down without the soft smile she had when she looked at Hannah. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
“Right,” Garth said before turning to look at Hannah. “We should go get the next load of your things.”
“Do you need help?” Becka asked Garth, a hint of amusement in her voice.
Garth’s cheeks flushed pink again. “No, I’ve got it.”
“Do you?” Becka raised an eyebrow. “You were really struggling with that small box.”
Shunamite laughed from the bed again, and Hannah had to bite the inside of her cheek to keep from giggling. “He’s got it, I promise,” she replied. As funny as it was, Garth was helping her, so she didn’t want him to get too embarrassed. “We will be back in a couple of minutes.”
“Oh my god,” Becka exclaimed as soon as Hannah and Garth left.
“Do not,” Shu warned from the bed. “I will not go through this again.”
Becka ignored the warning and laid back on the bed next to Shu. “Did you see her?”
“Yes. Yes, I saw the straight girl and her weird little boyfriend come into the room.” Shu gave Becka a small shove. “Stop it, you literally look like you have hearts coming out of your eyes.”
Shu was, once again, ignored. “That is the kind of face you write not only a song about, but an entire album.”
“That is the kind of face that sends you spiraling, and then I have to pick up the pieces, and then you write an album about the heartbreak.”
“I don’t know how I’m going to survive living with her,” Becka sat up on the bed. “Shu, I’ve never seen someone so pretty.”
Shu frowned. “She seemed kind of uptight, and like Amish or something. Or maybe like a Mennonite. Who wears an ankle-length denim skirt and a button-up blouse? Either way, I don’t trust you to be normal about this at all. Maybe we should switch roommates. Mine is already on my nerves. Hilda or Hulda or something. She’s like sunshine personified. It makes me sick.”
“That’s your fault, you know. Your dad wouldn’t let us request to room together because he thinks I’m a bad influence.”
Becka was correct; it was Shu’s fault. In the fall of their senior year, the police detained Shu for getting drunk at Katie D’Angelo’s birthday party and attempting to steal a chair from Taco Bell at 2am. When the police officers returned her to her father, she couldn’t handle the idea of her father being disappointed in her, so she turned on the tears and told him she took the blame for Becka since Becka had already been through so much. Shu’s father believed her immediately. Believing that poor little fucked up Becka got drunk to drown out her sorrows and disturbed the peace was much easier for him to stomach than to think his precious Shunamite had done so.
“Just please promise me you won’t fall for another straight woman. My mental health can’t handle that again.” Shu hadn’t resorted to begging yet, but she wasn’t above it.
Becka closed her eyes and thought of Hannah’s face. “I can’t promise you that.”
The late August heat caused Hannah’s blouse to cling to her skin. Garth had removed his black shirt and was now clad only in a tank top. In her younger teenage years, this would have made Hannah absolutely lose her mind. But that crush had long passed, and now she just hoped his sweat didn’t get transferred onto any of her belongings.
“What do you think of your new roommate?” he asked as he surveyed the back of the SUV, determining which box to grab next.
Hannah wasn’t sure why the first thing that came to her mind was that she thought Becka was absolutely gorgeous. She also decided that her first day on campus wasn’t an ideal time to unpack that, so she ignored it and said, “I think she seems nice,” instead.
Garth rolled his eyes. “I thought she was a bit rude,” he said as he picked up a box, only to spill the contents onto the ground.
Hannah watched as her hair and makeup products tumbled onto the pavement. “Well, she wasn’t wrong,” she said under her breath.
When she crouched down to pick up her belongings, she saw a girl crouch down next to her. “Hey, I’m Daisy,” the girl said as she handed Hannah back the mascara in her hand.
“Hannah, and thank you,” Hannah replied as the two continued to pick up the various items. Garth, annoyingly, was just watching. “Are you a freshman, too?”
“Yeah!” Daisy smiled. “Carmichael Hall, room 519.”
“I’m in room 520. Seems we are just across the hall from each other.”
“I think I met your roommate earlier,” Daisy said. “Small, curly-haired girl?”
Hannah smiled. “Becka, yeah. I think she seems really cool.”
Once everything was picked up and packed back into its box, Daisy reached to pick the box up. “I’ve got it,” Garth said as he grabbed the box.
“You sure about that?” Daisy ignored him and grabbed a different box from the back of the SUV. “More hands will make it go by faster, anyway.”
“I really appreciate this,” Hannah said as she too grabbed a box. “You really don’t have to.”
“I know.” Daisy smiled over her shoulder as she headed back towards the dormitory. “I want to.”
Hannah ignored Garth rolling his eyes and followed Daisy. Making friends had always been hard for her in her small, wealthy town. One of her biggest fears before college was that she would have the same trouble at Tennyson. And even though it was too soon to call Daisy or Becka a friend, things were starting off promising.
“All done!” Becka exclaimed as she stood proudly over the cart she’d finally finished assembling.
“Looks unstable,” Shu said without looking up.
Becka ignored her and shoved the extra screws she had somehow ended up with, that definitely looked super important, into a drawer. “I appreciate all of your help,” she said with a roll of her eyes.
“Later I can help you put my furniture together,” Shu said as Garth walked back into the room. “Do you need the help of a very, very small girl again?” she asked him.
“Shu!” Becka chastised despite wanting to laugh. Getting on the bad side of her new roommate’s boyfriend wasn’t how she wanted to start her freshman year.
Hannah came in next, followed by a girl Becka met earlier that morning, Daisy, if she recalled correctly. “Oh, I see you got some help.” Becka desperately wanted to sound nonchalant; she failed.
Thankfully, Hannah didn’t seem to notice. “Yeah! This is Daisy, she said you two met earlier.”
“In the common room, remember? We talked about music,” Daisy said as she placed Hannah’s box down.
Becka remembered. She thought Daisy had seemed cool. She wanted to learn guitar; Becka said she’d help her. But now? Becka wanted to shove her out of their window. And over what? Because she was jealous that Daisy got to carry the box of a pretty girl she’s known for all of two minutes? Insanity. She glanced over at Shu, hoping she couldn’t tell how jealous she was. This was something Shu would never let her live down.
“Is there more?” Becka had to remind herself not to sound too eager. “I don’t mind coming down and grabbing a box or two.”
Hannah smiled at her, and Becka swore it’s the most beautiful thing she’s ever seen. “That’s so sweet, but I think we can finish it in just one trip. I mean, no pressure, Daisy, you definitely don’t have to come with us.”
“Happy to help,” Daisy said. Her smile was not the most beautiful thing Becka had ever seen.
The two of them, along with Hannah’s seemingly useless boyfriend, headed back down for the last of the boxes, and Shu finally got off of Becka’s bed.
“Why does the girl with the pretty blue eyes get to carry my weird, hot roommate’s things upstairs and I don’t,” she said in a fake whiny voice, mocking Becka.
Becka immediately defended Hannah. “She’s not weird.” Then she realized what Shu had said. “Pretty blue eyes, huh? Guess I’m not the only one with a crush.”
Shu’s cheeks instantly flushed. “Zip it. It was just an observation. Now, come on and build my new cube organizer. And try to do a better job than you do on that stupid cart.”
Becka laughed as she followed Shu out of her room and down the hallway. Everyone, including her therapist, had told her that college would be a fresh start for her. That the change of scenery would be good for her. Becka hadn’t been convinced, but now she thought that maybe everyone had been right.