Chapter Text
Etho groans as “Call Me Maybe” blares through the room, waking him up while his roommate who set the godawful alarm continues snoring. There surprisingly aren’t too many downsides to living with Grian, but his ability to sleep through the terrible pop music he insists on making his alarm is definitely one of them.
Last year, Etho had to find a new and creative nonconfrontational way to wake him up at least twice a week: “accidentally” knocking over his water bottle, getting a mutual friend to just so happen to call at 7:00 (Etho still can’t believe he leaves his ringer on while he sleeps), and even, in spring semester as Etho grew more comfortable with Grian, gently shaking his shoulder.
Now, as Carly Rae Jepson sings “where do you think you’re going, baby?”, Etho hurls his pillow at Grian’s head. Grian sits bolt upright, knocking both his phone and Etho’s pillow off his lofted bed. He half-jumps, half-falls to the floor to retrieve them, humming along to the song for a few notes before finally shutting off the alarm. Upon seeing the day on his lock screen, he groans and flops backwards, lying on the carpet.
“Etho,” he cries.
Etho grins slightly. He’s sure he’ll find his usual exasperation with his roommate’s antics very soon, but after a summer apart, he may have kind of missed Grian’s dramatics.
“Yes?” he calls back, indulging the man on the floor.
“PLEASE tell me it isn’t the first day of classes.”
Etho hesitates. “Is this one of those lie-to-save-your-feelings moments, or..?”
In response, Etho gets his own pillow to the face.
Thirty minutes later, Etho is dressed and ready to go, and Grian is still complaining. “Stupid 8am classes. Who would ever willingly choose to take a class at 8am? In the morning??”
Etho laughs from his desk, where he’s double-checking his schedule to make sure he has the right textbooks for his Monday classes. “You’d think after two semesters of complaining about them, you’d stop taking them.”
“You’d think after two semesters of me complaining about them, Osborne would stop scheduling them!”
Etho lets the comment go unanswered as he frowns at his syllabus for American Literature of the 20th Century. He has his textbooks for his two morning classes, but where he should have four novels for his required Literature class, he only has three.
“Hey, Grian? You haven’t seen The Great Gatsby anywhere, have you?”
Grian shakes his head from where he’s attacking his hair with a comb.
Etho uneasily packs the five books into his backpack. In all likelihood, the professor won’t check that they have the required reading, especially not on the first day, but he hates being underprepared. Maybe he’ll check the library before class to see if someone has already gotten to their copy.
He turns back to Grian, who’s now apparently losing a wrestling match with his favorite red sweater. By the time his head finally pops out, his hair could use another encounter with the comb. “Are you almost ready? Or should I leave without you?”
Grian throws a notebook and his textbook for his first class into his book bag. “I’m ready, give me like 30 seconds! Gem just texted the group chat saying she’s waiting for us at breakfast.”
Etho makes his way through the first half of the day pretty easily. He goes to breakfast with Gem, Grian, and Gem’s roommate, Pearl, then his first two classes, where the professors go over the syllabus and he greets a few classmates he was friendly with last year.
3:50 rolls around, and he reluctantly climbs the stairs in the musty building where they put the humanities classes to get to his third-floor classroom. Scanning the room, he only recognizes a few faces. The only one he knows by name is Cleo, an Education major from his orientation group last year, sitting next to a short guy with a red headband who Etho vaguely recognizes as one of her friends. Cleo smiles at him, and he nods back, relieved that they recognize him.
He briefly considers sitting next to them, but decides that would probably be too much for their level of acquaintance. Maybe not for one of his more sociable friends like Grian, but Etho’s not exactly known for being outgoing.
Instead, he takes the desk in front of Cleo’s friend and starts rummaging through his backpack to look busy. Should he take out his books? No, he’s still missing one. Besides, the professor probably won’t even think about the books between introductions and the syllabus.
He looks up as the door to the classroom shuts behind a woman who- yep, that’s definitely an English professor. She adjusts her glasses and rolls up the sleeves on her knee-length, colorful cardigan as the class quiets down.
“Welcome,” she smiles, “to American Literature of the 20th Century! I’m Dr. Carroll Richardis, but just call me Carroll.”
She introduces the class, and Etho is surprisingly not too bored. He’s started to enjoy himself, scribbling down the occasional note.
“…and I know that a lot of you are here for your humanities credit requirement-“ Etho smiles to himself “-so don’t worry, I won’t be judging you based on the standards of literary academia. I will, however, be judging your commitment to the class. I trust that all of you have the books I asked you to get before class.”
Etho looks at the nodding students around him, panic starting to set in.
“Great. I always give five points extra credit to everybody who has the first book, which is, of course, The Great Gatsby. I like to encourage you to actually enjoy the class, and it helps me learn your names.”
Etho’s stomach sinks as everybody takes out their books. Carroll starts at the back of the classroom, checking off names on her list of students and chatting with them.
He knows she won’t care, and it doesn’t even matter because it’s just extra credit, but he hates the thought of disappointing this professor on the first day. As he’s anxiously looking around, he makes eye contact with Cleo’s friend. The guy raises his eyebrows at him, and he quickly looks away. Eventually, Carroll makes her way to his desk.
“Ooh, heterochromia!” She must read the unease on his face at her pointing out his two-toned eyes, because she laughs good-naturedly. “Sorry, I don’t mean to make you uncomfortable. I had a dog with heterochromia when I was younger! Her name was Hestia — needless to say, we got her when I was first getting into Greek mythology.”
Despite his usual reluctance to participate in small talk, Etho finds himself saying, “I had a Greek mythology phase in middle school!”
She nods approvingly. “It’s never really a phase. It shapes who you are. Did you have a favorite story?”
“Well… I guess I liked Psyche and Eros just because it’s different from every other myth where it ends in tragedy and the message is ‘don’t mess with the gods’.”
Carroll smiles in what Etho thinks might be approval. “What’s your name?”
“Uh- Etho Slab.”
“Very nice to meet you, Etho.” She finds his name on her clipboard. “And… do you have your copy of The Great Gatsby?”
“Um- I-“ His fear of disappointing the professor comes back full force. As he reaches for his backpack knowing full well it isn’t in there, he feels a tap on his shoulder.
“‘Scuse me!” It’s Cleo’s friend. Etho turns around to look at him. He’s grinning, and his hand is extended towards Etho, holding a beat up copy of Gatsby. “I found this on the floor! Is it yours?”
Etho’s eyes dart to the next person Carroll’s going to check. Her book is on her desk. He looks back at red headband guy, who winks at him. He slowly takes the book.
“Yeah, uh- thanks. Yes. This is my book,” he says, probably unconvincingly, as he turns around and shows it to Carroll. She doesn’t challenge him and checks off his name on her list. Etho wonders if he’s imagining the gleam of amusement in her eyes. Either way, he doesn’t think he exhales until she’s done complimenting the outfit of the last person in his row. Once he’s deemed it safe, he turns around to his savior to offer back the book that must be his- except there’s already a brand new copy on his desk. Red headband guy is already looking at him.
“So… Etho?” He smiles. This guy sure smiles a lot.
“Yeah, is… is this not your book?” He furrows his brow and does a more thorough scan of the surrounding desks, finding nobody without a book.
Red headband guy nods. “I have two copies. I got a new one ‘cause I’ve annotated it twice, and I want to read it fresh without my high school self telling me what to think.” Etho notices that that he has a very expressive voice — unlike anyone else he’s spoken to. His pitch fluctuates, and his cadence is just odd enough to be worth noting.
Etho puts the book onto the guy’s desk. “Well… thank you for saving my neck. I thought I ordered mine, but this morning I could find every book except for this one. I’ll give your copy back now, seeing as it’s a historical artifact.”
Red headband guy laughs, even though Etho personally doesn’t think his joke was all that funny. “Hey! You take that back!” The exaggerated offense catches Etho so off guard that it draws a quiet laugh out of him. “But actually, you’re totally welcome to use this one if you’d like. It’s not like you could really destroy it anymore than I already have.”
Etho gently opens the cover, finding a title page full of pencil doodles, with “BDUBS” written in block letters in the top right corner. “B-dubs?”
“That’s me!” Bdubs confirms. Odd name, but at least it’s better than “red headband guy”.
“Thanks for the offer, but I’ll check my order confirmation and see what’s going on. My copy’s probably getting here later today or something.”
Bdubs shakes his head. “Just until yours gets here! I insist!”
Etho hesitates, but relents and places the book on his own desk. “Thank you.”
“No worries!”
Normally at this point, Etho would turn back around and busy himself with anything other than conversation, but for some reason he wants to keep talking to Bdubs.
“So… are you an English major, then?” He turns back around.
“Yep! Guilty as charged! Art minor, though. I swear, I’m not just a literature nerd.” As he talks, he crosses his arms on his desk, leaning forward slightly.
Etho shrugs. “Hey, it’s better than being an engineering nerd like me.”
“Ooh…” Bdubs sucks in air through his teeth and leans away from him. “Yeah, that might be worse…”
As Etho scoffs and prepares to defend himself, Carroll claps her hands together twice at the front of the classroom, and the chatter stops as everyone turns to look at her.
“Alright! I think I covered everything, but if you have any questions, my office hours and email are listed on the syllabus. I’m going to go ahead and let you all go early. Remember to read the first three chapters of Gatsby for Wednesday!”
Etho packs up his stuff. As he picks up Bdubs’ book, deciding he’ll give it back to him and wait for his own copy, the man in question walks past his desk, chatting with Cleo.
“Hey- uh- Bdubs-“
Bdubs looks at him, sees him holding the book, and shakes his head, smiling. “You’re keeping that until I see that you have your copy.” Before he can protest, Bdubs turns to leave. He calls over his shoulder, “Bye, Etho! It was nice to meet you!”
A little confused, Etho mutters, “you too,” even though Bdubs isn’t listening.
Cleo laughs lightly and waves at him as she follows Bdubs to the door.