Charmed Thirds_ A Jessica Darling Novel - Megan McCafferty [104]
I, too, wish our love was right. But it wasn't. Not at all.
Regrettably wrong,
Jessica
* * *
the second
I was expecting Wallach, my residence hall, to be deserted. But while the campus isn't exactly teeming with students, I have found company with a coterie of holiday refugees.
Wallach is quite a comedown after two years of luxurious living in Furnald. It's one of the oldest dorms on campus and looks every minute of its age, with paint-over-paint-over-paint-over-paint jobs and industrial carpeting in that vague grayish-brownish hue designed to hide all manners of filth. Wallach is one half of Hartley-Wallach, twin buildings that comprise the so-called Living and Learning Center, a program meant to “integrate academic life with residential life and create a distinct society of scholars within the larger campus community.” (Or so it says in the brochure.) I've lived here for a semester, and as far as I can tell the only unifying trait among all inhabitants of the Living and Learning Center is that we all didn't want to risk getting an even shittier room through the housing lottery.
Each room in these suites is depressingly cold, boxy, and utilitarian, facts that no amount of ironic artwork (e.g., a black-and-white poster of a beefcakey hunk cradling a kitten in one steroidal arm and a newborn baby in the other) can overcome. The only exception is the ground-floor lounge, with its high ceilings, marble fireplace, and shiny grand piano. The lounge became the de facto social center for winter break malcontents like me, for whom even Wallach was better than home.
One was Tanu, who I was friendly with as a first year, but kind of fell off with when she moved to East Campus as a sophomore, which is only, like, a quarter mile away but you know, location, location, location. I might have made the effort, but she got way more entertainment value out of our friendship than I did. As a Biophysics major, devoted Claymate, and writer of 7th Heaven fanfic, Tanu is someone I've long considered to be the human equivalent to unbuttered toast. Square, dry, and bland.
Another was this guy named Josh, whom I've nicknamed ALF because I swear he crash landed from Melmac.
Then there's Kazuko. When I showed up yesterday, she was reading a graphic novel, idly kicking her chunky-heeled, silver-buckled Mary Janes over the arm of the couch. I sort of recognized her, but there's a surprising number of little Asian-girl goths who wear petticoats and carry parasols, so I couldn't be sure. Tanu and ALF were both into their iPods, and Kazuko looked the most interesting, so I surprised myself by boldly making an introduction.
“Hey, I'm Jessica,” I said.
“Ohhhh, I know you,” Kazuko said. “You're the girlfriend of that guy who died.”
First, it struck me as funny how the term “girlfriend” is only used on this campus when the “boyfriend” half of the coupling is, in fact, a corpse. Then I remembered where I'd seen Kazuko before: She broke the news on the sidewalk that afternoon.
“I'm not,” I said. “I mean, I wasn't.”
“You're talking about that guy who died?” asked ALF, jumping right into the conversation. “How'd it happen?”
Everyone at Columbia refers to William as “that guy who died,” and not only those who were there that day. I assume it will continue until some new guy (or girl) dies on campus in a mysterious way.
“Tanu knew him, too!” I said, hoping to redirect the questioning.
“Yes,” Tanu replied sheepishly. “But not as well as you.”
“They ruled out suicide, right?” resumed Kazuko.
“And drugs,” said a drowsy male voice coming through the front doors.
It was Kieran, who was in my Music Hum class last semester. He's two years younger than I am, a first year who still possesses that obnoxiously brainy hubris people develop when they have been told by every teacher since kindergarten that they're the smartest student ever ever ever. It will fade after another semester or two of impassive, unimpressed silence