***********
Although I wasn’t running late, I practically skipped out of my apartment and down the staircase.
“Morning, pretty lady,” Hans, the doorman, greeted cheerily as I entered the small, carpeted lobby.
He called me that every single day; I had long stopped trying to make him stop.
Hans was a middle-aged man who was as bubbly as a twenty-year-old. There was rarely, if ever, anyone who ever saw him frown or even sound angry, not even when delivery guys were being annoying.
“Morning, Hans,” I answered, approaching the glass double doors. “Bye!”
“Have a nice one!” he called back.
Even I didn’t know exactly why I felt the need to rush. All I knew was that, if someone asked me, I’d say it was just how I felt. There was this cloud of apprehension over me. It was as if something bad was waiting to happen.
Considering that being late for my Victorian Poetry class was the only bad thing I could think of, I was trying to beat it. The last thing I wanted to hear was Professor Singer’s unflattering talk about how strange and disgraceful it was for a final year undergrad to not have the right priorities.
As I marched across the road and walked towards the bus stop, a black car remained within my peripheral vision. I stopped walking and turned partially to the side. The black car was a sleek Mercedes-the caliber of cars that lined our compound in SoHo. The type of car that my dad still nagged me about not wanting to drive to school.
He had never been able to understand my preference for being a regular NYU student over the Senator’s daughter status. I had long chalked it up to his being hyper-ambitious and me, on the other hand, being…me. I was grateful enough that he didn’t stop me from moving out to my apartment or living on my own terms.
The pedestrian traffic whipping past me brought me back to the present, and I resumed walking as I casually looked sideways to get a full look at the car. It was moving slowly and, unlike most of those in our garage, the windows weren’t tinted. Not that I couldn’t see the two suited-up men sitting at the front through the windscreen.
The uneasy feeling didn’t quite subside, but I couldn’t see any sign of danger, either. Okay, maybe I was alarmed when I noticed the lingering presence of the black car. But, seeing how the guys in the car looked every bit of executive staff at an accounting firm and weren’t even looking in my direction, I had nothing to fear there.
So I walked on and didn’t look back until I got on the subway.
I was on campus with 28 minutes to spare, and I enjoyed a cup of coffee at a cafe close by before heading for the lecture hall. I wasn’t the only one who didn’t like the idea of getting into the hall after Professor Singer; fellow classmates passed me in the hallway in groups of three or more.
I had barely taken a seat in the fourth row from the front when I heard, “Hey, Emilia!”
I didn’t need to look around to know it was Ruby. Her ever-jovial voice was unmistakable.
“Ruby,” I greeted with a small smile as I looked backwards. “How’s it going?”
“You really didn’t show up for the party yesterday,” she half-accused, faking hurt.
“I had to head home, I told you,” I pointed out. “I’ll be at the next one.”
“You said so the last three times, babes,” she disclosed, chuckling. “Anyway, I understand. Don’t mind me.”
“Bless you for that,” I whispered, earning a short laugh from her. “Viola isn’t here yet?”
She was about to answer when Collins appeared beside her.
“Yo! Party pooper,” he teased, sitting beside Ruby and lazily throwing his left arm around her.
“C’mon,” she remarked.
“Just kidding,” he told her before turning to face me again. “Howdy?”
“Good,” I answered, shrugging.
I knew practically everyone taking this course with me, but the trio that comprised Ruby, Collins, and Viola was the only sort of meet-and-greet relationship I had. Ruby and Viola took a classical literature course with me last session, and Collins was an English Lit student like me. However, our little ‘friendship’ didn’t get the chance to go beyond the university premises. Or, better put, they had come to terms with my refusal to visit their homes.
The four of us used to sit together in Professor Singer’s class; it didn’t last longer than three weeks. The reason was nothing more than the fact that they always chose their whispered chatter and inside jokes over the lecture. I was always shushing them with a polite smile and, sometimes, the professorwould kindly interfere. Eventually, to my obvious pleasure, they decided to sit a few more rows back. While I didn’t support or fully understand it, the fact remained that the class was the type where the back rows filled up before the front ones-that was how much people enjoyed it.
“Still on for group study with Hannah and the rest after 2661?” he inquired.
