Total pages in book: 102
Estimated words: 96178 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 481(@200wpm)___ 385(@250wpm)___ 321(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 96178 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 481(@200wpm)___ 385(@250wpm)___ 321(@300wpm)
With that thought, she sprang from bed.
Years ago, Ren had read somewhere that air travelers should plan to be at the airport at least an hour before their scheduled flight, but apparently the same was not true for students and classes. Even twenty minutes before her immunology seminar began, the hallways were empty.
Ren’s blood was humming, vibrating with excitement. At the locked classroom door, she cupped her hand around the small window and peered in.
“Let me open that.”
Ren turned to find a man in a navy shirt and matching pants with a large set of keys hanging from his belt loop. He sorted through a few before finding the right one.
“Are you a professor?” she asked.
“Oh, God no.” The man laughed, shaking his head. “Name’s Doug. I’m just the custodian.”
“There’s no such thing as just a custodian,” Ren said. “Custody comes from the Latin root custos, which means guardian. That means you take care of this building, and everyone in it should be grateful for what you do.” She held out her hand. “Ren Gylden, student.”
Doug wrapped his thick fingers around her hand and shook, grinning at her. “Nice to meet you, Ren. Have a good class.”
When she turned to look inside the room, every thought fell away. Absently, Ren dropped Doug’s hand. She’d seen a few films that depicted classrooms as huge lecture halls with steep stadium seating—and had mentally prepared herself for that kind of overwhelming introduction to learning—but Hughes Hall room 205 wasn’t like that. Ren hooked the strap of her bag over her shoulder and stepped inside. The room was smaller than she’d expected, with eight long tables organized in a square U shape and all the seats along the outer edge, facing the center. Along one wall was a glimmering sweep of windows looking out on Lake Douglas and the Spokane River beyond. The other three walls were mounted with end-to-end whiteboards, as if the class would collectively be so inspired here that their words and ideas would spill in two hundred and seventy degrees around the room.
Ren wasn’t sure how seating worked, whether it would be assigned or open, but she decided to choose a seat as close to the front as she could get, knowing she might not have the luck—or the seniority—to hold on to it. When the first student entered, Ren made sure to explain, “I’m happy to move if this seat isn’t available for me.”
The woman looked at her and then made a slow show of looking around the rest of the empty room. “I think you’re good,” she said dryly before choosing her own seat in the back corner.
Much like with Miriam the day before, silence gobbled up the space between them, and Ren worked to strangle down every one of the questions she had about what to expect. So far, she’d felt like a walking chatterbox with her peers. Fitz had been sardonic in his silence; Miriam was still borderline hostile in hers. The other college students seemed surprised at Ren’s friendly greetings as they passed on the sidewalk. She was used to others being quiet—Steve was always nonverbal until he’d had at least two full mugs of black coffee, and Gloria was never much of a talker even at her most energetic. Ren might not be street-smart, but she did realize that not everyone was a morning person. But when the other student took her jacket off and revealed two arms covered in the most colorful flowers Ren had ever seen, she couldn’t keep quiet.
“Oh my goodness.”
The woman looked up, startled.
“Your arms,” Ren said, lifting her chin. “They’re beautiful.”
“Oh.” Something hard in the other woman’s gaze eased. “Thanks.”
“They’re the most beautiful tattoos I’ve ever seen,” Ren told her. There were two brothers at the farmers markets with tattoos down their arms and weaving up their necks, but they were nothing like this. “I’ve never seen color like yours.”
“My guy is really good.” The woman looked at one arm, sending the opposite hand softly down the length of it. “I gave him the sketches, and he did them perfectly.”
Ren gaped at this. “You drew those?”
She nodded, and Ren was left speechless. She’d been drawing since she could hold a pencil, but she’d never considered drawing art for her own body before. The way the other woman created the overlapping flowers and foliage to perfectly fit the curve of her bicep, the crook of her elbow, the narrowing of her forearm into her wrist…It was magical.
She broke into Ren’s stunned silence. “What’s your name? I haven’t seen you around before.”
“Ren. Today’s my first day.”
“Transfer?” she asked, and Ren deflected.
“Sort of.”
“I’m Britta. Give me your number. I can AirDrop my tattoo artist’s info.”
With a little grimace, Ren admitted, “I don’t have a phone.”
Britta took this with the expected amount of shock. “How?”