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)
Ren leaned forward to see all the way to the top through the windshield. “It looks so fancy,” she whispered.
With a rumbled settling of the engine and a tiny puff of exhaust, they parked at the curb in a space marked LOADING ZONE.
Ren scrambled out after Gloria, stretching her arms to the sky and spinning in a slow circle. “Look how beautiful it is!”
After giving her a handful of seconds to take it all in, her mother waved her to the back of the truck bed. “Come on, Ren. Give us a hand.”
“If they tow my truck,” Steve began as Gloria took hold of one trunk handle and Ren took the other, “I’m gonna raise hell.”
With that, they followed Steve inside to find Ren’s new Monday to Friday home: room 214.
Bigelow was an all-female dorm—a requirement of her parents if she was going to be allowed to live on campus—and her dorm room was objectively unremarkable: two twin beds, two wardrobes, two small desks. Even so, Ren was immediately in love. The room was neatly split down the middle, with exactly one half decorated chaotically in a collage of photos, postcards, ticket stubs, and posters of rock bands, and the other half—Ren’s half, she realized—left starkly white. The mattress on her bed was bare, the desk empty.
A blank slate. It sent Ren’s pulse soaring.
A girl stood from her desk chair when they entered. She was tall and pale, with thick dark hair, and dressed entirely in black. Ren tried to mask her double take at the various piercings through the girl’s nose, ears, lip, even what she thought was a real piercing through the girl’s septum, like an actual bull.
“Hi,” Ren said, holding out her hand. “I’m Ren. I’m your new roommate.”
“Yeah.” The girl shook it, limply. “Miriam.”
“These are my parents, Steve and Gloria.” Who, unsurprisingly, were studying Miriam and her room decor with silent disapproval.
Miriam let out a quiet “Cool.”
“Are you enjoying Corona so far?” Ren asked.
Miriam’s eyes flickered to Steve and Gloria and then back to Ren. “Sure. It’s fine.”
“Have you chosen a major yet?”
“Communications.”
Ren felt her brows slowly rise and fought the urge to make a good-natured joke. Instead, she said only “How wonderful.”
Her parents were always sparse with their words, and Ren never had a problem being the chatterbox of the family. But the mood right now didn’t seem to call for friendly small talk. Ren found herself facing a social brick wall as awkward silence settled over the room and Miriam fidgeted with the rings on her fingers before slowly returning to her chair, shoulders stiff.
Ren turned back to her parents, whispering, “Do you want to stay for the campus tour I have in a half hour?”
“Nah.” Steve shoved his hands in his pockets, looking uncomfortable. “We’ve got the drive home to make.”
It felt so abrupt, after everything, for them to leave so unceremoniously barely five minutes after arriving. But Ren knew her parents too well to see it going any other way. They hardly spoke to people in town back home; they sure weren’t going to draw out a sentimental goodbye with Miriam sitting right there. Ren’s excitement shaded bittersweet as she rushed to hug each of them in turn. “Okay. Be safe. Thanks for bringing me.” She stretched to kiss each of their sun-weathered cheeks. “Don’t worry, I remember the rules.”
With one more “Be smart, Ren,” and a final look to caution her against the dangers of city life, Steve gestured for Gloria to lead them back outside.
Ren knelt on her bed, staring out the window to watch her parents climb into the truck and disappear back the way they came. Apprehension swarmed inside her chest like bees on honeycomb. She was here. She turned, ready to dive into college life. A hundred more questions for Miriam popped up, each begging to be answered.
But her roommate spoke first: “Your parents seem pretty chill.”
There was a weight to her words that Ren couldn’t quite translate. “Chill?”
“Easygoing.” Miriam moved to sit on her bed, crisscrossing her legs. She pinned her elbows to her knees, rested her chin on steepled fingers. With her black T-shirt, black leggings, even chipped black polish on her toes and fingernails, Miriam looked to Ren like a beautiful shadow stepping right out of Bram Stoker’s world and into the modern day.
Ren smiled. “Oh, they are very easygoing. I mean, with everything going on at home, I’m lucky they let me do this.”
Miriam’s dark brows furrowed, bloodred lips flattening. “I was being sarcastic. They seemed seriously intense.”
“Oh.” Sarcasm. Right. Ren had never been good at spotting it. “They don’t like the city much,” she explained.
Ren wasn’t unintelligent. She’d read enough contemporary literature to know that her upbringing was unconventional, and she was sure Miriam wouldn’t be the last person at Corona to notice or even call her out on any perceived weirdness. Ren didn’t dress like other women her age; everything she wore was handmade or purchased secondhand. She didn’t watch live television or listen to the radio; she wouldn’t catch many of the slang or cultural references at school. She knew most college freshmen weren’t twenty-two years old, and she knew even fewer would be obligated to go home to their parents on the weekends. Modern-day freshmen gained fifteen pounds and learned their limits with alcohol. They flirted and “hooked up” and lost their virginities to people who broke their hearts afterward.