cigarettes [Leighton Murray]

turntables

the next morning she rushed back to the campus, wanting no one to find out about last night, she walked by the statue of an old man when she bumped into someone, blonde, she knew who it was and she didn't have to look. 

"watch where you're going" the blonde said her expressions changing when she saw rue 

"how the turn tables" she said refrencing 'the office' 

"that's not an expression" the blonde scoffed "it's actually-" 

"i know the expression, i was-" rue sighed "it's too early in the morning for your shit. coming back from-?" 

"none of your business?" the blonde stated, rue was now kind of liking getting on her nerves 

"a one night stand, got it" the blonde grunted in annoyance before bolting away, and rue stood there watching the girl walk away, she shook her head heading to her own dorm 

there they were, Kayla and Abigail, on the couch discussing last night's party when rue walked in, they looked at her expectantly. she attempted to ignore them at first and walked to her room's door but sighed and retraced her steps to sit on an empty couch 

"so.." abigail began "who was he?" 

"was it a one time thing?" kayla questioned "was he hot?" 

"where did you meet him?" the two bombarded rue with questions 

"okay, okay. calm down" she decided as she's gonna spend the rest of the year with these girls she better come clean "trick questions, it was a she" she looked at them "i am gay" 

"oh" kayla looked at abigail "was she hot?" she looked at rue "the questions didn't change so go on" rue chuckled 

"well, she was ashley, we are kinda friends, no it was not a one time thing, yes she is hot, i met her long ago, in middle school" rue lay all the facts in front of them 

"so it's like a friends with benefits situation?" abigail asked 

"yes, abigail. that's what i just said" rue refrained from saying anything more. she wasn't trying to go advertising her commitment issues, the reason she never had a serious relationship.

"ew." rue furrowed her eyebrows at abigail's comment "not on that, just call me abby, 'abigail' makes me want to throw up"   

"cool" rue chuckled

"can we like, show our schedules to each other?" kayla spoke "to see if any of us share a class?" 

"yeah for sure" 

after the discussion about schedules, as it turns out rue shared no classes with her roommates, which kinda bummed her out. she was walking to her first class of the day, computer applications when she spotted the blonde from earlier. 

"hey, you don't look like shit for once in your life" rue tried testing the waters 

"don't talk to me, people might think we're actually friends" the blonde said 

"you wish" rue walked with the girl "where are you headed? just wanna make sure i don't have you in my class" 

"you would really love that, wouldn't you?" the blonde fired back "math 350" 

"oh great, you're dumb, i am in computer applications" rue boasted "but uh, i'll see you around if you need any help in your... homework..?" rue smirked before bolting to her class.

 the blonde watched her walk away with a small smile tugged on her lips, quickly turning into a frown when she came to her senses 

the first class was okay for rue, not too much information dumped which gave her enough time to make a study plan for each of the concepts. she was taking two of the hardest classes on campus and without a plan she was in it to fail. 

after her day of classes she sat in the common area with kayla and abby, scrolling mindlessly on instagram

"how was your first day?" kayla looked at rue as the girl turned her phone off to answer her roommate's question

"it was easy, but it's only the first day so the professor let us off the hook, how about you guys?" 

"yeah french was the only thing that was hard, rest were easy" abby nodded at herself 

"yeah, i mean for me neuroscience made me want to stab myself in the eye, otherwise it was good" kayla mentioned as the girls bonded over the difficulty of classes 

"hey um" rue started "just out of total curiosity, how many blondes are on the campus?" abby and kayla looked at each other in confusion 

"girl, you have to give us more than that, there are like a million blondies on campus" kayla set the record straight 

"okay describe your person" abby took a rational approach to the batshit question rue put on the table 

"okay, it's a girl. maybe like 5'6, blonde, obviously. a rich snob" rue explained "yeah that's all i got"

"yeah, that doesn't help" abby said