Where Do We Go from Here?

viii.

     "Ms. Tan, may I ask, if you don't mind, is there something going on in your home?" Ms. Judith, with her sunken brooding eyes, inquires. 

     I look at the cat figurines on her desk, representing 10 different breeds of them. Each of them showing a different cat sleeping position.

     Cat lady, huh? Fitting. I think to myself. 

     I wet my lips thinking I can solve my dry throat with it, "Who doesn't have some family problems, but nothing I can't handle." 

     I see a speck of relief as her eyes relax. 

     "Well, if there's anything, anything at all, you can talk to me," she clasps her hand to control her fidgeting fingers. 

     A wave of guilt washes over me as I remember all the times I thought of nothing but the class dismissal whenever I was in her class. 

     "Sure," I nod, "Is this about my grades?" 

     She purses her lips and grabs something under her table. "Yes, uhm," she places the file on the middle of the desk, "Well, uhm,"

     "It's bad, huh?" I spit out as it seems she is having a hard time saying it. 

     "No, no," she waves her hands at chest level, "Ms. Tan, it's not the worst case we have, because as you can see in the exams that matter, you actually bring your average back up, just enough so you can pass the semester," she explains. 

     Not the worst case really makes me feel better. 

     Not. 

     I scratch my neck in response, "So..I'm still in Accountancy?" 

     "Well, if you do well enough in the finals, yeah," she nods.

     I look at the paper in front of me and I see countless Fs with a few Bs and Cs. I also see my current grade point average, 2.0 out of the 4.0 scale. 

     "I have to get 85% on the finals to push it back to the program's maintaining grade?" I ask with my eyes wide in shock. 

     Eighty-effin-five percent? That's a B. 

     Why don't they just kill me now? 

     That's Cobi's score, on a bad day. 

     "You can probably get it, Naomi, I know you can," she affirms, "But the real question is, are you really in this program, one hundred percent?"

     Her eyes beg for honesty so honesty I shall give. "No, not even 85% of me is in it, I think you know the infamous story of how I got here, but yeah, with one stupid mistake, here I am,"

     "But do you have to be here, some people don't even know what they want, at least you know what you don't want, maybe you can start there," she advises.

     "You kicking me out?" I smile at her.

    "Don't get me wrong, I love having your presence in my class, even if I know your mind floats most of the time," she chuckles and I feel my ears heating, "But I can't have a strong promising girl like you lose the potential to be in a place she belongs because of one humorous mistake she feels like she has to live with for the rest of her college life," 

     I drag my head down and bite my lip. 

     In my defense, I have tried to shift to another program during my first week of University but I have been told they couldn't process further transfers until the end of the semester as most of the programs were already overly enrolled.