Jacky Jennings stood in the doorway of the dorm room, staring at the two beds with their bare mattresses, two desks, and the scuffed-up combination closet/dresser that took up all of one wall. This is it? he wanted to say, but then his mom was right behind him.
"This is it," Mrs. Jennings affirmed. She gave him a nudge. "Go on, let's get you unpacked. Is your roommate here yet?"
The room was obviously empty, walls bare. A whole three feet of space between the two beds. "Nope, he's not here yet." He managed to make his words sound like he was rolling his eyes.
"I still think you should have emailed him or something. You could have coordinated your colors."
"Everything goes with black and gray." Jacky hurled his duffel onto his bed.
"Ah yes, there's my ray of sunshine." Mrs. Jennings dragged the wheeled plastic bin with most of Jacky's other stuff into the room. She dropped it then looked around. "This seems smaller than I remember my dorm room being."
"You think?"
"I'm sure it's the same size." Mrs. Jennings tossed Jacky the car keys, then started unzipping his duffel. "Go on and get your laundry basket, I'll make up your bed."
He'd rather have it be the reverse than to have the other students and his new roommate see his mommy making his bed. But then he remembered how awkward it would be to make his own bed one-handed, and bit back a sarcastic comment as he headed back into the crowded hallway.
A few months ago, he had imagined moving into a college dorm he'd be sharing with Ryan, and Ryan would have saved Jacky from all of this: both the effort of physically carrying things, and the heaviness of the looks people would give him when they realized he only had one arm.
Of course, there would have been looks Ryan would get, the "what a nice guy, taking care of the disabled." Everyone would have looked at Jacky and thought, "He can do so much better." There would be the inevitable day when Ryan would find someone else. Someone better.
He had made the right decision, he told himself. He needed to learn to exist without Ryan's protection.
It didn't stop him from glaring at every eager college student who had also arrived early on move-in day, who would now bear witness to Jacky's struggle to achieve the most basic tasks.
He unlocked his mom's car with a beep and wrestled the wheeled laundry basket to the ground. The fact that his laundry basket was filled with all the snacks and food his mom thought he'd need outside of the dining hall, and a full jug of detergent, made this all the more difficult.
"Hey, need a hand?" a male voice asked, and Jacky turned to find himself looking into the face of a guy who might have been a model on the college brochure: longish sun-streaked hair under a backwards baseball cap, chiseled cheekbones, and a friendly smile. Not to mention the muscles that filled out his orange polo shirt.
Jacky straightened up, the laundry basket safely on the pavement. "I got it," he said, as the guy stepped in and shut the trunk for him. Jacky's annoyance was eased by looking at that very attractive face again.
"I, uh, just realized," the guy said, turning slowly to look at Jacky, "what a terrible pun that was."
Oh, God. Attractive and funny and self-aware? Could it be possible that he found a hot, single, gay guy within five minutes on campus? Jacky's face felt hot. "I wasn't going to mention it..."
"Anyway, I'm Steve," the guy kept going with that undimmable smile. "And if you're heading up to Wright Hall, then I'm your RA."
Jacky managed to keep the smile on his face. Of course, Steve was the RA. He was required to be nice to underclassmen and help them unload their cars and make them feel welcome. "Cool. I'm—" Jacky choked a little.
In his last two years of high school, he'd gone back to his childhood nickname of Jacky. No one had ever called him Andrew anyways. But this was college.
"Jack," he said finally.
"Cool, cool. I'm in the first dorm on the left if you need anything. See you at orientation tonight!" Steve gave a little wave, then headed back to a girl with long beachy hair and golden skin.
He's probably not gay, either. Jacky lifted the laundry basket's handle and rolled back to Wright Hall. The heat had left his face by the time he arrived back at his room.
"It's really too bad Ryan couldn't come with us today," Mrs. Jennings said as soon as he walked in. The bed was all made and she had arranged his pillows for him.
Jacky rolled his eyes behind her back as he parked the laundry basket near the desk. They'd already had this conversation in the car. "He's busy packing."
Jacky hadn't told her the part about breaking up with Ryan, so he couldn't really blame his mother for hammering away at it. They had spent holidays together and gone to prom together and hung out together almost every weekend, which was probably part of the problem. Ryan's words echoed in his head: If that's how you feel... With a small shake of his head, Jacky started unloading the non-laundry-related items from the basket: his Bluetooth speaker, a stack of new comics and a couple of fantasy novels, his Xbox and his one-handed video game controller.
"I know, but still. It's going to be a while before the two of you get to be together again."
"It's fine, Mom." This time Jacky couldn't keep the sharpness out.
Mrs. Jennings ignored it and smoothed the comforter down. "Well, let's get this food unpacked and in the fridge, and then I'll get out of your hair. I'm sure you want to hang all your posters yourself."
He did. And he just wanted college to get started already. His mother, despite her words, kept rearranging things in a way she hoped would be more "accessible" to him, until there was literally nothing else for her to do. But their good-bye hug turned into him walking her out to the car and another, longer hug. Once he was sure his eyes were dry, he pulled away and tried not to notice the shine of her eyes. "I'll call you in a couple of days," he told her.
"You have your phone charger?" she asked.
He rolled his eyes. "Yes, Mom." He waved her off, then trudged back inside.
In every room it seemed there were roommates laughing and talking to each other's families and having a grand old time. Maybe he should have contacted his roommate. But he figured a guy with a name like Liam Dixon-Doyle would have contacted him first. The name sounded British, and Jacky had some fantasies about a hot rich guy with an accent.
Then, as the summer passed, it felt awkward. Jacky figured it didn't really matter if he liked his roommate or not. He could switch rooms.
Still, he felt more alone than he'd felt in a long time, standing in his half-empty dorm room. He had so few things to put away. He had no one to talk to, until his roommate arrived.
He couldn't talk to Ryan, obviously.
He couldn't talk to his best friend Cody, who wasn't going to college and probably didn't want to hear about it. Nina was going to a school in Europe somewhere, and Monica was more Ryan's friend than Jacky's. Most of his friends were more Ryan's than his. It hadn't mattered while he was dating Ryan.
He shook that name out of his head and put his clothes in the dresser drawers, and tacked up his posters. It barely took half an hour to settle in, and then Jacky sat on his bed and wondered what to do with himself. He didn't want to look like he was sitting here waiting. So he took out his phone and put on his headphones and listened to music. He didn't want to scroll through social media and see how great all his friends were doing on their first days at college.
He didn't want to see how Ryan was doing without him.
Jacky had just closed his eyes to take a nap when he heard a sound at the door. He snapped his eyes open and sat up to greet his roommate. But when he saw who stood there, his mouth dropped open.
Instead of some British guy named Liam, it was a familiar face.
"Billy?" Jacky managed to say.
His new roommate was his ex-boyfriend from middle school.
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Ah, the old "and they were roommates" trope... What do you think is going to happen between Jacky and Billy?