It takes me several seconds to realise that both my family and Issy are looking at me, waiting for me to speak.
I clear my throat. 'Um. Hi. Yeah,' is what comes out of my mouth. My voice sounds rusty from the near-silent seven hours in the car.
Issy looks at me. Her smile doesn't falter. 'Nice to meet you!'
She steps forward and engulfs me in a hug that I definitely wasn't expecting. I seem to have retreated inside myself over the past seven months, away from any physical contact, and this feels invasive, wrong, even. Still, I endure it for the sake of my parents, who want to see me make a fresh start, and for the sake of my reputation - I don't want the only person at uni I've met so far to think I'm some kind of freak.
I step backwards as soon as I ascertain that the hug has lasted an appropriate number of seconds, and Issy grins at me and begins to shake hands with each member of my family in turn, talking non-stop as she does so. 'I'm so glad you're here, Maya, I've been here three days already and have hardly seen anyone, I've just been sat in my room like a loser, I mean, I've spoken to the girls in the flat next door and they're okay, but I was really looking forward to you arriving, I think we'll get on so well, don't you, I'm from Exeter, so not too far really, it only took us about three hours to get here, what course are you on, by the way?' All this is said very fast and I see Mum take a tiny step backwards as though overwhelmed by the sheer velocity of her speech.
'Dance,' I mumble, casting a sideways look at Katie, who smiles at me reassuringly.
'No way,' she exclaims in surprise. 'Me too! They usually put you with people on different courses, I heard, so you get to know everyone, but maybe they ran out and had to put us together. At least we'll know each other on Monday, won't we, I was so worried I wouldn't know anyone, we can go in together in the morning!'
I nod, a rush of something that might have been relief filling my insides at the realisation that I won't have to go to my first class alone.
'Do you know our timetable yet?' I ask her, not wanting her to think I'm some kind of mute.
She shrugs, tucking a stray piece of blond hair behind her ear. 'All I know is we have to be in Studio Three at nine on Monday. I think we'll get given the timetables then.'
I nod, wondering what else I could say to make her think I'm interesting, but before I can open my mouth again, she says, 'Well, I'll let you get settled in, anyway. I can take you next door later if you like, to meet the other girls? They're not on dance, but they're nice enough, and there's some boys in the flat at the end of the corridor who seem alright, it might be nice for you to meet them before we start?'
'That sounds good,' I say, and she beams at me.
'Let me know if you need anything! It was nice to meet you all!'
And with that, she practically skips back to her room and shuts the door with a snap.
Mum, Dad, Katie and I look at one another.
'She seems nice,' says Mum brightly.
I nod, suddenly worried that I'll be too boring for Issy. She seems like the kind of girl who is friends with just about everyone, who goes out three nights a week and still gets all her work done, who somehow manages to go to the gym on top of all her dance classes. She was probably hoping for someone more dynamic than me, I think to myself glumly.
Though maybe this is what I need. A fresh start, in a new place, with new people who don't tread on eggshells around me, who don't know my past, who just treat me like a normal person. Maybe here I'll find the old Maya again.
Katie breaks into my thoughts. 'Right, loser, let's hurry up and get you settled, because I want to go exploring.'
Mum booked a hotel for the weekend in town, so they could have a break from the driving before going back home again. 'A lovely little weekend break,' Mum said when she told me, her face shining with excitement.
Now, she claps her hands together and looks at me. 'Right, Dad and I will go back to the car and get the rest of your stuff. You and Katie can make a start with this.' She indicates the devastation on the floor between us.
I nod, pick up the handle of the nearest suitcase, and begin to drag it towards the last door at the end of the kitchen, which must be mine. Katie grabs a box and follows me, and I open the door.
The room is fairly small and rectangular in shape. A bed sits against the wall by the window, and there's a large desk and chair on the other side of the room, leaving a small strip of bare carpet in between. There's a lamp on the desk and a bin in the corner. Apart from that, the room is empty and bare.
'Well,' says Katie. 'We'll have to get your fairy lights up, for a start.'
I couldn't tell you why, but at that moment I suddenly experience a huge rush of affection towards my big sister. Maybe it was the fact that she actually seemed interested in what I was doing, she wasn't bitter and resentful that I got here first, she was willing to endure the seven hours and a missed weekend of work to put up my fairy lights with me.
I drop my bags and hug her.
She staggers slightly. 'What's this for?' she says, her voice muffled against my hair.
I release her. 'Just going to miss you. And thanks. For coming.'
She laughs. 'I couldn't let you go alone, could I? Come on, stop being all emotional. Have you seen the amount of boxes we've got to sort through?'
We sit down, side by side on the stark, bare carpet, rummaging through the boxes together, asking each other where things should go. She leans over and ruffles my hair as I untangle the string of fairy lights from the bottom of the box. 'I'll miss you too,' she says softly.
By the time we've started on the second box, Mum and Dad are back, having navigated their way through the labyrinth of corridors again, and the room looks a little bit more like a piece of home. My books are stacked neatly on the desk, the bed is made with my favourite duvet cover, patterned with blue flowers, and a number of my clothes are folded away into the storage units. Mum heaves a box on the bed with a sigh.
'You've done a good job, girls,' she says, looking around approvingly. 'I think you'll be alright here, May.'
I nod. 'You guys can go, if you want. I don't mind doing the rest.'
Mum looks stricken, and I can tell she was hoping this moment would never come.
'Are you sure?'
'There's not that much left to do. Just my kitchen stuff, really.'
'Oh, May,' Mum says, and her face crumples. I step forward and catch her as she slumps forward, her arms holding onto me for support, her shoulders shaking with suppressed sobs. 'I'm sorry,' she hiccups, emerging a moment later. 'It's just a big day for us all. Both of you are adults now! You're not my little ones anymore.'
'Don't be stupid,' Katie and I chorus.
'I'll phone every week,' I promise. 'I'll even write letters if you want me to.'
Mum makes a noise that's half-sniff, half-laugh. 'Being silly,' she mutters, and steps back to fish a tissue out of her pocket.
I look towards my dad. He's standing in the doorway, hands in his old jean pockets, looking around the room with interest. When our eyes meet, he smiles at me, and I step forward to be engulfed by his big, strong arms, the way it's always been since I was little.
'We're so proud of you,' he murmurs into my hair. 'You'll be fine. You're gonna smash this dance malarkey.'
I laugh, feeling tears well up in my eyes. 'I love you, Dad.'
'I love you too, sweetpea.' He pulls away and pinches my shoulder lightly. 'Don't forget your old dad when you're a famous dancer, eh?'
We all laugh and sniffle and have one more big hug, all of us together, and then it's time. Katie waves her phone at me as they leave the room, and I know she means text me. I nod and see them out of the flat, waving and blowing kisses and smiling, and then I stand behind the closed door, feeling suddenly empty of everything. The tears that threatened to spill over only seconds ago have vanished as quickly as they came. The flat is eerily quiet and I wonder if Issy went out while we were unpacking.
I wander into the kitchen and sink onto the leather sofa by the window, fishing a pack of cigarettes out of my pocket. Leaning over to open the window, I light one, inhaling deeply and breathing in the mixture of the smoke and the fresh salty air from the sea.
'You're not technically supposed to smoke inside,' says a voice behind me. I turn and see Issy leaning against the doorframe, her arms folded.
'Oh,' I say.
She shrugs. 'I won't tell on you. I wouldn't fancy five flights of stairs just for a cigarette, even if there is a lift.'
She walks across the kitchen and plonks herself down in the chair opposite me.
'Do you smoke?' I ask, offering her the pack, but she waves it away.
'Only when I'm very drunk.'
I nod in understanding.
'So, Sadie and Claudia offered to cook for us tonight, and as you've now make the kitchen a no-cooking zone for the rest of the day, I think I'd better accept, don't you?'
I look around and see that the kitchen is cloaked in a grey haze. 'Shit. That was meant to go out the window.'
Issy laughs. 'The wind from the sea just blows it straight back in. So? What shall I tell them?'
I shrug. 'Sounds good to me. And, um, next time I'll smoke outside.'
She waves away my apology. 'Sadie's vegetarian, so Claudia's decided to not cook with meat either. Then they can share food. Is that okay?'
I nod and she whips out her phone and begins texting furiously. 'Cool. We'll go round at seven.'
'So, you're from Devon?' I ask, tapping my ash onto the windowsill and making a mental note to clean it up later. I look at Issy, taking her in. She's smaller than me, but apart from that we're about the same build. Now she's said it I can tell she's a dancer from the set of her shoulders and the way she walks. Her hair is a dark brown at the roots but fades into a blond so pale it's almost white, and her face is pretty and heart-shaped.
She nods in answer to my question.
'It makes a change being in a big town,' she says. 'Fancy a cuppa?'
I nod and she springs up and begins to fill the kettle with water.
'This is a big town?' I ask, unable to keep the disdain out of my voice. Compared to home, Falmouth is no more than a small village.
'You don't think so?'
I shrug. 'It seems pretty small to me. But I like that. I was never one for the big cities.'
Issy puts two large mugs down on the small coffee table and sits down opposite me again.
'Where are you from?'
I tell her. For the next couple of hours, we slowly get to know one another, batting facts about ourselves backwards and forwards over our slowly cooling mugs of tea. I learn that she's nineteen, a year older than me, and that she took a gap year to save up some money because 'uni students are all broke, everyone knows that. I want some spare money for fun things. And maybe a house afterwards.' Her parents live in Exeter, along with her mum's side of the family, but her grandmother on her dad's side is Taiwanese, so half of her family live on the other side of the world. 'We see them once a year at Christmas, if that,' she says sadly.
She's been dancing since she was three, like me, and though she's classically trained, her real love is contemporary and post-modern dance.
I look at her enviously when she says this. I'd much rather spend my degree learning ballet exercises than studying contemporary, which is what most of the syllabus consists of. She's going to be way better than me.
'I've only done contemporary for two years at college. Do you reckon I'll be good enough?' I ask her, looking out of the window in what I hope is a nonchalant manner and doesn't give away the fact that I'm completely terrified of our first technique class.
'I reckon everyone will be in the same boat,' Issy says, and I deflate with relief. 'Most people have only done classical classes, I think.' She checks the time on her phone. 'It's almost seven. Shall we go next door?'
I nod and gather up my worldly possessions which consist of my phone and a jumper in case it's cold in their flat, and we proceed three metres down the corridor to the door adjacent to ours.
Issy raps on it briskly and it's pulled open to reveal a small girl with glasses and dark auburn hair. 'Hey, Issy,' she says, smiling at us.
'This is Maya,' Issy says, virtually shoving me towards the girl so we shake hands, 'Maya, this is Claudia. She's on... what course are you doing again?'
'Journalism,' Claudia says. ' Come in, guys. Dinner's almost ready.'
She leads us down the hall, identical to ours, and pushes open the door to the kitchen. A mouth-watering scent reaches my nostrils, I let out a groan of longing.
The girl standing at the hob stirring a huge pot turns around. She's tall and slender, with dark blonde hair cut into a bob that falls in a sheet around her face, and it's cut into a short fringe over her forehead. Her is smattered with freckles and when she smiles at us her cheeks break into two identical dimples. She waves at us with a wooden spoon clutched in her hand, sending a spray of red sauce in our general direction.
'Hey!' she says. 'Oh, shit, I'm so sorry! Did I get sauce on you?'
I look down at my pristine white trainers that are now gently speckled with red. 'No, it's fine,' I say.
'Oh, thank God,' she says, grinning. 'I'm Sadie, by the way.'
'Maya.' I reach out to shake her hand and she swaps it for the one not holding the fated wooden spoon just in time. 'What course are you on?'
'Music. You?'
'Dance. Same as Issy.'
She nods in approval before turning away from me and scooping pasta into four bowls. She tops it with a huge ladle of the red sauce and passes me a bowl. 'Cutlery's on the table, if Claudia laid it... nope, she didn't. Cutlery's in the drawer. You want ketchup, anything like that?'
I make a face of revulsion. 'Ketchup on pasta?'
'That's what I said,' chirps Claudia, holding her hands out for her bowl.
'It's nice!' says Sadie defensively.
Claudia marches past me and whispers, 'She's from Birmingham,' as though that explains everything. 'Wine?' Without waiting for me to answer, she pours a large glassful and forces it into my hands.
We all sit down around the table. Sadie lights a candle for 'atmosphere'. I toy with my food, feeling nervous and uncomfortable around these people that I've only just met. But as the time goes on and the bottle of wine rapidly empties and is replaced by another from the fridge, and Sadie gets a cheesecake out for dessert, I begin to relax. The sun sets outside the slightly open window and I rest my chin in my hands, leaning against the table, as we all talk and get to know each other, and by the time Issy glances at her watch and exclaims in surprise at the late hour I feel like I've known these three girls all my life. Maybe it will be okay here after all, I think to myself hopefully.
'We'd better go,' says Issy eventually, pouring the dregs from the bottle into her glass and draining it. 'You look dead on your feet, Maya.'
'I could use an early night,' I admit. Issy's words make me realise how tired I really am. It's been a long day.
I suddenly have a violent and inexplicable longing for my bed at home.
'I'll take you round to meet the boys down the end in the morning,' Issy says. 'It's too late to go now, they might be asleep.'
Claudia snorts. 'They don't do early nights, trust me. Their music was coming through the wall at like two AM last night.'
'Claudia fancies one of them,' says Sadie in a stage whisper.
'I do not!' says Claudia indignantly. 'We've only known them, like, two days!'
Sadie shrugs. 'I don't blame you. He's cute.'
'Thanks for the dinner,' I say, getting to my feet and tugging my jumper over my head, surprised at how unsteady on my feet I am after all that wine.
'We'll cook tomorrow,' Issy promises, and drags me to the door before we've finished with our goodbyes.
She yanks it open and screams.
In the doorway, fist raised, whether to knock on the door or to punch someone I'm not quite sure, is a boy. He towers over Issy and I; dark hair falls into his eyes and he brushes it away impatiently. When he realises Issy's not going to stab him, he lowers his hand and scowls at her.
'Jesus, you scared me!' Issy explodes dramatically. 'What are you doing?'
The boy mumbles something that I don't catch. The only word I hear is spatula.
'What do you need a spatula for at this time?' says Issy. 'Doing some late-night baking?'
'Something like that.'
He moves his attention to me. Unsmiling, his dark eyes bore into me. I suddenly feel supremely creeped out and want to hide behind Issy.
She follows his gaze and smiles brightly. 'Um, this is Maya. She's my new flatmate. Maya, this is Toby. He lives that way.' She jerks her thumb to her left.
'Pleased to meet you,' he murmurs.
I lift up my hand as though to shake his, but change my mind at the last moment. Something about this boy unsettles me and I'm not sure I want to touch him. I run my hand through my hair instead. If he notices, he doesn't say anything.
'Well, we'll get out of your way,' says Issy, edging around him. 'Enjoy your baking!'
I follow her lead, suddenly holding back an explosion of giggles. The thought of this dark storm-cloud of a boy baking red velvet cupcakes at midnight like some sort of dark ritual is extremely incongruous.
His eyes follow us out of the door and down the corridor, until it slams shut behind us.
☆ ☆ ☆
A/N: WHEW okay that was a long chapter. sorry guys. if you made it to the end in one piece i'm proud of you.
so we met the mysterious new guy? what do we think? is there any potential for something to happen there?
I know I've updated twice in the last few days already but I'm just so excited about this story and want to post a chapter every day. (unfortunately i can't write fast enough to keep up with that though).
I'm trying so hard to get all my uni work done so I can have a proper break and really focus on getting some chapters done but there's not enough hours in a day and there's SO MUCH to do and I just get bored and unmotivated and write anyway and then feel guilty for it because I should be getting my work done first. hopefully I can finish it tomorrow or wednesday and then not think about uni at all for like 3 weeks because i have HAD ENOUGH.
anyway. hope you're all having a lovely christmas break so far (if you're on it yet - if you're not hang in there I believe in u) and thank you so much for reading!
mills xx