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the next day flew by as expected, and before i knew it five o'clock was approaching.
i glanced at my clock for the millionth time this evening, which only caused my anxiety to worsen. i had already told my parents sam was coming over, my room was clean, and i even prepared some notes for the project. you would think i had nothing to worry about, and if you look at it from that perspective, i don't.
but just thinking about being around sam gave me butterflies, the fact that she was actually gonna be in my room made me anxious as hell.
i made my way downstairs to wait and saw my mom and dad were both in the kitchen, snooping around to wait on sam. i rolled my eyes slightly and sat on the couch, scrolling through my instagram timeline.
my ears perked up as i heard a knock from the front door. i felt my mom and dads eyes on me as i slowly went to answer it. my hand met with the cold doorknob and i took a deep breath to calm myself down before opening it.
on the other side i was met with sam, who smiled once she saw me at the door. i smiled back and spoke to her.
"hey sam."
"wassup leilani..." and she trailed off her sentence while staring at me.
we both stood in silence until my mom spoke from the kitchen.
"invite her in lani! y'all can't work outside!"
i mentally facepalmed and sam chuckled, stepping into the house. i close the door behind her and led her to the doorway of the kitchen, where my mom stood with a smirk and my dad with a blank face.
"umm sam this is my mom and dad, mom and dad this is sam... my classmate." i spoke hesitantly, trying to look anywhere but at them.
"hi mr. and mrs. jordan." sam greeted them politely and i saw my mom raise her eyebrows.
"hey sweetheart, it's nice to meet you..." my mom nudged my dad's shoulder.
"oh yea, hi sam. it's very nice to meet you." he gave a smile that seemed genuine and i cracked a grin.
we all stood there in an awkward silence until i figured i should break it.
"we're supposed to be working on a project together... so we'll be up in my room for a few hours..." out of my peripheral i saw my mom almost chuckle at my nervousness.
i grabbed sam's hand and led her behind me and up the stairs; she followed while grasping my hand lightly. when we made it to my room i pointed over to the bean bag i had in the corner close to my bed, gesturing for her to sit.
she plopped down in it, trying to discreetly observe my room in the process. i grabbed my book bag and sat in the middle of my bed, criss cross applesauce.
"so, do you have any topics in mind that we could use?" i asked her.
"i have a few, you?" i nodded at her and pulled out a piece of paper from my bag.
"well to get started we can write them all down and use process of elimination to pick, that ok?" i gave her a questionable look and she nodded, giving me her answer.
i wrote the three topics i had in mind and then asked her what hers were; she began listing them off.
"capitalism."
"christianity and homophobia."
"wage gaps."
"ivy leagues and where their grant money goes... because it's definitely not the students.", and i chuckled at that one because it's true. i once read an article on that and let's just say, they're not helping anybody but themselves.
i wrote them all down and looked over the list with a grin. whatever topic we choose will be a hell of a good one.
"come look." i told her and she got up from the bean bag and joined me on my bed, sitting rather close. we went over the whole list and ended up choosing the one about ivy leagues and grant money, since we both were really interested in it.
after about an hour and a half, we had done hella research and watched a plethora of youtube videos about the topic. even though research isn't mandatory we wanted to go down the rabbit hole together,
and we were not disappointed.
sam was now currently laying on my carpeted floor, staring at the ceiling in disbelief. she looked up at me from the bed and spoke, "i can't believe this shit. you tellin me harvard got like billions of dollars in grant money and only invested 5% of it back into the school and students... ?"
"and then the other 95% was invested in making more money... who needs that much fuckin money? you gotta be hella greedy to have billions of dollars and only worry about making more." i added on to her statement, concluding the video we had just watched.
"and then think about all of the money that could be used to relieve tuition costs and other shit... college is really a business." she had gotten up from the floor and was now pacing around my room in irritation.
i giggled slightly at her face, she looked cute when she was upset.
"what you laughin at?" she asked me, squinting her eyes in a playful manner.
"you look funny when you're irritated." i shrugged and she stopped pacing, coming to sit at the edge of the bed with me.
i opened up a google doc on my computer and asked her, "so... should i write the paper and you do the surveys or you wanna collab on both?"
"i don't mind collabing on both, you're a way better partner than i usually end up with." she said and shook her head, remembering past partners i assumed.
"you are too. i usually get partners who don't do much and put it all off on me, so thank you for being a good partner sam." i said genuinely and she only nodded with a smile.
"no problem." her eyes wandered aimlessly around my room, unbeknownst to me because i was typing something, they landed on my wall shelf full of books.
"you read a lot?" she asks curiously.
i glanced over at my shelf and grinned, "yea it's something i enjoy."
sam laid back on my bed and stared at me, "what else do you enjoy?"
"um i really like to bake, and i like to write, and listen to music... and i like to decorate things ." i answered with the first few things that popped into my head.
she scrunched her face up cutely, "awww you like to bake? that's cool. i love people who bake 'cause like, your idea of fun revolves around making sweets... adorable."
i chuckled lightly.
"well, what do you enjoy?" i asked her.
she thought for a minute and spoke, "i enjoy drawing, and i like writing too, and styling clothes is one of my favorite things to do..."
i nodded at her and we exchanged a couple more facts about ourselves and wrapped up with our work for today. we wrote down how the structure of our paper would look and also typed the introduction together.
my dad ended up coming to check up on us and surprisingly he didn't embarrass me too bad.
it was about seven something and sam was packing up her own book bag. she stood up and sighed lowly, swinging her bag on her right shoulder.
she didn't look ready to go home.
"you ok?" i asked curiously.
"yeah i'm good..." she looked up and spotted me at the door, "you walkin me out?"
"mhm, come on," and i grabbed her hand like before and led her back downstairs. i caught a peep of her smiling at our hands and discretely did the same.
my mom was in the living room watching tv and she diverted her attention to the two of us.
"you leavin' sam?"
"yes ma'am, it was really nice meeting you and your husband." my mom nodded and gave her a polite smile before diverting her attention back to the tv.
we made it to the front door and i opened it for her, a breeze soon coming through, making us both shiver a bit.
"same time on thursday?" i looked up at her and answered.
"that's fine with me, i'll check with my parents to make sure tho."
she nodded and we both hesitantly disconnected our hands.
"see you tomorrow, leilani."
"you too, sam."
another breeze ran through and i shivered, alone this time, as i watched her walk to her car. i waited until she got in and pulled off safely before going back into the house.
after closing the door i leaned up against it, staring at the miniature hole in my sock. i fondled with my right hand and cracked a grin.
sam is sweet, i liked sam.
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