2. Chapter Two
Chapter Two
Margot
I wake with a start, as I sometimes do when rattled by a particularly startling dream. Grabbing the journal I keep on my bedside table, I furiously write out the insane scenario that just ran rampant in my head. After a few minutes, I sigh deeply and pull myself from the warm and cozy bed.
Clutching my dream journal, I head into the kitchen, immediately spotting Danika with a blanket around her shoulders, brewing a fresh pot of coffee.
“Good morning, beautiful people!” Sydney hops into the kitchen, clad in one of her twenty matching workout sets. Skipping the coffee, she grabs a water bottle from the fridge as she inserts her headphones into her ears. “Headed to the gym. See you in a bit.” Danika and I groan our goodbye as the door closes behind her.
“Weird one?” Danika asks, looking at the worn down book in my hand. I hand it to her as I grab a mug of coffee. Behind me, Dani has flipped to the most recent page in my journal.
“Aliens? That’s new,” she comments as she reads. I plop myself down on the couch with my mug and Danika joins me.
“Green and blue aliens. Thoughts?”
“Well,” Danika starts, humming as she thinks through the weirdness that invaded my head last night. “Being abducted by aliens is pretty cut and dry. You’re not happy with where you are and you wish someone would come and transport you to a different place. Whether that be a physical location or some other change in your personal life.”
She hands me the journal and takes another sip of her coffee.
“Maybe it’s trying to tell me to transport myself out of that public speaking elective class I have tomorrow.”
Danika gives me a sympathetic look. “You’ll be fine. Journalists need to be good at public speaking. This is good practice.”
“Since when?”
Danika only shrugs as she settles deeper onto the couch.
I sigh. “I think I need to log some hours in the library this morning. My study room is calling.” I take a final sip of my coffee, and Danika hands me her empty mug as I walk toward the kitchen. “Care to join?”
“No, thank you very much,” Danika replies, already hitting the power button on the TV remote. “I think I’ll take this last day before classes really start as a day to rot.” She scrolls through Netflix until she finds her favorite season of whatever dating reality show she’s obsessed with this week and pulls the blanket over herself.
I laugh at her, wishing that I could join but I need to get this speech done and the only way I can truly focus is in Study Room G6–my sanctuary in the campus library. Getting myself together, I grab my things and head for the door.
“Enjoy rotting,” I call to Dani’s immobile form.
“I plan to!” she calls back and I chuckle as the door closes behind me.
While having an apartment off campus has its clear advantages, it also has an even larger amount of disadvantages, at least for me who has no mode of transportation other than public or begging. Today, I was too slow to hitch a ride with Sydney so onto the bus I go.
Fifteen minutes later, the bus pulls up to campus and I hop off with vigor.
I can write this speech. Just pick an easy topic. It doesn’t have to be that deep.
“Hey Margot,” Edith, the school librarian, says when I scan my ID. “It’s nice to see you back. How was your summer?”
I shrug. “Uneventful,” I reply with a smile. “How was yours?”
If she is allowed, Edith, with her tight gray curls and her lovable yellowing grin, can chat for hours on end without skipping a beat. Luckily for me, I have a couple years of practice on how to get her to focus on what’s in front of her, which right now is me, trying to get the key to my study room.
Right in the middle of the word “Nantucket,” I make my move. “Oh, Nantucket! I hear that place is beautiful in the summer time. I’ll have to make a trip out there at some point. Anyway, I’m just going to head downstairs to G6, okay? See ya!”
As I’m already headed toward the staircase to the downstairs level of the library, I hear Edith call my name. So close .
“Actually, Margot, that room is taken,” she says sheepishly. I stop in my tracks. Taken? But that’s my study room.
While I do know that she can’t permanently hold that room on reserve for me everyday—that would be ridiculous—still…I hoped she would at least steer everyone else toward different study rooms until that one was the very last resort! Is that too much to ask?
“The room was booked online this morning by a group.”
“Wait, you can reserve rooms online now?”
Edith nods excitedly. “Oh yes, part of the new system this year.”
I sigh. Online room booking will be very useful in the future but for today, it’s done me dirty. “Good to know, thanks. Well, I guess I’ll just take any available room then.”
A look of anxiety flashes across Edith’s face.
“You’re kidding me,” I balk. “The semester has barely started yet!”
A chuckle releases from Edith as she smiles proudly. “Apparently people are finally taking their studies seriously this year.” My mouth flattens to a frown and I sigh, backing away from the desk, with a sad wave to Edith.
I could just sit at a table but the noise of passersby distracts me. Going to the newsroom is definitely out of the question. I usually love the quick atmosphere there, but not when I need to focus on school work. I could always just go home and work at the desk in my bedroom, but I came all this way…
“Morning, I booked room G6,” a deep, somewhat familiar voice says, snapping me from my thoughts. There’s a tall, tall man at the desk and while the voice sounded like something I’ve heard before, I can’t exactly place him in my mind.
“Right, of course. I’ve got the key for you right here.” Is Edith actually blushing ?
The man doesn’t speak again but I’m assuming he gave her a megawatt smile based on the way she all but melts in front of him. Well now I have to get a look at him.
As he turns around to face me, I can’t control the way my jaw drops to the floor. Alex, the person-throwing ogre from the party last night, is here, standing in front of me. And he stole my study room.
“I can’t believe I’m about to say this but, you should close your mouth. You might catch flies with it wide open like that,” he smirks at me. Smirks ! What an oaf.
I am stunned into silence. Even if I wanted to speak, I have no words to describe the feeling of seeing this man in broad daylight. I do have to give it to Edith though, he is wildly attractive. The sunlight shining through the windows brightens his dark brown irises and his even darker brown hair is tousled in that sexy “just got out of bed” look.
“Problem, sunshine?” I want to wipe that smirk clean off his face using the shirt from the guy that he threw out the door last night.
My anger returns and I’m finally able to muster up a response. “Nope.”
He takes a step closer toward me but if I step back, I’d topple down the staircase so I hold my ground under his scrutiny. “You look surprised to see me.”
“Just shocked you know where the library is,” I reply, regaining my confidence little by little. I still don’t know what it is about this guy that pulls the worst out of me but somehow I feel sure that he deserves it.
Alex chuckles darkly at my comment. “Another joke about my intelligence? Can’t think of anything more original, sunshine?”
“Give me a few minutes, I’m sure I can think of another reason to insult you and why do you keep calling me sunshine?” I blurt out before I can stop myself.
Alex takes another step forward, definitely aware that I have no choice but to stay put. “You never told me your name.”
Taking a deep breath, I look up directly into Alex’s eyes, not letting the bottomless pit of brown lull me into a false sense of security. “You’re right.” I shrug and step around him to head out the way I came.
“Oh come on,” I hear Alex laugh from behind me but I don’t turn back around. I refuse to let this arrogant beast get under my skin anymore than he already has.
Once outside, I finally take a deep breath. Taking my phone out of my pocket, I call the only person who will be able to help me make sense of all this.
“Missing me already?” Danika says lazily.
“That guy I talked to at the frat party. Person thrower. Tall guy…”
Danika chuckles. “Is there a question in there?”
“Who is he?”
“Why the sudden interest?” I can tell her eyebrows are raised in that devilish way. One thing my best friend loves to do is make me squirm. I roll my eyes and dive into the sad library study room tale that ends with that arrogant troll getting a place to work in peace and my sorry ass out on the pavement.
Danika gasps. “Not study room G6! But everyone on campus knows that’s your room.”
“I am not finding you amusing right now,” I deadpan. Danika’s laugh loosens a bit of tightness in my chest.
“His name is Alex Prescott. He’s the president of Kappa Alpha, the frat we were at on Friday. I’m not sure his major but I know he throws a great party. Thanks to daddy’s money.”
“Daddy’s money?”
“His dad owns some big business, Prescott Cars or Motors or whatever.” A loud crunching sounds from the other side of the phone and I know that Danika is indulging in her favorite lazy day snack—pretzels and peanut butter.
The news that Alex is rich doesn’t surprise me one bit. Of course he is, no one with an ounce of humility would go around acting the way he does. I’ll bet he’s so used to getting what he wants. Which makes me all the more angry that he got that study room over me. I should go in there and demand he gives it to me. What’s he even using it for? He doesn’t strike me as the studious type.
As much as I wish I had Danika’s confidence enough to go into that study room and demand it back, I can’t do that. He booked it fair and square but over my dead body will he get it from me again.
“Well, now I’ve got nowhere to work so I’m gonna see if Sydney is almost done in the fitness center and then catch a ride home with her.”
“Check this out while you’re waiting. Might give you some insight on the great mystery that is Alexander Prescott.”
Before I can ask what she means, my phone vibrates against my face and I pull it back to reveal a link to an Instagram profile. After a quick goodbye to Dani, I hang up the phone and click the link. My phone is flooded with workout videos and photos, all with Alex front and center. Quickly, I close my phone, suddenly remembering that I’m still directly outside the place I just ran into him and he could walk out those doors and see me cyberstalking him any second now.
Sending Sydney a quick text, I make my way toward the fitness center, hoping she’s finishing up around now. As I plop myself down on a bench outside the gym, I pull up Alex’s profile again. It really was impressive the way he handles the gym equipment. The videos look professional and the posts seem to have lots of good advice, even including things like nutrition and health. I guess this is what he devotes his time to, besides partying.
I’m not sure how much time passes as I get lost scrolling through the mind of Alex Prescott.