Before It Rains

He let go when we got to the elevator and pushed the down arrow. “So you’re from New York?” I asked him, remembering his introduction from earlier.

“Yeah,” he said. “Like, right outside of New York City. It’s cool. And you’re from Florida? That must be nice,” he said. I looked down.

“It’s okay I guess. I mean, Florida’s great and everything, but I have a lot of brothers and sisters, and my dad left four years ago, so we’re not too well off. Ruben and I are here through a sponsor,” I explained to him. Now was as good a time as any.

“Sorry,” he said. I guessed he was uncomfortable because he didn’t say anything after that. But he didn’t need to. As we walked out of the dorms and into the sun, three girls quickly made their way over to us. I didn’t know any of them.

“Hi Austin,” said the first. She dragged out the “au” in his name. She had beautiful shiny brown hair and big brown eyes, and from the pink and white summer dress she was wearing, I could tell that she wasn’t too poor herself. The two girls behind her were both very pretty as well. One was close to platinum blonde with sparkling blue eyes and a tiny tee-shirt and shorts, and the other had beautiful oatmeal-colored skin with almond eyes and thick black hair coming to just below her shoulders.

I had almost never been this jealous in my entire life.

“Austin,” the brunette said again, “Who’s your friend?”

“Oh, um, Sam this is Kelsey. And Felicity and Rosa,” he said, gesturing first to the blonde, and then to the other. “This is Sam.”

“Hello Sam. You know, I know you’re new this year, so I just thought I’d let you know that you aren’t allowed in the boy’s dorm. It’s against the rules,” her voice was sticky sweet and something told me she liked having to correct me. Fortunately, she was wrong.

“Sorry,” I told her. “But I think I’m allowed there. I’m staying there.”

“You’re what?” asked Felicity.

“My brother and I are sharing a room. In B,” I said very slowly. “There were no other rooms.”

“Oh.” As much as I was jealous of her, I could tell she was jealous of me too. I was staying in the boy’s dorms. What girl wouldn’t be?

“Well,” Kelsey started, glancing over at Austin, who looked sick to his stomach. “We were going back to my room. You wanna come?” Her voice sounded nice, but underneath I felt there was something else. And I realized I didn’t really like her all that much. So I shook my head.

“I don’t think so. Austin and I were going to get some lunch. Maybe another time.” I was trying to be nice and to get rid of her at the same time. But she just stood there. So I said, “See you around,” and dragged Austin off towards a big building in the distance to our left, which I thought might be the cafeteria. I waited until they were out of sight.

“You could have said something,” I accused Austin as we continued on our way to find food. He looked sharply at me.

“What?”

“That you and Kelsey had a thing,” I explained. It was obvious. Why else would a cute guy like him not go for someone as pretty as her. I’d seen it a bunch in Florida. He looked surprised.

“How’d you know about that?” he asked, on the verge of alarm.

“Oh, come on, I can read you like a book!” I told him.

“It’s that obvious?” He shook his hair out of his eyes. “Really?” I nodded. Again, he was not exactly comfortable with the subject, but this time, I changed it.

“So, you’ve been here before?”

“Yup, last year.” So did that mean he was a sophomore? I crossed my fingers. “I’m a sophomore this year.” Could this guy read my mind or something? Seriously, that made twice today. Maybe I should have tried this wishing thing sooner.

We reached the cafeteria and opened the big double doors. It smelled amazing. I rushed through the short line and by the end I had a hamburger, salad, an orange, and a piece of cake. Once I’d gone through the line, I realized I had no clue where to sit, so I waited for Austin at the end. He gestured with his chin to a table in the corner where two other boys, plus one girl sat. I walked over, and waited for Austin to sit before I pulled up a chair next to him.

“Hey, dude, what’s up?” said the guy on Austin’s left. Austin answered by shoveling a forkful of lettuce into his mouth. Ignoring his buddy, the stranger turned to me. He had blond hair in almost the same style as Austin’s with big blue eyes that had me staring.

“Um... hi?” I said sheepishly, realizing he was probably thinking I was weird for looking at him so long. “And who are you?” Every sitting at the table laughed. Austin punched him in the shoulder.

“Hey Shane, did you ever think you’d see the day when someone didn’t know who you were?” He sulked.

“Hey people, cool it, I know who he is,” I said, picking up on the use of his first name. “Nice to meet you, Shane.” He grinned at me.

“Yeah, I’m Shane, and this is Kai, and Max, and Asia,” he informed me, pointing around the table. I waved to everyone and started to eat. Not to be rude, but I was starved, so I just sat there and listened to them talk. After I had finished, someone touched my arm. It was the only other girl at the table. I hadn’t noticed before, but she was pretty. Not as exotic as Kelsey and her crew, but still. She turned her head and whispered.

“Hey, I’ve been looking for girl company forever. You want to come and I’ll show you around?”

I looked around the table at the guys still poking fun at one another. Shane still had almost all his food left. I nodded at Asia. “Sure, let’s go.” I pushed my chair back and picked up my tray. Asia did the same. “Hey y’all we’re outta here,” I told them, cutting into the conversation. They all looked over.

“Aw, Asia, you going with her?” he asked, pointing to me. I stuck my tongue out at him.

“I’m Sam, and yes, we’re both going. See you!” And we turned and headed back towards the doors, dumping our trays on the way.