Just a Feeling

It didn’t take me too long to convince Mom into letting me go to College. Everything was settled real fast, even I couldn’t believe. As ecstatic as may looked to them, I couldn’t help but feel little worried. After all, the only University that I had applied to was a thousand miles away from where I was now. No one knew still though. I wasn’t planning on telling them until I find out the results. But my hopes hadn’t gone off the roof yet; somehow I’d given myself the benefit of the doubt—if there was actually any.

“So Max, which college are you going to attend by the way?” Sab started. I only complied to her question with a shrug. There was no way in hell that I’m going to let her know before anything.

“Oh come on? You must have some Universities in mind!” she persisted. But I only shook my head and she eventually dropped the subject.

The days dragged by as I waited for the examination results. My pessimistic side had overwhelmed my whole existence again that I couldn’t stop hoping for the worst. But after about a week or so, my suffering had finally come to an end. The letter came in shortly after I’d read the e-mail from the University itself.

Sab went on a drastic rant about me not telling her that I’d applied to Cambridge, which was in England—a country that is actually really far from where we were born and raised. She almost threw a punch at me when she realized whom the letter was from. “Well?!” she exclaimed.

“Well what?” I’d tried my best not to laugh at her reaction.

“Open it! How would we know if you’ve passed?”

I shrugged and ripped a side of the envelope open. A thick A4 sized, cream-colored bond paper slid out and I flipped it open.

Good day, Ms. Hanson!

We are very pleased to inform you that you have passed—

I didn’t even bother reading the rest of it. My body automatically jolted and I tackled Sab down so fast, she didn’t even see it coming. I could feel my heart thumping really fast, as if it was going to leap out of my chest. Holy crap, I’m going to England! My emotions had mixed up and I couldn’t feel my legs anymore, it was like adrenaline rush. Sab was screaming in excitement. I was trying to control my breathing. Mom had bolted inside my room to check on me, and almost lost her shit when she found out. We gave Dad a call, and he too was ecstatic about me passing. And in the next moment, I was already packing my stuff up for College.

Everything just transited too fast. After two weeks of preparing, and trying to set my system to a new life ahead of me, I was finally standing in the middle of LAX. People were busy running here and there around me, some were late for their flights and some had come in too early. I couldn’t hear myself think so I headed to the rest room for a while. Inside, I’d splashed water over my face to snap myself back to reality. I hadn’t realized that I was spacing out a little too much.

“Okay Max, you can do this. You'll actually make it through.” I murmured to myself before heading out to check in.

Waiting for my flight was just torture. My back had started to ache a little bit in the first two hours. My friends and Sab were the only ones keeping me from dozing off and missing my flight. They were on Skype, talking about random things and me getting them British ass. “Guys, I’m going there to study. Not look for British ass.” I raised my hands up to make an air quote to emphasize on the British ass. Sab just laughed it off.

“But you can’t seriously just study there? A British bloke will always come by.” She winked.

“Please, that’s the last thing I want to come by as of the moment. Remember what happened to our parents?” I laughed and mocked her wink. She glared at me jokingly and started laughing hard again.
Fortunately, their never-ending stories helped me kill time. My flight was finally next, and I headed to towards the long tube that led straight to the plane. Before heading in, I inhaled deeply and took one last look at my old home.