A Real Disaster

A
REAL DISASTER

By Molly Ryan

Chapter
One

There was one problem about being a good
girl. One single thing that I can pin point almost immediately: Good girls
hardly ever do
anything
. How would I
know?
Because I’m a good girl, of course.
I’ve been a
good girl my whole life, from my first ‘A’ in kindergarten to becoming the
valedictorian of my graduating class.

People ask me all the time why I was a
good girl. Didn’t I want to have fun? Didn’t I want to have a life? Didn’t I
want to fall in love and have more memories? These were the questions that they
would ask and I would answer the same way. Of course I want all of that. That’s
all I ever wanted but it just never happened. The girls I knew who
weren’t
good girls were usually the ones
who ended up pregnant and alone. They were the ones that contracted STDs and
the one’s whose names and numbers were on the stalls of the boy’s bathroom. So
as much as I hated being a good girl, it was easier to do so. There was no
drama if I was a good girl. However, college changes everything.

*
         
*
         
*

The campus was crowded with people…
Almost overcrowded.
Kids and their parents were everywhere.
Every time I turned there was another rolling luggage passing me by or two
friends hugging hello after a long summer away. I, on the other hand, had
nothing but a duffel bag and a nervous smile for everyone else. I guess that’s
what happens when you’re a freshman and thousands of miles away from home.

I adjusted the strap of the bag on my
shoulder and steeled my back, standing straight. I wouldn’t show fear, I
couldn’t. If I showed any type of fear the vultures of the college would eat me
alive. That’s what I thought anyway. So instead, I pulled my mouth into a full
smile and began to look people in the eye.

“Hello,” I said to one person. “Hey,” I
said, turning to another. Both people stared at me, their eyes wide.

Great, now I look like some kind of
freak.

Great job Lily.

I kept the smile on my face but I
shifted away from the girls and grabbed the map in my pocket. Studying the
page, I used my finger and traced a path from where I was to my new dorm. My
furniture and rest of my clothes were already there waiting for me. So was my
roommate, the roommate I had only spoken to on the phone a couple of times. We
never met up, never introduced ourselves, nothing. I took a deep breath and
headed towards the dorms.

My hands shook as I approached the door
of my dorm. It was closed and I took the key out of my pocket, inserting it
into the lock and turning. The lock clicked open and the door swung to the
side. I was greeted with an army of My Little Pony staring at me from one of
the dresses. The neon colored plastic ponies stood in three straight lines.

Oh. My.
God.

I walked through the threshold.

This cannot be happening.

It was my luck to be stuck with the
child of the dorm house. Obviously I had drawn the short straw.

“Welcome!” a cheery voice greeted me.
“You must be Lily! It is
so
nice to
meet you! I am Sabrina! I am
so
excited!”

Sabrina took my hand, shaking it so hard
that the rest of my body shook with it.

“I hope you don’t mind but I took the
bed on the left. My bed at home is on the left of my room so taking it kind of
made me feel better.”

I stared at Sabrina not saying a word.
“Oh but if you like the bed on the left I can move. I don’t want to start off
on the wrong foot because of a silly thing such as the bed.”

It’s official. Her rambling made it
obvious that she was nervous.

Glad I wasn’t the only one.

“It’s fine,” I told her. “I don’t care
which bed I get. As long as it’s clean and accessible, that’s all I need.”

“Great!” Sabrina exclaimed.

I slipped past Sabrina and walked over
to where my rolling luggage was waiting. Kneeling down, I unzipped it and
started moving the clothes from the luggage into the one empty dresser, all the
while avoiding looking at the My Little Pony dolls.

I had to figure out some way of getting
rid of those things.

“So what do you like to do?” I heard
Sabrina ask.

I could hear springs squeaking as
Sabrina sat down on her bed.

“Read, listen to music, study.”

I kept my answers short and simple
hoping that it would deter Sabrina from talking anymore so I could unpack and
get settled.

No such luck.

“That’s it? Seriously that’s all you
do?”

I nodded.

“But…how?”

“What do you mean how?” I asked as I
faced my new roommate. “It’s not that hard.”

“I don’t think that it’s hard,” Sabrina
said sputtering.

I had shocked her, obviously.

“It sounds…
Boring.
Haven’t you ever gone to a party? Had a drink?”

“No, and I don’t want to.”

This time Sabrina outright laughed.

“You don’t
want
to?” she asked. “That has to be a joke. You’re pulling my leg,
aren’t you?”

“No I’m not,” I said. “I don’t drink or
party. I don’t see the point…”

“The point is that you socialize! You
meet other people and make friends. Maybe even get yourself a boyfriend, or at
least a good hook up.”

“Why? So I can end up pregnant or
carrying a disease?” I rolled my eyes. “That’s exactly what I want to do.”

Sabrina sat there, staring at me with
her mouth hanging open.

“Are you telling me that you’ve never
kissed a guy? Never had sex?”

“I’ve kissed guys,” I said.
“Plenty of them.”

Actually, it was one. I kissed one
single guy my entire life and it wasn’t even someone that I had feelings for.
Back in tenth grade, when I was nearing my sixteenth birthday, I decided that I
was sick of waiting for ‘Mr. Right’ to sweep me off my feet.

I was officially the only one of my
friends and probably even in my grade that had never kissed someone else on the
lips at the time. Some people thought it was admirable but most of them made
fun of me, snickering behind my back. They thought I was a freak and I started
to believe them.

So one Friday after school I asked my
friend Steve, a kid I had known since we were in diapers, to kiss me. I wanted
to get it over and stop being the ‘freak’. Steve wholeheartedly agreed and I
was sure it was mostly because of the massive crush he had on me. The kiss was
wet and sloppy but I wouldn’t have traded it for the world. I had finally
gotten my first kiss and I wouldn’t be the ‘freak’ anymore.

Although I still was.

“What about sex? Have you had sex?”
Sabrina asked. I shook my head. “Have you even sucked a dick?”

This time my lip curled and I gagged.

“Gosh, are we seriously having this
conversation?” I asked. “But, no. It’d definitely have to be the right guy
because it sounds disgusting.”

Sabrina rolled her eyes.

“It’s not that bad,” she informed me.
“When the guy is hard, which he usually always is,
it’s
fun. It’s like having an ice cream cone. First you start at the top and swirl
your tongue over the tip. Guys like it if you stick your tongue right in the
little hole at the top. I’ve heard that doing that to them feels the same as if
they ate us out. It drives the guys crazy.”

I put my hand up but Sabrina continued
still.

“Then you have to start on the shaft.
You put your lips on his head and make your way down. Guys like when you put it
in as far as you can. Some even like it if you gag on it. It makes them even
more excited.”

“Sabrina stop,” I said and put my hand
to my stomach.

 
I
felt nauseous and I looked around for a garbage pail to throw up in. There
wasn’t one.

“What?” she said.
“Too
much for you?”

“A little,” I admitted.

“What are you, a prude?”

The words felt like a slap and I actually
skittered back from my roommate.

“No,” I said hotly. “But, I’m not that
kind of girl. I don’t do those things. I have school to worry about so I can
keep my scholarship.”

“So you’re a freak?”

There it
was,
the ‘freak’ word again. It seemed like I couldn’t get away from the damn word.
But unlike when I was sixteen, this time the word didn’t bother me.

“Sure, why not,” I said.

I’m the freak and yet she has a My
Little Pony collection?

I kept my mouth shut. There was no point
of getting into that with my roommate. I didn’t have time for the drama that
surrounded roommates not liking each other. I had a G.P.A. to keep up.

“Whatever.”

Sabrina frowned and then immediately
forced her face flat.

“My mom told me that frowning caused
wrinkles earlier. I can’t wrinkle my face.”

“Why not?”

She looked at me as if I was an idiot.

“Because I’m going to be an actress,”
Sabrina said.
“Duh.”

Of course she was going to be an actress.

That’s exactly why she was in college.

How could I not have known that already?

Refraining from rolling my eyes, I
turned back to my clothes and continued to unpack. This was going to be a long,
long year.

*
         
*
         
*

What the hell was I thinking
?

I sat in my dorm room staring at the
wall. Classes didn’t start for another week and I was stuck here, in the
cramped room, with absolutely nothing to do. I had no friends, I didn’t know
where anything was, nothing. Basically I was screwed.

My hands itched to pick up the phone and
dial my house number. My parents would come and pick me up, that I was sure of,
and they would let me stay with them until the classes started. That’s what
they wanted me to do to begin with. But I couldn’t call them, I
wouldn’t
. If I called them they would
lecture me about how they were right and I was wrong.

So there I sat, bored and alone, while
my roommate flittered about. Since the moment she unpacked, nearly two days
ago, I hadn’t seen her for more than a couple of hours. She only came back to
the room when she needed to sleep or change her clothes. I didn’t mind, though.
The less I saw of her the better.

We were complete opposites. The best
part about her being gone is that I could put a towel over her precious My
Little Pony dolls. Their eyes freaked me the hell out and they looked
perverted, staring at me as I changed. They had to go and I had to find some
way of doing it.

Getting off the bed, I moved to my desk
and started to organize the books and pencils around it. I would need to make
labels for the hanging file folders, pick up post-it notes and highlighters,
and a recorder before I would be able to step into the classroom. Was I
obsessive?

Maybe.

I liked things in order… I liked knowing
where things were and knowing that they would be there when I looked for them.
As I organized the desk, there was a knock on the door.

Who could that be? No one in the dorm
knew me and I hadn’t introduced myself to anyone. The knocking persisted and I
slid from the seat, shuffling to the door. Turning the handle, I pulled the
door open.

“Can I help you?” I asked in my most
bored tone.

There was a guy standing there, fliers
in his hands, his hair flopping over to one side covering his ice blue eyes.

“You’re new, right?” the guy asked me.

Considering that I was in the freshman
dorms, I thought that the question was stupid. Of course I was new.

“No I’m not new,” I answered. “I like
staying in the freshman dorms.”

 
Instead of the guy turning away like I hoped
he would, he laughed,
throwing
his head back.

“You’re funny,” he said.

He held out his hand.

“I’m Turner.
Turner
Schmidt.
I’m a sophomore here at Kingston University.”

After a moment I shook his hand.

“Nice to meet
you.
I’m Lily. Lily Williams.”

“Welcome Lily Williams to Kingston
University.”

He handed me a flyer and I scanned the
contents.

“There’s a concert this weekend, kind of
like a welcome back to school thing. I hope you can come.”