So Much to Learn (7 page)

"Regarding the
duration of the appointment for a Justice of the Court…"

There was a
long pause and, as it became awkward, I focussed back on what was
going on. The lecturer appeared to be staring right at me! In panic
I looked down at the book and saw that the passage he was referring
to was at the top of the page my book was opened to. As I looked
back up, the lecturer continued, "Well, perhaps the man asleep in
the back row could tell us all about it as he obviously has a good
enough grasp of this to not pay attention."

For a moment I
was simply relieved that he wasn't catching me out on my seemingly
drugged state, but then, as people in the lecture started staring
and sniggering, I began to feel bad for the poor guy next to me. I
nudged him surreptitiously with my elbow causing him to jerk awake
and gaze blearily around the lecture hall.

"Ah, I see
you've emerged from your slumber, how kind. Would you be able to
tell us all the answer to my question?"

What a snarky
prick that lecturer is!

The guy next to
me stiffened and starting going red and the professor should really
have accepted that he was the victor and moved on, but he continued
to look expectantly up at the back row. Feeling a bit squirmy at
the uncomfortable silence and the hostile looks being shot up
towards me I waited until the lecturer looked pointedly at the
clock and shoved my text book across the desks so it rested in
front of the poor unfortunate next to me.

"There," I
whispered pointing at the passage in my book that he was supposed
to know. To his credit he immediately caught on and, without even
seeming to read from my book, he quoted the section perfectly. I'd
like to see you fault that Professor Gray, I thought triumphantly
trying my hardest not to smirk down at the lecturer.

The professor
pursed his lips looking extremely disappointed and snapped, "Well,
that's the passage, yes, but your friend won’t be able to point out
the appropriate parts of the textbook in the exam so I suggest you
try and pay more attention in my lectures in future."

The guy next to
me nodded contritely and murmured a, "Sorry."

I flushed at
being included in the criticism and bowed my head over my notes to
avoid the continued stares of my fellow students.

Finally the end
of the lecture came and I quickly gathered my stuff off the desk
and into my bag. Being in the back row, I managed to escape the
majority of the crush as people virtually stampeded in their desire
to leave the lecture hall. Throwing my bag onto my back I turned
onto the path which led down to the large library situated pretty
much smack bang in the middle of campus. I needed to research some
cases for my tutorial on Monday, but, after that, it was the
weekend for me.

I was just
considering what I was going to do with the free time my split with
Brad had afforded me, when I heard someone shout, "Hey!"

I turned my
head to see if the shout was directed at me and saw the guy who had
been asleep in the lecture hurtling down the path towards me.

"Wait up!" He
called and so I stopped, although I wasn't completely sure it was
me he was talking to. Barely a second later he arrived, panting,
next to me. "God, you walk fast," he exclaimed with a wide grin as
he pushed some floppy hair out of his eyes.

I shrugged. "I
guess," I said, eyeing him somewhat suspiciously. Now I was seeing
him without his cheek squished against the desk in the throes of
sleep there was something about him that was very familiar. Where
did I know him from? OK and, more pertinently, what did he
want?

Seeming to
sense my confusion he thrust something at me and, looking down, I
saw that it was my textbook. I had completely forgotten that he had
it in my haste to leave the hall.

"Oh," I said in
recognition, "Thanks." I took the book and shoved it into my
already crammed bag.

"No, thank
you
," he objected. "You saved my life back there. Professor Gray
is a twisted old codger."

"I totally
agree," I smiled. "But it was nothing, honestly."

He lifted his
eyebrows unbelievingly. "I bet not many of those sycophants we
share that lecture with would have helped me out. I'm Adam by the
way." He held out his hand and, after only a tiny little pause, I
took it.

"Talia," I
replied before quickly dropping his hand. The memory of my last
handshake was a little too fresh for me to want to extend the
moment any longer than necessary. Hmm, that somewhat goes against
the point of my lessons with Jack… If Adam noticed my quick
withdrawal he didn't show it and instead continued,

"Nice to meet
you, Talia. Hey, listen, do you have to rush off somewhere now or
do you have time to let me buy you a thank you coffee?"

I opened my
mouth to decline, but then hesitated as I thought it over. Why was
I immediately going to say no? He seemed like a nice guy and there
couldn't be any harm in getting a drink with him. Noting my
hesitation he spread his hands out in a gesture of openness.

"Hey, if you're
busy I totally understand. It's just that that was my last class of
the day and I'm meeting up with a friend in about an hour so I have
some time to kill."

I liked the way
he gave me an excuse so I could get out of it if I wanted, plus a
deadline showing he wasn't going to try and seriously crack onto
me. Very gentleman-like. Switching into my somewhat disused flirty
mode I put my hands on my hips.

"Oh so I'm just
a stop-gap, is that it?" I teased.

He glanced at
me as if to check that I was joking and, seeing my smile, nodded
vigorously. "Yep, I'm afraid so. You saw right through my ploy. I
just don't want to look like a Nigel-no-friends in case my street
cred suffers."

"Well," I
sighed seriously, "I'd hate to be responsible for your suffering
street cred. Make it a smoothie instead of a coffee and you're
on."

"Great." He
smiled widely again and I found myself grinning just as warmly
back.

We started
walking slowly towards the uni café bitching about the long, long
lecture we had just suffered through as we did so. He explained
that he'd fallen asleep not only because the lecture was
interminably boring, but also because he'd been up most of the
night watching a Kung Fu movie marathon on TV.

He couldn't have said anything more endearing if he'd tried.
I
love
Kung Fu
movies.

"Oh my God, you
watched them all last night?" I exclaimed in amazement and
admiration. "I couldn’t because we had people over, but I totally
wanted to."

"I was just
going to watch a couple, but then I got sucked in and I'd be dammed
if I was going to go to bed just to make Professor Gray happy."

There was a pause after he said this as I tried desperately to
bite back a smile and he turned a brilliant shade of red. "That
did
not
come out
right," he said hurriedly as even his ears started
glowing.

"I should hope
not," I choked out. "Otherwise suspicions may arise as to how
you're passing first year law!"

Arriving at the
café, I ordered a mango smoothie and, after Adam insisted on
paying, we snagged a table near the window making the most of the
feeble, late winter sunshine. I took a moment as we both settled
ourselves and took the first sips of our drinks to study him. He
wasn't good-looking really. His nose was quite long, his ears stuck
out a bit too much and, although I've heard some women find it
attractive, his red hair and subsequent pale, white skin just
didn't do it for me. However, he was friendly and open and had a
great smile which made up for a lot. Not to mention I'm hardly
Helen of Troy myself! The fact that I couldn't place his face was
bugging me, though. Where did I know him from? I shied away from
asking 'Have we met before?' because it just sounded too much like
a cheesy pick up line. Maybe I was just remembering him from past
lectures.

Sensing that
the pause while I gave him a quick once over had gotten
uncomfortably long, I searched about for something to say. Before I
had time to think of anything, however, Adam brought up the paper
we had to hand in next week and soon we were, once again, happily
embroiled in conversation. It was good to talk to someone about
uni. All my close friends were doing degrees in other faculties and
the friends I'd made in Law all turned out to be the sort of people
who didn't turn up to lectures and only rarely to tutes. Also, the
girl I usually sat with in Friday's lecture was a friend of
Allison's so it was no surprise that I had found myself alone that
day.

To use a
well-worn, but seriously truthful, cliché, time flew by as we
chatted. Adam was incredibly easy going, fun to talk to and,
probably because he knew it was his best feature, he smiled a lot,
making me feel as if I was a truly entertaining and interesting
person to talk to. Nothing like a bit of a self-esteem boost on a
Friday morning!

We had just
started discussing what we were planning to do with our law
degrees, i.e. do good for the world or make pot loads of money,
which seem to be the only avenues to take, when, out of the corner
of my eye, I saw someone striding towards our table. Glancing up, I
was most displeased to see it was Micky and, from the look on his
face, he wasn't too happy to see me either.

"Hey man, is it
11 already?" Adam asked, seeing Micky too, but not seeming to
notice that Micky and I were glaring daggers at each other. Or
maybe he did, but wisely decided not to mention it.

"No," Micky
said curtly. "It's 11:30, the band has been waiting near the
fountain." He paused significantly then added, "You know, where we
agreed to meet."

Adam swore,
downing the rest of his drink in one large gulp. "Sorry, mate." As
he started to gather up his things, something clicked in my
mind.

"Wait a minute, band?" I exclaimed. "I
knew
I knew you from somewhere,
you're in the Wheelwrights!"

Adam looked
over at me in surprise. "You've seen us play?" He asked
unbelievingly.

"Yeah, a couple
of times," I answered before slapping my hand down on the table.
"Thank God I figured out where I'd seen you before, that would have
driven me insane!"

"Like we’d have
been able to tell the difference," Michael scoffed, looking over at
Adam and adding, "She's only been to our gigs because she tags
along after her brother all the time."

"Well, that
would make two of us," I snapped.

Adam was
looking a bit uncomfortable at our obvious animosity, but he did
his best to reclaim some civility for the proceedings, asking,
"What did you think of the band?"

"You were
pretty good, apart from some crappy guitar playing." I glared at
Michael who, as my slight sunk in, looked like he was going to sock
me one.

"Adam, we
should go," he growled starting to move towards the door, but Adam
hung back.

"Hey, you know,
we're playing a set at the uni bar tomorrow night, you should
come," he said looking intently at me.

After glancing
past him to where Micky was glowering at me I smiled prettily up at
Adam and said sweetly, "Yeah, maybe I'll see you there. Thanks for
the smoothie."

"Anytime, and I
mean that. Thanks again for…" But Adam didn't get to finish as
Michael, obviously having had enough of the goodbyes, grabbed the
back of his collar and yanked him away from the table. He waved
resignedly at me as he was dragged away and I waved back before
grabbing my bag and also heading out of the café.

~*~

After spending
two or so hours in the library I walked home, glad that it was
finally the start of my weekend. As I crossed the car park and
patted my little car hello I found myself in quite a positive mood.
I was, therefore, most annoyed to see Haley, in another one of her
floaty top and little skirt combinations (seriously, didn’t she
feel the cold like other people do?), about to enter the flat
complex. She held the door open for me and I had to force myself
not to deliberately slow down to delay the moment I had to speak to
her.

"Thanks," I
said politely as I walked past her into the building.

"That's
alright, Natalia," she said, and I had to hold back a shudder at
her sickeningly sweet tone. Reason number 1268 why I don't like
Haley: with her ridiculously innocent expression and her tendency
to make things a lot wordier than they have to be, you never quite
know if she's taking the piss.

We walked up
the stairs together in silence, our footsteps echoing up the ugly
concrete stairwell. When we reached the door to my flat on the
third floor, I slipped the key in the lock and prepared to slip
inside with nothing more than a hastily muttered goodbye to see
Haley on her way, but it seemed like she had other ideas as she
suddenly spoke. "Is Jack home, do you know?" She asked shyly and I
couldn't stop a small sigh escaping my lips.

"Um, your guess
is as good as mine since I arrived here when you did," I pointed
out, trying to stop myself sounding too rude.

"Oh, I suppose
so." She bit her lip and looked away and I realised, with a
swooping feeling of resignation, that if he was home she was likely
going to invite herself in.

"Hang on, I'll
check if he's here," I said, with a decided lack of enthusiasm in
my tone. Skirting the furniture in the main area I dumped my bag in
my room and called out for Haley's benefit, "Well he's not in my
room."

As I walked
back out into the large room I saw that she was hovering in the
doorway expectantly. Biting the inside of my cheek to stop myself
snapping and telling her just to bugger off, I threw open the door
to Matt's room and poked my head inside. The room was empty,
although, technically, there could have been about ten decomposing
bodies in there considering the smell and mounds of stuff piled
everywhere.