Angie stood at the edge of the sidewalk waving, as the red minivan pull away. Alone, she stood for the first time in her life. Her parents and her younger brother were in the van, leaving her standing alone to face her first day at college. To say she had lived a sheltered life would completely fail to capture the degree of social isolation she had experienced over the last six years.
Yet, here she was, nineteen, a first year student at a small liberal arts college in central Michigan. A year older than all the other incoming students, Angie realized that was one of the smaller differences between her and them. For some reason that no one fully understood, Angie had not made a good transition from Elementary School to the middle grades. A year of poor performance had lead to her being held back a year. A lack of improvement the following year had lead to her parents’ decision to home school her. So, while her brother continued to attend public school, Angie had stayed home with her mother. Absorbing knowledge in a way she had never been able to in a typical classroom. At issue had never been her intelligence; rather it was her inability to deal with the increased pressures of socialization required during those awkward preteen years that had lead to further isolation.
“Hey, don’t look so down in the dumps!”
A friendly voice broke her thoughts, as she turned, she gave a slightly startled jump as she realized the speaker, was a boy, obviously not a first year student standing only a few feet behind her.
With a casual grace she had never learned, the boy stepped closer and said, “I’m Jon, welcome to Andersen College.” Continuing as she tried to find something to say “I’m an RA in ‘Davidson’, the guys’ dorm over there, stop in and say ‘hey’ sometime.” With that he smiled again and walked away.
Angie was left standing, numb, realizing she hadn’t said a word…”God, he must think I’m a moron…” she thought. With a soft sigh, she walked back into her new home “Chapman Court” the only “girls-only” dorm on campus, known to everyone as the ‘virgin-vault’.
Jon dodged another van full of stereos and beanbag chairs and walked across the quad to his dorm. “Cute girl” he thought, “kind of odd, but cute.” With a smile he mentally undressed the silent student. Slim, long blonde hair, big brown eyes, small perky breasts under her “Andersen” t-shirt, and a tight little butt in those white shorts. “Wonder how long it will be ‘till some drunk frat boy is pile driving her?” With a chuckle, Jon walked into the RA office to get ready for the arrival of the upper classmen tomorrow.
Angie climbed the stairs to her dorm room “Why did I bring all this junk?” she asked as she started to unpack. After about forty minutes of sorting through clothes and shoes, she heard a soft tap on the door. Opening, she was greeted by a short brunette and her parents.
“Hi!” the girl said “I’m Tina, you must be Angie… this is so cool!” Angie met her new roommate and the girl’s parents she began to wonder what she had gotten herself into. This girl, “Tina” was everything she was not. Tina was full of personality, always laughing and joking.. the minute she walked in she sat her CD player on her desk and popped in a CD. The music filled the room and between cheerful comments and sidelong glances at her parents, Tina managed to compress her entire life into ten minutes of rambling monologue. As Tina’s dad lugged chest after chest of clothes up the stairs, Tina and her mother rapidly unpacked more clothes than Angie had ever seen. Continuing to organize her items, Angie realized it would take a minor miracle for her to fit a word in edge-wise as the good natured girl continued to fill the air with interesting but ultimately meaningless details about her high school friends, their problems, and how happy she was to be “FINALLY” going to college. Tina’s parents were saying goodbye, giving both girls a hug and pulling away. Only when Tina’s continuing conversation broke into her thoughts did Angie realize Tina’s dad had given her a $50 bill just as he had Tina. “For pizza and stuff” he had said. She had been too lost in thought to even thank him.
The days went by quickly, adjusting to a new routine, learning how to find her way around campus, days spent in the classroom and lab, evenings spent in the library. Angie was a good student, to be fair with herself, she was an outstanding student. Better trained and better motivated than her peers. She found she liked college. There was none of that endless, overwhelming, peer pressure she had felt in public school. That endless aching need to be popular. Here, at Andersen, no one even noticed her. She moved in quiet anonymity through her days. In fact, other than her lab partners, Tina, and a few other girls on her hall, she hadn’t spoken to anyone at all.
It was Friday evening and Angie was packing her book bag for her usual after supper trip to the library. “Oh no you don’t you bookwork!” laughed Tina. Pulling the chemistry book from Angie’s hand she continued “It’s Friday night, we are going to do something…”
