The droning, monotone voice of the teacher seemed more and more like a background noise, and I was severely bored. I had paid to take this class, and holy shit! It was beginning to drive me up the wall in boredom. I looked around at the other people in the classroom, seeing that they were as bored as I was.
There was more than a few pretty cute girls, and one really beautiful one. Rosa, this amazing Spanish woman, sat only a few desks to my right, twiddling her flowing, almost black hair, brushing the end of a lock across her full, glossy lips as she stared off into space. She was no older than twenty, but definitely older than eighteen. I took off my hat, brushing my hair back with my hand. Sometimes it was necessary to wear a hat to tame my hair a little. Donning my hat again, my eyes drifted over to where Rosa sat in a pair of thigh-high, white shorts and a spaghetti-strap tank-top. She was still drawing a tress across her lips, but she was no longer staring off into space.
Instead, she was staring at me, and at first, I thought she was looking right through me. Then she smiled as I looked back at her. I smiled slightly, seeing that she wore a slim ring on her ring-finger. Of course, she had to be married; only the hottest ones seemed to be taken.
I tore my eyes off her big, brown doe-eyes with some difficulty, checking the clock on the wall of the classroom. 'Thank God,' I thought to myself. It was time for class to be over.
I grabbed my book bag and stuffed my Sociology textbook into it, following it with my notebook. We all flowed out of the classroom, chased out by the professor's warning of a possible quiz in the next few days. I walked out to my car, a beat-up Corolla, tossed my bag in the bag and started it. I had left the volume up on my radio on the way to class, and after a few seconds, it was suddenly overwhelmingly loud. As I turned it down, a shadow fell across me, and I looked up.
Rosa, her purse slung on her shoulder, looked uncomfortable just standing there, like she was embarrassed.
"Hi," she began, hesitated for a minute, tucking a few strands of her hair behind her ear.
I nodded, "Hi Rosa, what's up?"
"Um, I need to ask a favor."
I shrugged, "Sure, what do you need?"
"Well, my friend, Carly, was supposed to drive me home, but she has to stay for some thing. I was wondering if you could drive me home."
I agreed, and cleaned off the passenger seat of random items, such as junk mail that usually stayed there after I checked the mail, a pack of gum, and a few c.d.'s. She set her purse down on the floorboard, and got in, giving me a split-second glance at her full, round butt. Her legs were naturally tanned, and appeared to be quite smooth. I rolled the windows down to let some fresh air into the car, knowing it smelled like fast food. I'm one of those people that let crap pile up in my car, and I know it, but I usually procrastinate when it comes to cleaning it out until absolutely necessary. I wished that time had come before class.
"Which way do you live?" I asked, backing out of the parking spot.
"Barrett Heights, the south end," she buckled her seat belt.
"Really?"
"Yeah, I live there with my roommate."
I was taken aback, "Roommate? I figured you were married, or engaged or something like that."
She rolled her eyes, "Well, I was engaged, but that didn't work out."
My eyes left the road and I glanced over at her, "You're still wearing a ring."
She lifted her left hand and twirled the ring around with her right, smiling dryly, "I keep it on to remind me that he left me, you know, just in case he comes crawling back. Apparently, he decided that after only a month of planning a wedding he wasn't really prepared for married life."
I was incredulous, "Why would he propose if he didn't want to get married?"
She laughed every bit as dryly as she had smiled a minute ago, "So he could get laid."
I thought I might have a chance to be her rebound, but I found that I couldn't say anything that would help achieve that. Stupid conscience! Instead I noted aloud, "Seems like a stupid thing to do just for sex."
She glanced over at me, her eyes narrowed slightly, apparently thinking that my criticism was aimed at her.
"I mean for him," I clarified quickly.
"Oh. Yeah, I guess it was. It was my fault as much as his, though. I should've made it clearer that I expected more from him than sex. I was just so happy that someone proposed to me, I let it go."
Before our conversation could go any further, she changed the subject, "I live on the third street on the right, Cheshire Circle." I looked for the street sign, and when I found it, I turned onto the street. She pointed out the little house, a one-story pad, and when I pulled up into the driveway, she picked her purse up, began to get out, and then stopped, looking back at me for a second or two.
"Listen," she seemed unsure, "Since you're here, do you want to come in? I can get you a soda or beer or whatever, if you want."
It's not like I had other plans, so I just pretended to think about it. As if coming to her senses, she quickly added, "You know, nevermind. I'm sure you've got somewhere else you have to be."
"Well," I grinned, "Nothing that can't wait awhile. If, that is, you haven't changed your mind, I could use a soda."
She seemed tense as I followed her through the front door. The living room and kitchen were separated by a counter, both being pretty small. The furniture looked far from new, but was still in decent shape. She had me sit down on the sofa and she went into the kitchen, looking in the fridge for a second. The counter blocked my view of her as she bent down briefly to get a couple cans, but I imagined it was quite a view. When she stood up, she had two cans of Coke.
"Are you sure you don't want a beer?"
I shook my head, joking, "No thanks. Beer makes me think I'm somebody."
She laughed and brought me the can. She opened hers and took a swig. Fascinated, I watched the muscles in her slender throat as she swallowed the soda. Then I hurriedly opened my can and drank from it.
"Do you have any idea of what we were supposed to be learning in class today?" she asked, trying to relieve the awkwardness and tension.
"Huh?" I found myself staring right into her eyes, and looked away, "Oh, not really. The professor droning on about whatever he was talking about almost put me to sleep. It's like having a noisy box fan in the background."
She nodded, "I know what you mean. I only took the class because it's required. I just can't get interested in it."
We talked of trivial things, mostly our majors and how many credits we still needed. However, instead of relieving the tension, it instead built up. She seemed like she wanted to say something, but whatever it was, she continued to talk about other things.
"So," she cleared her throat, "Do you live around here, or are you just here for college?"
"I live about fifteen minutes north of here, in Hereford."
Soon we were running out of things to talk about, and, finally, in an innocent tone, seemingly devoid of any agenda, she asked me, "Was your girlfriend expecting you home soon? If you need to go, it's cool."
I laughed a little, "If I have a girlfriend back at my apartment, somebody needs to inform me about it. No, it's just me."
She smiled, taking a sip of her drink, saying no more about it, but the tension eased slightly.
I took my time with my drink, nervous, yet not really wanting to lose my excuse for being there. She set her can down and stood up, informing me that she'd be back in a second. Then she disappeared into a small half-bathroom near the kitchen. I stood up and looked around the living room. A decent-sized television perched atop a small swiveling stand. In the small glass cabinet within the stand, I could make out the titles of about eleven or twelve DVD's, various genres of movies. On the walls were some cheap prints of painters I'd never heard of. One print had a landscape of a planet that couldn't exist in reality, with three moons, some strange plant life, and a looming storm in the distance. The other prints were similar in topic. Either Rosa or her roommate was interested in science fiction.
As I continued to look around, noticing small things, like a discarded pair of pants that had been left on the floor. 'Well,' I thought to myself, 'At least they're women's pants.' Inside the pair of pants peeked a bit of red, and I toed the waist of the pants, revealing a pair of panties that had apparently been stripped off with the pants. I wondered who these garments belonged to. The pervert in me suggested I pick up the panties and have a sniff, like a recently post-pubescent teenager. I flushed a little at the thought, and left them alone. I went back to looking at the DVD's in the stand when Rosa returned.
"Some interesting movies in here," I didn't bother with trying to sit down before she emerged, instead reading some of the titles aloud.
"About half of those are my roommate's," she explained.
I was almost through with my drink, and had no other excuse for hanging out, so I asked her if she wanted to watch a movie, "We can rent a few, if you'd like. My treat?"
She nodded as if she'd also been looking for an excuse to have me there, "That'd be nice, as long as I can pay for a pizza."
Fifteen minutes later, inside the Video Store, standing side-by-side, Rosa and I scanned the movies, reading them aloud one at a time if they sounded interesting. She picked up a slice-and-dice thriller, read the summary on the back, and suggested that one, so I held it. The next one was a science fiction movie, and the third a comedy.
"That should be plenty," she decided.
