“You’re not a morning person, are you?” He asked.
“It’s not that, I just have a lot on my mind.”
“Need to talk about it?”
I shook my head ‘no’ and followed him down the steps.
“Well, how’re your classes coming?” He asked.
That was another thing that I didn’t want to think or talk about. “Fine, but I can tell that my calculus class is gonna kick my butt. My teacher expects us to get through the first three chapters by next Wednesday afternoon and I hardly understood page one! He’s trying to kill us.”
“Sounds like you have Mr. Patel,” Terrell added.
“You had him, too?”
“Yep. He’s a beast, but I pulled an A. I could help you if you want.”
I could definitely use the assistance, but what about AJ? He already wasn’t speaking to me, but I honestly did need Terrell’s help if he really had this calculus crap figured out. Without further hesitation, I responded, “Would you really teach it to me?”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
I thought about Maisha and her unwelcoming gaze. “What about your girl? Won’t she be mad?”
“Maisha knows I’m not going anywhere. She’ll be fine. You need help or not?” He asked.
“Yeah definitely.”
“Then it’s settled. You free Friday at like five?”
“Yeah, I only have one class and it’s early,” I replied.
“Cool. Friday then.” Hopefully with Terrell’s help, I’d get a passing grade.
That night after class, a group of us journeyed to The Rip for dinner, or what was supposed to be dinner. I stared at my plate and questioned whether or not I should take a chance on eating it. My fork felt like it was repelling from the food as I inched toward it. It looked like it should have been bubbling on the plate, releasing offensive gasses into the atmosphere. Once I had a small amount on the tip of my fork, I closed my eyes and went for it.
It was heavily salted like the cook was trying to mask something that had spoiled. I grabbed my napkin and spit it out hurriedly. It wasn’t until I heard the laughter all around the table that I realized that I had an audience.
“There’s nothing like seeing someone’s first reaction to the food here,” Andrea said. Deanna was smiling at my reaction and handed me my glass of water. I guzzled it and didn’t stop until it was empty.
“You get used to it after a while,” Nina added. I covered my plate with a napkin and pushed it away from my face so I didn’t have to smell it.
“I guess I’ll be eating pizza again for dinner,” I decided. That would be the third time in one week. Pretty soon all of the employees would start to recognize my voice.
There was no chance I was going to eat anything else in that place. Instead I sat watching the others choking down their food. They’d built up some sort of immunity to it I guessed. The laughter surrounding me seemed to lull into the background as I checked my phone to see if maybe I’d missed AJ’s call, but he hadn’t even tried to text. Deanna saw me deep in thought and placed her hand on my shoulder. I’d filled her in on the drama between him and me, so she already knew why I was bothered.
“It’s ok. He’ll call,” she said caringly.
“He won’t even acknowledge me. Has he said anything to Karl?” I asked.
She shrugged her shoulders. “If he has, Karl hasn’t said anything to me about it.”
I sank back in my chair and folded my arms over my chest, waiting for everyone else to finish. When I heard chairs scooting back from the table, I hopped up from my seat and walked toward the door impatiently. As we walked back to the dorm, Deanna and I lingered behind the other girls. There was a lot on my mind and I didn’t really feel like being in the conversation.
We reached the building at nearly eleven o’clock, but there were about fifteen guys out on the lawn playing football; Terrell was in that group of course. He waved at Deanna and me as we started to walk inside with the girls.