I didn’t mention anything to Aislinn the next morning as I got ready for my first lecture of the day.  The dream was probably just me worrying too much about trivial things that didn’t matter.  I didn’t want to seem mad in front of my room mate, no matter how accepting she was of my behaviour.  Telling someone you’d had a dream about them when you were still fairly new friends just wasn’t something people did.

So I walked off to my first lecture of the day without mentioning anything to anyone about what had haunted my dreams.  The campus was very quiet as I crossed over to my lecture hall.  It was before midday so I could excuse the majority of students without lectures in the morning for not getting out of bed.  However, there was one figure walking towards the lecture halls that I hadn’t expected to see.

“Lloyd,” I called, waving to catch his attention.  He turned and smiled back at me as I hurried to catch up with him.

“Hey, Nessie.  How are you?”  He asked casually.

“Fine,” I said, a little taken aback that he was so nonchalant about our relationship.  “How are you doing?”

“I’m alright I guess.”

We continued to walk along together in silence, none of us quite knowing what to say.  I knew exactly what I wanted to ask him, but I didn’t know if I had enough courage to confront the problem head on.

“Lloyd,” I said, trying to ignore the sick feeling in the pit of my stomach, “can I ask you something?  About the other night?”

“Yeah sure,” he said.  “What’s up?”

“This is going to sound really stupid, but I was wondering if you could tell me exactly what happened.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, after we went upstairs, I can’t remember anything that happened.  The last thing I recall is you and me kissing.”

To my utter dismay, Lloyd started laughing.  “What’s so funny?”  I asked gruffly.

“Nothing,” he said.  “I’m just not surprised you don’t remember anything.”

“Why?”

“Because you fell asleep.”

“What?”

“We went upstairs into the bedroom, lay down on the bed and as I started to wonder where things were going you fell asleep in my arms.”

“Oh no,” I exclaimed, hiding my face in my books.  “That’s so embarrassing.  I had no idea that is what I had done.  I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it, it was quite amusing at the time.”

“So how did I get home?”

“I saw that you had your key to your flat in your bag, you should really take off your room number from that by the way, and so I carried you home.”

“That was really nice of you.  You didn’t have to do that you know.”

“After the fight you’d had with your friend earlier, Owen was he called, I didn’t think you would have anyone else to get you home so I thought I should do the right thing.”

“Well thank you very much for that.  I didn’t expect you to do that for me.”

“That’s alright.”  I could tell that Lloyd was beginning to get a little uncomfortable, not looking at me but staring intently at our surroundings.

“I do have one more question though,” I continued, stupidly thinking that I was doing the right thing.  “Where does this leave us?”

“I don’t understand.”

“Do you want to ask me out on a date or something?  I thought that seeing as we spend most of Saturday night attached to each other we might as well go out on a proper date.”

“Nessie,” Lloyd said, his tone setting off alarm bells in my head.  “I really like you, you’re a pretty girl and I had a really good time the other night.  But I’m not really looking for a relationship.”

I felt my stomach hit the floor as the words left his mouth.  I couldn’t believe that he could reject me in such a cool and calm manner, especially after I had shown such an interest in him.

“You understand,” he said, “don’t you?”

“But- I thought-“

“People hook up at parties, it’s just what happens,” Lloyd said far more brutally than I had thought possible.  “I’d still like to be friends.”

I couldn’t believe the nerve he had to shrug my feelings away so easily and then tell me that he still wanted to be friends.  I’d thought Luke had been cruel breaking up with me but Lloyd just didn’t seem to care.

I couldn’t think of anything to say to Lloyd, I couldn’t believe the anger that was boiling up inside of me so the only thing I could do was walk away.

“Nessie?”  Lloyd called after me.  “Where are you going?  Did I say something?”

I ignored him, listening instead to Alex’s voice inside my head as I imagined what she would tell me at this moment in time.  He’s not worth it.

Although Lloyd called after me, he didn’t bother to follow so I was grateful when I got inside my lecture building, found the right hall and could slip into a seat beside Lily.

“Hey Ness,” she said cheerfully.  “What’s with the face?”

“Nothing,” I said stiffly, not hiding the fact that I was blatantly lying.  “I just had a bit of a strange conversation with Lloyd.”

“You’ll have to tell me about it after the lecture,” Lily said as Professor Jacobs entered and began preparing his notes for his lecture.  “I need to concentrate or I’ll just never get any of this.”

I smiled dutifully, as Lily expected me to do, but I was glad when the lecture began and I could finally focus on something other than Lloyd, Aislinn or Luke.

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My Camp NaNo novel for August '11

A solo sequel to the successful collab, A Modern Day Fairytale, started by Stargazer. Read the original here:
http://www.protagonize.com/story/a-modern-day-fairytale

Nessie Jones arrives at university she doesn't expect that her time there will be as exciting as the universe has planned for her.
Her roommate, Aislinn, is strange. Nessie feels almost like she knows her but can't quite place her. Will she discover what is so different about her roommate when strange dreams start to haunt her?

Word Count (not quite up to date):
Day One: 2,208
Day Two: 1,303
Day Three: 681
Day Four: 800
Day Five: 364
Day Six: 810
Day Seven: 3,894
Day Eight: 992
Day Nine: 1,823
Day Ten: 148
Day Eleven: 251
Day Twelve:
Day Thirteen:
Day Fourteen:
Day Fifteen: 1,560
Day Sixteen: 1,946
Day Seventeen: 17
Day Eighteen: 2,200

Total: 21,595

updated Aug 18 '11 by dottylotti