Roommates
Faith halted to heave her duffel bag a little higher up her shoulder when her eyes fell on the large banner with colourful letters painted over it: "Welcome Freshmen to UC Sunnydale!". She stared at it for a while until people started bumping into her. The road was full of young people carrying all kinds of bags and boxes. They all looked excited, ready for a new phase in their young lives. Some were accompanied by proud looking parents, others were alone and nervous looking.
Faith wasn't nervous... she just couldn't quite believe where she was. Only a few months back she would've laughed at anyone even suggesting she should go to university. But here she was, starting her first year at Sunnydale university. And even more surprising: she was happy about it.
Faith had never liked school. Not because she wasn't smart enough or anything. She just couldn't cope with all the damn rules. People telling her what to do always rubbed her the wrong way. It was also boring. So. Very. Boring. Faith was never able to sit still and concentrate. So she would just skip class and hang around the city. No-one seemed to care about her skipping nearly all her classes so she just stopped going altogether.
It had never bothered her until she arrived in Sunnydale. It was all Buffy's fault really. She would never stop yapping about how school was important, even for slayers. She had Giles and Willow to back her up and after a while even Buffy's mom started to whine about it. Normally she wouldn't have given in but... she did care about what Buffy thought of her. She was the closest thing she ever had to a friend and going to school was a great excuse to hang out with her even more.
So she had re-inscribed at Sunnydale High with the help of Giles and Joyce. It had been a complicated procedure because the school year was already halfway over. But with some excuses and false documents (compliments of Willow) she was finally allowed to start classes. And much to everyone's surprise Faith had managed to catch up and pass all her exams.
At first the plan was to just get a high school diploma (which had been difficult enough with that giant snake at the graduation ceremony). But Giles, who seemed especially fond of her now, advised her to apply to a few universities. "Just in case" he had said. It had seemed stupid to her at first, especially seeing how even Buffy probably wasn't going to university, but she had done it anyways.
And so now she, Buffy and even Willow were going to attend UC Sunnydale. It was pretty mind boggling.
She trudged onwards in the hot sun towards the dorms carrying her bags and trying to hold on to the tiny creased map of the campus.
When she arrived at the building she could already tell that this was going to be the nicest place she had ever lived in. She dragged her bags up the first flight of stairs while digging in her jeans' pockets for the paper that told her what room she would be staying in. She halted on the second floor and smoothed the paper out a bit.
Your room number: 214
She picked up her bags again and made her way down the hall looking left and right to check the numbers on the doors. She quickly found the room she was looking for and put her hand on the door handle hoping her roommate wasn't a total bitch. When she turned the handle and opened the door however she found herself staring into a very familiar face.
"B? What the fuck are you doing here?"
"I could ask you the very same thing. This is my room you know."
Faith looked down at the crumpled piece of paper in her hand and then back at the door.
"Well it's my room too princess."
"No way, that can't be right" she said as she threw down the stuff she was holding and walked over to check the paper in Faith's hand. "Let me see that."
"I guess that means we're roommates now." Faith couldn't suppress a wide smile creeping over her features. She kinda liked the idea of having Buffy as her roommate. It was certainly more appealing to her than sharing with a complete stranger. And it might have some other perks as well...
"This... This is great!" Buffy looked up from the paper with a radiant smile. "Better than great! This is amazing!" She pulled Faith into a quick hug and then started dancing across the room. "I can't believe I lucked out like that! Here I was worrying that I was gonna have to share with a complete stranger but... I can't believe it! Now I won't have to hide my stakes and holy water! And I won't have to explain where I go every night when I'm on patrol! ... "
She kept babbling for a while longer about the advantages of having Faith as a roommate while Faith herself tried to get over the shock of being hugged by Buffy. She hadn't expected Buffy to be this happy about it and she certainly hadn't expected a hug. She wasn't the kind of person that hugged so Buffy was lucky to get away with her head still attached.
Faith smiled a little as she watched her friend dance excitedly across the room.
When Buffy had finally calmed down Faith had dragged her bags fully into the room and started unpacking.
"Is that all you brought with you?" Buffy asked eying Faith's bags while she continued to unpack her own things.
"You should be happy I didn't bring that much. It wouldn't fit in this room along with all your junk"
"Are you complaining already? Well you're a sucky roommate."
"You don't know half of it. I'll bet you anything you'll be begging for another roommate before the week's up." Faith said with a smirk.
"What do you mean by that?"
"I'm just saying you shouldn't cheer before you find out what living with me is like."
Buffy eyed her warily but didn't answer.
