Cloud rolled over and slammed his hand down a little too hard onto his already ill-treated alarm clock
Cloud rolled over and slammed his hand down a little too hard onto his already ill-treated alarm clock. Letting out a great yawn, he peeled himself off his wildly spread sheets, looked up, and noticed the shower was already going. Typical. Frowning, he glanced at the alarm clock. It was much too early to be in the shower already. Class didn't start for another...fifty-seven minutes! Cloud sighed and swung his feet around and scratched his head. What was anyone going to do with fifty-seven minutes at their dispense anyway? Aside from sleeping, Cloud could think of no other logical activity to insert into the time slot. There was—at a minimum—another twenty minutes left to spend doing just that; so he thought.
Cloud's logic was that he should get up in just enough time to shower and get dressed. That way he could sprint to his first class, thus getting his exercise out of the way at the same time. Contrary to popular belief, Cloud didn't see himself as lazy, but an efficient user of time. He always had a way to cancel out his bad attributes.
Just then, the shower had squeaked off and Cloud could hear Leon fiddling around in the bathroom. Sighing, he muttered "way too early," and proceeded to make his bed–which was to be executed with minimal effort. Setting the pillows near the top of the bed and pulling the blanket over the rumpled sheets—before Leon could raise sand about it—Cloud was finished with his task before the minute even changed. Leon was way too picky about things like that. He always did things painstakingly perfect.
As if summoned through the magical powers fermenting in Cloud's mental cauldron, Leon closed the door behind him and placed his rolled dirty clothes in the hamper adjacent from his bed. He did so without so much as a good morning to Cloud–typical.
Cloud snorted, sluggishly walking to the shower. Again, he muttered another disapproval of how early Leon insisted on getting up. He closed the door behind him and immediately turned on the shower.
This was the way morning rituals were carried out, day after day. Cloud rarely ever got the shower first, however this suited him just fine. And Leon, being the early riser that he was, never had to worry about finding a dirty post-used shower because this simple routine suited him too. Things worked out without too much hassle, but Cloud had wondered what it would be like to get at least one pleasantry from his malignant roommate.
Leon frowned shouldering his book bag, then sat it back down on his bed. Why was he forced to live with such an unreasonable person? Leon was really making the initial referral to how untidy Cloud's bed was, but if he really thought about it—it wouldn't actually take that much thinking—that was how Cloud's entire personality was: a pile of rumpled sheets hidden to the simple on-looker by a concealing blanket.
He decided he couldn't stand it for another day. He removed Cloud's blanket and neatly made up the sheets. He pulled the blanket over that, then stacked the pillows at the top. Sighing, he shouldered his book bag again, and left.
XxX
Cloud drummed his finger tips lightly on the edge of the desk as he boredly stared at the clock, earnestly waiting for those last laggard minutes to tick by. This by far was his least favorite moment of the entire day; the final moments before lunch. Listening to his professors drone on and on was something Cloud had grown accustomed to over the years, but surely one of them had to realize that bio-symptomatic matter was not an interesting topic—at least not interesting to Cloud anyway. He considered leaving, but judging from the amount of detail the lecture included, and his own lack in understanding them, he figured he should absorb as much information as possible.
His chin sank even deeper into the light well in the heel of his hand. Then, in a sudden moment, the last ounce of his attention span and brain capacity were spared when the minute hand reached the twelve. In one swift tide-like movement, everyone filed out into the hallways and outside crowding the cafeteria building like a heard of gazelles that suddenly stumbled on the last watering hole for miles.
Cloud had his two trays in hand and was surveying the quickly filling tables for an area to sit. Near Sora and Riku in the far left corner? Nah, from the looks of things, Riku would have preferred to converse with Sora in solitude. In the center where the cheerleaders sat? Definitely not; for some reason, the colorful display of flashing pom-poms and...body parts did little to amuse Cloud, especially when the group decision to raise their popularity by sitting deliberately in the direct center of the Cafeteria was quite obvious. He sighed, then noticed a pair of raised flailing arms in the distance, three of the ten fingers adorned in familiar silver rings. He could barely hear "Hey, over here," through the din.
Grinning, Cloud made his way through rolling oranges and spilled mashed potatoes to the corner off to the right where Seifer sat with an empty spot in front of him, which Cloud took thankfully.
"Hey," Seifer said finally putting his arms down. "Geez, I thought you were never going to see me."
"Well, I did." He said sing-song and forced the milk carton open. "You managed to flag me down."
They continued fraternizing for a while, yammering on about this and that, then suddenly, there was a clatter of trays behind Cloud, making both Seifer and him look up. A student had dropped his tray accidentally, managing to scatter the would-be contents all about the table and on several other passersby. More than less of the food had adhered to Cloud's shirt.
"Gahh!" Cloud said standing up and dancing around, trying to brush the offensive food items from his clothing. The group back there had managed to catch the majority of all the eyes in the cafeteria. A light flush spread across the middle of Cloud's face. He looked around a bit bemused and smiled goofily. At that, like a fad, the cafeteria seemed to move on to something more electric to pike their interests such as… what they were doing previously.
Cloud chose this moment to sit down, but his gaze shifted briefly into the far back of the cafeteria, where there at a lone table sat Leon looking at him; not smiling, not frowning, but just looking. Cloud tipped his head to the side, but Leon shifted his gaze back down to his tray of food and resumed eating.
"Hey, are you still there?" Seifer said, snapping his fingers in front of Cloud's nose. "I said, 'Can I have the rest of that?'" He pointed directly at Cloud's partly eaten portions of food.
"Uh yeah..." Cloud said not listening fully at what was being said. He craned his neck to see further back to where Leon sat, near the outside door. He was sitting alone and quiet, occasionally spooning food into his mouth as he read a different novel than what he had seen him reading the previous night. Cloud frowned, not understanding why he cared to look back there any way, but then Leon looked up from his book. Scowling deliberately at Cloud, he muttered something and got up to leave. Shocked and bit embarrassed, Cloud shot around toward Seifer, who was savagely devouring what remained of Cloud's lunch.
"What's got you so interested over there?" Seifer said between bites.
"Me?"
"Yes, you. Who else!?" He reached for Cloud's napkin.
"Ah, nothing–hey!"
"What?" Seifer said dabbing at his mouth with the napkin. "You said I could have it!"
"Yeah...but...I didn't think...you'd eat everything!"
Seifer shrugged. "You didn't complain while I was eating it, you were too busy staring at Leon."
Outraged, Cloud blushed. "Huh? No way! I was not!"
"You were too. I saw you."
"I said I wasn't!"
"Really, what were you looking at then?"
"...Cheerleaders."
"Mm-Hmm." Seifer said, ignoring what he had said and finishing off the last of Cloud's milk. "You don't like the guy, and you certainly don't like the guy, so quit...doing whatever it is that you're doing."
"I know, but..." Cloud said, forgetting his eaten food. "He just sits back there by himself...and..." He was cut off as the minute hand again signaled it was time to get moving for a number of students. A wave of them headed out the door. Seifer grabbed the trays between them.
"Then let him sit there! Who cares? Not you, not me, nobody! So just focus on that party tonight, okay?" He nudged Cloud in the ribs. "As they say at the nursery: 'Leave the pricks to the roses and pick a daisy.'"
Cloud nodded, not exactly feeling better by the words, but continued with the flow of traffic.
Meh, a bit more of that creative license we talked about was utilized here. Hah, the chance of all three of these people having lunch at the same time is rather unlikely. I know.