Finally, it's Tuesday, January 15th. Spring semester can officially begin as planned. So far, Quilene and Aerolynn haven't tried to kill each other yet, so that's good, I guess. Anyway, I've got classes to worry about now. For this semester, I've decided to take Creative Nonfiction on Mondays and Wednesdays from 1:10 PM to 2:30 PM; Medieval Civilization on Tuesdays from 9:50 AM to 12:50 PM; Introduction to Gender, Race, and Sexuality on Tuesdays from 8:10 AM to 9:30 AM; Gender and Human Rights on Thursdays from 2:15 PM to 5:15 PM; and lastly, Elementary Algebra on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 1:10 PM to 2:30 PM. All that means I've got Fridays off. Good, I've got three-day weekends to look forward to.

So first off, it's 7 AM. I'm already up. I've got to take Gender, Race, and Sexuality; Medieval Civilization; and Elementary Algebra today. Man, I've got my work cut out for me. Why do I make this harder for myself?

The first thing I do after I've woken up is get ready and then make myself some breakfast. For breakfast, I decide to try something totally different for once and have one of those Aussie breakfasts I've heard about so much, though only part of the meal. I just have corn fritters with French toast and baked beans. As for Quilene and Aerolynn, they just have microwave breakfast sandwiches. I'm not sure those things would be totally fulfilling by the time they got to class, but whatever's quicker to make, I guess.

My roommates and I just sit at the kitchen table, eating our breakfast in near-total silence. I say near-total silence because Aerolynn's also scrolling through Reddit and laughing at any funny memes she happens to come across. Quilene just glares at her from across the table while also eating her breakfast sandwich. Jeez, talk about awkward. I still don't know why Quilene and Aerolynn aren't friends anymore, but I don't want Quilene to feel like she's reliving her trauma, so I'm just going to let it be. In the meantime, I'm going to be as nice of a mutual roommate to them as I can be.

"So..." I begin to speak. "Did any of you guys have a good weekend?"

Quilene just shrugs. "I guess? I went early Valentine's Day shopping for Jonah, but I couldn't really find anything that he would like. All I could get for him were some clothes and some jewelry. That's about it. Hopefully, I'll have more luck this weekend."

"I just went out to the bar and got wasted," Aerolynn replies. "I wanted to spend my last week of freedom partying my butt off. No use reading up on some boring-ass books until class actually started."

"I see." I just take a sip out of my glass of Coke Float milk (regular milk that I mixed with Coke Float snow cone syrup that I brought from home). "Well, I'm sure you guys had fun, especially you, Aerolynn. You must have had the time of your life."

Aerolynn smirks. "I did, actually. While boring ol' Quilene wanted to go buy some fancy-shmancy jewelry for her boyfriend, I was out getting wasted and making out with lots of guys."

Quilene scoffs and rolls her eyes. "Oh yeah, wanting to buy something that I think my boyfriend will love is just so boring. Why do that when I can just drink away my hopes and dreams?"

"I'm not drinking away anything! I'm just trying to have a good time and create some memories, that's all! What's wrong with that?"

"Oh yeah? And are any of those memories going to be things you want to tell your kids about?"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" I decide to interject. "Let's pump the brakes here. As much as I'm sure you guys would like to argue and be petty, we're gonna have to leave for class soon. Speaking of, once I'm done with breakfast, I'm gonna go grab my things and go."

Aerolynn lets out an annoyed groan. "Fine. I'd rather be in class right now anyway."

First off, I have to go to my Gender, Race, and Sexuality class in the Wright-Rieman Laboratories. I find it funny that this class is in the same building that my Introduction to Philosophy and Greek Civilization classes were in last semester. I also find it funny that Rhonda is also my professor in that class. Rhonda fricking Spivak, one of the Off-Colors, is my Gender, Race, and Sexuality professor. I guess this really is a small world we live in. Anyway, off to find my class. It doesn't take much time for me to find my class and go inside. Some kids are already sitting at their desks, but whatever. Rhonda's not here yet, so I'm not late. I just sit at my desk and catch up on some required reading to pass the time. Soon enough, Rhonda walks into the room.

Rhonda is this real curvy woman with baseball-sized breasts, chestnut-colored skin, and a long pointed nose that is slightly turned upward. She has a wide black afro with lavender gray highlights. She's also got two pairs of arms, the top pair being thick and the bottom pair being thin. I can still remember all those years ago when Rhonda was telling me that her other pair of arms are actually from a parasitic twin and that she can control them just like with her own arms. Her eyes are a dark, dark brown to the point where they might as well be black. She's wearing a custom-made rainbow cardigan over a custom-made black sweater dress, and her feet are equipped with black Doc Martens boots and white socks. She doesn't wear much makeup as far as I can tell.

"Good morning, class," Rhonda begins to speak. "I hope you've been beginning your spring semester on a good note so far. Before we can start going over the syllabus, why don't we all introduce ourselves by order of our gender identity, ethnic identity, and sexuality? I'll go first. My name is Rhonda Spivak. I'm a cis woman, I'm Afro-Barbadian and Ashkenazi Jewish, and I'm an aromantic asexual."

We all greet her with friendly hellos.

"Okay, good," Rhonda continues. "One of you will go next. Hope, I can see you've already got your hand raised."

I flash a smile at Rhonda. "Yes, Professor Spivak."

"And even though we already know each other outside the classroom, I'd appreciate it if you introduced yourself anyway. It's moreso for the sake of the class."

"Okay." I clear my throat. "My name's Hope Harvey-Dahl. I'm a cis woman, I'm mostly white with Chinese and Thai ancestry, and I'm a lesbian."

The rest of the class tell me hello. Some of the students might not understand why we have to introduce ourselves this way, but I personally think it's to normalize our identities within the social world. In any case, it's one heck of a way to start the first day of class. I just wait patiently for everybody else to introduce themselves while keeping my eyes squarely focused on Rhonda. Finally, they've all stopped. Now it's time for Rhonda to start giving out the syllabuses.

"Alright, now that we've introduced ourselves to our classmates," Rhonda begins to speak again. "It's time it's time we started going over syllabuses. Now I'll just go around and hand these out. For the first week, we will be going over the basics of what it means to have a gender identity, what it means to have an ethnic identity, and what it means to have a sexuality. All of these play a factor into who we are as people. As we progress through this class, you will be learning about things like intersectionality, ethnic relations, and how our genetic makeup may shape gender roles and how our sexualities are presented. Make sure you go over the syllabus carefully this week."

We all proceed to do so. Not much time seems to pass before Rhonda finally dismisses class. Well, that sure was insightful. I'll be sure to go over the syllabus every chance I get. But not right now, because I've got just twenty minutes to get to Medieval Civilization.

I just got back from Elementary Algebra. Damn, talk about difficult as hell. Don't get me wrong: I'm great at algebra, but if I had to choose between actually doing algebra and watching "Cooked with Cannabis" on Netflix, I would just watch "Cooked with Cannabis." At least with that show, I just get to see contestants figure out how much THC they can infuse into a dish. Anyway, I'm back in my dorm now and just catching up with Quilene and Aerolynn on how their classes went.

"Oh, my first class of the day was so great," Quilene replies to my query. "I mean, Professor Carman is just so passionate about his classroom. He's actually part-Delaware, so he's got plenty of expertise when it comes to Native American studies. He even wrote one of the books for required reading."

"Oh, cool," I reply. "I hope he knows what he's doing."

"He's pretty old, so he can be senile at times. He even said it himself."

"Okay, and what about you, Aerolynn? How did your first class go?"

"Uh, alright?" Aerolynn replies. "I just spent most of the time on my phone."

"Really? What about your syllabus? Did you get one?"

"Yeah, but I'm not gonna read that shit."

I just facepalm. The audacity of this woman… doesn't she even care that she's here? Clearly, she paid thousands of dollars just to get into this school, and she's just gonna throw that away like it's nothing? Don't get me wrong: my grades weren't perfect last semester, but I still took them seriously. Who does Aerolynn think she is?

"Okay, have fun failing this semester," Quilene sneers at Aerolynn.

"Have fun being a little bitch," Aerolynn sneers back.

I feel like I'm going to die of secondhand cringe. I swear to God, their arguing gets on my nerves. I have to find a way to curb their petty fighting before it truly gets ugly.