Chapter 2: Riches I Heed Not
After a twelve-hour drive from Baton Rouge to Roanoke, Virginia and an hour's worth of check-in with the Residence Life department before she received her room key, Elise wanted nothing more than to collapse into bed. But she'd have to make it first.
'Aw, shit' she thought uncharitably as she heard loud giggles emanating from room 308 at the end of her third-floor hall. They were high-pitched and irritating as hell. She sighed and soldiered on, her Navy surplus sea bag stuffed full of clothes bumping against her hip and her combat boots thudding on the floor. The giggles subsided as she entered, taking stock of the room that was to be her home for the next few months. It was a little bigger than she'd imagined, but just as bland, with stark white walls. One of the beds had been pushed against the far wall, underneath the window, and it was covered by a plain blue duvet. Two girls were seated on it, still chuckling a bit, and the boy- oh wait, nope. That was no boy, that was a man (what the hell was a man doing on the campus of a women's college?) standing in front of them, who turned as she cleared her throat.
"Hi," she managed, letting the heavy bag slide to the floor, her eyes flicking back and forth between the three occupants of the room, wondering which one was her roommate. The shorter girl with the grating laugh? Or the taller blonde with striking green eyes? Elise suddenly felt very young, standing there in her jeans and combat boots, her nails black, her hair hanging halfway down her back, and her very run-of-the-mill brown eyes. "I'm Elise."
The taller girl suddenly stood and rushed towards her, her arms outstretched. Elise submitted to the hug, a little bemused. She caught the man's sparkling hazel glance and realized that he was laughing again as the blonde gushed,
"Hi! I'm Abigail and I'm your roommate! I hope you don't mind that I took the left side, it's just-"
"Whoa, who, Abby!" the man cut in, pulling on Abigail's shoulder, "Let the girl breathe, huh?" Elise shot him a grateful glance as she bent to open her bag.
"It's cool. I don't much care where we sleep, yet." She answered, digging for the Wal-Mart bag that contained her new sheets and comforter. "Besides, we might decide to move stuff around anyway."
"Right!" Abigail agreed brightly. "Well, this is my little sister, Marie and my older brother, Cameron."
As Elise reached forward to shake Marie's hand, she realized that the girl was noticeably younger than she'd thought at first, maybe 14 or 15 and that she was now glaring sullenly at her sister.
"Big sisters, huh, Marie?" she asked teasingly. "I've got two." The little blonde's sneer morphed into a bright smile, a great deal like her sister's, except for the braces.
"Damn, I'm sorry," she giggled.
"Marie!" Cameron admonished, his own smile quirking into more of a smirk. "Language!"
"Eh, you get used to it." Elise cracked as she stood, ignoring Cameron for the moment. "Plus, you can always steal the clothes they can't fit into anymore, as much as they try. Actually, my oldest sister's name is Marie too."
She turned to Cameron then, her hand out. As he took it, she glanced up into deep eyes, green at the center with amber flecks making them sparkle as if at some universal joke. 'Whoa' just about summed up her thoughts.
"Hi, Elise," he said, pumping her hand firmly, but not excessively. "It's nice to meet you."
"You too," she managed to croak out. Then, she could feel the words bubbling up and she tried to stop them, but she blurted out "You have really pretty eyes."
Cameron laughed again, the skin around his striking eyes crinkling slightly. In fact, every single one of them had extremely lovely eyes. Abigail's were a pale green, and Marie's icy grey.
"Thanks," Cameron chuckled, "You have a very cute accent."
Elise could feel her cheeks getting hot and flashed Cameron a smile before she turned away to begin pulling her sheets out of their packaging. Some furious whispering was going on behind her, but she simply began tucking the fitted sheet over the mattress and trying to smooth out the worst of the wrinkles.
"Uh, Elise?" Cameron's voice was still shaking with repressed laughter. 'Great.' She thought, 'Perfect, your roommate's very cute brother thinks you're a complete fucking moron. Well done, Miss Dempsey.' She turned, face still flaming red and tried to smile at the brother and sister tag-team.
"Do you need any help getting the rest of your stuff up?" Abigail asked kindly.
Elise cast an eye over the bags she'd dropped to the floor. Sea bag, laptop case, big black duffel full of various shoes and assorted items, purse. That was it.
"Um," Elise cast her eyes down as she asked quietly, "the rest?"
Abigail stared at her for a moment, and looked down at Elise's belongings and looked up at her brother. Cameron did much the same, but when he looked up it was at the brunette who was fussing with the bed clothes. That was it?
"Fucking awesome!" Marie burst out, causing Cameron to look at her exasperatedly. "I just spent four hours dragging Abby's shit up here, and you made it in one trip! Girl, you rock!"
The ice broken, the three older people burst out laughing. Abigail was the first to recover, chirping brightly,
"Well, it's a good thing I brought the TV and fridge, right?"
"Yep," Elise agreed easily, pulling slightly squashed pillows out of the duffel bag and sliding them into their cases.
"We'll have to get some posters or something to brighten this place up. I wonder if we could paint if we painted over it at the end of the…"
Elise continued unpacking her meager belongings, refolding and putting away plain white tee-shirts, band shirts and wife beaters, placing her jeans in the bottom drawer and throwing her laundry bag in the bottom of the closet along with her shoes. She listened happily as Abigail chatted away about posters and lighting, classes and parties. A few times she looked up to watch Cameron's eyes crinkle in laughter. A couple of those times he caught her gaze and held it until she dropped her head, blushing.
'Not a bad day, all things considered,' she thought. 'Now to get through orientation. And find a job.'