Chapter 12: Good Morning, Class

I stay in my bed and wait, listening to see if Alex is going to get up or go back to sleep following his little private party with himself. I still can’t believe he did that with me in the room. Soon the deep rumbling of his snoring starts, I guess it’s back to sleep for him.

Once I’m sure he’s passed out, I quietly climb down out of bed. I think I’ll go down and take a better look at that Fitness Room, maybe try out a few of the machines. I don’t bother to change out of my sleep pants and the t-shirt I slept in. I live here now, nobody cares if they see what I sleep in, they all walk around in their sleep clothes too.

I grab my iPod and earbuds and take the elevator down. No one is in the Fitness Room at this hour, I have the place to myself. Time for a little warm-up on the treadmill. I find that listening to faster, more driving rock music really fits well with working out, it gets my blood pumping and energy going.

I see the door open and Rachel comes in. She sees me and waves, I wave back. She’s wearing a skimpy, super-tight, cute little workout outfit. Her whole body is well-toned and in great shape, this girl knows how to take care of herself.

She gets on the other treadmill. Soon she has worked herself up to a pretty good run. I am distracted watching her pony-tail swish from side to side, but what is especially distracting, is watching her boobs bouncing up and down. She looks over at me and smiles, this girl knows what she’s doing, something tells me she enjoys being watched.

I think I better switch to one of the weight machines that I can sit down at. Those bouncing boobs are giving me an erection, one that I am sure will easily show through these loose-fitting sleep pants.

At a curling machine, I set the pin for a weight I think I can do, but it’s way too much, I can’t lift it very far. I back off on the weight a little bit, there, that’s better, but still probably too much. The same thing happens at various different equipment I try, I must look like an idiot in here switching the amount of weight down so often.

Rachel comes over and motions for me to pull out my earbuds. She asks, “Have you ever worked out at a gym?”

“Uh, no, not really.” I admit.

“I noticed you’re trying to start off with too much weight, you can really strain your muscles and end up doing some serious tissue damage. Would you like me to help you? I’m a trainer at Planet Fitness when I home from school.”

“Yeah, that would be great!”

Rachel spends some time showing me all the machines and what muscle groups they each target. It turns out that it’s not about putting on the maximum weight I think I can handle, but setting it to a weight I am comfortable with and then doing several reps, sets of ten repetitions.

She tells me, “Don’t try to show-off like, look at what I can do. A lot of the guys around here do that, thinking they’re going to impress someone. Keeping in shape is not about how much can you lift, it’s about sticking to a good routine. You will be able to add more weight gradually as you work yourself up to it.”

She lays out a plan suited for me work with. I ask her, “My roommate, Alex, is interested in getting into better shape, would you be willing to help him out too?”

“Sure! I’m down here most mornings by 6:30, I’ll be happy to help him.”

“Thanks, Rachel.”

My muscles are already feeling the burn from the 45-minute workout as I go back up to the 4th floor, but I feel really good too. I’m glad they have this facility here.

I take a seat on the couch in the Common Room to watch some TV. A girl, from the East Wing, has a talk-show on featuring six trashy looking women, all fighting over some super-scuzzy, trailer-park dude, covered in tats with half his teeth missing. When I see guys like this, it has always confounded me that there are any women, trashy or not, that would allow such a scumbag to actually stick his dick in them; and this creep apparently boned all six of them! I can sure chalk that up to the many mysteries of life...

Alex is still snoring away as I let myself back into our room. I grab a change of clothes, my shower tote and head to the showers. There are quite a few more people up and around now.

The shower-room is a full house today. I take a seat on the bench and wait for one to free-up. I see the blond guy from the meeting yesterday (the one who was asking about the no jackin’-it in the showers sign) emerge from one of the stalls, looking quite refreshed. He sees me waiting and motions with his thumb, “All yours, Buddy.” Umm, I don’t think so, I think to myself. I know all too well what he likes to do in there. Even though I have flip-flops on, I’ll pass.

I put on an act like I forgot something, “Thanks, but just realized I have to go back to my room, forgot my shampoo.”

I return ten minutes later and find a different shower stall open.

I arrive at Milverton Marketplace at 11:45, 15-minutes early for my interview with Mr. Curtis, the store manager. I walk in and ask the cashier where I might find him. She grabs the mic for the P.A. system, “Mr. Curtis, there is a young man here to see you.”

She clicks off the mic and says, “He’ll be right here.”

“Thank you.”

A few minutes later, a thin, balding man in his late 40s to early 50s approaches, he seems a bit impatient as he vigorously motions for me to follow him.

“Are you Mr. Stevenson?”

“Yes sir, that’s me.”

He leads me to his cluttered office in the back, “Have a seat.” Pulling out a file with my job application, “I see you are on time, that’s a good start. Okay, Mr. Stevenson, tell me about where you have worked previously. It says here you worked at a Pizza Depot?”

“Yes sir, I worked there for a year and half. I started out as bus-boy and clean-up, then I moved up into the kitchen as a pizza cook. After that, they trained me on how to run the cash regist -”

“So, you’re familiar with SFHP? Safe Food Handling Procedure?”

“Yes, sir.”

“What hours would you be available to work?”

“I have classes on Monday through Thursday till 3:00, so after 4:00 on those days would be good and anytime on Friday through Sunday. Although, I would prefer not work on Sunday after-”

He cuts me off, “How far is your dorm or apartment from here and what mode of transportation do you have?”

“I’m staying at Everett Hall, it’s about a mile away and I have my bike to get around. They don’t allow first-year students to bring our vehicles-”

He cuts me off again, “Yes, yes, I fully understand the Universities’ motor-vehicle policy. You do understand that once winter arrives, getting here will be a challenge?”

“Yes, I understand.”

“I can only offer minimum wage and about 12 to 15 hours per week. We would be looking at one afternoon on a Monday or a Thursday, a four to six-hour shift on Friday and a four to six-hour shift on Saturday or Sunday.”

“Sounds good to me.”

“We expect you to be on time and ready to work when you arrive. I will not tolerate any excuses for poor performance because you were out drinking all night.”

“I understand.”

“I hope you do. The kind of work you would be doing is assisting the cashiers with bagging groceries, bringing in the shopping carts from the parking lot, assisting in the bottle return area, working with stock, keeping the shelves supplied and sweeping and mopping.”

“I think I can handle all of that.”

“I know this job may look easy to you Mr. Stevenson, but you need to understand that we need you to be on your toes at all times, it can get very hectic in here.”

“I will do my best.”

“Okay,” he sighs, “We’ll try you out and see how it goes. Come in next Thursday at 4:00 and ask for Ted Emerson, he will get you started. We require you to wear black pants and black shoes, they can be the sneaker-type, but they must be black. Ted will fit you with a store logo shirt.”

I stand up, “Thank you, Mr. Curtis. I appreciate this.”

“Please don’t be a disappointment to us, Mr. Stevenson.”

Riding through town, I’m hungry for a nice big pizza to celebrate landing the job. Locking my bike up at Tony’s Brick-Oven Pizzeria, it’s cool looking restaurant amongst all the fancy buildings lining Main Street. Once seated, I order a medium peperoni, mushroom and onion with extra cheese.

While I wait, I replay the interview in my head, I think I did well. I get the impression that Mr. Curtis is going to be a different kind of boss to work for than I’m accustomed to. For example, I noticed that he likes to be called Sir or Mr. at all-times, but then again, I guess that’s normal in the working world. I’m used to easy-going Bill Moore, by contrast, Mr. Curtis doesn’t seem to be a very warm person, definitely cold and snippy. Maybe he’s had some bad luck with college kids not panning out to be good workers in the past? I’m not a goof-off, but he won’t know that about me until I’ve worked a few shifts. I’m sure everything will be fine once I get into the groove of working in a grocery store.

I enjoy the pizza, although it is a bit pricy, probably paying more because of the trendy atmosphere here at Tony’s Brick-Oven. But, it was still very good, I would come back.

Back on campus, I make a stop in at the Admin Building and get my Official Student ID squared away. The head-shot picture they took looks dorky, but isn’t that how it always goes on any form of picture ID, driver’s license, etc.?

There’s a huge crowd at the Campus Bookstore today. I make my way through and find the ones I need for two of my classes, Creative Writing 101 and Philosophy 101. My other two classes, General Psychology 101 and Economics have online books that I can access with my laptop. Just these two books came to $300, one was $125 and the other $175, talk about insane! I was warned that college textbooks are expensive.

My parents set me up with a credit card to use while I’m away, but I can only use it for supplies, books, clothes, anything school-related or emergencies. I can’t use it for things like eating out at restaurants (because I don’t feel like going to the cafeteria), buying X-Box games or partying, basically all the non-essential stuff. I got the part-time job to earn my own money for that kind of thing.

I get back to the dorm around 5:30, I’ll see if Alex wants to go the cafeteria in an hour or so, I’m still stuffed from the pizza at Tony’s.

I let myself in and stop ... okay, Dude, really? Alex is not here, but his dirty clothes are scattered all over the floor and his bed. Just to get in the room, I have to gingerly step over his nasty undershorts, complete with a prominent brown racing-stripe on the inner backside. I didn’t think I would need to bring a pair of extra-long cooking tongs from home to pick up such things and toss ‘em on out of my way. Let’s be honest here, I’m not a neat-freak by any stretch of the word, but this is ridiculous. I use the toe of my shoe to carefully slide the toxic underwear under his bed so I don’t have to look at them.

I text Alex, “Where are you?” felt like asking what the fuck is up with the dirty laundry display, but instead texted, “Wanna go eat at 7:00?”

Alex texts back, “Hey Kyle. I’m in town with Zach and Connor. Go on to dinner without me, I’ll catch up later.”

“Okay.” I reply.

A couple minutes later, I get, “Sorry about the mess in the room, I’ll take care of it when I get back.”

At least he acknowledged it...

At 8:00, I come back to the room from the cafeteria, Alex is still out. My phone bloops, it’s a text from Renee, “Hey, Sport! How’s college life?”

“Great!” I answer and then ask, “Can I call you?”

“Sure!”

She answers, “Hey, Hot College Guy!”

“Hey, Renee.”

“So, how is going? Are you settled-in and learning your way around?”

“Yeah, I can’t believe it’s already my third day here.”

“You will be amazed at how fast time flies at school. How do you like the dorm?”