So here’s the first section of Thunder, the story that an wonderful (read evil) muse banged me on the head with on Friday night. If you want to read more I’ve got it on this site.
Naomi is, as you’ll see, a book blogger. She is running from her small town in North Carolina for a purpose the reader does not yet know, and is only in search of one thing—freedom from her past.
Chapter 1—starting fresh
I slammed the car do behind me. That had a lot of significance to me, just slamming the door. I slammed it on my memories, I slammed it on my past. I was starting over. Nobody here would judge me, nobody here was prejudice against me, nobody here knew me. Although that last thought wasn’t exactly an encouraging one.
It was a little unnerving, walking up towards the dorms, not knowing any of the people around me, not knowing any of the landscape or buildings. I had never even visited the campus. I didn’t even know if I was in the right spot.
I had not picked Campbell University for its reputation or its pretty campus or its programs. I picked it because it was the first college that sent me an advertisement, the first one that accepted me, and the one with the most financial aid. After all, almost every college had a writing program, I lucked out when I found they had a good Library Science also. I didn’t care where I got the degree, I just wanted to get it.
If I was being honest with myself, I’d admit that I hadn’t gone to college to get a degree, because I didn’t really want one. I had a job, I had a career, I had made a name for myself. But I needed to get out of New Bern, and college seemed like the fastest way out. It would keep me busy. I could study, work, and read. That was the story of my life, recently.
I knew there was more to my life than just study, work, read. But lately, that had been the only thing I wanted. So I had strived for just those things. No friends, no family, no social life, limited internet (because you can’t be a book blogger without being on the internet, it just doesn’t work). I didn’t want to think about anything except the things that were important. And since those were my priorities, those were the things I worked for.
I trudged up the stairs to my dorm room, carrying my few bags. I was on the top floor, directly across from a boys dorm which I couldn’t remember the name of. I could look into their windows and see guys moving back into their rooms after their Christmas breaks. I made a mental note to keep my windows shut at all times.
When I finally got to the top, I swiped the card that I had gotten from the check-in earlier. The door unlocked and I pushed it open, exposing a small room with five doors. On either side, there were two rooms that were shared by students. On the back end was a bathroom.
I turned directly to my right: Room 221B. I bit my lip, feeling a little smug. I wasn’t a bit like Sherlock Holmes, but I knew some serious studying would be going on in that room, just like Sherlock had mused over his facts and various cases.
I had the room all to myself. I had come in halfway through the year, starting in the spring semester instead of the fall one, as this whole college thing had been a whim. I knew I was lucky to get a room. This had been the last empty room in the college. I had been offered my own room, or a chance to share with four other girls in a suite. I picked solitude.
It was a weakness of mine, as I had been noticing in the past few months. A nasty habit that I knew I’d have to change. If I was going to make any friends this semester, I would have to start interacting with people. But I wasn’t ready for that yet.
I just wanted to get moved in. That was my goal. Focus on one thing at a time, Naomi. I told myself.
After a few trips I had moved everything in. I organized my clothes, I organized my shelf with my few objects of importance. An empty picture frame that my brother had glued sequins to and given me when he was four, a jewelry box with two pairs of earrings that I never wore, a TI-86 plus graphing calculator, and a pencil cup filled with mechanical pencils and led refils.
Then I organized my books. I set them up on my floor by the foot of my bed, with the top priority ones closest to the window. I used the classics that I always kept with me—Sherlock Holmes, Pride and Prejudice, the complete works of William Shakespeare—as a bookend on one side to keep them from falling over. On the other side I stacked the low-priority ones.
I dumped my extremely expensive textbooks on my desk and started filling my 3-ring binders with filler paper. As I looked at my textbooks, I mused why couldn’t I be a textbook reviewer? I would love to be able to get a $189 textbook free in the mail for review…
All of a sudden I heard a huge crash and a loud screech. I dropped my 3-ring binder on the floor, the filler paper spilling out everywhere. Pounding started in the other room, like someone was banging on the doors and screaming. I dashed out of the room and thrust my head into the room across from mine.
A tall brunette with curly brown hair and a little nose ring was jumping around the room, moving her body in ways I recognized but never had enough gut to try myself. A short blonde was turning down the volume of a boom-box… I realized the pounding and screaming was what she called music.
The brunette turned off the music when she saw me, and smiled an obnoxious smile. Immediately my defenses went up. She looked like she was going to say something to try to intimidate me.
“Hey! I’m Lexi you’re the new girl Dory told us about, aren’t you? Sorry about the music I guess I should have said something, did I surprise you?”
Well, I thought, she sounds friendly. I tried to relax but had a hard time. Her expression still looked a little proud. “Um, it’s ok. I just… didn’t realize it was…” I stopped before I said something she’d consider offensive. “I mean I didn’t recognize the artist and I thought… I mean it sounded like… actually—I’m sorry I just… I totally said that wrong.” I finished weakly, utterly embarrassed. Here we go again, I thought woefully.
She laughed. “It’s ok, I did the same thing to Lisa last semester, she thought I was killing someone in here.” She motioned over her shoulder to the blonde girl, who was looking at me suspiciously for a reason I couldn’t understand. I looked back at Lexi when she started speaking again. “Like I said I should have warned you don’t feel bad.” She winked.
I smiled, relieved she wasn’t annoyed at my apparent lack of contemporary music education.
“what’s your name?” Lisa asked me when Lexi stopped for a breath.
“Naomi.” I tried to smile.
“that’s… different.”
I tried to hide my expression, but I wasn’t even sure what my face looked like. I didn’t know how I felt about that.
“Thanks,” I think. “Um… What time is dinner?”
“Any time. They’re open from 7am to 9pm. Just go when you’re hungry.” Lisa turned around and began sorting various inanimate objects on her tiny shelf above her desk.
“Ok… thanks.” I smiled at Lexi and left them as quickly as I could.
If that was the kind of music they played in this dorm… I would either have to get some ear plugs, or I’d have to do all my work in the library. And the library was one of my biggest distractions. Maybe I could find a coffee shop around here or something. But then again, it was Buies Creek. I had to drive two hours through back country roads to get here. I was 45 minutes away from the nearest Wal-mart. The only thing out here to do besides study was talk to the cows. And I wasn’t even sure they had cows.
I looked at my stack of books. I had three books to read and review this week, and two more due the week after. I had a stack of low-priority books that didn’t have deadlines but still had authors waiting for reviews, and of course I had my textbooks. I was going to have to find somewhere to read.
But I tried not to think about that right away because I had a lot to do today. I had to figure out which buildings were which and where I belonged when and—
On my way out the door to go back to my car, I almost walked into two other girls. The girl in front was tall with straight brown hair pulled back into a knotted bun at the nape of her neck, flat brown eyes, high cheekbones, and a turned up nose. Her eyes squinted slightly when I almost hit her.
“Excuse me,” she snapped. “Watch it.” she pushed past me. The other girl, whose hair was styled similarly but a lot messier and was about a foot and a half shorter than Lisa skipped after her, pulling three suitcases. She didn’t tell me to move it, but she didn’t apologize when she rolled over my foot, either. I tried not to glare at them as I left the dorms.
A red-haired girl in the room beside me poked her head out, a tired, dreary, almost dopy expression on her pale face. “Don’t mind Emily, she’s always mean.” She said. Another girl who looked exactly like her poked her head out beside her. The other girl looked happy and was flushed with excitement. It struck me as funny—like tweedle-dee and tweedle-dum from Alice in Wonderland. I smiled a little and nodded at them, then made my escape and went off to find the cafeteria and maybe a coffee shop.
This was going to be an interesting semester.
So that’s the first chapter.
Comments? Criticism? It is probably the fastest story I’ve ever gotten. I was inspired on the 12th of February, and I’m already on Chapter 3… Maybe I should be majoring in writing instead of Criminal Justice? idk. Why not both?
We’ll see ;)
