The truth is, I need to tell them I don't want to go back to college. Emptying out my dorm room felt amazing. After four semesters of trudging dutifully through finance and accounting classes, with a little bit of math and English thrown in for good measure, I was glad to empty out that tiny little closet, those cramped cubbies. I was happy to chuck all my stuff into the back of Subaru and set out for the highway toward this admittedly strange destination.
Two years in college felt like a prison sentence, and I’m finally on parole.
Still, I take my duffel off the bed and move it toward the desk to attempt to do what my dad asked. The books clunk together when I set it on top. They're worthless now. Six hundred dollars in textbooks, and for what? How can a book possibly cost $150 when you can only use it once? That seems stupid.
I never even picked a major, just straddled the fence between business management and finance, hoping that I could see myself as a banker or a CFO or something. But it never clicked. It all just seemed so absurd.
And really, shouldn't my parents have known that? It's been a source of family pride that we are the kind of people who can always be on the road, always ready for the next new adventure, always taking up the challenge when it's presented to us. How could they have thought that I wanted to sit in an eight-by-twelve-foot dorm room for years at a time? Scribbling out notes in spiral-bound notebooks until somebody granted me yet another piece of paper? Why would they think that was me?
I push aside the pale curtains and peek out through the pretty, divided light window. Just below, my dad marches across the lawn to my mom. They stand there moving their hands and pivoting ninety degrees this way and that, like keys that won't turn completely in their locks.
In a few moments they separate and she walks around the side of the house, while he walks to the back of my car. He pulls out another couple of boxes and stacks them on the edge of the driveway, then takes my guitar case and closes the trunk.
Who would've thought that guitar case would cause so much trouble in my life? But we've argued over it quite a bit. Last time we talked, I laid down the ultimatum that I would only go back to school if I could major in music. If college was so important to them, I should at least have some say so in what I studied, was my reasoning.
That conversation didn't go very well.
But I can't help but be excited when I see him carrying my guitar. It's like watching my own kid from far away, knowing it's coming closer, knowing it will be right back in my arms at any moment now.
Dad clomps back up the stairs and carefully angles the case into the room ahead of him, making sure not to bang it against the shiny wood work. He casts me a look and then lays the case on the bed, scowling at it for just a millisecond before looking at me again.
“Well,” he announces finally. “That’s just about it, I guess. Welcome home, Vanessa!”
“Thanks, Dad,” I smile. I know I have a thousand things I need to say to them if we are going to work through this together, but I don't have to say them all right at this moment. We've got the rest of the summer.
Chapter 2
Vanessa
After getting my clothes out of boxes and into dresser drawers, I figure I'm pretty much done unpacking. My newly pink room is easy to organize. Just like my dorm room, it's more or less made to hold a modest amount of stuff and that's exactly what I've got.
My dad was right, though, this bathroom really is nice. In the dorms, I shared a bathroom with about forty other women. Their stuff was everywhere, and they were constantly making a racket, twenty-four hours a day.
Having this nice, clean space all to myself is an unimaginable luxury. It's white from the ceiling to the floor tiles. Even the shower is enclosed in white subway tiles. The counter is white, the cabinets are white. Someone has thrown a nice, fluffy, turquoise rug in the middle of the floor as the only splash of color. I wiggle my toes against the kitten soft tufts and smile to myself. It's like being in a hotel, almost.
I suddenly realize all this counterspace is mine. I can just leave stuff right on the counter: toothbrushes, hairspray, nail polish. Whatever I want. No more carting a basket back and forth to a communal bathroom.
Holy crow, this is amazing.
Actually, I could use a shower. I twist the handle to set the temperature at about two o'clock, which usually corresponds to some kind of warm temperature water. After undressing, I glance myself in the wide mirror over the sink. I’m not a little girl anymore. I definitely got the freshman fifteen. Sophomore seven, too.
I pinch the cylinder of plush that circles around my middle, and switch my weight to my other side. It's not bad. I was always a skinny, wiry child. But now I look grown, womanly. My roommate at school was just a tiny cheerleader of a thing, and when we would go out the boys all stared at me. They liked the cleavage. They liked the jiggle when I walked. I like it too. It's nice to feel so feminine, so solid.
I have to remember to thank my mother for stocking my shower, too. I didn't even think about it before I stepped into the enclosure, but there's already a couple of shampoos and a nice fluffy shower puff in here.
As I lather up with the lavender scented liquid soap, I feel my irritation with my mom revealing itself for what it really is: nervousness. She's really sweet to me. She's really thoughtful, even if she's not much of a talker. I'm just worried that quitting college is going to disappoint her deeply. I'm worried what she'll think of me.
I should try to be nice. I should try to appreciate the little things, like this wonderful sulfate-free shampoo she picked out. Or this hibiscus scented conditioner. I love floral conditioner. We both have really thick, blonde hair, and sometimes when I shake my head I catch a little whiff of my shampoo throughout the day. She knows that. She knows me really well.
So, she will probably understand what I have to tell her.
Steam and heat dissolves my anxiety and I feel good, better than I have in a long time. I feel clean, pampered. I turn around and let the strong water currents massage my shoulders, the rivulets trickling down my spine and into the deep crevice between my butt cheeks. As I'm washing, I let myself enjoy the sensation of the water, the slippery soap, as though the perfume saturates me from the inside out.
My fingers drift down my smooth, slick belly to my sex, lightly flicking back and forth over my swollen lips. Circling lightly with my middle finger, I let myself lean forward against the tile and push my heels shoulder width apart. In moments I can feel my own juices adding to the slickness, thinking about this luxurious privacy, my body alive and solid.
The orgasm is quick, sparking like a match, burning and then going out. My heart pounds as my body clenches twice, three times, releasing the last of my frustration.
I smile to myself as the water pushes itself over my shoulders, covering me like a veil. I stand there for a little while longer until the water starts to cool. I probably used up the hot water. Good thing it’s the middle of the afternoon and nobody else is likely to try a shower.