Page 29 of June

“Well, if that’s what you want… It’s your date,” Rory said. “Do you want to go?” she asked Logan.

“I’m ready when you are,” Logan replied.

“Text me later. Tell me how it went,” Rory said to Enid.

“Okay,” she agreed.

Rory and Logan stood, and Enid watched them walk off hand in hand, with Logan carrying a bag from the campus bookstore that likely had Rory’s book in it. Enid closed her own book, leaned back, and sighed. Rory was right, though. If she wanted to actually eat dinner tonight, she needed to find a place that had reservations because most places would be packed, and she didn’t want to have to awkwardly sit or, more likely, stand in the lobby of some restaurant with loud music on her first date with Jill. She found one place that she thought would be okay and made a reservation for seven-thirty. She was supposed to pick Jill up at seven. That would give them time to do the whole awkward thing at the front door, for Jill to maybe give her the tour of her place, and then, for them to drive to the restaurant.

Enid opened her banking app and checked her balance. She had enough money for the dinner and gas for the next few weeks, but she really needed to find a job. Her parents would loan her money – well, they’d give it to her, really – and she’d pay them back whether they wanted her to or not, but she didn’t want to ask. She needed to get out of this damn rut.

Pulling up the app she had recently downloaded for her job search, she scrolled through listings and thought that maybe sheshouldtry to ask Melinda for a job, but in the office or something, not as a tour guide. Maybe Mel needed help with the books. Enid could do that easily, and it would just be a fewhours a week. She could do the payroll for her, but that might be awkward because she’d know what Jill makes, and maybe Jill wouldn’t want her to know that if they were dating. She sighed again and continued scrolling. Could Logan teach her how to bartend? Candace’s place was hardly a mixologist’s paradise. Logan mostly poured beer and shots. Enid could learn how to do that and work there a few shifts a week. That could help. She hated having to rely on others to help her, though, so she leaned forward, and with more determination, she opened a few listings to see if there was a match.

“Hi.”

Enid heard the familiar voice and looked up to see Caroline standing there, smiling down at her. Enid locked her phone and smiled back, happy that her ridiculous plan of sitting out here at the same table had worked.

“Hey,” she said.

“Can I maybe join you?” Caroline asked.

“Yeah, of course,” Enid replied and motioned for her to sit in the chair next to her.

“I’m glad you’re here,” Caroline said as she put her bag on the chair Rory had been sitting in minutes earlier.

“Youare?”

“Yeah. I was kind of mad at myself yesterday because I didn’t–”

“Get my info?” Enid interjected for some reason and smiled wide.

She probably looked as nervous as she felt, which was odd because she shouldn’t be nervous, but when Caroline nodded, at least some of Enid’s nerves dissipated.

CHAPTER 8

Caroline was walking out of her building and down the street, with Viv in tow. She had asked Viv if she wanted to go for a late lunch at one of the other dining halls on campus. They typically ate in the hall downstairs in their own building, but the same food week after week got boring, so Caroline liked to mix it up when she had the time. The dining hall in the union was cash-only, though, so they couldn’t use their meal plans for it. The food there was the best on campus because, of course, it was, but there were six other dining halls to choose from where they could swipe their student IDs and get their food paid for with their plans.

Caroline’s meal plan included fifteen meals per week, and they didn’t roll over, so if she didn’t use them, she lost them. All seven dining halls had sit-down spaces where you carried your tray through a line and couldn’t take anything to-go, but one of them had to-go options for lunch seven days a week. She could pick six items, and it would count as one meal. She already had drinks back in her room, so she didn’t need one of those to be included in her six, and that meant that she could pick two hot items for lunch now, like a hot dog or chicken sandwich and some fries or something, and grab four items that she could eat as snacks later. Caroline sometimes grabbed the trail mix or fruitsnacks. It gave her something to eat when she got hungry that she didn’t have to buy with cash.

On top of her meal plan, her parents also gave her fifty dollars a week for food. She tried to be smart with that money and usually went to the grocery store to buy stuff instead of eating out, but she allowed herself ten to fifteen bucks a week to grab fast food, which didn’t even get her that much these days. With that meal plan, she also had one thousand dollars per semester to spend in campus stores, which included the bookstores and the small convenience store attached to one of the dining halls, but that money only worked for the fall and spring semesters. For the summer session, she had two hundred dollars to spend, so as she and Viv walked silently, she tried to remember what she had inside her buddy Frank and what snacks were on her small crate shelves behind her desk. Fifteen meals were only enough for the week because she skipped breakfast some days to make up for the other meals she would need. Today, she decided she would swipe her card twice to get the items for lunch and stock back up on her snacks, and she’d skip breakfast tomorrow to make up for it. She could still afford to grab something from the convenience store, and they had this juice drink that she really liked, so she would grab a couple of those.

“Are you here?” Viv asked.

“Huh?” she asked back, looking over at her.

“You haven’t said anything since we left.”

“You haven’t, either,” Caroline replied.

“Actually, I asked what you were going to get for lunch about two minutes ago,” Viv said.

“You did?” Caroline shook her head at herself. “Sorry. I guess I was thinking about something else. I’ll probably get the chicken sandwich and fries if they’re fresh.”

“Me too,” Viv said. “So, what are your plans for the rest of the day? I’m thinking about checking out the movie they’re showing at the union theater.”

There was a small theater on campus that only had one movie playing in it a few times a week, but the tickets were three dollars for students, which was far better than the major off-campus theaters. The price even included one free small bag of popcorn per student. It wasn’t a bad deal, but it did mean that they’d be stuck seeing the only movie playing this week, and she’d heard of it and wasn’t interested.

“The ticketsarecheaper there,” Caroline said. “But it’s some action thing, so I don’t know.”

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