The calendar now said march, the first month of spring, and the semester was well on its way. Some students would spend long afternoons preparing for their mid terms, while others more privileged ones (or so they thought) would spend long evenings to party their life away....
Frost lingered on the window these early morning hours, but the snow was already showing signs of giwing way this morning while our dear students were waking up and getting ready to take on another day..
Oliver Freddy felt a little uneasy as he went out the door this
morning, something was up, it was soon to be here again.. just like
it was with every season... It definately felt a little confined
outside as he made his way through the mist.
A breath of milder air had swept across the landscape to melt the snow on the ground and the ice on the lake and turn the resulting moisture into a smothering mist to encapsulate the lower areas of the town... but he could still see it through the damp air, as it hang there in the sky with its faint glow colouring the mist in a ghostly hue... it was soon to be here again, and he didn't like it...
Inge
didn't really care about that though. For one because she hadn't been
outside yet, but instead walking around the house to try to clean up
the dirty laundry that was always scattered around the place, and
secondly because her mind was filled with new ideas for her next
novel.. It was going to be a romance/drama novel, and she already had
the perfect name for it... The Nail Clipper...
She was so focused on her writing she didn't even notice the smelly bowl of food leftovers in the room.. atleast not until after she had been writing for a while...
************
Meanwhile in the next room, romance was happening between Liz
Tarry and Skip Taylor, which was good for Inge, as now Liz would have
something else to think about then her boyfriend..
After a good couple of hours of writing, the fog had lifted and it was starting to look and feel like spring outside. Winter was quick to let go this year, she thought, and and this was the perfect moment to get some fresh air and to practice painting another graffiti piece..
Ah yes, the lovely sounds of chirping birds coming alive again
after a long harsh winter over the sound of a spraycan decorating
another brick wall.. good times. ;)
She is really happy about her result.. this is definately the best piece she has done yet, she thinks. This wall certainly looks much better than it just did a few moments before...
..however she can't stand there and admire her art piece forever,
as she too has to run off to attend todays lecture..
..but as she gets closer to the Student Union a man with a known face is seen jogging almost alongside her on the lawn.. She doesn't notice him, she's to preoccupied with where she has to go, but that man is her father, Jarle..
..now what is up with this? Last month it was Inges mom coming for a random visit, without informing her daughter, and now her father is here, without informing anyone.. he's just observing her from a distance as she runs inside for her lecture..
..and then he spends his time practicing chess just outside, seemingly waiting for her to finish so he can keep observing her.. or something like that..
Meanwhile Oliver Freddy has gone upstairs to the canteen to get some lunch, before sitting down next to Shasha Parks to study. Shasha has gone for the old school route today, choosing to work with pen and paper instead of on a computer. She appears very busy doing so, not even seeming to notice that Oliver Freddy sits at her table. After a while they are joined by what I assume is a freshman student, Beate Salberg, who sits down to have her lunch, and is also a little more talkative...
After she leaves and Shasha falls asleep from exhaustion, Oliver Freddy finds his own table to study in peace (without someone snoring across the table...), but that doesn't last long because Madeleine Noetal, Inges professor from their first semester, suddenly decides to jam along with the music from the speaker just behind her...
Maybe the cafeteria isn't the best place to study, however Oliver Freddy seems pretty unphased... being motivated to learn as much as possible and to get a good grade to show his mom and his aunt when he gets back home definately helps..
If peace and quiet was what he wanted, he probably would have been better off studying at Inges lecture. Her only other fellow student is Gabby Ahmed. The drop off rate for art studies on higher levels is pretty high it seems...
*********
After
reading through the chapters that are planned to be covered on their
next lecture, Oliver Freddy continues his journey down the scientific
path, this time to do some research on a sample of a cockroach he has
had lying around for a while.
How does the cockroach DNA differ
from the DNA of an anchovy, a human and a werewolf hybrid? And what
parts of the DNA is unique to each species? If he could figure this
out, he thought, he would know what parts to ignore when one time in
the future, hopefully, making an attempt at splicing the DNA of
humans and plants...
Inge
left her lecture now with the desire to make a valuable painting.. in
this fair spring weather finding a motive that was outside appeared
to be the best idea, however she didn't want to make a traditional
painting of nature, but instead try for something that had a message
and perhaps was a little provoking..
..and as she ran off, she still didn't notice that her father was
just nearby, now pretending to watch the fountain, as if they didn't
have an almost identical one in Sunset Valley... but this fountain
was not just a fountain, it was an art piece...
When Inge approached one of the many big parking lots around
campus – specifically the one between the School of Business and
their dormitory, she got an idea.. she would paint the parking lot...
not because it was pretty, but because it was ugly...
Imagine that, here, by this beautiful lake,
surrounded by nature and wilderness, a university campus was built
and the land was paved with grey parking lots filled with polluting
cars... well, atleast once it was that way.. of course nowadays many
cars were electric cars which didn't pollute atleast the local
environment, but still... this was an ugly parking lot, and she
wanted to paint it as a statement against mankinds destructive
ways... if it wasn't for this ugly asphalt surface of metal scrap
this could have been a tranquil forest, rich with insects and animals
and birds...
...and speaking of insects.. and animals, and birds.. and trees.. Oliver Freddy thought he had done another brilliant discovery when he had successfully on his own know mapped out the DNA of a cockroach.
It didn't seem very related right now, but he thought of this as another small step to fulfilling his goal of creating plantsims.. a more environmentally friendly version of the human too, though saving the world or other such things wasn't necessarily his goal.. it wouldn't hurt to have made a contribution in that direction as well...
It was a moment worthy of celebration, so he walked back upstairs to the cafeteria to find some music and enjoy his small victory by doing a little dance in between the lunch tables...
Inges painting was coming along nicely, but a painter also needs food so as to not end up starving, so she ran back towards the Student Union to have lunch while soaking in the energy she felt from the nice greenery that surrounded her.. small patches of nature embedded within the brick and concrete human builds...
*********
Inside the cafeteria she walks right past her boyfriend
dancing while pretending not to see him.. that's just a little to
embarrassing. She doesn't want to tell him, but she would rather he
didn't do that... she has a social standing to think
of...
Her spray painting had just earned her a little bit of reputation among the rebels, and she wanted to keep it that way.. A rebel didn't dance like a nerd in the cafeteria for everyone to watch...
She finishes her lunch while doing her best to discuss art
with some clueless slob who just showed up at her table to get a free
meal by licking the crumbs and leftovers from all the other
plates..
Oliver Freddys
dancing then quickly turned into a panic attack.. "It was here!"
He knew it was here, because over by the counter Samanthas younger
sister Ulrikke did her transformation...
However, it wasn't the werewolves that terrified him, as he knew that they were nice people from Inges friendship with Samantha.. no, it was the celestial body itself that scared him.. as pretty much anything whose origins was outside the safe sphere of the earth did... as far as he knew, they only brought bad things with them... it was around the times when the moon was full that the voices was at their most intense, and that couldn't be a coincidence...
The best way for Oliver Freddy to deal with this looming sense of terror was to do his best by blocking out as best as he could by focusing even harder on his studies..
Inge – who was completely unaffected by the movements of the celestial bodies – went the opposite way, as she went downstairs to the room with the research stations to play computer games – and receive yet another party invitation from Jefferey Dean. Now that the snow had cleared, he was hosting a bonfire party and of course, wanted Inge to join.
Going there, she has her thoughts of raising babies again.. and probably if it wasn't for the fact that raising children and being a student may seem a little bit like incompatible life styles, there's a high chance she would find herself pregnant or being a mother already.. but you know how it is...
For the time being its all about expanding her brain with
knowledge, enjoying the student party life and gaining as much
popularity as she can.. and as usual then, she does her best to
kickstart the party by turning on every stereo that isn't already on
before greeting the host of the party..
The bonfire party, that is, so she also took responsibility to do another thing that the host fail to do – to actually light the fire. ;)
She throws on a few more logs to build a real fire and watches as it attracts the attention of the other party guests..
..before shedding a few tears again, because even if she has been pretty popular among her fellow students for a while, the memories of being a loser are still there, and the popularity she has gained sometimes feels a little fragile, like she could lose it at any given time if she doesn't do the work to maintain it...
Oliver Freddy continued his life of science by practicing holding a presentation of his most recent findings...
...before exiting out in the hallway to study the potted plants
there, pondering what would happen if they were alive.. what would
they be thinking and saying?
His ponderings turned to fear however, when the plants appeared to
respond to them.. they weren't supposed to do that.. yet... which
only meant one thing..
Time to get out of there as fast as possible! It could also be that what he heard was just the rumbling from his stomach, and that his anxiety due to the full moon had tricked his mind into thinking he heard voices.. but he was pretty sure that what he heard, whether it came from the plants or not, definately came from somewhere outside himself.. after all, he knew his stomach well enough to know what it sounded like when he was hungry.. and it was not like a group of voices talking to him..
At Jeffereys party a passing hailstorm had led everyone to temporarily flee inside to take cover, and for some reason lead Asala Karam to think it was now time to find herself right at home and switch into her sleepwear..
She didn't change back as they went outside back to the bonfire who had miraculously survived the hailstorm, and kept eyeing Inge with jealousy as she kept talking to Jefferey by the bonfire..
The conversation went well and Inge picked up on Jeffereys ambition and that he apparently had a natural talent when it came to making lips join, as well as being irresistible.. but not irresistible enough for Inge, because when he thought the conversation was going well enough for him to move in on getting a hug, he was met with surprise and rejection..
Sure enough, Oliver Freddy was a little nerdy and sometimes weird, and no longer one of the cool kids like Jefferey... but she couldn't do that, not even a hug.. she knew what her plan was in the long run, and Jefferey wasn't a part of that one...
It didn't end their conversation though.. Inge knew her limits, but at the same time didn't want to upset Jefferey to much as it might hurt her social standing, so she kept listening to him for a little while longer as he bragged about his potential future income.. still under the intense gaze from Asala.. why was he talking to Inge all evening... and not her...?
"Look at them! It's so disgusting! Now she's pretending to be all up in ears over his cooking – when she hasn't even tasted his food! That pretentious, wanna-be artsy girl and her disgusting paintings...." Asala thought to herself with resentment.. doing what one can to be as popular as possible, one always runs the risk of becoming unpopular with someone else..
Inge never even noticed Asalas presence though and has a good time chatting with Jefferey and enjoying the heat from the bonfire until she thinks its time to go home, but not without complementing Jefferey for his party and his awesome nachos which she has yet to taste... and from the looks of it, he hasn't tasted them either, but he probably will soon..
Then its off into the night. Oliver Freddy might already be in bed
at this hour, so she should probably walk in quietly when she gets
back home to get a shower, because she does reek quite heavily from
the bonfire and the various test tubes that were thrown into it
during the night...
*********
..but actually, she was wrong in her assumption. He wasn't in bed.. after he had gotten home, he had finished his supper and then sat up to wait for her...
Inge then felt a little guilty and nervous, and began to excuse herself by saying that she was just over at Jeffereys house, which was true, and that she just forgot about time...
Oliver Freddy didn't want to listen to that, so he stopped her before she was allowed to ramble on.. he wasn't mad, and in fact he just realized that the sight.. and smell.. of his girlfriend right now made him feel a little... shall we say... aroused...
She was such an inappropriate girl, coming home late and smelling like she'd been living with a family of skunks for the past year.. and inappropriate girls deserve inappropriate behaviour.. so he quickly grabbed her by the waist to show her that even if he might not be as good of a kisser as Jefferey might be, he still knew what he was doing...
Oh my... what a man.. this was one reason why she loved him..
Jefferey, or anyone else she knew for that matter, didn't have this
about them... He was an oddball, like she had always been, and he was
inappropriate at times, not giving two ounces of oomph about
what is the correct way of doing things, something she never knew she
would be into until she met him..
Let's just hope that all of their dorm mates are heavily
asleep, because for a while now, noises of love will emanate from
their room...
Yup...
When they were done, and after a brief moment of some sweet pillow talk and a good night, Oliver Freddy fell asleep immediately.. like a log..
..whereas Inge laid there for a while, pondering about how amusing life was just now, how she could come home late smelling like a garbage can and find that her boyfriend finds it exciting...
Good night.. ;)
