The Dorm Guard

*

The next day, before everyone could get ready for school, not that anyone was in the mood to or had the desire to, Ava called a "dorm meeting."

Despite the somewhat early morning, everyone was up and awake for the meeting, some already dressed for school while others were still in their pyjamas.

I was the last one to get down and stood by Amada by the doorway.

Ava was sitting at the dining table, and upon my arrival stood up. "Okay…" she rubbed her hands together as she smiled, "Now that everyone is here, I have some important news for you all." My eyes rested on Robyn, who had sat beside Ava at the table, her gla.s.sy eyes and fisted hands led me to think she already knew what was about to be announced.

"I am leaving the dorm," Ava said.

The silence that laid over us was heavy. It was an expected announcement but equally shocking as we all shared puzzled looks. "You"re leaving?" Amada muttered.

His sister elbowed him, "That"s what she just said."

Ava nodded. "Yes. I"m leaving. Along with being expelled from White Winter Prep, my position as the translator has also been terminated," Ava forced a bigger smile and shrugged off what was happening, "The Penrose Family and I agree that it would be better if, in light of recent events, I resign quietly-"

"Better?" Bonnie spat.

Ava sighed, "Bonnie-"

"What is "better" about that?" Bonnie rolled forwards slightly, "We"ve been around this c.r.a.p all our lives, how is there anything better?"

Ava cleared her throat. "Want me to be blunt?" she asked, "It"s so I don"t embarra.s.s them, or Robyn, by a.s.sociation. Your parents would do the same thing if I did what I did under their name. We"re lucky no one wants to press charges."

"So, what happens now then?" Estelle asked. She was glaring at a spot in the table, hands clasped together, trying and barely managing to maintain her princess-like composure.

Ava paused, before answering, "I"ll be gone by the weekend. With my expulsion and termination, I have no means of sustaining myself in this dorm or this town, so I"ll be moving back home with my Ma and Pa."

"Where"s that?" Amada asked.

Ava"s smile faltered. "Too far," she answered, "Robyn will be staying with her family while they"re in town. They"ve rented a house out by Windmill Lake and are a.s.sessing their options."

Bonnie bit down on the inside of her cheek. ""a.s.sessing their options"?"

Ava glanced at Robyn, but she had yet to look at anyone. "I"m not too sure, but I"m under the impression Robyn may be moving schools as well," she explained with slight disgust, "They have agreed with me that Robyn"s wellbeing would be compromised at White Winter Prep with her "friends" there." She bunny-eared the term friends, the motion catching Robyn"s eye, and prompting a further shattered look from her. "It"s not concrete yet or anything, but likely."

We all paused, likely unsure how to respond to this. Alexis broke the silence, "This is c.r.a.ppy," she announced as she stood from her chair, "But if there"s nothing we can do, I"m going to miss you. Both of you."

Ava nodded, "Thank you, Alexis."

Alexis navigated the dining room to hug Ava, patting her on the back and reaching out to Robyn to offer similar comfort. Slowly, everyone else followed Alexis, the twins offering tearful hugs and words of encouragement, Estelle hugging her friends but couldn"t hold back that she was upset that this was happening, and Bonnie just outright announcing her disapproval of the whole situation, even voicing that she thought there was bound to be something more everyone could do. This only caused Ava to scoff and agree, but otherwise, shut down the conversation. Mia detached her water bottle from her teeth to hug the two of them, opting to sit on Robyn"s lap to elongate the hug.

Ava clapped her hands, her forced smile returning. "Now, s.h.i.tty announcements aside, pancakes anyone?"

Without an answer, Ava went to the kitchen and grabbed bowls.

The others not convinced but unsure what to say dispersed, some going back to their rooms to change for the day or taking their place at the dining table or in the living room. Robyn had yet to move, and, despite Mia attempting to get up once, clutched Mia to her lap like a doll. Whether Mia recognised something I didn"t, she didn"t struggle in her embrace like I expected, rather she rested her head against her shoulder and played with her fingers.

I stepped away from the doorway when the twins left and made my way over to Ava, who had gotten all the raw ingredients out for pancakes.

"Isn"t this usually Robyn"s job?" I tried to yarn.

Ava clicked her tongue, giving me a half smile as she replied, "How about you go ask her for pancakes then?"

I took a glance at Robyn, who had yet to move from her chair. "Is she okay?"

Ava shrugged, opening the milk and eggs, "She won"t talk to me." I almost missed what she muttered.

I pulled a bag f flour towards me, having made pancakes several times for everyone, and pulled out a measuring cup. "So, you"re leaving," I commented, "Is that what last night was about?"

Ava managed a full grin. "Way to be nosy, Lawson?" she countered, "But sort of. I was just telling my Ma I was coming home. It was nice to see them, just wish it was for something not so… grim." She cracked the eggs into a small bowl. She grumbled something when we saw bits of sh.e.l.l still in it. "I hate this…" she complained as she awkwardly picked out the egg shards.

"The eggs or the getting expelled thing?" I pried.

Ava flared her nostrils as she managed to catch the shards. "The b.l.o.o.d.y eggsh.e.l.ls," she said as she shot me a glare.

I smirked at her hateful look, causing it to falter as she mirrored my expression. "But still, silver lining, I suppose," I tried, shaking the flour to loosen it up, "I mean, you get to go home? Maybe rearrange your room? Be with your parents and little brother? That"s nice."

Ava"s face slowly dropped the more I spoke. "Ma and Pa are my grandparents. Carlos is my cousin," she explained, "Dad is in the army, so he"s overseas and stuff a lot. Ma and Pa are great but too old for proper work. My family has a history of deafness, so being a translator for a rich-a.s.s family seemed like the way to go."

Something pinged in my chest at hearing Ava speak like that. But the straight face she made, I wondered if I was incorrect in a.s.suming it was an indirect insult at Robyn. Ava paused, for a single second, and I wondered if she had a similar thought to me.

I cleared my throat, "You know, you"re allowed to be angry, Ava."

Ava took in a deep breath, puffing out her cheeks as she flicked egg yolk from her fingertips. "Yeah? At who?" She took another egg and started delicately tapping it against the side of the bowl. "Those kids?" Her gentle tapping wasn"t doing anything to the eggsh.e.l.l. "Robyn?" Small fractures started forming. "Myself?" Ava smacked the egg against the bowl, the egg awkwardly breaking and spilling both shards and yolk onto the countertop and in the bowl. She groaned, stepping away from the mess. "Me getting angry now isn"t going to fix anything," she said. We watched the egg drip down the cabinet and drip onto the ground, "I"m gonna get some paper towel. Excuse me."

Ava sped walked from the kitchen, leaving me alone with the egg mess. I sighed as I reached across the counter and pull some sheets of towel from beside the microwave, deciding I had pushed too far and to leave her alone.

Halfway through my clean-up, Robyn appeared beside me, taking the bowl and ingredients and combining them while I cleaned up. When I first met Robyn, her cooking skills left a lot to be desired, but now I watched her skilfully mix all the base mixes together, churning them by hand into a smooth texture, all with a focused expression.

I had grown rather fond of Robyn over the months I had been in the dorm with her, such a silent presence I had grown to almost rely on for company. I remembered only a few weeks ago, she had taught me a more efficient way to sew any holes in my clothes, since my old way kept coming loose by the end of the day, and another time where we got into a friendly argument over the best way to make spaghetti. We ended up making one batch each and presenting them to the judges: Ava and Estelle. According to them, we tied.

When we gave our food to Italian heritage twins Amada and Amia they scolded us for our poor efforts, but we still enjoyed ourselves.

I had never seen Robyn so unhappy before.

A subtle change from her usual attentive expression, the kind that made her seem simultaneously in the moment while also in a million other places. Now it looked like she was barely in one place, and as if her being here caused an unexplainable pain.

Despite this, she pressed on, ignoring my presence to pull out a frying pan and melt b.u.t.ter on the stove top. All the pa.s.sion was gone from her movements, everything was mechanical, nothing prompted a smile, everything was an effort.

*

Alexis laid on my bed and stared at the ceiling, her eyes darted around as if she was watching something. I sat at my desk, my biology textbook open next to my notebook. I bit down on the end of my pen in thought as I stared at a graph for the tenth time in a row willing it to make some sort of sense to me.

"Okay," I blurted out, seeking a distraction, "What"s on your mind?"

"Just stuff…" she breathed, stretching her arms above her head.

"Please," I said as I stood and plonked on the bed beside her, "Regale me. Distract me. Do something to me."

Alexis snorted. "I"ve got some ideas."

I rolled my eyes, "I"m sick of biology."

My girlfriend chuckled as she rolled on her side to face me. "I was considering the concept phenomenology my art teacher spoke of in cla.s.s," Alexis said, "Phenomenology is the philosophical study of the structures of experience and consciousness. Very heavy-handed topic, very confusing, I haven"t even wrapped my head around it yet."

"It must be hard then," I replied.

Alexis blinked, her face twitching with her thoughts as she continued, "Apparently every creative pract.i.tioner uses phenomenology even when they don"t mean to. People who do things as simple as making a chair answer a mult.i.tude of questions beyond just what they see or what the traditional function is. The weirdest idea was that everything is given a gender."

"That seems problematic in this day and age," I chuckled, reaching a hand out to tangle my fingers in her red hair.

"It"s interesting to delve into," Alexis added. I was half convinced she didn"t hear me. "The conversation was eventually on the function of door handles."

I tilted my head, "What?"

Alexis leant her head into my hand and shrugged. "We were tasked with considering every aspect of the door handle, not just its function." She started blowing raspberries as she started to recount: "Throughout my life, I"ve encountered many doors with and without appropriate handles. In one day on average, people encounter ten to twelve different doors, some which slide, making door handles pointless, and ones that have the same style doork.n.o.b on each side, making the notion of push or pull complete, utter guesswork, especially for me." Alexis was getting worked up about door handles, and I tried not to audibly laugh.

"The mental energy that runs through me when I independently must decide whether the door is suitable for pushing or pulling is exhausting." Alexis pulled away from my hand to sit up. "Imagine how I feel when I approach an office building, all I can think is; is there a handle? Does that mean it"s a pull? The last door I went through was a push, but why would there be a handle for a push? Wouldn"t a door look silly if there weren"t a pair of doork.n.o.bs on each side of the door? Is this for aesthetics? Do we care about aesthetics?" Alexis threw herself back onto my bed, arms outstretched. "And what ultimately happens when I reach the door? I either run nose first into the gla.s.s, which is always hilarious to others, successfully pick the fifty-fifty chance based on ambiguous visual cues that I can even see, or I wait until someone else goes through the whole ordeal for me."

I couldn"t hold in my chuckles, the lightest snicker escaping me. Alexis reached forwards and placed a hand on my face, her palm pressed against my nose before adopting a lighter touch and pinching my cheeks. "You find phenomenology funny?"

I cleared my throat, "No. Of course not." I took her hand off my nose and planted a soft kiss on it, "Your pa.s.sion for it is interesting. What does that have to do to be a creative pract.i.tioner? Plan on making door handles?"

Alexis chuckled along with me. "People can get lost in considering phenomenology. It can be applied to almost every aspect of life, existence. It"s ripe with the potential for Existentialism," she said, "I don"t enjoy thinking about it though."

I frowned, shuffling a little closer, "Why not?"

"All my opinions on these things are apparently wrong. Because I can"t traditionally see I obviously see things a little differently. That"s one sense down," Alexis pressed her hands against her eyes in annoyance, "And at the same time, I really don"t think someone making a chair is giving it a gender when it"s being made. Why would they care? They"re making a G.o.dd.a.m.n chair!"

"Mmmhmm?" I placed an arm around her front and snuggled against her, brushing my nose against her neck and closed my eyes.

She shifted in my grip to hug me. "I"ll shush now."

I grunted, "No, you don"t have to."

"You clearly want me to," she replied mid-chuckle.

"I"m just tired," I confessed, "But I"m still listening. Promise."

Alexis ran her hand through my hair, playfully pulling against some of it as we laid together. "Hey, I"ve got a date idea if you"re interested," I said when the silence dwelled. Alexis hummed in response. "I overheard some kids at school talk about this carnival that"s setting up over the weekend. Sound like fun?"

Alexis hummed again, "Yeah, that sounds good. Maybe it could be a sending off for Robyn and Ava," Alexis considered, "Unless you wanted it to just be a date?"

I lifted my head, "More the merrier, just so long as I don"t have to share you for the whole day." I gave her some quick kisses when someone knocked on my door. I sat up, much to Alexis" annoyance, and called out, "Come in."

I saw the shadow under the door, but they didn"t enter. "Must be Robyn," Alexis said as I stood up and approached my door.

When I opened it I saw Robyn, rocking back and forth on her heels and jumping when I opened the door. "Hey Robyn," I said, quickly opting to make very vague signs, "Something wrong?"

Robyn tapped her fingers together, the motion alone confusing me as to whether she was trying to say something or was just tapping her fingers. Her movements became fluent as she spoke, but it took me a while to understand. "Are you doing anything this weekend, Landon?" I think she asked.

I shook my head, trying, badly, to sign back. "Nothing yet. What is up?"

Robyn blushed slightly as she quickly signed, "I want to do something special for Ava," she began. Her gestures were so rapid and undecipherable she had to sign it at me twice before I understood what she was trying to say.

She wanted to the carnival this weekend with everyone in the dorm, have a final get together with everyone before Ava was sent away and before she was taken away too. She called it a "Day of Fun."

"Robyn that sounds lovely," I signed because I knew the word for lovely but not good for some silly reason, "I can let everyone else know. Make sure their Sat.u.r.day is free."

Robyn perked up, properly perked up, and nodded, signing her excitement. "Now go to bed," I instructed, "School night."

She called me a spoil-sport and walked down the hall to her room.

I closed my door and smiled. "Looks like Robyn had the same idea as us," I announced.

"Oh, that"s nice," Alexis said sitting up.

"Brilliant," I sat back down at my chair.

"No!" Alexis grumbled, "Come back for cuddles."

"I have biology c.r.a.p to do," I countered, spinning in my chair.

"I"m a biology c.r.a.p. Come back," Alexis countered.