The Chronicles of Edwin, Ch. 9 "Back to the Grind Again"

Edwin woke with a start, panting heavily.  What a nightmare.  Edwin dreamed a lot, but seldom had nightmares, and his nightmares were not of monsters and death, they were of people.  More specifically, they were about girls he was fond of at the time.  Ariel was sitting there on the window sill, she had been watching Edwin sleep.

"You okay Ed?" she half whispered.

"Morn'n Squiggers, yeah... I'm alright.  Just had a bit of a nightmare."

"What happened, hmm?"

"meh... okay, you know Jenna?"

"Oh yeah, the cute blond with the huge..."

"YEAH... her." Edwin shot Ariel such a look, she nearly fell over backwards laughing.  She knew he hated women being described that way, so she teased him about it.  Edwin continued, "well, we were hanging out at my old house, at a picnic table out back.  Everything was fine till my brother came and sat with us.  They hit it off on the spot..."

"I'm sorry, Ed.  You know it's just a dream though right?"

"Yeah, I know..." he trailed off.  Ariel popped up and gave Edwin a big hug, well, as big a hug a nine inch tall spirit could manage.

She knew Edwin well enough by now to know how complicated his relationship with his brother was.  They were distant, got along well, but there was a sort of rivalry between them.  Nothing explicit, sometimes Edwin wondered if maybe he was just imagining it, but there were hints.  It was hard because Michael was naturally so quiet and did not talk about much beside his passion, blacksmithing.  Edwin also always thought Michael was better looking, and overall just better at everything except people.  He wanted to help his brother kind of open up, he kind of didn't though.  It was selfish and he hated this, but thoughts like this popped up every now and then.  This dream was a harsh reminder of that.

"Com'on buddy,  School time."  She pointed at the clock next to Edwin's bed.

"Shoot!  I almost forgot!!!"  Edwin practically flew downstairs.  He somehow managed to throw on some clothes and put on his backpack before he hit the bottom of the stairs.  He was about to grab something to chew on as he rode to class when he remembered, he had no idea what his first class was.  In a flurry of zippers and gadgets, Edwin whipped out his scrivener and pulled up his class schedule then quickly wrote down his weeks schedule.  Slap, zip, whump, he was headed out the door again.

Edwin was panicking, he had to get to his parking lot in time to catch the first Bhusr going to campus and his clock had said he was late.  It was not till he reached the lot and was waiting did he realize his bedroom clock was twenty three minutes fast.  Nothing like a good first day panic to start off the school year!  Now that he had gotten his wits back about him he began to observe those around him.  There were a lot more people at the bhusr stop than last semester.  Some he recognized as commuters or folks who lived in the nearby apartments, but there were a lot of new faces, some had that scared and excited but slightly lost look freshmen tended to have.  Finally the bhusr showed up, unfortunately all the seat were full and Edwin had to stand.

Well, the ride wasn't so bad after all.  He pulled out his composition book out and looked at the class times and locations he had written down.  His first class would be statistics for magitecnicians.  He headed over and found the room, then checked his watch.... he was over an hour early.  Edwin simply sighed and went to the lounge on the floor below to read on his scrivener.  He was used to waiting for things as a commuter student.  He would hear people complain about how they had to get up early for their 8:00 class and laugh.  The only people on campus who got up when Edwin did were in the military and had no choice in the matter.  People were spoiled and lazy and had no idea.  But Edwin didn't mind so much.  The sacrifice was worth it in the end, to get a quality education that would lead to an excellent job for a huge discount.  The Lord really was watching over him, exacting His plan for Edwin's life each day, slowly transforming him into a powerful tool for His service.

Edwin also liked to take that time to read or catch up with friends.  He had been reading a story a friend of his had written.  She was a super talented writer named Jim.  Edwin was really enjoying her story More Than Beautiful.  It was about a teen with bad acne and her brother figure who was too good looking for his own good and how the drama that was their lives unfolded.  She captured the characters so well in her writing, Edwin was heartbroken every time he had to stop reading and realize they were not real.

Finally it was drawing close to class time so he got up and found himself a seat.  He found some guys he had met in his summer class and talked to them for a bit.  Edwin still did not know their names, after six weeks of sitting next to them in ENG 208.  But they were cool and actually interesting to talk to, so that was nice.  The class itself did not seem so bad, it was Edwin's first black teacher which he thought was cool.  Also, the notes were online, so Edwin could put them up on his scrivener and made note taking almost too easy.  Finally, after about Edwin's seventh yawn, the class ended and he went out to his next class.

The next two classes he had with his friends Eliza and Naterasha.  They looked to be interesting classes.  After the one on fluid dynamics Edwin had to talk to the professor to make sure he could get into the class.  Edwin finished talking and called the girls on his cellular device to find out where they were eating and see if he could join them.  They had gone to one of their usual spots from the spring semester, so Edwin headed off.  When he got there he was met with a surprise.  The entire indoor eating area had been moved into a giant tent while the place was being renovated, they called it the bubble.  Just wait till I tell this one to my friends at home, he thought to himself.  Lunch in the bubble was not so bad, the artificial air crystal cooling system worked surprisingly well.  Edwin's friend had to go to class, so Edwin went into the library for a while to pass the time.  Then he went to his last class of the day.

The class was the history of some foreign country from some time to the present.  Edwin was not thrilled at all.  He had originally planed to take a philosophy course but the teacher bailed last minute and this history was the only class Edwin could find to replace it.  So Edwin sat in the huge theater like lecture hall, watching it slowly fill up.  There were some real pieces of eye candy bouncing up and down the aisles.  He thought of how Ariel would describe them, he laughed out loud at that.  Noticing people staring at the guy spontaneously laughing for no reason, he blushed and stared at his book bag.  He noticed a guy he knew from Church sitting a little more than midway up the left section of seats, Edwin tried to catch his eye, but failed.  Some guy seemed to think Edwin was staring at him, because he gave Edwin a weird look.  Finally the teacher came in and started class.  Edwin had a hard time really concentrating though because of a couple of things.  All he was saying was what was in the syllabus Edwin had already read through, and the other was that the guy looked like a very large pigeon.  He had this walk and way of bobbing his head as the talked that looked just like a pigeon, and Edwin swore that if pigeons could speak, his voice would come out.

The class eventually ended and Edwin went home exhausted.  It had been an obnoxiously hot day, and having to stand on the bus rides did not help any.  Edwin chilled at his house that evening and went to bed early, falling into a deep dreamless sleep as soon as his head hit the pillow.  Ariel came in while he was snoring loudly, brushed his forehead, and whispered "sweet dreams" into his ear.  She curled up next to his head, enjoying the warmth that emanated from the big guy.  She hoped, for his sake, some girl would take an interest in him soon.