Page 6 of June (New Orleans #6)

“N ice to meet you, Jodie. Sorry, she finished your drink the other night,” Enid said, and Caroline smiled over at her before she looked up at Jodie.

“I got one sip of it, so I’d say she did more than just finish it,” Jodie replied, sitting down at the round table between them. “So, how did you two end up at this table?”

“Oh, I ran into her at a booth. Enid is in grad school here. Small world, huh?” Caroline replied.

“Yeah, small world,” Jodie said. “Sorry, I’m so late.”

“It’s okay. I’ve walked around a couple of times already and ran into Enid when she was about to, so I was just joining her.”

“Are you looking for a job?” Enid asked Jodie.

“Not yet, thankfully. I wanted to see what was out here, though. I’m thinking maybe an internship in the fall or the spring, if I can get it.”

“And you’re a junior, too?”

“Yeah,” Jodie said.

Enid then took a drink of her coffee, and Caroline used that as an opportunity to give her friend the look. She would know what the look meant, and it should make her leave this table. Jodie wasn’t looking at her, though. She was looking off toward the career fair and seemed to be smiling. Caroline had to lightly kick her under the table to get her attention, and when Jodie turned to her with a grimace and confusion in her eyes, that was when Caroline gave her the look.

“Oh,” Jodie said. “Right.”

“What’s right?” Enid asked.

“I was thinking that I wanted to walk around alone for a few minutes. I can’t stay long, so I want to be focused.”

That was a bad lie, but Enid didn’t seem to notice, and Jodie stood.

“I’ll call you later,” she added.

“Yeah,” Caroline replied.

After Jodie walked off, Caroline picked up her coffee and took a drink. It had way too much cream in it, but she’d been nervous at the coffee cart and hadn’t been paying attention. Now, she could barely taste the coffee in her cup of cream.

“How long have you two been friends?” Enid asked.

“A couple of years,” she replied.

“She seems nice.”

“She is. She’s my best friend here.”

“So… You were going to show me your sketchbook,” Enid said.

“You really don’t want to look at it. It’s just boring stuff. I drew the mini fridge in my dorm room yesterday.”

Enid laughed and replied, “I’m sure in some art circles, that would sell.”

“I highly doubt that. I gave him a face.”

Enid laughed again and asked, “You called your fridge a he , and you drew a face on him?”

“Yes. He fights with me sometimes and won’t fit everything I want to put in there, or the ice shelf at the top doesn’t freeze at all or freezes so much that it’s just a giant block of ice, so it’s a guy, and I drew a face on him just for fun.”

Enid smiled at her and said, “I’d like to see that.”

Caroline bent down, pulled her newest sketchbook out of her backpack, and dropped it on the table between them.

“Don’t judge me.”

Enid picked it up and began flipping the pages, which left Caroline to just sit there, carefully watching her face for any kind of expression. Then, Enid’s nose scrunched a bit… Was that a bad thing? Did she hate the stupid face Caroline had drawn on her mini fridge? Probably. It was really silly.

“This is cute.”

“Huh?” she asked.

“Your fridge face. It’s cute,” Enid replied, turning the sketchbook toward her in order to show her the drawing she had done, so she knew exactly what it looked like.

“It is?”

“Yeah. And you have this one of your microwave, too.”

“Yeah, that’s Miranda.”

“Sorry?”

“The microwave. I named her Miranda. She’s a bit of a diva at times, so I named her after the character from The Devil Wears Prada .”

“Your microwave has a name?” Enid laughed.

“Yeah. And the fridge is Frank. Frank the Fridge and Miranda the Microwave.”

“Do any of your other appliances have names?” Enid asked as she continued laughing.

“TV is Tim. And my laptop is called Larry.”

“So, Tim the TV. Larry the Laptop. What about your phone?”

“Oh, she doesn’t have a name.”

“But it’s a she ?”

“Yeah. And so is my car,” Caroline said. “Corrina the Corolla.”

Enid smiled and shook her head.

“You don’t name your stuff?”

“No. But maybe I should. I feel like I’m missing out.” Enid returned her attention to the sketchbook and told her, “These are good, Caroline.”

“They’re just sketches.”

“Some of them are sketches, but others are more like characters.”

“Characters?”

“Yeah. Like, you’ve got Frank and Miranda here. Maybe they’re an old married couple or something. Frank is mad because he works hard all day, freezing your food, and then Miranda cooks it for too long and ruins it or something.”

“Why can’t Miranda work really hard all day having to defrost and cook the food Frank overfreezes?”

Enid smiled and said, “I guess it could work like that.”

“What about Tim and Larry?” Caroline asked, leaning over the table, finding that this conversation had taken a turn but one that she really liked.

“Tim could be mad that you spend more time with Larry than him.”

“It’s true: I’m always on my laptop.” Caroline leaned in farther and whispered, “Don’t tell Tim, but I watch more TV and movies on Larry than on him.”

Enid laughed and replied, “Your secret is safe with me. But why do you have Tim, then?”

“He’s my roommate’s TV. She has this thing where she likes to do work on her laptop and watch TV on an actual TV. You know the campus channel that shows the same movie over and over again for like a month?”

“Oh, wow. I forgot all about that, but yeah.”

“She’ll sit there, reading a book, and just have Tim on in the background. I have nearly every movie that channel has shown memorized.”

Enid laughed and said, “Well, that’s a talent. Maybe you could turn that into a career one day.”

Caroline laughed, too, and said, “My roommate should be out right now. If you want, we could go to my room, and I could show you the sketches I have there from my trip.”

Enid looked around, so Caroline worried she’d say that she wanted to stay at the career fair instead.

“Okay. Sure. I can’t stay long, though.”

“No problem,” she replied.

They both stood and started walking in the direction of Caroline’s building, which was straight down the campus’s main drag and then one block over.

“So, Jodie’s not your roommate?”

“No, she lives down the hall. My roommate was randomly assigned to me. Her name’s Viv. She’s nice.”

“Not crazy? I didn’t live in the dorms when I was here. I lived at home for the first year and got an apartment with a few friends for the rest of undergrad, so I never had a random person assigned to share a small room with me.”

“She’s not crazy, no. She’s very studious and not all that social, but she’s nice and clean. The room is always spotless on her side.”

“What about your side?” Enid asked.

“I’d say I’m relatively clean, but I definitely leave my bed unmade most days and need to take out the trash more.”

They walked for a few more minutes in silence before Caroline unlocked the door that led to the staircase up to the second floor, where her room was on the right. She unlocked it, too, and let Enid walk in before her.

“It’s been a long time since I’ve been in a dorm room. They’re even smaller than I remember,” Enid said.

“Yeah, I know. We bunked our beds, which helps add some space.”

Caroline dropped her bag on the floor by her desk and pulled out the bottom desk drawer to find her old sketchbook.

“Um… You can sit down wherever.”

There were only two chairs in the room. One was her desk chair, and the other was Viv’s. Viv had the bottom bunk, and Caroline didn’t let any of her visitors sit on it because that wouldn’t be fair, but it would also be weird for her to suggest that Enid sit on the top bunk with her, so she pulled Viv’s chair over toward her own desk to sit on, and Enid sat in hers. Then, Caroline handed Enid the sketchbook.

“Where did you go on your trip?” Enid asked as she opened it.

“A little bit of everywhere, but I focused mainly on the west from here. I went up through Mississippi, Arkansas, into Oklahoma, and I just kept going.”

“How long were you gone?” Enid asked as she flipped the pages.

“About three months. A little longer, technically.”

“By yourself?”

Caroline nodded.

“That’s brave. I was worried about moving to Florida on my own, and you just got in your car and started driving?”

“I was restless in school. My parents are great people, and I love them, but they couldn’t understand it. They’d both gone to college, liked it, and found their lifelong careers. It wasn’t working for me, so I told them I wanted to leave. I made sure to text and call them regularly so that they didn’t worry as much, and I sent them pictures, too. The deal was that they’d continue to support me as long as I still graduate on time, which is why I’m taking summer classes.”

“Oh,” Enid uttered.

Caroline looked at her face and wondered what she’d stop to look at. Then, she remembered.

“Oh, shit. Sorry. I should’ve warned you.”

She leaned over Enid’s shoulder and saw what she had expected to see.

“That is a naked woman,” Enid noted.

“Yes. Her name is Brooke.”

“And you drew her naked.”

“I did.”

“She let you?”

“Yeah, it was her idea,” Caroline replied.

“You and she… were together?”

“No. I met her on the trip. We spent about a week together before she went one way, and I went the other.”

“But you saw her naked. Was that just for the drawing?”

“No,” she replied.

“Ah…” Enid let out as she continued to stare at the drawing. “She’s pretty.”

“She is, yeah.”

“Do you keep in touch?”

“No, I haven’t seen or heard from her since.”

“So, it was just sex?”

“It’s hard to explain… I was on this journey of self-discovery. She was there for part of it. I don’t think it was just sex, but it wasn’t a relationship or much more than that.”

Enid turned to the next sketch and asked, “More?”

Caroline laughed and said, “She asked for a close-up.”

“Yeah, I’d say that’s pretty close up.” Enid cleared her throat. “You definitely understand the… female anatomy.”

She laughed again and said, “I meant to give those to her, but after I drew them, I kind of forgot about them until after we said goodbye.”

Enid turned the page to a more PG sketch of the motel sign Caroline had drawn at the next place she’d stayed after parting ways with Brooke.

“What did you discover about yourself on the trip?”

“I don’t know. Not much. I thought I’d find what I was supposed to do. Hell, I’d bought that sketchbook right before I left on a whim. I didn’t think I would use it. I had not liked that art class, remember?”

“Maybe you did.”

“Did what?” Caroline asked.

“Found what you were supposed to do,” Enid said and closed the sketchbook before handing it back to her. “Now, can I meet Frank, Miranda, Tim, and Larry? Corrina, I assume, is parked outside?”

It made her smile that Enid had remembered the names she’d given to the random objects, and she replied, “Sure.” Then, she looked around her room. “Um… Everyone, this is Enid. Enid, this is everyone.” She motioned with her arm.

Enid laughed and said, “It’s nice to meet everybody.”

“Oh,” Viv said softly as she walked through the open door. “Sorry. I didn’t know you were having someone over.”

“Viv, it’s fine. This is your room, too,” Caroline said and stood up from Viv’s chair. “This is Enid. Enid, this is Viv, my roommate.”

“Hi,” Enid said.

“I thought you were out today,” Caroline noted.

“I was at the fair.”

“You said you weren’t going.”

“I wasn’t going to, but one of the professors asked if I’d help run a booth for the first couple of hours this morning, so I decided to do it and just got done.”

“I should go,” Enid spoke.

“You don’t have to,” Caroline replied as Enid stood.

“It’s okay. I’m going to head home to get some studying done. Thanks for showing me your sketches. You really are talented.”

“Thank you,” she replied.

“See you around?” Enid asked her, and when Caroline nodded, she added, “Nice to meet you, Viv.”

“You too,” Viv said.

Then, Enid was gone, and Caroline flopped on her desk chair, staring at the open door.

“Sorry if I interrupted,” Viv added.

“It’s fine,” she said and sighed.

“New friend?”

“I don’t know. Maybe,” she replied.

“She looks older,” Viv noted.

“Twenty-four,” she said, remembering what Enid had told her before.

Viv sat on her bed after dropping her bag on the floor and asked, “Do you like her?”

“I just met her,” she replied.

“But you look like you like her.”

Caroline looked over at her and replied, “I might.” She paused. “I’m sorry, Viv. I didn’t think you’d be here.”

“It’s okay,” Viv said. “You’re allowed to bring whomever you want here. It’s your room.”

“I don’t want things to be awkward…”

“They won’t be.” Viv shrugged. “You and I are roommates and friends, right?”

Caroline nodded as Viv lay back on her bed.

“So, we’re okay. I’ll be okay. I mean, yeah, I like you, but you don’t feel the same way. I’ll be fine.”

Caroline then watched her pick up her book and open it, so she knew that their conversation was over. She didn’t know what to do now since she’d planned to spend the afternoon at the fair with Jodie, so she grabbed her phone and her old sketchbook and climbed onto her bed. Having opened the sketchbook, she returned to the images of the very naked Brooke. Brooke had been sexy as hell, and drawing her had led them to having sex in the bed this sketch depicted. Caroline closed the sketchbook and picked up her phone instead. She wasn’t sure what she was planning on doing with it, but the instant she unlocked it, she remembered that she hadn’t gotten Enid’s phone number. She hadn’t even gotten Enid’s last name.