Page 2 of Want It All
I followed Harry up the staircase, trailing my fingertips over the silk-smooth wood.
‘Every room has its own bathroom and kitchenette,’ he told me over his shoulder.
‘But meals are served in the dining hall, so most students use their kitchens for cups of tea and comfort food. Breakfast is from six to nine am, lunch is from eleven to one, and dinner from six to eight pm. The kitchens are closed to students between those times, but the dining hall itself is always open, and there are always snacks. Tuesdays and Thursdays are cookie days,’ he went on, shooting me a kind smile.
‘Wednesday is slice day, and Friday, pie and crumble. Mondays are by request – you can submit suggestions through the Banksia app.’
The stairwell spilled into more corridors; Harry turned down one to the left. I followed him past a row of closed doors until he stopped outside one marked Fourteen , spelled out in brass letters.
‘This is yours.’ He settled my bags down before it and unlocked it with his swipe card.
He didn’t step inside, a courtesy I appreciated; my instincts would have bristled at a stranger entering my room.
‘Your swipe key should be on your table, along with your welcome package. You can download the app from the Banksia student intranet. It will tell you everything – your schedule, how to book study rooms, how to submit assessments, your mailing address, how to lodge a ticket with the housekeeping team, see the doctor … Everything. You can also book appointments with the administrative team or the campus support officer if you need to talk it through.’ He gave me another smile.
‘Good luck, Rose. I hope you have a wonderful time here.’
I thanked him, then waited until he’d disappeared back down the hallway to drag my bags inside, locking the door behind me. There was a wide window directly opposite the door, open, and the scent of lemon myrtle laced the air.
I exhaled, trying to calm my nerves.
The room was laid out like a studio apartment, with a queen-sized bed to one side and a wide TV on the wall opposite.
A large study desk sat beneath the screen, with a fancy-looking ergonomic chair wrapped in plastic waiting to one side.
The kitchenette held a sink, a stove top, a small convection oven, and a new kettle, still in its box.
Opposite the kitchen was a closed door; I opened it to find a modern-looking bathroom, tiled in white and mint green and boasting a bath-shower combo, a long mirror, and a toilet.
Considering what I’d seen of student accommodation when researching other schools, it was amazing.
Everything was spotlessly clean and new.
The wallpaper was a neutral cream-and-silver, patterned with branches and birds.
The window made the room light and airy, and there was even an armchair against the wall, upholstered in a light grey velvet.
I spotted a built-in wardrobe next to the bed and decided to start unpacking.
I loved unpacking, no matter where I was.
It felt as if I was claiming a space as my own, even if I would only be there for a short time.
I hung and folded my clothes, then placed my favourite tea on the kitchen bench.
The mattress was brand new, still wrapped in plastic, so I unwrapped it and covered it with my own sheets and my pastel-pink duvet, taking a moment to catch my breath once I was done.
I placed my laptop on the study desk, along with my eReader, a speaker, and my tablet.
I climbed up on the bed to string fairy lights along the wall, then folded my favourite throw blanket over the armchair.
By the time I was finished, I was happy with the way it looked.
My bed needed more cushions and I wanted extra fairy lights to string over the desk, but I could do some online shopping later.
Ideally, I would hang a canopy around the bed, too, but there were no hooks in the ceiling and I wasn’t sure how I’d manage it.
My welcome pack waited on the table. I thumbed through the brochure, then downloaded the student app onto my phone.
Banksia Online , its icon proclaimed. I checked my timetable and my academic contacts before a pop-up message let me know that my first week would be full of orientation activities – the discipline mixers sounded great, though I was less keen about kayaking in the nearby river – and that class started in the second week, bright and early on Monday morning.
When my stomach rumbled, I realised the sky was darkening and it was time for dinner.
I took a quick shower, reapplying my scent-cancelling lotion afterwards, then pulled on my favourite outfit for luck.
I sprayed myself with synthetic perfume, gathered my hair into a loose bun, then stuffed my key and phone into one of my dress pockets.
Before I left my room, I swallowed my nightly dose of scent blockers.
According to the Banksia app, the dining hall was on the ground floor, along with the gym, the administration and student support offices, and a small indoor pool.
I found the main staircase and followed the corridor east, checking the online map as I went.
The ground floor seemed relatively public; it reminded me of an English historical house, open to visitors, with placards detailing which famous person once sat at this ornate writing desk, or that this print once belonged to that distinguished artist. I suspected I would be dreaming of wallpaper for years to come; acres of the stuff stretched above the smooth wood panelling, interrupted only by doors with shining bronze handles.
Another corridor opened to the left and I veered down it, drawn by the sounds of chatter and cutlery. I didn’t walk far before I spotted the lettering on the wall, reading Dining Hall , with an arrow pointing to an arched walkway.
It wasn’t as big as I’d expected. The hall held four long tables, each able to seat twenty or so, positioned parallel to two central food stations which seemed to hold salads and desserts, respectively.
Beyond them, a few students queued before a serving station that looked very much like an airport cafe, trays in their hands as they chatted.
I headed towards them, offering a tentative smile to a woman at the back of the queue who caught my eye. She seemed a little older than me, possibly one of the later-year students, or perhaps someone who stayed on to undertake a prestigious Banksia PhD.
She smiled in return. ‘First year?’
‘First year, first day.’ I held out my hand. ‘I’m Rose.’
‘Marina,’ she said, shaking my fingers. ‘Welcome.’
My nose itched, but it wasn’t from her scent; with more students around, the metallic tang of scent cancellers was thick in the air.
I inhaled, but caught only the myriad aromas of food, twitching my nose at the sensation.
Even though I couldn’t scent Marina’s designation, she had the straight gaze and upright posture of someone used to getting their own way; in other words, she seemed like an alpha.
Nevertheless, it was freeing not to know.
And even more freeing not to tell.
My instincts didn’t like it – human scent was the way we made sense of the world, the way we knew which people were for us, and which weren’t – but I loved it.
Everybody here was on equal footing – in one way, at least; it would be the height of ignorance to pretend other power imbalances didn’t exist. But not having to be ruled by designations – not living every day braced for the possibility of scents that made my skin crawl or my stomach churn, or worse , the rare scents that were complementary and sent my instincts into a spin – was something I’d been dreaming about for years .
The scent-blocking tablets and cancelling sprays and lotions we used were medical grade, supplied by Banksia, and they were much better than anything you could buy over the counter.
They were free, too, for me at least; no doubt the fees from paying students covered the cost many times over.
If I’d had to use the same blockers and cancellers outside, I’d bankrupt myself – and my parents – in a matter of weeks.
It wasn’t just scent that was controlled here.
The terms of our enrolment dictated the use of hormone stabilisers which minimised the frequency of ruts for alphas, and of heat suppressants for omegas.
Banksia’s rules were strict, but they reflected the government’s laws about mandatory scent blockers in all educational institutions.
With the stabilisers, suppressants, blockers, and cancellers, it was as if the Unveiling – the time when designations first began to appear a few hundred years previously, stalling our technological development and causing massive social upheaval – never happened.
‘How are you settling in so far?’
‘I’m not sure I’ve been here long enough to know,’ I admitted, then asked Marina which discipline she studied.
The Banksia House curriculum was different to other Masters programs at Australian universities.
It was three years long, for a start, and all students began with a general knowledge and research skills stream before they chose their specialisation.
The second year was all coursework, and the third gave students a choice between more coursework or research, the latter which was subsumable into a PhD if you were good enough to secure a place.
Banksia cohorts were tiny, capped at thirty students per year, which meant that once you chose your specialisation, you were guaranteed one-on-one tutoring from experts in your field for the rest of your degree.
My suspicions about Marina turned out to be correct; she was a PhD student in the ancient history stream, the same discipline as my undergraduate degree. I tried to block out the noise around me as she talked about her research, determined to remember every word falling from her lips.