Wake up exhausted

Round 13: Spring 2020


Stephen Marlowe is 19.
(Zach is 16.)

Narrated by Stephen Marlowe.

There's this new girl Eve who moved in to the dorm this year. She's a Sophomore like me and she may seem like a tough chick with her all piercings but it turned out she's really nice. We play chess quite often together.

She's paying her tuitions herself so she works in the dorm cafeteria whenever she has time. She also cleans the dorm and tends the garden so she got a discount on her tuitions.

It makes me feel very priviledged to be able to just concentrate on my studies. I'm doing very well and I think it's mainly because I'm so interested in what I study. I think some people were surprised that I chose Psychology as my major but I'm focusing on Forensic Psychology and that should help me get a job in the SCIA after I graduate.

Zach only has two years of high school left so he came to check out the campus the other day.

We played pool for a while but then I happened to ask about Dawn.

"Dude, you'd better sit down for this" he said.

I was pretty shocked when he told me that Dawn is pregnant! I mean, she's only 16. She's been dating Finn Harris for some time now but obviously the baby wasn't planned.

I was kind of glad to hear she was dating Finn because I wasn't very proud of the way I treated her when I was in high school. I wasn't expecting something like this to happen to her though.

"Would it make you feel better if we beat the crap out of Finn?" I joked to Zach.

"Yeah, it would probably make me feel a lot better. But I guess it would just upset Dawn. She's pretty stressed right now. Man, I just want my sister back the way she was before all of this happened" he said.

I can't even imagine what Dawn and Finn are going through. Zach said that they haven't decided what they're gonna do with the baby yet but at least she's going to give birth to it.

Things with Kaitlyn are going really well. We're both studying hard so we don't get to spend time together every day but we see each other whenever we can.

Mom invited us over for the weekend. It's the first time Kaitlyn meets my whole family. She met my parents last year but I haven't taken her home with me before this. We've been dating for about a year now so I guess it's time she meets everyone.

We were invited in for dinner almost immediately after we arrived. Mom still cooks almost every meal. Kaitlyn and I both enjoyed her cooking very much after we've been eating at the dorm cafeterias for months.

Mom and dad still act like they got married yesterday. I used to get embarrassed by them when I was younger but now I just think it's kind of sweet. I just hope Kaitlyn doesn't get any crazy ideas, I mean I like her a lot but I'm too young to settle down.

We asked if we could use the hot tub. Mom looked at us both, raised her eyebrows and said it's fine as long as we behave. It's not like I'm going to have sex with my girlfriend in the hot tub when one of my family members could walk in on us any minute!

Everyone seems to like Kaitlyn a lot. She got along very well with Alexandra.

And mom absolutely adores her.

"That girl's a keeper, Stephen" she said. I tried telling her that we're both still very young but you know how my mom is. She's always hoping for weddings and babies.

I was pretty relieved that she didn't say anything to Kaitlyn though. They just talked about Kaitlyn's studies

I got more pressure from Alexandra when we were playing chess.

"I really like that girl of yours. You'd better tie her down before she runs away" she said and winked.

All in all, it was really nice seeing my family. I just wish they'd let me make my own decisions. Dad is the only one who hasn't even hinted toward me marrying Kaitlyn.

Mom gave me a big hug as we were leaving and made me promise to visit home soon again.

She also hugged Kaitlyn and said that she can't wait to see her again.

I was getting kind of anxious to get back to campus so I was glad to be able to say that we had to hurry to catch the bus. I love my family but they can be pretty exhausting.

Notes:

• Title from "Wake up exhausted" by Tegan and Sara
• Stephen got A+ from both his final exams and continues with a 4.0 GPA. He's so skilled that he probably doesn't need any additional skills during his time in college and he always gets the occasional want to go to class or write a term paper so he gets good grades quite easily.