A Crowded Place

Chapter 10: Weighty workload

The first few months of semester passed by in a blur. I laughed, I cried, I developed as a person. I missed my friends and my family and Aaron back in Australia more than I could say. At Yale, I was constantly overwhelmed by the amount of work and the constant onslaught of tests and assignments to do.

But underneath the weight of piles and piles of lecture notes and textbooks, I learned to breathe.

I made several new friends in the course of a few weeks: there was Henry, an elite swimmer and probably the funniest guy I'd ever met, and Sophie, an aspiring medical student, with knowledge and wisdom way beyond her age. But Alana would always remain my closest friend, with whom I'd confide all my secrets and to whom I'd go for when I needed any kind of help.

Us four friends would usually study together at the library, or in a cafe, and their help and support was the only thing that kept me going throughout those first few months.

My favourite classes were probably Latin and Documentary-making, while the subject I struggled most with was Economics Game Theory. Attending each lecture was painstaking and absolute torture.

This semester also brought about some pretty disappointing grades - since all the test and assignment structures were so different from what I'd worked with before, I was constantly receiving marks I wasn't happy with. Once I even got a C+ in my Game Theory assignment! I was crushed by that result, since I'd never received such a bad mark in my life.

After that shocking mark, I just remember crying in my dorm for hours on end, ignoring nearly all my texts and calls. The only text I sent was to a very worried Alana, saying: 'Sorry I can't talk for a while, I'm trying to deal with something myself.'

——

After classes each day I would go to the music center to practise, in preparation for the music talent show. I was planning to play a virtuosic showpiece by Wieniawski. It sounded spectacular, and it would definitely be a crowd-pleaser. However, the piece was incredibly hard, with numerous double-stops and tenths on the violin.

I tried my best to avoid Jacob at the music center, but he seemed to dwell in that place. I saw him virtually every time I came in to practise, but I made sure that he couldn't see me - even if that meant choosing to walk 3 flights of stairs in the Fire Emergency stairwell instead of taking the elevator to my practise room.

Yeah, I really did not want to come face-to-face with that guy again.

And of course, I never made the rookie mistake of going into the auditorium to practise, even though the acoustics there were — *chef's kiss*. I would have done anything to avoid Jacob.

On a Friday afternoon I was busy preparing for the talent show, which was fast approaching in a little more than 2 weeks (I was counting down the days on my calendar, I was so excited). Just as I finished the last note of my piece, out of the corner of my eye I spotted someone standing outside the door to my practise room.

I feared the worst - that Jacob had somehow heard me and found my practise room. Sure enough, there he was standing, his saxophone in one hand. Time seemed to slow down as I tried to think of what to do. My only comfort was knowing that since the windows to the practise rooms were frosted, an outsider couldn't see the person inside the room.

I heard him knock on my door.