Undercurrent

Chapter 19

NINA: I'll be there in 15 – bus was running late. Can you wait for me?

Ugh. I hated being rushed in a morning. In my usual style, I'd been at the bus stop twenty minutes early but no matter how early I was, it didn't stop the ancient bus from creeping round the corner nearly half an hour later than it was meant to.

RO: Stupid question. You insist on us coming so annoyingly early – and making me get up so annoyingly early – that I'm sure I can manage to wait.

I laughed. It was a stupid question. Even with my delay, I was still going to get to college nearly half an hour earlier than I needed to.

NINA: Fair point. See you in a bit.

I didn't know how, because it'd had never happened before, but I actually quite enjoyed it when Ro called me out on my nonsense. Normally, if anybody even hinted at some kind of character flaw or something that was a little odd about me, I'd be mortified. I'd want to hide away and never speak to them again. But no, here I was, quite happily engaging with being told how annoying my need to be early is.

I was changing. Slowly, frustratingly slowly at times, but it was happening. The heaviness that I'd carried around with me for as long as I could remember was not getting lighter as such, but it was definitely becoming easier to carry. I smiled to myself. This was what I'd wanted. This was why I'd pushed myself out of my comfort zone.

For the first time in a long time, I didn't seem to get up in the morning feeling both heavy and empty all at once. I was excited about things. Enthusiastic about things. It almost felt like I was waking up.

Still mulling over my revelations, I stood up to leave the bus when we pulled up, spluttering disconcertingly, at college. I stumbled out of the doors, carried by the throng of students clearly desperate to further their education this morning. Well, more likely desperate to get their morning caffeine fix before they had to head into lessons.

I spotted Ro sat on the wall outside. She looked like she was talking animatedly to someone but I couldn't see who it was through the crowds of people milling around. I felt a familiar pang of anxiety about having to talk to someone new but I noticed that it was much weaker than it usually was. Clearly spending a successful Saturday night with new people had helped ease my fears a little.

I checked the time as I made my way over to them. We still had twenty minutes before we needed to be in Psychology. A bit more rushed than I liked, but still plenty of time. Ro smiled at me as I approached, raising her hand in her standard exaggerated wave. I smiled and waved back as the person she was with turned to see who she was greeting.

I felt my stomach drop and the smile freeze on my face as I locked eyes with him.

Ollie.

I hadn't expected to see him at all today and definitely not having an intense chat with Ro. By the look on his face, he was surprised and not overly pleased to see me too. To be fair to him, the last time he'd seen me, he'd left me soaking wet and limping at the café after finding me passed out in a storm so I could understand why I wasn't top of his list of people he wanted to see first thing in the morning.

Part of me wanted to run away but they'd both seen me now so I had no choice really. I carried on towards them, each step feeling like I was lifting a dead weight.

"Hey, Nina!" Ro said when I reached them. "This is Ollie."

I tried to make my forced smile a little more natural as I said, "Actually, we know each other already."

"Art class," Ollie offered, as Ro looked at him confused. "Nina's my partner for that sketching project, remember?"

"Oh, I didn't realise it was Nina you were talking about!"