Professor C (camren)

10 - Nostalgia

There are days when you just know that it'd be one of those bad ones where everything just goes wrong and optimism would be nothing but a tiny, insignificant particle that could easily be ignored.

Lauren woke up with a pounding headache from staying up all night; reading about the topics of the three sets of projects Camila had left to be able to help the students. She had never hated graphs, bars and numbers so much in her life. What made it worse was the outcome of her research and the struggle to understand them all. Economics had never been as complicated as she remembered and she took two courses as electives back in college.

On top if it all, her eyes were sore. It wasn't the smartest to stay up, reading everything she could find from the bright screen of her phone in the midst of a dark room after going through over a hundred pages of books.

It was a Wednesday, the week after and Lauren still had two days to fulfill the duties vested upon her, which she tackled by studying since Monday afternoon. She had been so devoted on the task that she even dreamt of answering a Microeconomics test whereby she vividly remembers the first question, with which she woke up to.

What is the primary objective of firms?

"Maximizing profit." She mumbled indistinctly as her voice was muddled by a groan; hands shooting up to her rub her eyes and legs extending as far as they could go. There was a pause as Lauren drew a deep breath, body bracing for a yawn while her lips parted to release a deep exhale before she continued, slurring her next words. "Net profit is generated by deducting expenses from revenue. Hence, it's not revenue."

"I need coffee," were what the next words she said upon groggily checking the time on her phone. Of course, she bemoaned those words out amid the ache in her joints from sleeping in the same position all night.

"Fuck. I hate studying."

Lauren had to get up. She'd developed a habit to rise an hour and a half before eight in the morning to compensate for shower and coffee time. Those are her two essentials to be able to function everyday.

Begrudgingly, she sat up and swung her legs over the edge of her twin-sized bed after she threw the thick duvet off. She slouched down as her eyes continued to flutter shut when the will to fight it is kept at a low. There was a desire to focus her hazy vision around the inclusion, but to no avail.

Her windowless room was nothing but blandly simple. It was similar to all her other rooms, except that one was a little too lackluster, even in terms of minimalist designs. Barren white walls meet old light brown carpeting; a bed pushed to one corner and a desk right by it that she used for its purpose and as a bedside table, and a closet/cabinet across the other side, next to the door.

There were no pictures, no little sweet notes she cherished, no letters and no posters. No nothing. There were clothes on the floor though, laundry that she had accumulated in two weeks.

Lauren pushed herself off the bed, charging towards the kitchen; pacing herself like a turtle in its 100s. She was probably slower. Her lifeless feet skid against the soft surface of the carpet, with no intention of being lifted up to even as low as an inch. In no time, she would have generated enough static electricity to zap a person painfully.

That would be a cool superpower.

Lauren checked the cupboards first, searching for a pack of coffee beans but remembered she'd ran out and was supposed to be grocery shopping the previous day. She was too engrossed in Economics, rather, too confused, that she'd march straight to her living room and read three textbooks they used in Camila's classes – forgetting about her chores in the process.