Morganville (Justin Bieber)

Chapter 2

Erica was right about the quack shack being the logical first stop; I got my ankle wrapped, an ice pack, and some frowns over my forming bruises. You could say I've had a pretty good day so far. Nothing in my body was broken, but I was going to be black and blue for days. The doctor asked some pro forma questions about boyfriends and stuff, but since I could truthfully say that no, my boyfriend hadn't beaten me up because I didn't have one. She told me to watch my step. He had also written me and excuse note, gave me some painkillers and told me to get some rest.

No way was I going back to my dorm, truth is, I don't have much in my room anyway. Some books, a few photos, some posters, I didn't really get a chance to call it home, I didn't feel safe there anyway. I wonder why. It had always felt like a warehouse, a warehouse for kids who were going to leave.

I lumped over to the quad, which was a big empty concrete space with some rickety old benches and picnic tables, cornered on all the sides by squat, unappealing buildings. I had heard a rumour that one of them had fallen down a few years ago, but then, I had also heard a rumour about the janitor being beheaded in the Chem Lab and haunting the building, and zombies roaming around after dark.

It was mid-afternoon already, and not a lot of students were hanging around the quad, with its lack of shade - great design, considering that the weather was still hovering up in the high nineties in September. I picked up a campus paper from the stand, carefully took a seat on the blazing hot bench and opening it to the housing section.

Dorm rooms were out of the question; Howard Hall and Lansdale Hall were the only two that took girls under twenty. I wasn't old enough to qualify for the coed dorms, stupid rules. I skipped the pages until I got the off campus section. Not that I was going to be allowed to live off of campus, mom and dad would have a total freak out over it. But if it was between Monica and parental freakage, it's moot.

I dug into my pack pack finding my little cell phone, it was kind of lame in Morganville, truthfully, out in the middle of the prairie, in the middle of Texas, which was about as the middle of nowhere as it was possible to get unless you wanted to go to Mongolia or something. Two bars. Not great, but it will do.

I started to dial the numbers. The first person had told me that they had already found somebody, and hung up before I could even say thanks. The second one sounded like some old weird guy, the third was some old lady. The fourth one, well let's not even go there. The fifth listing down on the page read:

THREE ROOMATES SEEKING FOURTH, huge old house, privacy assured, reasonable rent and utilities.

Okay, so I wasn't sure I could afford that 'affordable' rent, but at least it sounded less weird than the others. Three roommates. That could mean three more people who'd take up for her if Monica came sniffing.

I called the number on the page, and got an answering machine with a mellow sounding, young sounding male voice. ''Hello, you've reached the Glass House. If you're looking for Micheal, he sleeps days. If you're looking for Justin, good luck with that cause we never know where the hell he is' distant laughter was heard in the background. 'And if you're looking for Eve, you'll probably get here on her cell phone or at the shop. But hey. Leave a message and if you're looking to audition for the room, come by. It's 716 West Lot Street'.
A totally different voice, a female one lightened up by giggles like bubbles in soda said 'Yeah just look for the mansion' before I was left with a beep.

I blinked, and coughed before finally speaking up into the phone. "Umm..hi..My name is Anastasia? Anastasia Ian? And I was um, calling about the um, room thing, um, Sorry" and then I hung up in the panic. Those three people had sounded...normal. But they sounded pretty close with each other. And in my experience, groups of friends like that didn't open up to include the younger people. They just sounded self confident, something I wasn't.