I usually go to the Student Center at ten every morning during the break before my eleven o'clock class. I get a midmorning snack and either study or talk with friends. Surprisingly, Tom and his girlfriend Sandy were there that morning. I'd seen them occasionally but they normally didn't frequent the center when I was there.
I watched them as they walked through the café line, both of them like royalty on show for their adoring public. I tried not to stare at Tom in his football jersey and tight jeans but it was hard to ignore him. I was surprised when he turned and walked to the table where I was sitting alone.
"Is it okay if we join you?" he smiled.
"Sure, go ahead."
I cleared the table of my books. Sandy looked astonished that Tom had decided to sit with someone she didn't know.
"Sandy, let me introduce to my engineering tutor. This is Lucas Blake and he's the smartest guy in the engineering department, maybe the whole college."
Tom was grinning and as usual, I blushed. Sandy suddenly seemed interested in me, maybe a little curious.
"Tom's just trying to pump me up for some free tutoring sessions," I laughed.
"Well, don't let him. Tom's too used to people giving him things for nothing."
Sandy was smiling but her tone had a bite. From the look on Tom's face at her comment I could see there was trouble in paradise. Tom's dark look was quickly hidden as he sat down with orange juice and a bagel.
"Lucas was the quarterback of his high school football team but an injury kept him from going out for the college team, thank God."
Tom's eyes were dancing with merriment.
"Like he'd need to worry about me," I said.
"Are you involved with any sports now?" asked Sandy.
"I swim a couple of times a week and I go for a run every day. I keep up with what's going on in the sports world and I go to games but I'm not a member of any teams now."
"Do you have a girlfriend?"
Sandy's probing eyes were looking for a weakness in my character.
"I've dated several girls since I started here but no one steady like you and Tom."
Tom rolled his eyes at me.
"I dated Maxine Watkins most of last year but we were never serious or anything."
"So you're Maxine's Lucas. I can see why she liked you."
"Oh yeah, she was on the cheerleading squad so you knew her," I replied.
"Yeah, and she was in my dorm."
"Too bad she transferred out."
"She didn't have any choice."
"Yeah, she was needed at home so she needed to go back to Oregon."
Sandy's laugh was tinged with a nastiness I didn't like. From Tom's quick glance to me I could see he didn't like it either.
"She was needed at home all right," she said sarcastically. "She was on academic probation and the dean basically told her she needed to find another school for the fall quarter. So she went home to Oregon."
"She never told me that. If she had I might could have helped her."
Sandy reached over and patted my hand. I hated the patronizing intimacy of her touch.
"No, Lucas, I doubt you'd have been able to help her unless you wanted to tutor her in remedial work she should have gotten in high school. None of us could ever understand how Maxine even got accepted here. It was her writing; her written grammar was awful, and it kept dragging her down in all of her classes. Like a fool she was taking French and she barely knew the parts of speech in English."
"I didn't know. She was always a fun girl to be with and we never really talked about her classes."
"We all loved her but I'm afraid Maxine's true calling is to be a beautician. I told her she needed to enroll in cosmetology school and forget college."
"God, remember how she dyed her hair a different color every week?" Tom laughed.
We all burst out laughing.
"Remember when the dye burned her the ends of her hair and she ended up looking like she had Afro tips?" I chuckled.
"And remember when she tried to change colors and her hair turned baby shit green?" Sandy laughed. "Maxine was so much fun and we had a blast with her in the girl's dorm but she just isn't college material. Even she admitted it."
I shrugged.
"I still can't believe she never let on to me about her problems. And we dated almost all of sophomore year. My sophomore year, that is; she was a freshman."
"And there's no one special this year?"
"Oh, give it a rest, Sandy," Tom said. "I brought you over here to meet my tutor, not for you to give him the third degree."
His knee bumped mine under the table and he grinned, his eyes dancing.
"Are you coming to the game tonight? We're playing our biggest rivals and it's the most important game of the season."
Sandy sounded excited.
"I'll be there. Tom gave me two tickets to some of the best seats in the stadium."
She suddenly looked pissed off.
"Tom! I thought you were going to give those tickets to Sue and Pete."
"Pete's already got tickets so I gave them to my tutor."
Tom looked amused that Sandy was annoyed.
"Who are you bringing with you?" she asked.
"I asked Mary Beth Hudson to go with me."
Several people stopped at the table to talk to Tom and we spent the next twenty minutes or so discussing the big game. Tom took my hand and squeezed it as we stood to leave.
"I'll see you at the game tonight and I'll be over to your apartment at one o'clock tomorrow. How about I bring some Chinese?"
His eyes said we'd be doing more than vector analysis.
As usual, Tom was great at the game that night, making six touchdown passes. It was a massacre and the home crowd cheered so loudly I thought the stadium would collapse from sound reverberations. Tom was carried off the field by his teammates, his face one of total joy.
Mary Beth and I slipped out quietly and I took her back to her dorm room for an obligatory fuck. I'd dated her several times and she'd thrown herself at me from the beginning. After two dates I'd fucked her and now she expected that every date would end with sex. I felt like her whore but she was a good cover for me.
True to his word, Tom knocked on my door at one o'clock on Saturday. He came barreling in with two paper bags, wearing blue jeans and a football jersey.
"I didn't know what you like so I got vegetable fried rice, General Tso's chicken, beef egg foo yung, and shrimp lo mein," he laughed. "If you like Chinese, surely you've got to like one of them."
"Actually, I like all of them. Did you get fortune cookies?"
"Oh yeah," he grinned, "but I'm your dessert."
"Oh, you are, are you?"
"Damn straight, and you're mine."
