Go Talk with Lucille

Lucille looks around the musty classroom one last time before she heads out the door, her gaze sweeping around until she catches your eye. A moment later, she’s out the door, her thin figure a monochromatic ghost fading into the corridors of the institution.

You pack your things up—notebook, pen, The Works of Lord Byron, Vol. 1—and follow after her, quick strident steps that echo in the narrow hallway. You brush past Annalise, who was first out the door, ignoring the sultry look she shoots you. Your eye is fixed on Lucille. She makes a left, pushing open the heavy wood door, letting in a gust of heavy autumn wind.

Seconds later, you’ve just about caught up to her on the paved path that cuts through the green.

“What’s the rush?” you ask.

Her small backpack, drawstrings loose about her shoulders, bounces quick against her ass; your eye is naturally drawn to the sight for the fraction of a second before she turns to face you.

“Am I in a rush?” she replies, picking up her pace by a fraction.

“I can barely keep up,” you say, and she raises an eyebrow, as if to say What’s new?

You walk abreast in silence for a few seconds. She pivots right towards the dining hall, before she turns to glance at you again.

“I walk fast because I’m from New York,” she says by way of apology.

“And is that where you got your cynicism about love too?”

“Maybe,” she says doubtfully.

There’s a small trickle of people heading into the dining hall, but it’s still early: the real rush will come once classes officially end at the hour. Lucille hands her ID over to the gruff old man tending the cash register. He swipes the card and wordlessly nods her in, and you do the same, following a step behind her.

“Back in the classroom, those were some serious thoughts about love. You don’t get a conviction like that out of nowhere,” you comment, scooping some overcooked cucumbers onto your plate.

“No, you don’t,” Lucille agrees. She throws you another glance. It’s not an ‘I don’t want you here’ glance so much as it is a ‘I’m not sure why you’re here’ glance. She circles around a cafeteria island, picking up two plums from a platter of fruit. She plops one onto your plate, saying: “They’re quite good.”

“I’m surprised they feed us anything good,” you say.

Lucille laughs, a quick noise that she stifles as soon as it leaves her mouth.

“I’ve had better food on flights,” she says.

“What, the little package of peanuts?”

“Yes. At least you can’t fuck that up,” she says, putting her plate down on a table. It contains her plum, and a small helping of mushy pasta that she begins to pick at.

“Hey, at least it hasn’t given me food poisoning yet,” you say.

“I bet you you’ve used that line on a dozen girls already,” Lucille says, eyeing you. “How many of them have slept with you?”

“That’s… that’s ridiculous,” you sputter, covering your mouth with your hand, trying not to spit out the bite full of cucumber you’ve just taken. “What makes you think that I’ve done that?”

“It’s what my second brother would do,” Lucille shrugs. “He’s a fuckboy through and through.”

She picks up her plum and pushes her plate aside. Half the pasta sits there, uneaten.

“So that’s where the cynicism comes from,” you say, as if the idea had suddenly dawned on you.

She rolls her eyes.

“Look, I think you’re kinda cute, but you don’t have to try so hard,” she says, taking a bite out of the plum.

“I just wanted to talk about our Seminar assignment, bounce some ideas off you,” you say. “I liked what you said in class, so…”

“You’re still trying,” she says, chewing on the plum.

You take a bite out of your own. Dark on the outside, sweet and juicy on the inside. You gaze at Lucille.

“Not going to lie, part of why I followed you in here is because I think you’re cute too,” you confess.

She gives you a dazzling smile.

“Now was that so hard?” she says.

While you try to come up with an answer, she gets up, taking her plate with her.

“If you want to talk more about the assignment, I’m free Thursday night,” she says.

Lucille +10