So last night I was at the Officer's ball, with only my advisee wearing formal attire. 'Cuz told me the girl by the door was interested in 'communicating' with my dad. I regretted a little being so immediate and upfront about it with him, though, since he practically raced over there and abandoned any possible mystery he might have had. Although his fluency in Italian impressed me, I could see it didn't outweigh the desperation he'd shown to my cousin et al.

It was a much more southern style campus, fraught with catholic architecture. There were two specific houses I knew like the back of my hand, one which sported the round window clocktower effect. It felt like home, but home right before a grown-up party full of people I didn't know. Some kind of banquet was going to take place, for my classmates and I. I got caught playing around with the chocolate dollars, and tried to claim I'd been eating them. I was told that "One would be good for me, but.." So I reluctantly had one even though I didn't even want it. I had a partner, but it didn't do me much good as 7:30 rolled around and the name-calling was about to begin. I hadn't checked my watch yet but I had a sinking feeling. I couldn't last past 7:30, I thought, and when I saw 7:40 I was crestfallen. I'd called out for the sake of brevity, but the wrap-up was going to be excruciating nonetheless. I closed my eyes and reached out to whoever was in front of me. It could have been a lot worse, I found out, when I opened my eyes and saw she still had her eyes closed and was smiling. It broke up quite abruptly and I managed to make my way to the table, embarrassed as I was, trying to stop myself from shewing how much I wanted to sit beside her. I was served, but my appetite was nothing compared to earlier that day, due mostly in part to the eating of chocolate. The salad looked healthy and everything, but my mood was put off by the original name-calling (which seemed to have become a self-fulfilling prophecy.)