New Life : A Second Chance

Chapter 24 - Roommates

The girl's name was Sarah.

She was a rather petite girl at only 5 feet tall, and of Chinese descent. Her hair was dark, cut in a bob style that framed her slightly round shaped face, reaching her shoulders. She had recently moved to the country when her father got transferred. Hence, her ignorance of the Smith Twins and the Elite Five.

Her father made her attend Sakura Academy, and to live in the dorms as he didn't have time to truly take care of her. Her mother had passed on the year before, and her father still found it difficult to handle his grief - and hers. So he did the next best thing. He let someone else do the 'taking care of'.

Sarah didn't know anyone yet from the dorm, and she had merely come down to try to make some new friends before school began. Her roommate hadn't arrived yet, and she had no idea when that would be. Initially, Sarah tried to make some friends the night before, but found that most hung out with their respective roommates. She didn't have the courage yet to break the ice, and thus, she had hoped to be more successful at the lounge.

That was another reason why she hadn't known that one of the new arrivals was her new roommate. And she couldn't have guessed that her innocent question would have caused such a reaction!

"Which hole did you crawl out from, not to know them?" asked one, snorting. She felt that Sarah's question was purely an act seeking attention - which worked, since Kyle actually looked at her and smiled! At .. at this little thing! Jealousy burned inside of her.

Sarah gulped, not knowing how to respond or why the animosity was being directed at her.

"Oh come on, Janice," said another, "It's obvious it has to be from some backwater village. Just look at her clothes!" They both then peeled in laughter.

Sarah looked down at her T-shirt and jeans. Sneakers. What? What was wrong with them? It was clean, and comfortable. She looked at the two girls. They were dressed in jeans as well, but had on heels and a blouse. Sarah shrugged, not bothered. She didn't know why these girls were being so nasty, but she really couldn't be bothered.

As they were laughing, Sarah then walked away.

"Oh look, the little mouse is running away!" said Janice and Sarah frowned, but didn't look back. She went to the lift that would take her to dorm room, thinking that it would be better for her to just wait in the room until it was time to attend school. Making friends can wait another day. Today was just too exhausting.

Sarah got off her floor and walked to her dorm room. It was then that she realised there was quite a crowd in the corridor. "Excuse me, excuse me," she said as she squeezed through whenever she could. The crowd was even denser nearer to her dorm room, and she couldn't quite push through anymore.

One girl in front of her turned back and said, "Stop pushing!"

"I'm sorry! But I just want to get to my room. Can you please move aside?" Sarah pleaded.

The girl harrumphed, then replied, "Yeah, right. Give me another excuse. You just want to get to see him better, isn't it?"

"Huh? See who?" Sarah asked, puzzled.

Before the other girl could reply, Matron's clear voice was heard, "Sarah? Is that you? Come here, child."

"Excuse me, Matron Camillia is calling me," insisted Sarah to the girl in front. The girl had no choice but to make a way through since the Matron called her.

Sarah's entire gaze was on the people around her, and on the floor as she slowly made her way through. She loudly let out the breath that she didn't realise she had been holding, with a 'phew' and she gave one last glance behind her, mumbling, 'crazy people blocking the corridor'.

She froze when she heard a slight laugh in front of her and her head whipped back in front, her eyes seeing a chest right in front of her. She then looked up, and was greeted by the same intense blue eyes she had locked eyes with in the lobby.

"Hi," she squeaked out, and he laughed again, louder this time, causing the girls around to just sigh.

"Hi," he said, "The name's Kyle. And you must be Sarah, my sister's roommate."

"Sister?" Sarah repeated then when the words clicked, her eyes brightened, "Roommate?" Sarah turned to her room, looking in. There, she saw a girl taking out several soft toys from a bag and arranging it lovingly on the bed.

"Kayla!" shouted Kyle at the doorway, "Your roomie Sarah is here!"

Kayla turned, and Sarah gasped. Even to her, she found Kayla's beauty breath taking. Kayla came rushing over excitedly, grabbing both of Sarah's hands, saying, "Hi roomie! Call me Kay!"

"Erm, okay. I'm Sarah," Sarah replied then mentally knocked her forehead. Of course Kay would already know that, since her own brother told her already.

"I'm sure we're going to be good friends!" Kay smiled, letting her hands go. Kay then turned to look at her brother, saying, "Get lost, Kyle. You're creating a disturbance here."

Kyle rolled his eyes upwards, gave her a two finger salute while leaning on the door frame, "Gotcha sis. Getting lost. See yah." Kyle then looked behind Kay, shouting, "Mum! Leaving now. Send Dad my regards."

Delilah just smiled and waved him off. Before turning away, Kyle smiled at Sarah, saying, "Nice meeting you."

Then he turned, and saw that the corridor was blocked. The Matron just glared at the girls and they parted, taking deep breaths as Kyle walked by. No one dared to actually reach out to touch him, and they looked on dreamily as he entered the lift and out of sight.

Delilah frowned, not liking the way the girls acting. When the said girls saw the mother of their dream boat walk out and stare at them, they quickly looked down and suddenly found things to do elsewhere. Getting on the bad side of their potential mother-in-law would not be a good start.

***---***---

Kyle went down the lift to the ground floor, then walked across the main area to the lift on the opposite side. This lift would take him to his dorm room. He looked at the keycard in his hand, remembering Matron's words, "Your room is B1209, which means it's on the 12th floor, Wing B. It's to the left of the lift."

Reaching his door, Kyle looked at the number plate on the door, and the empty name slots that were at the right side of the door. Kyle was curious at that. Wasn't his roommate already settled in? Kyle shrugged, and inserted the keycard into the slot at the door handle. Just as he pushed down the handle, his ears detected some slight movement inside.

Instinctively, Kyle went on high-alert. The room was dark, and there was just enough light that filtered through the closed curtains that he could make out the vague shape of the room. Kyle pretended not to have heard anything, and walked in without missing a beat.

The moment he closed the door behind him, he sensed some movement on his left. Just by taking one small step to the side and twisting his waist slightly, he avoided the lumbering figure that had reached out to him. The said figure couldn't stop in time, stumbled and crashed onto the floor.

Kyle flipped the switch on, illuminating the room. On the floor, sat Xing Han who stared up at Kyle, aggrieved.

"Damn it Kyle!! Why did you move so fast?!"

Kyle smirked, reached out a hand and pulled Xing Han up, "What are you doing here? I thought you're not staying in the dorms?"

"What ? ME? Not staying in the dorms? What would you do without me, your best friend forever and ever and ever?! We're going to be the best roommates! Ever! We'll do everything together! Ah! I'm so excited just thinking about it!"

"Wait. YOU'RE my roommate?"

"Yeah, isn't this just Fate?" Xing Han grinned, "We're meant for each other!" He reached over to give Kyle a hug and Kyle prevented him, his hand on Xing Han's forehead.

Kyle was 5'8", and taller than Xing Han by 2", and he so he just managed to keep Xing Han from coming closer, "Whoa, down boy. And what do you mean, Fate? I distinctively remember my roommate's name is Gerald."

Xing Han stopped, gave him an innocent look and replied, "Gerald? Oh ... he suddenly realised that I would be a better roommate."

"Xing. Han," Kyle said in a low voice, enunciating each word clearly and slowly while putting down his hand.

"Ah, relax Kyle," Xing Han said while walking to his side of the room, "Gerald is now the owner of two limited edition sets of Rianna's photo album. Sexy edition, mind you."

Kyle sighed, and walked over to his closet, taking out his school uniform. Unlike Retsu, the Sakura Academy's uniform was the standard secondary school set. A short sleeve white collared shirt, black pants. The school emblem was on a pin, to be pinned on the pocket that was on the left of the shirt. Kyle walked into the bathroom, and Xing Han teased him, "What? Shy?"

Kyle grinned back, as he walked in then just before closing the door, he said, "I just didn't want you to drool over my ripped body."

Xing Han made a gagging motion as the door closed.