Chapter 3
February, 2006.
HE AWOKE at 5 a.m. It was February 2, 2006. Still winter. Today would be his 10th meeting with Prof. Ladd. It had been nine months including his fall semester when he was accepted in the University of Denver for passing the full academic scholarship program. Her mom called last night saying that his father went with her attending Rev. Michael Forester's gospel church prayer. His brother Edgar called them too but his father never spoke to him. He had promised to get home In December. He was glad to hear that. It had been three years since his brother was home in Aspen.
His apartment Olsen resident's hall stood inside the university campus. It was a little bit dumpy for the two of them as roommates but they had their own bed. They were in the fifth floor of the building where mostly freshmen stayed. The room had two windows where they could see students walking and jogging by on the streets. There, they could also see the view of the Rocky Mountains.
Billy Hall, his roommate still on his bed snoring while sleeping. The sunshine almost appearing and Jayson was preparing for shower. The room was filled with different belongings scattered everywhere—t-shirts, pants, the television wasn't in right position, porn magazines, DVD's, empty beer cans. It was a usual boy's room.
Jayson had the better arrangement of his belongings. His clothes were properly folded, his books properly arranged in small bookshelves. He loved reading newspapers but he always placed them in the right place after reading. His very first expensive cell phone was stolen in this room during the fall semester, so he bought an inexpensive cell phone so no one would get interest into it. He had a lap top. He loved internet surfing, network gaming and social network.
The other bed was a hell. Its wall was full of sexy pictures of—Angelina Jolie, Jessica Alba, Kate Winslet, Jenifer Lopez, and other more with different vandals such were—I love you Natalie Portman, mother fucker, shit, I hate Jesus Christ. The walls were re-painted before the spring semester, during the break. They had removed the previous pictures from the last semester so it looked well for a while, but only weeks had passed it was starting to re-appear.
Billy Hall was actually his first cousin from mother side, a cartoon character to be described. A thin with curly blonde hair, that when get drunk all his pimples got red. He was addicted in all computer games. He was a lucky son because his father was a professor of criminology in a small college in Aspen. He had inborn tiny ears and never developed in maturity. His voice also never developed so when he spoke, he seemed to be an eight years old kid talking childish. He was older for a year to him since he missed a year in college. He took up computer technician course. He was drunk last night; his only girlfriend ever broke up with him.
They had their own—fridge, stove, oven, television, cable connection, free Wi-Fi. They also had a common bathroom, and common hallway. The room had a very small living room with two sofa's facing each other. The hi-tech laundry machines were at the ground floor.
Fifth floor had a common living room where students mostly meet to watch in a huge flat screen television at the wall. There was also space for group study with at least two tables and a common kitchen, so students usually meet there while cooking before meals.
Most food could be found on the ground floor. The apartment had his own canteen, there students could buy—burgers, sandwiches, pizzas, pastas, tacos, and the meal of the day. Most students from different levels in the entire building usually meet there to eat. Ground floor had also a space for gaming zones for the students –billiards, arcades, play stations, x-boxes and others. Billy was always there to play.
Students of the university were use to life of I.D. swiping, a life of modern a hi-tech technology. Everything about—food, entry passes, books, rentals, laundries, credits were connected on their I.D. cards. They had this called university supplied eco-pass, a card which anyone in the campus could avail, and use for all means of transportation inside the campus, or even at the rail transit linked from the university to downtown Denver. University bikes scattered everywhere as mostly students choose for easy and convenient travel to catch up classes.
It was nearly 7 a.m. Jayson packed up his books on his backpack. He raced through the elevator in the ground floor and approached the receptionist Ms. Brenda Tyson, a working student in the university.
"Good morning, Brenda, haven't yet shifted?" Jayson asked.
"Good morning. Not yet, 7 a.m. exactly."
"Can I leave you a message and relay it to Anne when you get shifts."
Anne would be the day receptionist.
"What's the message?"
"Please tell to my cousin Billy when he'd probably pass here that I borrowed his rubber shoes."
"Where's Billy?"
"Still sleeping and snoring. I didn't wake him yet. He was completely drunk last night."
"Okay."
"Thank you, Miss beautiful," Jayson joked while leaving.
Jayson took a bike on the backyard and pedaled it to catch his class at seven.
The University of Denver was found on 1864. It has a 125 acres total land measurements. Buildings are separated by each department of colleges and studies. The oldest building University Hall is still standing built in 1890. In recent years millions of money was invested to develop the university in constructing modern buildings for different fields of study, apartments, theaters, and sport centers.
There are hundreds of trees standing everywhere and open spaces, still covered by ice, but when spring comes, when ice would melt, it would replaced by greenery of grasses, and a good place for chatting and group study during time breaks.
The known Newman Center for the Performing Arts is one of the most famous buildings in the university. The building is located at the southwest corner of E. Iliff Avenue and S. University Boulevard. Here, mostly word's class performers are being watched—ballet dancers, cultural shows, orchestras, choral groups, musical and stage play. They are performing in the university shows and being invited for different occasions in Denver, whole Colorado, U.S. states and even abroad. They are also competing with other schools.
Jayson read every day the university gazette, so he'd known all these histories of the university.
The Sturm Hall stood at east Asburn Avenue. Jayson on his bike arrived five minutes before 7 a.m. His first class today would be in Prof. Monette Stafford. It would be about early civilization of South America. Jayson entered the building, swiped his I.D. card in the computerized magnetic access glass door, saluted the security and walked on the lobby going to his class. It was almost seven when he entered the class. His classmates smiled at him. Vincent Thomas and his girlfriend were there, but the other Denver boys weren't there because they were not classmate with this subject.
"Good morning," Jayson greeted Vincent.
"Oh, Mr. Einstein, how are you?"
"What do you think?" Jayson asked.
"Ready to rumble with, Prof. Stafford?" Vincent answered him with a question. He chuckled.
Jayson shrugged. "Maybe."
"I want you to meet someone on Sunday."
"Who?"
"Our friend, Nina."
"The ballerina?"
"Yeah."
"But why on Sunday?"
"She comes here every Sunday to practice."
"Where?"
"At Newman Center."
"But why here?
"Actually, she's a very good one, so the university is asking her help through her mother to practice here with the new recruits this year," Emily said.
"Her mother works in Newman," Vincent added.
"Why doesn't she want to study here?
"We told you before. She doesn't want to bear any issues between her and her family here. Her father is a former city federal judge here in Denver, and he doesn't want her to be a ballerina."
"A federal judge?"
"Yeah, he is, and also now the current dean of the college of law here, a damn professor. He's failing most of his students."
"Really, sounds influential. But that's good to hear, following her passion. My brother went to college with our father's decision forcing him to be an engineer, but he had another passion. His passion won."
"But both of his brothers followed the passion of their father," Emily said.
"Really?"
"Yeah. The eldest is a second year now at the college of law, and the other one, the war freak, is also a political science student and he plans also to become a lawyer someday."
"War freak, that's a little bit terrifying."
"You should, he's a leader of known fraternity here."
The conversation stopped when a small fat lady entered. She was not Prof. Stafford and not one of their classmates either.
"Prof. Stafford cannot come today. She's sick, she has flu. She told me to tell you that you must review chapter ten to fifteen of your book course and have a long discussion next week. That's all, thank you."
"What the hell!" someone yelled from the students.
"Don't you like it, dude, we can go back to sleep. It's still early," another student said loudly.
The small fat lady left and the students were leaving the room. He left the room with Emily and Vincent and they were walking to the hallway.
"Have you taken your breakfast, Jayson?" Vincent asked.
"Yeah, before I came."
"Don't you want to eat with us?"
"Maybe next time. I must go back to my apartment to fix some trashes."
"Then we will drop you by in your apartment."
"I have a bike."
"Of course everyone here has a bike. Just leave it there and we'll drop you by, alright."
Vincent Thomas had his own car, a Ferrari, an obvious rich kid of Denver. They were both freshmen, but didn't meet any subjects during the fall semester. They had four subjects in common including Prof. Ladd and Prof. Stafford classes.
Vincent Thomas was tall, athletic and handsome with half a Brazilian and American blood. That's why his girlfriend was so much insane about him, so she even enrolled the same degree with him.
Her girlfriend, Emily Goddard was a cheerleader during their high schools. They were in love—according to them—because of their common passions.
They reached the apartment a few minutes later. Jayson thanked them for the ride.
"See you at 2 p.m. with old grandpa's class," Vincent laughed on the car window, waved his hand and sped away.
Jayson's next class would still be 11 a.m. He had still three hours to wait. After that 11 a.m. class, he had also class with Prof. Ladd at three p.m. the old freak or the old grandpa, according to Vincent.
He picked up the newspaper at the reception. Anne was already there. Another working student of the university; receptionist during the day and was attending her classes at night.
"Can I borrow this for a while?"
"Of course, what brings you home so early, Mr. Fisher?"
"Yeah, my professor had flu. Didn't my handsome cousin dipped downstairs already, did he?" Jayson asked.
"Nope."
"Forget the message I left, alright."
"Fine"
"I'll borrow this and gets it back to you before my eleven class, okay"
"Don't rumple it."
"Yeah, I know. You're sexier than Brenda, you know. "
"Crazy."
"I'm serious, let's have a date."
"You're lunatic."
Jayson laughed while leaving Anne in the reception and soared up to the elevator. He proceeded to the study table at the fifth floor. It was early so there were no students yet. He sat and started to read the newspapers. He didn't go straightly to their room because he knew Billy was still snoring. The front page was obviously news about American soldiers in Iraq. Two American soldiers and Iraqi civilians were killed by a suicide bomber. The American officials in Iraq said that the Americans were supplying foods and medicines in rural areas when a suicide bomber ran in the middle of the crowd and the bomb exploded with them. There were many injuries to the American soldiers and civilians. Unfortunately some lives were taken. Since American soldiers were sent in Iraq to dethrone Saddam Hussein, there were hundreds of casualties, injuries and many lives were lost. No days that these subjects of news were being broadcasted in televisions, written in newspapers and subject of different blogs on the internet. But the government had no intentions to pull out these soldiers according to them. They said that Iraq must start a new life after along years of chaos in the hands of evil and could only be reborn in the good hands of the Americans.
The other news was followed by the nonstop debates between the Democrats and the Republicans. Two names among the Democrats emerged as strong candidates for 2008 presidential election, a former first lady and a senator from New York. The Republicans had also their own bets, a senator and a governor. Democrats were winning the minds of the people since their non-stop attacks to the President, a Republican, for sending American troops in Iraq. Republicans arguments, they just wanted to help.
In local news was about a Mexican-American and an African-American in downtown injured each other when they had a chilling argument if to who were better Oscar de la Hoya or Mohhamad Ali. Both of them went to jail.
In sports, Dallas Mavericks hoped for first ever championship this year. Denver Nuggets hoping for eight spot on the standings so they could join the semis. Carmelo Anthony was optimistic. Maria Sharapova, hottest girl on earth.
"Hey! Aspen boy, what's the good news?" It was Gregg, one of their room neighbors in fifth floor.
"Usual," Jayson said."
"Want some coffee?"
"No. Thanks."
"How's your break in Aspen?" he asked while sipping his coffee.
"Cold," Jayson snickered as he folded the newspaper in two.
"Skiing?"
"Sometimes with my friends but it was December, so I just stayed home with my family."
"You love your family, really?"
"Yeah, of course."
"How about girls? We're now on spring semester, dude, but I haven't seen you yet with a chick. Are you gay?"
"What do you think? Jayson smirked.
"You damn beautiful boy. You must not. If I have that face, I should have encountered sex already with all these beautiful girls here in Olsen."
"Not now. Perhaps, someday."
"Precisely, that's good. I want it too, so I can focus in my studies. But man, I just couldn't resist when all these beautiful and sexy girls walk in front of me, and when I smell that perfume, I get insane."
"Your coffee is empty," Jayson tried to change the topic.
"Sorry, but I tell you, dude, if you doesn't like any of these ladies here in Olsen then we could go and search somewhere else, probably in Nagel or J-Mac. I tell you man, those chicks are hot," Gregg boasted.
"Who's hot? an approaching voice coming their ways asked. It was Daphne, Gregg's girlfriend. They lived in together since the mid part of their fall semester without their parent's knowledge. They met in Olsen and had decided to rent a single room.
"Nothing, were just talking about the news. Ask Jayson," Gregg said, smiled.
"Good morning, Jayson. Where's Billy?" she asked.
"Perhaps still sleeping."
"Don't you have a class yet?"
"I should have but it is cancelled. My professor had flu."
"Hey! Greggy, breakfast is ready. I have a class at eight. Come on," Daphne said and left.
"I told you, dude, those chicks are hot," Gregg whispered and sneaked away from him.
Jayson just chuckled.