Other Freshmen Probably Busy

NEW YORK, NY — Scrolling through her Twitter feed for the seventh time in an hour, Alicia Dobson (FCLC ’21) considered reaching out to her friends to make plans for that evening, but ultimately concluded that the other freshmen, who, like her, had just arrived on campus without knowing almost anyone three weeks earlier, were probably busy.
“It’s not a big deal, and I don’t want to seem clingy,” said Dobson, who silently wondered whether she made a mistake in skipping the optional, “fun” orientation programming earlier that month. “I figure that if people are doing stuff, they’ll invite me if they want me around. No need to make things awkward by trying to butt in.”
“I thought about asking Alexis [Jacobs (FCLC ’21), Dobson’s roommate] what she was up to, but she left thirty minutes ago and seemed to be in a rush. She’s probably hanging out with her old high school friends or something.” After a pause, Dobson, who had completed all of the readings for that semester thus far, and whose midterms remain over a month away, admitted, “It’s probably best for me to get some studying in anyway.”
“I would head down to the dining hall to talk to people, but it’s already 7:40, and it closes at 8. I don’t want to make the dining services people stay late to clean my dishes.” Dobson then gathered a couple of stray sheets of paper from her otherwise spotless desk and remarked, “I might as well get some cleaning done tonight. That’s nice and productive.”
“Anyway,” Dobson offered, “I haven’t called my mom in a while, and by the time she’s done talking, I’ll be ready to go to bed anyway.” [Editor’s Note: Her mom was out with friends.]
At press time, Alexis Jacobs was seen in the floor lounge across the hall, deleting a Facebook message to Dobson which had been halfway written.