Second Time Around. Erin Kaye

Even if she extricated herself from the house, where would she go? Amy couldn’t help – she lived with her parents in East Belfast. She could live at home she supposed, but her parents would want to know what was wrong. They claimed university was as much about ‘the student experience’ as it was about academic achievement. They had no idea what it meant in reality for Lucy.

      ‘Well, I’m really sorry to hear that,’ said Amy, looking into her drink. ‘I know how much you hate it there.’

      A loud ripple of laughter broke out on the other side of the room, giving Lucy the opportunity to look away, effectively bringing the depressing conversation to an end.

      A small group of girls near the door to the kitchen were clustered around a very tall, well-built man, maybe six foot four, with a straight choppy fringe of light brown hair and a broad, clean-shaven face. His big hand encircled a pint glass of coke and he was casually dressed in distressed jeans and a faded rugby shirt with the collar turned up around his thick neck. He looked older than the rest of the group and the way he held himself – straight-backed and square-shouldered – combined with his imposing physique gave him an air of authority. His reserved, lopsided smile suggested that he was the source of the sudden mirth.

      The laughter died away and the tall man glanced up, his eyebrows knitted together in an amused expression. His blue-eyed gaze, as bright and piercing as a spear, met Lucy’s and she felt a strange, unfamiliar sensation in her stomach. Her heartbeat fluttered momentarily, then stabilised again. Startled, she put a hand to her chest as if holding it there might steady her heartbeat.

      ‘I can’t stay long tonight,’ said Amy, glancing at her watch, and Lucy looked over her shoulder to see who the man was staring at. But there was no one there. When she turned round again, he was standing right in front of her. She let out a little silent gasp and, shyly, looked up at his face.

      ‘Hi, I’m Oren Wilson,’ he said, the smile replaced with a searching, curious look as if he was trying to remember if he’d met her before. To Amy he said, without looking, ‘How’s it going, Amy?’

      ‘Good. This is Lucy Irwin, Oren,’ said Amy absentmindedly, and she waved at someone on the other side of the room. ‘Did you win today?’

      ‘Fifteen-three,’ he said and, taking in Lucy’s blank face he added, ‘Rugby. We were playing against Malone.’

      ‘Oren’s captain of the first eleven,’ interjected Amy.

      Lucy, impressed, said, ‘Oh.’

      ‘Yep, a couple of my team-mates are over there.’ Oren pointed at two ruddy-faced, muscled blokes amongst the group he’d been talking to. ‘They’re sound lads. The rest of them are out getting smashed somewhere.’ He rolled his eyes and his smile, when he shook his head, conveyed a kind of benign disapproval.

      ‘Look, would you two excuse me a moment?’ said Amy. ‘I have to speak to Carolyn about Talkshop on Thursday night. We’re nearly out of coffee and biscuits.’

      Amy disappeared and Oren, who had not taken his eyes off Lucy, said, ‘So, are you a first year?’

      ‘N … No,’ said Lucy and she tried to smile but her heart was inexplicably full of a feeling akin to, but not quite the same as, dread. ‘I’m second year, like Amy. I’m doing Applied Mathematics and Physics.’

      ‘You must be very clever,’ he said, his tone one of mild amusement rather than conviction. Was he making fun of her?

      ‘Are you?’ she squeaked.

      He laughed easily at this. ‘With humility comes wisdom. In that sense, I hope I have insight.’

      She blushed, tongue-tied by confusion and said at last, ‘I … I meant are you a first year?’ And then she blushed again at the stupidity of her question while Oren looked on, his thin closed lips almost smiling. He was too old to be a first year; he must be a mature student, or a lecturer even. ‘So, what are you doing? I mean studying? If you’re a student, that is …’ Her voice trailed away and she looked at the floor, wishing it would open up and swallow her whole. Not only was she stupid, she could hardly string a coherent sentence together.