Bonnies over Clydes: Encounters in classroom romances

I never used to make friends in class. I would come right on time, sit by the door and leave as soon as lecture ended. No time for chitchat. But last semester, in some twist of fate, I attracted a community of near-door sitters, who too had no time for chitchat. Somehow, chitchat we did. The bond never extended beyond the confines of the curriculum, but a camaraderie blossomed nonetheless, and out of our hesitant alliance, I developed a class crush.

The attraction was just as anomalous as the friendship had been — our interests were totally dissimilar. But I liked his hair. It was shiny and flowed like honey. I liked his voice and what he said. He was passionate, and it didn’t really matter that we weren’t passionate about the same things.

I joked about my crush keeping class interesting. I smirked and solicited advice to take our bond beyond academia. I asked questions mostly out of irony — my friends knew of my in-class social ineptitude — but I did want to make it happen and felt pretty confident that I could. I just needed perfect timing.

I wanted to flag him down after the last class and say something such as, “I find you very attractive. You have my number, call me sometime.” In my mind, I’d leave him stunned and cast a flirtatious glance over my shoulder. But I didn’t want to disrupt the table arrangements for the final. If he was put off by my advance and didn’t want to sit with me, it would stress me out during the test. His perpendicular presence had become oddly reassuring and I didn’t want to go without it while taking a final. I decided to wait.

To make it actually happen, I needed to work myself up to being as bold as possible. I went to the “guru.” The guru is the bite to my bark. Her seduction advice is infallible and she used to know my honey-haired honey. She told me I should text him at precisely 10:30 p.m., asking if he was single. According to the guru, 10:30 p.m. is early enough that you’re probably sober but late enough that you might not be. Early enough that he won’t be drunk but late enough that he might not be sober. Most importantly, it’s early enough for a rendezvous later that night but also late enough to make time another day. He may take a while to respond but he would respond favorably.

I was almost certain Honey was single, so asking seemed excessive. Instead, I crafted and drafted and stewed between study breaks but to my surprise, he texted me first. “How are you studying?” It would be so easy to invite him over and segue into not studying, that is if I was suave. But another classmate messaged us both before I had time to plot, asking to meet the next morning.

When the final time came, Honey and I waited together, early but still by the door. Toward the end of the test, I could see him fidgeting and realized he was waiting for me. We closed our blue books in unison, rose at the same time, and he opened the door for me. My chance handed to me on a silver platter.

“How’d it go?” That’s what I got out before we were no longer alone in the hallway, before we were talking to classmates, before we had places to be. Text it was.

I arranged to go out with my former roommate that night, so that the possibility of rejection wouldn’t loom so large. I had already written my message and cleared it with the guru and my old roommate, so I could just hit send later. We lost ourselves in cider, conversation and Broad City for five hours until I could send it and the nervousness dissipated. I even sent it a few minutes early. But by hour four with no word I was stressed again, scrolling through picture after picture of him with cute Asian girls on Facebook.

By hour five, I was drunk at Jack in the Box. My old roommate and I shared the sick satisfaction of devouring a large fry. That’s what mattered to me. She had been abroad with me, lived with me, split meals and coauthored many text-seductions. The guru had guided me from banter to action, giving me the confidence to follow through on my fantasies. I cherished them far more than I ever would Honey.

Finally, my phone mumbled Honey. “Thanks! I’ll keep in touch.”

Days of obsessing, drafting, polling, plotting — for that. I took a screenshot. “WRONG,” said the guru.

“He sent THAT?!!?” said the old roommate. “He did. I’m over it,” I said back, and meant it. I had no guy and no game, but I had my girls and that’s all I needed.

Rica Maestas is a senior majoring in cognitive science and narrative studies. Her column, “Cuffing Season” runs on Wednesdays.