"Cooney, Linda A - Freshman Dorm 05 - Freshman Dreams" - читать интересную книгу автора (Cooney Linda A)

Freshman05 - Freshman Dreams - Cooney, Linda A.

One.
Winnie Gottlieb's life had changed in a Burger King.
It hadn't been an ordinary Burger King. It was a Burger King in Paris, France, which was furnished with little cafe tables and served sandwiches on baguettes.
Winnie had gone in for an old-fashioned hamburger and a Coke. Waiting in line, trying to pass herself off as a French student or a traveler from Rome, she had first laid eyes on him. His blond hair had rested on his shoulders. He'd been wearing faded French jeans, a soft collarless shirt, and the kind of open, loose vest she'd seen on so many Parisian guys since she'd arrived on her teen exchange earlier that
summer. When he'd reached the register, just ahead of her, and dug in his pocket for change, he'd pulled out three tortoiseshell guitar pics along with his francs and his centimes.
The guitar pics had made Winnie think of music, how her Walkman had broken the first week she'd arrived in France, and how much she missed KJAC, the radio station from her small town of Jacksonville back home. That had made her think about how much she missed everything at home: shopping malls and baseball and awful American junk food. Most of all she missed her best friends, Faith and KC. Thinking of Faith and KC had made Winnie feel so overwhelmed by homesickness that when a Muzak version of a corny old rock song about mountains and rain had come over the Burger King speakers, she had burst into tears.
"S'il vous plait?" the girl at the counter had prodded.
Winnie had stared through her tears, speechless for once in her life, while the boy with the long, blond hair had lingered at the counter in front of her, gathering napkins and straws.
"I can't believe it." Winnie had finally mumbled. "Even Muzak is sounding good to me. This is pathetic. What am I doing with my lust summer before college? I'm so homesick. I want to go home."
And that's when he had turned around, ready to take his food to a table.
Winnie had taken one look at him and had wanted to throw her arms around his neck and weep. All her homesickness had disappeared as she stared into what seemed to be cm all-American face: clear blue eyes, dimpled chin, straight-toothed smile-framed by long blond hair. Still, his hip European clothes made Winnie think he had to be Parisian. For about the hun-dreth time that summer, she cursed herself for not studying harder through all those years of high school French.
"Oui?" the counter girl asked her.
Winnie had been too distraught and distracted to place her order. She'd just stood speechless until he'd made a move to go past her. That's when she tried to give him room but ended up shifting in the same direction, so that they collided.
"Excusez moi," Winnie had whispered, her tears still wet and slipping down her cheeks. She'd half expected him to hear her American accent, roll his eyes, and storm away.
Instead, he'd come to life, acting as if she were his oldest, dearest friend. "All right!'' he'd cried in a raspy, subtly southern voice. lcAn American! My brain is working overtime, trying to get by in French, especially since I just came from Italy and Germany before that and, man, am I'm starting to get confused. I've been on the road for seven months, just me and my guitar, and I'm starting to feel like home is something
you just write songs about. Isn't that the way it is? When you're home, all you want to do is leave, and when you're on the road, you miss home so much you think you'll die. It's all or nothing, man."
He had taken Winnie's breath away.
"Come sit with me, beautiful," he'd urged. "Talk to me. Tell me everything about you and I'll tell you everything about me and then I know we'll both feel great.
Winnie had done just that. She'd sat with him. She'd talked. She'd listened. And the whole time, she'd known that Travis Bennett was going to change her life.
"So, Winnie, how long has it been since you last saw Travis?" Faith asked.
"Five months, four days, and six hours."
"But who's counting."
"Very funny, KC. I can't believe I'm going to see him again!"
"Are you nervous?"
"AM I NERVOUS? Sure, I'm nervous. I'm insane, ready to jump out of my skin, demented. Why do you think I was so glad you two could come along with me on this ride?"
Faith turned around in the driver's seat and winked. "Because KC and I are so cool, calm, and collected."
Winnie leaned forward and clutched KC and Faith's shoulders. "Compared to me right now, a cage of monkeys is cool, calm, and collected."
The three best friends were heading away from their university dorms, toward the Springfield bus station on a foggy November day. Thanksgiving break was coming up. Midterms were around the corner. They were nearly halfway through their first semester at college, and Winnie's life had changed again.
"What time is Travis's bus supposed to get in?" asked Faith as she maneuvered the steering wheel of the borrowed university van. Her hair was swept back in a French braid, and she wore a long denim jumper with an old WESTERN DRAMA FESTIVAL sweatshirt, an antique scarf, and cowboy boots.
"Twelve-fifteen." Winnie was in the backseat, shifting and wiggling so frantically that her long earrings jangled and the six bracelets she wore on each wrist clanked. She pitched forward to check her short, spiky hairdo in the rearview mirror. "We're going to make it, aren't we? Please, please say yes, Faith."
"Fear not, Win. We'll make it." Faith patted the dashboard. "Thanks to the trusty U of S day-care van."
"The trusty, sticky day-care van," cracked KC. She put down her Intro to Business book for a
moment and peeled a piece of soggy cracker off her seat belt. Although KC sat tall in her usual dress-for-success blazer, skirt, and little bow tie, she looked unusually relaxed. Her gray eyes sparkled and her dark hair curled more softly than usual around her beautiful face.
"Come on, KC," Faith teased. "You always talk about how important it is to have connections. Well, I have day-care connections." As an independent study project, Faith was directing her own experimental production of Alice in Wmder-land with a cast made up of freshmen, plus two University of Springfield day-care kids. "That's how I got the van."
"Sounds okay to me." KC laughed. "I'm just along for the ride. I really needed a break from studying all morning. Plus I love riding downtown on upholstery covered with cookie crumbs."
"KC, you're suddenly acting much too mellow," said Winnie. "What happened to the over-achieving, overly intense, sorority hopeful we used to know?"
KC held up her textbook. "She's still here. I guess I'm just in a better mood."
"Well, don't be. It just makes me even more nervous." Winnie shifted in the backseat. "Anyway, I for one am eternally grateful for this ride- cookie crumbs or no cookie crumbs. I'm de-
lighted, wildly relieved, insanely and totally grateful for the rest of my life. I would never have made it in time if I'd had to walk. Or run."
Faith grinned. "You're welcome."
"Thanks."
The van cruised past the fancy shops on the Springfield Strand toward the older, funkier part of downtown. Striped awnings and well-dressed windows turned into brick warehouses and parking lots.
"I'm even more grateful," Winnie chattered on, "because my life is beginning to feel about as surreal as a production of Alice in Wonderland. Did I tell you two about the dream I had last night?"
Faith shook her head.
KC smiled. "But I'm sure you will, Win."
"You're right," Winnie breathed, leaning forward again. "It was more of a nightmare actually. Okay, I dreamed that I had to race out of Hermann's Western Civ class to meet Travis's bus. I was trying to get downtown, running faster than I'd ever run in all my ten million exercise jogs, except that I wasn't getting anywhere because the sidewalks kept moving the other way. Isn't that weird?" Winnie slowed down for a moment. "Are you two following this?"
Faith nodded.
"Every word," KC assured her.