Jesus Freaks: Sins of the Father(5)
Not that they aren’t nice people, but they lobby—some of them, even many of them—to squash gay marriage. Meanwhile, I’m part of a Christian church that recently elected a gay bishop. My mom took me to marriage rights protests starting when I was ten. After I’d made the decision to apply to Carter, I realized that I was likely standing across the battle lines from future classmates. Gay marriage is just the tip of the iceberg of my political differences with everything Carter stands for—or seems to stand for.
That’s not why I applied.
Roland Abbot took on the role of pastor at New Life when I was a sophomore in high school. At that time, college was barely on my radar and Carter was a distant planet. I spent the next two summers taking various workshops at Harvard and Yale. When it came down to applying for colleges, though, something tugged at me. Just…try, something said. Someone. I don’t know.
Before I have time to give it much more thought, the doorknob turns, causing me to jump to my feet and fiddle with my bags. I feel the need to look busy, not like I was sitting around waiting to gawk at my new roommates.
Fluttery giggling precedes the entrance of two devastatingly gorgeous girls.
“Hi!” they squeal at the same time.
I miss my best friend. What’s so great about Yale, Mollie?
I put up my hand and offer a soft wave, suddenly feeling more shy than I have in my entire life. You’re a fraud, and they’ll know it in a second. No, you’re not. You’re a college student searching for meaning just like they are. They can’t judge your salvation. But they will. Maybe.
“Hi,” I finally speak above the spinning thoughts in my head. “I’m Kennedy. Kennedy Sawyer.”
The long and lean stunner with shoe polish-black hair in a tight ponytail extends a hand first. “I’m Bridgette Nelson.” Bridgette’s eyes are blue. Not just blue, I should mention, but… scary blue. The kind that makes you want to stare to see if they’re real, but gives you goosebumps if you stare too long. Her skin is soft and her smile heavenly. It really is. It’s the most bizarre thing. I try to remind myself not to view students here any differently than students at any other school I might have gone to, but that’s proving near impossible.
Cerulean. Her eyes are cerulean! I finally place the color thanks to years attending the Crayola University of Broody Children.
People…
Bridgette drops her hand and steps aside so our other roommate can introduce herself.
Roommate #2 is the most beautiful person I’ve seen in my entire life up until this point. Her skin is the color of a latte, her eyes an unrelenting green that sit in stark contrast to her sandy, bouncy curls. Her smile reveals picket-fence straight teeth.
“I’m Eden Vaughn.” She smells like lilacs. Even her voice sounds like lilacs might sound if they burst into song.
Were there singing lilacs in Alice in Wonderland?
Wait. Did she just say Eden?
“That’s a lovely name,” I say instead of something like, Oh, like the garden? I really need to get ahold of myself. I’m not the Antichrist.
She brightens her smile and seems extra focused on my face, as if she’s trying not to roll her eyes. “It’s something. My parents just couldn’t help themselves. I’m glad they didn’t go with Eve, I guess, since there are probably ten more of those wandering the campus.”
“Or Mary,” Bridgette cuts in, and both girls giggle some more.
I chuckle and sit on the edge of my bed. “Do you two know each other?”
“Since this morning,” Eden pipes in, plopping across from me on the other bed.
“And praise the Lord for that,” Bridgette responds. “I’d hate to go to my first class knowing only my brother.” She rolls her eyes and sits as close to me as someone who’s known me since kindergarten.
“Oh, your brother is here?” I ask.
She nods. “Twin. His name is Silas.”
I assume the name is in the Bible somewhere, but the only Silas I’ve ever heard about was in The Da Vinci Code. I keep the thought to myself.
“Oh, that’s awesome,” I respond. “Do you know anyone here, Eden?”
Eden leans back on her hands and looks to the ceiling for a moment. “Just a few kids from some camps over the years. My best friend goes to Bob Jones, though. I’m bummed about that.
“I’d be bummed, too,” I mumble sarcastically, without thinking. While Carter was no walk in the park, in some respects it functioned like Animal House when compared to the maddeningly strict Bob Jones University.
When I applied to Carter, I searched schools similar to it just to get an idea of the general community of Christian universities. Bob Jones stuck out to me as most legalistic. Insane, really. But then, Carter seemed mentally detached when I first examined it, too.
Bridgette elbows me softly. “I know, right? Their courtship and dating rules are so last century.”
Yeah…that’s what I meant.
Even though I’d studied the Carter Student Code of Conduct forward and backward from the time it was mailed to my house, there were a lot of things that were going to take some significant getting used to. Rules on dating was the biggest one. I never had a steady boyfriend in high school, but the concept of an educational institution dictating the dating lives of adults was so foreign to me, I’d wondered if my handbook was missing its Rosetta Stone CD to help me comprehend it all.
Andrea Randall's Books
- Where Shadows Meet
- Destiny Mine (Tormentor Mine #3)
- A Covert Affair (Deadly Ops #5)
- Save the Date
- Part-Time Lover (Part-Time Lover #1)
- My Plain Jane (The Lady Janies #2)
- Getting Schooled (Getting Some #1)
- Midnight Wolf (Shifters Unbound #11)
- Speakeasy (True North #5)
- The Good Luck Sister (Wildstone #1.5)