Isabella

All three of us sighed in relief, knowing full well what we just did. I turned to Morgan, a look of frustration obvious on my face. How could Morgan do that to our RA for no reason? Had she not realized that if it weren’t for me using my mana to see what he was thinking, he could have easily done something that could have gotten her into trouble?

“You do know if I hadn’t done what I did, he could reported you or worse?” I asked Morgan, anger and frustration coming out of me.

“It was a natural instinct, I’m sorry,” she responded, sounding as though she meant it but busied her mind elsewhere.

I scoffed and started pacing around in the living room, my appetite no longer there after my mana gave me an adrenaline boost. I know that by the time lunch rolls around, I will be hungry to the bone and will devour everything in sight. I looked at Anne, cast a mental projection of how I was feeling at that moment and she understood. She immediately went to go fetch a few cereal bars from the pantry and came back to hand me a few just in case. I nodded in thanks and stopped pacing so then I could look at Morgan.

“By the time lunch comes around, I better see you apologizing to him via text or in person and I hope he doesn’t tell his dad about all of this,” I told her in finality.

It seemed as though she was about to protest but I shot her a look and mentally projected the things I would do if she didn’t follow through. Morgan’s face paled, her mouth opening and closing while trying to find the right words. I guess her parents didn’t teach her about restraint and knowing when is the right time to pull out a blade. I just hope that our RA George doesn’t get the wrong idea about the three of us, because what just happened was beyond understanding. I sigh and start walking over to the bathroom.

“Where are you going Belle?” Anne asked curiously.

“Getting ready for school, it’s already 8:30,” I responded flatly.

“Oh crap, I have chemistry this morning,” Morgan responds before running to her room and closing the door behind her.

I get into the bathroom and look into the mirror to see that parts of my hair are sticking out in weird angles. I focus on that for a bit and after a few minutes, the best I was able to do to it was manage the knots but nothing more. My hair will always be super frizzy. I gave up and decided to pick up my toothbrush when Morgan came in. She grabbed hers along with the toothpaste I almost had in my hands. She put a bit of it on her toothbrush, put it under the faucet and then quickly started brushing her teeth. Morgan then handed me the toothpaste and I did the same thing.

“You are fast Morgan,” I said curiously.

“I live among a family of Rogues, I usually don’t have the luxury of time Belle,” she responded flatly.

I wondered how Morgan’s family was like. My parents always made sure that when it came down to how I was raised, it was always based off of how much control I had on the mana pool I had within me. However, when it came time to learn about her when we moved in together, Morgan basically just chose not to tell us much more than her name and that she was from the UK.

With that in mind, I got through brushing my teeth and once I finished, I went straight to my bedroom and grabbed what I had chosen to wear for the day. I had chosen a pair of jeans that had a semi-ripped hole on my knee and a simple t-shirt that had a v style on the front. I got dressed and then put on the blazer that was meant for those who were in the MTS house of the college and grabbed my backpack filled with school supplies, along with a mask, and headed out to my very first class.

*****

While I was heading into the building that held my College Algebra class, I was trying to make sure that the face mask I had was securely in place. Since the whole pandemic had started going on around the world, it seemed that people wasn’t realizing the severe turn it was going to take for everyone. I also knew that if people saw me without my mask, they would all criticize me even more than they already do at this point of my life. I really don’t want to be the type of person with whom people would be scared to be around.

I walked into the building and was trying to look for the room that my class is going to be at for the next few months. As soon as I came into the classroom, I found a decent place to sit and considering that I came in a half an hour early, I decided to plop myself down and open my backpack. I grabbed my notebook and pencil and carefully put both of them on the table. I also grabbed the small bottle of hand sanitizer as well from my bag and put it within reach for necessary precaution. This bottle, however, was protected by a spell I created myself so then whoever touched it without my permission right then and there would be given a really stinky situation.

While waiting, the minutes felt as though it was ticking on by and students started to roll on in one by one, all the while the professor was nowhere to be seen. By the time class should have started, as if by cue, a man who seemed to look confused walked on in and put his things down by the desk that was facing all of the students. Once settled, he started writing his name on the white board with a marker, and then turned to face all of us.

“Hello, my name is Professor Marcus Finnegan, and I will be your College Algebra teacher for the fall semester,” he said a bit too cheerily. “I hope you all are just as excited about this class as I am!”

Everyone seemed to shift uncomfortably in the air as he finished, grabbing a pile of paper and started to go to each aisle, giving a certain amount of the paperwork to the front row of people and letting them know to pass it back.

“While it is getting past back in each row, please look into the syllabus and once the extras are passed back, we will look through it together as a class and I will answer and questions you may have while we go through it,” Professor Finnegan explained, a chipper tone in his voice.

As I looked down and skimmed through the syllabus, something struck me as odd. This syllabus was written in a way that only those who are fluent in very old languages could understand. I immediately raised my hand. Professor Finnegan looked up and saw my raised hand.

“Yes, what is it….,” he asked, trailing off to know which of his students I was.

“Isabella Hoxha,” I responded, lowering my hand before adding, “It seems as though this is in some sort of language that might be unknown to some.”

“Correct Ms. Hoxha, do you know what it might be exactly?” Professor Finnegan asked flatly, a smirk coming onto his face only briefly.

I looked down and tried to figure it out precisely. It looked like Greek, but mixed with something else entirely. I couldn’t quite point out the exact language. After what seemed like forever, the only answer I could give him was a shrug. He looked happy but a bit apologetic at the same time.

“The language that you see on your syllabus is Greek mixed in with old English,” he announced, while striding back and forth at the front of his desk, “It is quite hard at first to read through the syllabus without properly looking at the translations that I will be putting on the board now.”

And with that, Professor Finnegan turned to walk to the board, picked up an expo marker, and started writing as everyone picked up their pencil and notebook to write. This was truly the start of a very interesting semester.