Page 7 of Falling for Carla
In my favorite comfy pj’s, I curled up on the couch, pressing the clammy sheet mask over my face.
“You look like a mummy,” Brenda said, eating Pringles right out of the container.
“So do you. But it’s supposed to remove toxins from my skin.”
“Are you feeling toxic?” she said, patting the sheet mask she had on.
“No, just tired. The first week of classes kicked my butt. Maybe brightening my complexion will energize me,” I said.
“We have Chunky Monkey in the freezer,” she said. “In case you need some sugar and fat to energize you.”
“That’s just evil. You snuck that in and didn’t tell me?”
“I only got it yesterday,” she said.
“That’s like twenty-four hours I didn’t even know it was here. I could have been eating it!” I protested. “If you opened it and picked out all the good chunks…” I said.
“Once. One time I did that and I was on my period, jeez!” she laughed, holding up a throw pillow to protect herself.
I vaulted off the couch and got the ice cream and a couple of spoons.
“This again?” I asked.
“What are you whining about? You like Channing Tatum.”
“Yeah, to look at. Not when he tries to act. It’s distracting. I just want to look at him.”
“Want to watch Magic Mike instead?”
“I do like that one. He looks hot when he dances.” I said, shoving ice cream in my mouth grumpily.
She switched movies and asked what the problem was.
“Nothing, I’m just trying to get my head on straight for all the work I have coming up. I might as well give up on having time to work out or sleep the next few weeks,” I groaned.
“Well at least you don’t have Professor Narcolepsy for forensic pathology,” she said.
“How’s that going?”
“It sucks. He’s boring, he reads aloud from the textbook, like grad students can’t read—and he made us watch a video of an entire autopsy. Now I love a true crime podcast as much as the next girl, but this was not helpful. It had nothing to do with proper collection and handling of forensic evidence and it was upsetting.”
“That sounds awful,” I said. “I’m sorry you had to watch that. We had to watch part of Donnie Brasco in my Crim 4 class.”
‘What’s next? Godfather Part III, the crappy sequel? I thought you were supposed to be learning about how organized crime works, not watching old movies.”
“Exactly. He wanted us to see the mood and the atmosphere of real organized crime which is apparently gritty and seedy or something. He doesn’t know from gritty, I can tell you. And it was kind of out of touch with reality and insulting. I mean, I lived that life. It’s not like the movies, which I think was his point but then showing us part of a movie defeated the purpose of that idea. Anyway, it’s not going to be a great class. I thought if I put up with the uncomfortable topic, I’d learn how to handle that subset of suspects in a more impersonal and detached way. But no. It’s just going to be weird and boring.”
“Speaking of Crim 4, how’s Professor Hottie doing? Is he at least enough eye candy to get you through the dumb parts of the class?” Brenda asked.
“No such luck. He seems like kind of a jerk, but other than that, not really any personality that I can tell. I mean, I haven’t made full detective on the force, but I can’t find any clues that he’s interesting or has more going on than an unimaginative movie clip and a cringey sense of humor.”
“Wow. You, my friend, are a tough audience, but I can’t say my crim teacher is any better. She’s straight out of the textbook, if you’ll refer to the syllabus, you’ll note that today’s topic is blah blah blah. Then she starts to sound kind of like an actual snore. Just a monotone,” Brenda said. “I guess all the excitement for our last semester just overhyped the reality for us.”
“Yeah, so far we’re looking at one-star-wouldn’t-recommend,” I said. “Oh crap!”
My phone rang. I saw my brother’s name flash on the screen. I looked at it, my heart pounding, my body tensing until it stopped ringing.
“What’s up?” Brenda asked, eyebrows raised.