Running my fingers through my short dark locks I let out another laugh in response to what my best friend, Irene, had been telling me. Some story about how some chick went ape when her pathetic excuse of a boyfriend was caught checking the tall girl out without even trying to act discreet about it. But was Irene the one to blame? Psh. Not at all. The boyfriend was the one being a shameless pig. And you know what? I didn't blame him. My best friend was hot. The definition of model material. Tall, slender, long legs and a beautiful face. She had long brown hair but had the majority of the tips dyed vibrant shades of yellow, blue, green and pink (she was totally into that stuff and I kind of helped encourage her).

Some women though... I wonder what went through their heads. You either have the confidence not to care about who he looks at—if in the end he does nothing to act on it—or get rid of him if you care too much. Simple as that. But don't blame a pretty girl who just happened to walk by.

"Can you believe that ?" She asked me with a scoff, shaking her head irritably. She was obviously still pissed about it. The thing about Irene was that she wasn't the confrontational type. If there's an option to take the more passive route in order to work things out or come to a compromise, she would immediately take it. The fact that she was so pissed suggested that she was basically left with no other option than to go on the offense. "Like handle your own man, ."

I choked back a laugh. "Did you tell her that?"

"Oh, what didn't I tell her," She said as she took a sip of her wine.

"Ah," I nodded in complete understanding. "I see I'm finally rubbing off on you. I mean it's only been eight years."

"Yeah. Yeah. Whatever." She waved me off as she playfully rolled her eyes. She knows it's true though. "So. Looking forward to this semester?"

I sat back against the chair and crossed my arms over my chest, sighing. We had just finished having dinner at our favorite casual but chic restaurant-slash-lounge nearby. The sun had long gone down, I could tell since we had sat at our usual booth beside the window and from it I could see the gorgeously lit up city streets. You could say we were pretty cool with the owners and a lot of the workers here since we've only been coming here since we were in high school. Plus, our unique looks made us easily recognizable—I was barely 5'3 while Irene measured a little over 5'8.  We were quite the sight, if you asked me. But aside from it being customary, it just had a great atmosphere and delicious, well portioned and affordable food. Why wouldn't we continue to go?

I thought about her question again, internally dreading every time I remembered my schedule for our sophomore year in University (which by the way, started tomorrow). "Not at all," I answered sullenly. "I have a Social Psychology class in the mornings." I didn't mean to so miserable when I emphasize that last part, but even my mouth automatically knew how unhappy I was with the fact.

"Oh, Min." I could tell she was able to easily picked up why I wasn't looking forward to this new semester. I could see the sympathy in her gaze.

"I told them. Anything but the mornings. Strictly mid-day and evening classes." I argued, already agitated by the fact that whoever the idiot was behind assigning the classes had not even taken my words into consideration. Why even ask for my preference then? I was having a difficult time getting to sleep as it was and it had only been worsening. Sometimes I would have to pull all-nighters in order to exhaust myself into sleep—sleep that would I would wake up from around 12:00 in the afternoon. Having to wake up at 7:00 AM would mean that I would get even less sleep, or no sleep at all.

Maybe I should try something a little stronger.

"Back pains still giving you problems?"

I looked up at Irene, my expression softening significantly. I hadn't even noticed the fact that I had kind of drifted off in my own mind. "Yeah." I had to be careful. Irene was my best friend, sure. No doubt about it. But I had to make sure she didn't suspect anything more. My back pains were obvious. So I didn't have to worry about hiding that. I've been suffering from them for four years now after the accident. But that was about as much as she knew. And that was as about as much as she would know. "But they're getting better," I assured with a smooth lie. I was ashamed at how good of a liar I had become with the last few years serving as practice. I put on a great act. 

In all honesty they weren't getting any better. My horrible sleep habits would sometimes aggravate the injury and leave me paralyzed from the pain in the mornings. I was lucky if I could even sit up, let alone walk. Irene thought that it was because of my back pains that I had difficulty getting to sleep—I know because I made her believe it—but that was only part of the problem. Like always I never told her the whole truth. I never told anyone. Sure my back pains played a huge part, but it definitely wasn't the only thing. In the last two years I developed a bad case of anxiety (it was easy for me to feel nervous, anxious and panicky about almost anything). In the last three it was Insomnia (it started with the back pains but eventually developed into something more along the lines of night terrors. It was just difficult for me to close my eyes). And  in the last four it was a very deep and serious case of depression (one that I done very well in hiding from everyone since the accident. I made damn sure of it).

Later that night—after Irene dropped me off at my apartment—I could already feel the strains on my lower back creeping it's way upward, making me shift uncomfortably as I quickly made my way to take a nice warm and relaxing bath with some salts that I had bought for muscle relief, Apparently it also had some therapeutic properties in the aroma that served as a relaxant. Hopefully it would work.

After I took a shower and made sure to let the dirty water run down the drain, I started filling up the tub with a measuring cup worth of the bath salts and warm water. I got back in and laid down once the tub had filled up, sighing upon feeling the warm water work wonders against my aching muscles. It felt so good and in no time I was able to get a nice whiff of the therapeutic salts—an interesting but pleasant aroma of lemon, jasmine and lavender. I had purposefully chosen them because of their therapeutic properties. Apparently lemon was known to enhance mental clarity and reduce stress and depression. Jasmine was also used to reduce stress and anxiety and as an antidepressant. While lavender, one of the most widely used essential oils, provided an uplifting and relaxing property to help heal the mind and body. I didn't know how well they would work for me in the long run, but for the time being it was doing it's job. Maybe it wouldn't heal me completely (let's be realistic, I wasn't expecting that to begin with) but maybe it would at least help me, in some degree, get the much needed rest I not only needed but deserved. 

8:32. . I was running late.

With the bath salts I had at least managed to get some kind of sleep the night before, but in the end I still woke up about half-way through with my heart pounding a mile a minute. . This was getting absolutely ridiculous. Would I not ever get better from this? 

I sprinted towards my class and grimaced as I got to the door which had just been closed, already telling me that this professor was going to be a stickler for punctuation. I looked at the time on my phone. 8:35. I was 5 minutes late and though not anything out of this world, it was still the first day of a brand new semester and I was already making a bad first impression. I didn't need a reputation as the student who arrived late to class. The worst thing possible was arriving to class when the doors were already closed. There was no casual way of walking in and not drawing unnecessary attention from the professor, as well as the rest of the students.

Just what I needed. This was just one of the reasons why I hated morning classes.

"Here goes nothing." I in a breath and built up my courage, walking in with as much feigned confidence as I could muster. And just as I had suspected, I received a warning glare from my professor and amused gazes from my classmates.

Since this was Social Psychology, it was encouraged that it would be two students to a rectangular linoleum table—like the ones you would find in a high school science lab. By the time I got there everyone was partnered up, leaving me to sit in one of the back rows with a table to myself. It looked pathetic but I kind of didn't mind having to sit alone for the rest of the semester. I was guaranteed some peace of mind. It occurred to me that usually classes had an even amount of students, but no way was someone crazy enough to show up later than five minutes. Of course I've been wrong before, and like clock work I stood corrected. 

A creaking sound at the front of the class caught everyone's attention and soon it was filled with low murmurs of overlapping whispers. The commotion drew my attention so I looked up to see the door closing behind a tall-ish looking guy. He looked familiar. Familiar, as in I've seen him around campus—his tousled golden blonde hair and tattoos were hard to miss—but I didn't know him personally. Despite that, he really didn't look like the type to take morning classes, let alone a Social Psych class.

My eyes stayed on him for longer than they should have, even as he made his way closer towards me. Wait a minute. Why was he moving toward me? Oh . I had totally forgotten the only other free seat in the class was sitting right beside me. My eyes caught his and naturally, I quickly looked away in the opposite direction. But by doing so I noticed some of the dirty looks I was getting by some of the girls in the class. That brought in a slew of headaches. The last thing I needed was to be caught up in some catty nonsense.

"Well, now that everyone has finally found their way here," The professor started, his eyes wandering critically over to my table. "I can start with roll call."  

Roll calling? Did I go back to high school? I raised a brow in confusion as he began going through the list, everyone responding to their names as he called them out. He's really doing this.<