Chapter 2: Time to be an adult for real

"There's more to this world than staying within the four walls, so always seek to see what is beyond all of this"

Khalid's POV

It wasn't long before Khalid retired to the hostel where he is currently staying at, pending the time he'll be able to get an apartment off campus that's empty or at least an apartment with at least one roommate looking for another, honestly at this point, anything would do for Khalid as he's simply tired of searching and running around like dog that has no sense of direction, but on a serious note he has none, I mean he is new to this town and without his roommates guidance he might have been in one of the apartment's in the rough side of town which was for some weird reason really big and comfortable at a cheap rate it also had furniture's in it, but his roommates were too skeptical about the price and when they decided to check it out indeed it was on the rough side of town which was opened to way too many risks and also it was way too far from school, so he had to turn the apartment offer down more than twice,  he has gone to check out over 4 apartments already!,  and his spirit is down but the only thing that is still motivating the man is his love for his privacy and solitude, there's only little to what a dormitory could provide, right?, so he'll keep searching till he's out of options, hopefully he won't find himself getting tricked once again, for the first time in his life he is being optimistic about this he thinks to himself and shakes his head in disbelief at himself with a smile on his lips as If he was amused by himself, which he probably was, the thing passion could cause…

It wasn't long before reality smacked into him that he realised that he had been standing at the door for only God knows how long smiling at the abyss of the door, if someone had passed by this dorm they would probably think that he has lost his mind, which he won't doubt he probably has, he is still unable to believe that his mom let him leave, and come as far away from her as this, his mom seems to have attachment issues to all her kids, but specifically him, she always wants him close but he succeeded this time, he grins as he knocks on the door of his temporary dormitory where he is staying with a friend, whose name is James among others.

Yes I just said others, because James has more than enough roommates which is one of the reasons why Khalid had his plans to leave as soon as possible, no matter how many times James says "him staying there for the entire year is fine," Khalid just feels like he is inconveniencing the occupants plus he's not really having freedom from guilt so no...just no!.

It wasn't long before the door swung open carelessly of course, would it hurt for them to do things more carefully, instead of choosing to give him a heart attack each time?, he thinks to himself while the other boys had no idea how paranoid he could be, he tried to keep himself from flinching at the harsh sound of the door hitting the wall.

"Hey man, you're back already?" James questions as he walks back towards his bed where he was arranging his own side of the room which was not so surprisingly a mess.

"Oh yeah, you know I just wanted to explore the town and it's apartments a bit, plus I found this comic store in the middle of town.." Khalid narrates making the other boy nod in understanding, he knows that comic store it seems.

"The one at Philips street right?" James questions out of curiosity, eyes blown in interest making Khalid smile, oh how he is going to milk this opportunity to tease his friend

" oh yeah, you know it?" Khalid questions with a raised brow

"Of course, I usually drop by when am free or need to clear my mind to get some comics or read them there for free, they have so many new volumes of manga don't they" James asks out of excitement making Khalid nod in reply

"Of course, so many new volumes it had everything you wanted literally " Khalid says while holding up the two copies out of the many many comics that he had gotten for himself teasingly and if not that James had other things on his mind, he would be jumping around and snatching the comics from his hands.

"Oh that great, did you find any good ones to bring for me?" James asks obviously absentmindedly while trying to pick up the empty cans around his bed creating a mess

"Yeah, I got some DC and marvel and also some mangas a friend back at home recommended,it's good to try new things right?"  Khalid narrates making the other boy nod in agreement.

"Right, I'll love to check them out later on, when I return from lectures" James said as he packed his backpack.

"Sure thing, are you going somewhere? Or searching for something?" Khalid finally asks, upon noticing how absent minded the boy looked while he seemed to be searching for something.

"Yeah, I have biology class right about now, and hey man have you seen my textbook anywhere?" James states in a tired tone, he wonders if he had thrown out the textbook he needed for this class without knowing.

"No, sorry dude, but you have class wow lucky" Khalid states excitedly making James roll his eyes at the enthusiasm the boy had towards classes or lectures, he wishes his lectures would start late this semester but that's only to favour the freshman students to settle in first.

"Trust me when you start having classes you are absolutely gonna hate them" James states making Khalid let out a laugh in disbelief.

"Yeah yeah, so you said" Khalid states in a sarcastic tone making James let out a laugh.

"Oh, You'll see. The guys are all out so have fun sitting here all alone or you can have a little tour around the school environment. You keep on going into town but not for once have you checked out the school environment" James states making Khalid let out a chuckle because it's true, he indeed has been running around town to explore but not once around school.

"Yeah, you are probably right, I should." Khalid admits with a sheepish smile while James struggled to put all his books he needed into his backpack.

"Do what you want dude, anyways I'm out" James announced dramatically before slamming the door shut on his way out.

If only he knew his shoelaces were untied… "oh well he will figure it out" Khalid thinks to himself with a laugh before sitting up on the bed he occupies.

 "I think I really should go on that school tour now, since I have nothing else to do and James is out till God knows when" he thinks to himself before pushing himself off the bed, he pulls on a black hoodie over a pair of jeans since the weather today was a bit chill before he made his way out of the door, slamming it shut using the key that James had left behind for him to lock it for the sake of security before he started to make his way down the hallways while twirling the keys on his finger tip.

Along the way He awkwardly replied to guys who said "what's up?" and other forms of greetings along the way, it's  not like he doesn't want to greet them all back but well, he is just not so good with crowds especially the ones he is unfamiliar with. He has always been like this, an introvert of some sort making it hard for him to get along or even fit in with the boys, it was long before Khalid had successfully made his way and strolled through the west wing of the school simply just looking and exploring, he never realised how massive the school environment actually is, and so are their buildings apparently.

Since he had no lectures today, he decided to go in search of the library simply for the fun of it without asking for any guidance of any sort. After what felt like eternity, he finally found the building which had the huge signboard that said library, he decides just to take a peak in, rather than walk in, he saw students sitting with their backs hinged while a book laid in front of them, they were obviously reading, the room was dead silent and he felt like his presence would be disruptive to their concentration so he quietly  made his way out instead, deciding to carry on his little journey, walking endlessly he also happened to stumble across what looked like the school farm and garden which he found incredibly pleasing to see freshly grown crops and beautiful flowers blossoming, it was so aesthetically pleasing that he couldn't help but to pull out his camera and to take a picture of it.

 Finally, after what felt like forever, ,his walk become much more slower as exhaustion started to take a hold of his body,  he decides it is time for him to retire back to the hostel instead, time almost seemed like smoke as he checked his watch only to see that over 3 hours had passed by without him noticing it earlier on, it turns out that if you are around things that excite your body and soul you seem to instinctively forget about the existence of time

Khalid let's out a smile at the realisation before he started to make his way back towards the hostel where he is currently staying at, with dread sitting at the bottom of his gut, as he reminds himself that"it's time for the very awkward endless greetings once again, once he steps through the door" "can't everyone just pretend to be blind to one another instead?" he thinks to himself obviously not looking forward to the event as he steps into the building with a nervous grin...goodness he hates it so much...it feels so fake of him and to him.

Inside the dormitory, there was this room that one must pass through before getting to the stairway and this room is referred to as the "common room" which is the most crowded part of the boys hostel. It's usually where the male students come to hang out at their leisure time; the common room has 3 huge TVs set arranged on the wall, 2 of them having PS3 & PS4 consoles connected to them and the 3rd TV is used for watching movies or the news but no one really actually did watch the news for real, the students were huge fans of the game set instead, sometimes they gathered around to watch sport matches on the third TV , such as football, american football, basketball among several others. He has to admit he had come down to watch a basketball match not too long ago with one of his roommates and he won't lie, honestly it was quite fun more than he had expected.

As he passed by the common room lobby and he sights a crowd,  He says to himself " I wonder what game they're watching " but he didn't want to go into the crowd so instead, he decided to proceed, to make his way up the stairs and to room 18 which is where he has been staying with James; aha and before I forget, I know you are probably wondering who this James kid is and how they met...no?, oh well it must be said,  so you see James is a friend whom Khalid had met online before coming to this very unique state which was basically nonexistent to some parts of the world, it was a state Khalid himself found due to research for the the furthest university from home, on the university portal there James was holding a medal from a maths competition where he represented the entire university, luckily he had an Instagram account so bam they became friends but that's not even the most interesting part of the story,  the boy wasn't just some random internet friend but also James was the universities Vice Chancellor's son, not that Khalid had any idea that he was in the first place, he only found that information from James roommates directly instead when they were teasing him about being privileged while James looked done with that topic; turns out James hates to be referred to as his father's title but rather as himself, for like he had said the other day "my fathers position doesn't define my achievements, I worked hard for them, so please let go this issue of privileges, like you all I am here to earn a degree and get out of this hell hole", Khalid from then on never used that term to define the boy, but James roommates are too stubborn to stop it seems, so nowadays James just waves it off because at least Khalid isn't doing the same, He isn't misjudging his character and success in school like other students of the school, so he just let it be it seem, but totally from Khalid's perspective James really is a good, intelligent human being..

"James is someone I met while I was hunting online for a college in Carmel city, he has been such a great help providing me with all the information I need as an aspirant for the great college. He has provided me with syllables and area of concentration to revise before I wrote the exams for the college in which I've passed right now, even though he is a year or two older than me, he has been a friend, he is intelligent soul, upon hearing that I didn't click for a dormitory, he also suggested that I stay with him and his roommates for the time being before I get an apartment for myself to live" that's exactly how Khalid described him to his Mom who kicked against him staying with a stranger upon moving to a new state but he needed a place to stay before he gets an apartment off campus and his best option was staying with James whom one of his roommate is still yet to resume, leaving a bed space free for now so good for Khalid right?.

And indeed James was a good person as he helped him settle in and assured him he'll get an apartment within the week, he showed Khalid the west wing of campus the previous night which led to Khalid's expedition earlier, he wondered how those places would look during the day.

Upon getting to the room, Khalid unlocks and swings the door wide open, he notices that James bed was still empty signalling that the boy was still yet to be back from class obviously.

"Oh right, yesterday, he had mentioned to me that he will be having lectures and won't be back till 6pm today" Khalid reminds himself as he checked the time and it was just 5:30pm so he won't be back until 6pm.

"Oh well time to enjoy this peace and silence before the crowd returns" he thinks to himself before taking off his camera, it was a university gift in which one of his elder sisters had prepared for him, knowing how much he loved taking pictures on his phone.

And in her words she said "since you would be so far away from home, we got you a new camera" she announced, making the boy's eyes to widen in disbelief, because he couldn't believe that his sister was handing over to him one of the most expensive cameras to exist in his city.

"Oh my goodness, are you kidding me!" He exclaims excitedly making everyone in the room to let out a string of giggles not that Khalid cared  if they were laughing at how giddy this gift made him look,

"I was starting to get sick and tired of seeing you walk around with that old camera dad left behind for you. So we all put in our little savings and got you this. 

Please make sure to take pictures of the best memories so that we can catch a glimpse of them when you return" the eldest sister states making the boy to elope her in for a hug, he currently had no words so he just let his heart speak so a tear escaped from his lids out of nowhere the whole family was hugging him, there Khalid was trapped in a group hug, perhaps Khalid had shed a tear because of his gift or because she mentioned his dad who had passed away recently or maybe he shed a tear because he actually understood all that was meant to be said for what she was simply trying to say was that she and the whole family are going to miss him a lot. He was the last child of their home, so of course they would miss babying him, and oh how he much hated it yet he didn't, they never listened to him whenever he tries to remind them that he is technically not a kid anymore, at 19 he is technically considered as an adult by the law but not at home.

At home, he grew up in a tightly knit family with his sisters and mom. It was hard to break out of their ropes but hey at least this time he was a little bit more successful because they let him leave even though they call him multiple times a day to check on how he is doing for absolutely no reason by asking him "how is the new town?".

As if that was the most important question out there, Amara his immediate elder sister had promised to jump into a car once he gets hurt to bring him back home, sometimes family members can be so suffocating he thinks to himself before letting out a grin and shaking his head at this realisation of his, because he had finally made it out of their grip and this is officially one of the best choice that he had ever made; to move all the way here and to choose this university. He doesn't regret it one bit because now it's time to be an adult for real, may he be able to survive this after this brief thrill of unknown freedom of his provides for him.