i remember everything, so who are you?

[self_composed]

Bella attends her classes with faultless punctuality, every time. She sits in the second or third row on an aisle in the middle section of seats, in the classes that take place in big auditorium lecture halls like the main section of Bio; she's willing to put herself closer to the professors in smaller classes like OS and of course her flute chair (third; she hasn't been quite ridiculously showoffy enough to climb beyond yet) is assigned. But right now, she is in Bio, learning tidbits about auxin and tropisms that the textbook didn't cover fully. She's running at about one and a half speed, just enough that she can trivially listen to and process the lecture against her memory of the text while also permitting some mind-wandering. She liiiiiikes her cognitive speedup power.

Comments

[self_composed]

"None of us in this room are typical people, I daresay," Bella says. "Probably half the folks who make it to Stanford aren't. The people we went to high school with are normal - for our socioeconomic classes, anyway."

[regularsized]

"No one I went to high school with was normal, I'm pretty sure," says Janine.

"No one I went to high school with was memorable," says Bridget. "At least not after this long."

[self_composed]

"Did you go to an unusual high school of some kind?" Bella asks Janine.

[regularsized]

"Yes!" says Janine. "It was ostensibly for gifted children but in fact seemed to accept anyone who was any two of rich, smart, and weird."

Bridget quirks a smile. "That sounds interesting."

"Extremely!"

[self_composed]

"Okay, so your high school doesn't count. I went to public schools in middle-class neighborhoods," shrugs Bella.

[regularsized]

"Same here," says Bridget.

"My school had many advantages, but no kind of normality was ever one of them," says Janine.

[self_composed]

"I went to a big normal school in Phoenix and a little normal school in Forks and met normal people there," laughs Bella. "And a statistically typical number of abnormal ones."

[regularsized]

"Which kind did you make friends with?" inquires Janine.

[self_composed]

"A mix. You've met Alice, of course, so there's that, but Jessica and Angela and Eric were pretty normal. Angela I even still email occasionally."

[regularsized]

"Alice seems nice," says Janine, "but definitely abnormal enough for at least three people."

"Who is this Alice of whom you speak?" asks Bridget.

[self_composed]

"My boyfriend," says Bella cheerily.

[regularsized]

"...Please tell me more about your boyfriend," Bridget requests, "if only so I can erase the image of you dating Alice Cooper from my mind."

Janine laughs.

[self_composed]

"That's actually one of the reasons he goes by that name, if I recall correctly," says Bella. "He's - hm, I don't think I actually have any picture of him handy, I should fix that for just this sort of situation. He's tall and he's got wavy brown hair just shy of shoulder length and he makes extremely distinctive facial expressions that defy verbal description. He sews dresses and bakes."

[regularsized]

"He sounds fascinating," says Bridget. "Does he or does he not wear stage makeup on a regular basis?"

"I have never seen him in any," volunteers Janine. "But I have not seen him that many times."

[self_composed]

"Makeup very occasionally, but not stage makeup. Dresses, though, he will occasionally wear."

[regularsized]

"Where does he live?" wonders Bridget.

[self_composed]

"Still in Forks, but he visits me here sometimes."

[regularsized]

"One more question. Where the heck is Forks?"

[self_composed]

Bella chuckles. "Little nowhere town in Washington State."

[regularsized]

"A long-distance relationship. Congratulations. I've never been able to hang onto one of those."

"He visits a lot," says Janine.

[self_composed]

"Yeah, we keep in close touch," Bella says.

[You're being talked about,] she informs Alice. And turns the read on, because why not, she can speed up if she needs to in order to juggle two conversations.

[edgeofyourseat]

Alice is in the middle of making dinner. Currently that means sitting on the kitchen counter in his lair, waiting for water to boil.

[By who?] he wonders, smiling at nothing in particular. Bella has that effect on him.

[regularsized]

"Is he also in college, or...?"

[self_composed]

[Me and Janine and my biology study-buddy Bridget.]

"No, he's not in anything at the moment, although he has a lovely little startup business for the dressmaking - Janine is among the customers," Bella says, waving a hand at her roommate.

[regularsized]

"They are beautiful dresses and I wish I could afford more of them," says Janine.

"Maybe I should look him up," muses Bridget.