"Cooney, Linda A - Freshman Dorm 10 - Freshman Changes" - читать интересную книгу автора (Cooney Linda A)

"Don't be embarrassed, KC," Peter said in an off-hand tone. "Even if you did go to all that trouble on my account, it wouldn't make any difference. I wouldn't care if you wore a mink dress and a diamond tiara."
"Well maybe you don't," Winnie jibed at Peter, "but your eyes certainly do, 'cause right now they're stuck on my good friend KC."
Two.
Later that day, Lauren Turnbell-Smythe I lay on her stomach on Dash Ramirez's I black and white checked sofa, staring at her calculator. The numbers weren't adding up. No matter how many times she worked it out, the total was still less than zero. How could that be? After working long hours every weekend as a maid at the Springfield Inn, Lauren was facing something she had only read about: poverty.
"I like the way you crunch numbers," Dash flirted from where he sat on the bare wooden floor of his rented room, surrounded by dozens of sheets of crumpled paper. He was busy working on his latest article for the U. of S. Weekly
Journal. "I always took you for the creative type, but you haven't taken your eyes off that calculator. They must be giving you a lot of homework in your personal finances class."
Lauren rolled over onto her back and closed her eyes. "I wish it were for my class," she whispered, running her fingers nervously through her wispy, light brown hair. "A case study is easy to solve because all the answers are at the back of the textbook. But I don't think I'm going to be able to look up the answers to this one."
"What's the problem?" Dash asked, sliding over on the floor until his head was right above hers. "Maybe I can help."
Lauren opened her eyes and gazed lovingly up at her boyfriend. His dark hair was pulled back into a ponytail, and two days' growth of stubble shadowed his lean face. A red bandanna, which he usually wore on his head, was tied loosely around his neck. Just having him near made Lauren feel safe and secure, and almost made her forget her financial worries.
"Go ahead, pick my brain," Dash said. "I'm not a math major, but I did get a 670 on my SATs." Dash looked down at her tenderly, his face moving closer to hers.
"Kiss me first," Lauren said. "That will be my
spoonful of sugar to help the medicine go down."
"What medicine?" Dash asked, but Lauren shook her head and pointed to her lips. "Anything you say," Dash said, brushing her lips softly with his.
Lauren's blood began to fizz and a warm feeling spread from her lips down to her toes. The sensation was so pleasant that Lauren didn't want the kiss to end. But it was time to face reality. As Dash leaned away from her, Lauren sat up on the couch and grabbed a yellow legal pad. "Which do you want to hear first?" she asked. "The bad news, or the bad news?"
Dash sprang up onto the sofa, and put his arm around her. "I'm a man," he said, making his deep, Latino-accented voice sound even deeper. "I can take it."
"I'm poor," Lauren said. "In less than one year, you've seen me go from riches to rags."
"And I respect you for it," Dash said. "You stood up to your mother, you stood up for your principles, and now you're making it on your own, without any financial help from her." When Lauren had first arrived at U. of S., her wealthy parents had provided her with everything money could buy: a BMW sedan, a personal computer, CD, TV, and microwave oven. That
all changed, however, when Lauren refused to join Tri Beta, her mother's sorority. Lauren's mother, furious at her daughter's rebellion, had cut her off without a cent.
"Standing up for my principles sounded good, in theory," Lauren said, "but I've just worked out the numbers, and somehow I come up several thousand dollars short by the end of the semester."
"No way!" Dash protested. "I thought you got a couple thousand when you sold your BMW."
"I did," Lauren said, "but it was banged up pretty good after Winnie had her accident in it. I didn't get very much. And it all went toward my tuition this semester."
"Well, what about your job?" Dash asked.
"That covers the rest of my tuition," Lauren said. "But there's nothing left for books or transportation or food, not that I really need to eat all those fattening meals in the cafeteria." Lauren stared ruefully at her slightly pudgy stomach, confined by the waistband of her black parachute pants. Pulling the sides of her antique, patchwork vest over her stomach, she buttoned it closed.
"You look good to me," Dash said, nuzzling her neck.
"I'm not going to look too good at the end of
the semester when I can't pay all my bills." Lauren removed her round, wire-rimmed glasses and placed them on the aqua blue, amoeba-shaped table next to the sofa, a leftover from the apartment's previous tenant. Then she hid her face in Dash's hair. It smelled clean and fresh, like lemons and soap.
"We'll think of something," Dash said, rising from the sofa and pacing to the opposite end of the small room in his high-topped sneakers. He paused by the "kitchen," really just a row of appliances against one wall-an old 1950s refrigerator with rounded edges, a freestanding double sink, an oven range from the 1970s, and a beige, Formica counter.
"I could sell my soul," Lauren suggested wistfully.
Dash's dark eyes took on a demonic gleam and he rubbed his hands together. "I happen to be in the market for a good soul," he cackled. Then his face relaxed again and he paced over to the barred window overlooking a fire escape.
"I'll spend every free minute I have helping you figure this out," he said. "We just have to find a solution before Monday."
"That's right," Lauren said. "I forgot you've got that special journalism seminar coming up."
"Every weeknight for the next two weeks,"
Dash said, staring out the window. "But we have a couple of days until then. Let's work on it right now. I'm sure we'll come up with plenty of good ideas. We're both intelligent, creative, incredibly talented people."
"Not to mention humble," Lauren said. She grabbed her glasses off the table and put them on. "Where's my pad?" she muttered, rummaging around on the sofa. "As we think, I'll write things down." She grabbed a pencil from underneath the sofa.
"Okay," Dash said. "First option. Generous relatives. I don't suppose your mother would relent and let you back into the family."
"Only if I joined Tri Beta, and that's never going to happen. Besides, I'm never going to ask her for anything ever again."
"We'll save that discussion for another time." Dash paced back across the room to the front door. "How about my parents?" Dash suggested. "They really like you, and they can spare the money. I'm sure they'd be happy to help."
Lauren didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Until a few weeks ago, she had assumed Dash was a streetwise kid from a poor family. It was certainly the impression he wanted everyone to have. So Lauren had tried to camouflage her upper crust bacKCround when she met the
Ramirezes, only to discover that Dash's father was the president of a bank and his MBA mother was chief administrator of a hospital. The funniest part was how entirely the situation had reversed itself-and for real. Now she was the poor one, and they were the ones with money. But even if she were starving, Lauren knew she could never ask Dash's parents to help her. "It's really nice of you to offer," Lauren said, "but I really can't accept. I won't take money from anyone. This is my problem, and I'll figure out a solution."
"We'll figure it out," Dash corrected her. He plopped down on the sofa and put his arm around her again.
"I could get another part-time job," Lauren said thoughtfully, chewing on the worn-down eraser on the end of her pencil. "Maybe the Springfield Inn would let me waitress on the days I'm not cleaning rooms."
Dash looked at her sternly. "When would you have time to write papers and study for exams? You're already taking one extra course this semester, not to mention all the work you're doing at the Journal. I'm surprised you haven't turned into a zombie already."
"I do feel like I'm walking around half-asleep a lot of the time," Lauren admitted.
"Maybe you should give something up instead of taking on more," Dash suggested.
"Don't even think it," Lauren said defensively. "I know what's going through your mind. Tfou think I should stop working at the Journal because it takes up so much of my time."
"I never said ..." Dash began, but Lauren cut him off.
"There's no way on earth I'd ever give up working for the newspaper," Lauren said. "It means more to me than any of my classes. I'd rather drop out of school altogether than drop the Weekly Journal."
"Well, something's got to give," Dash said, slumping back against the black and white checked sofa cushions. "If you can't increase your income, maybe you can cut expenses."
"How?" Lauren asked. "I'm only buying essentials, like books and toothpaste and stuff like that."
"I mean the big expenses like room and board. My rent is a lot less than what it costs to live in the dorm. And I spend half on food than what it costs you to buy a meal contract."