Naivete

\"Thank God,\" Samantha groaned loudly as she fell onto the bed in the far corner of the room, letting her purse fly from her fingers and land haphazardly near the desk. She stared up at the plain ceilings, the plain white walls in her peripheral vision and felt yet another surge of adrenaline. She couldn\'t believe she was finally there, finally attending the college of her dreams.

It had been an excessively long drive...Katy to Boston is an incredible distance...and while her parents had offered to drive up with her to keep her company, Sam recognized that for what it really was: they wanted one final stab, one final attempt to talk her out of it. But nothing could have talked her out of it, and now, she was here. Years of hard work had finally paid off. All that was left was to try and keep her scholarship, and just do the very best she could. Nothing could break her spirits now.

She sat up quickly and looked around the room. There were very few third-year dorms, and this particular section of this particular building in this particular corner of campus was far from desirable, but she didn\'t care. The campus was safe, and she didn\'t expect to be spending a whole lot of time there anyway. Her classes took up a great part of her day, and her evenings would most likely be spent wandering around the city, seeing the sights she\'d been longing to see for years. She thought about those memories as she carefully placed her clothes in one of the dresser drawers. A small smile grazed her lips as she remembered the pact she\'d made years before.

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Music camp was not an easy thing for a 12-year-old. Especially a 12-year-old who, despite having what had been described as incredible talent, had never sung in public before, and was now being asked to sing before a large group of her peers, many of whom had already targeted her as being boring and nerdy. She stood on the makeshift stage in the gymnasium, and the lights dimmed. She carefully smoothed the non-existent wrinkles out of her red flowered sundress, and squinted in the sudden harsh spotlight. She could almost feel the encouraging smiles from her instructors, but she was much more affected by the sneers of her primary audience. The opening strains of the music began. It was one of her favorite songs, and she was dismayed to hear loud snickers coming from the audience when it began. She could already feel the tears building up in her eyes, threatening to spill over onto her face, and worse, to cause her voice to crack and quiver. She took a shaky breath in...

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Sam smiled softly and shook her head. So long ago, so many years of growing she\'d done. She finished unpacking and slid her suitcase under the bed. Beyond this, she wasn\'t sure what she was supposed to do. Classes didn\'t start until tomorrow, and she didn\'t know anyone in the city. She briefly considered going out and looking around the neighborhood, but decided against it.

\'I\'ll need all the sleep I can get before tomorrow,\' she thought, flinging herself back onto the bed and pulling a tattered novel from on top of the bedside table. She had gotten a few pages in before the door slammed open and a very made-up and flashy girl came bustling in with a huge suitcase, talking animatedly on a cell phone.

\"Yeah, I know! But seriously, this place is huge. I don\'t know how I\'m going to find my way around!...Uh-huh, I know!!...Well, I\'m here, I guess...Yeah, I\'ll see you in ten! Bye babe!\"

Sam looked up sharply and grinned, barely suppressing the gag reflex caused by the shrill sound of the girl\'s voice. This must be her new roomie. She sat up, adjusting the collar of her t-shirt and stood, holding her hand up.

\"Hi!\" she said, offering her hand in greeting. \"I\'m Sam. I guess we\'re roommates?\"

Surprisingly, the girl smiled back, looking genuinely excited. \"Hi! Yeah, I guess so. I\'m Sarah. It\'s really nice to meet you!\"

Sam gestured at the girl\'s suitcase. \"You need any help getting settled in? I have nothing else to do for the next couple of hours.\"

Sarah giggled outrageously then. \"Oh, God no. Don\'t touch it. It\'s such a wreck in there, I\'m not even going to bother with it until tomorrow. Besides, I\'m meeting a friend for a drink in a few minutes.\"

She turned and pulled a compact out of her purse.

\"Christ, I look awful,\" she muttered appraisingly, glaring at her reflection. Then, she snapped it shut and turned to Sam. \"You wanna come? I mean, you said you weren\'t busy, and I\'ll bet you don\'t know anybody here.\"

Sam smiled abashedly, looking down a little. \"Is it that obvious?\" she asked, cringing a little.

The girl rolled her eyes and took a deep breath. \"Come on, girl. Let\'s get you drunk.\"

Sam\'s eyes widened as she was dragged out the door, barely having time to grab her purse and check her reflection in the mirror on the way out. She was shocked at the series of events that had just occured. In a matter of moments, this crazy woman had just called her out, and was now dragging her off to party.

\'This is going to be pretty interesting,\' she mused as Sarah chatted exuberantly about topics ranging from what classes she was taking, to her shopping spree before the semester began.

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As it turned out, when Sarah said \"a friend,\" what that translated into was \"twenty friends\". Sam\'s eyes widened as they entered the small bar and watched Sarah stride up to the huge table non-chalantly and wave. A tremendous surge of cheering filled the air as she approached, and she almost disappeared in a crowd of four or five people all trying to hug her at once.

\"Wow, so she\'s pretty popular then,\" Sam murmured, feeling uncertainty for the first time since her arrival. She had never been extremely comfortable in large crowds, and while they seemed like a nice enough bunch, her old insecurities began to creep up on her.

Sarah chattered for a few more moments before looking around behind her, a confused look on her face. When her bright eyes found Sam, she grinned and grabbed her hand, dragging her towards the table.

\"Everyone, this is Sam!! Sam, this is everyone, specifically, Billy, Eric, Kyla, and Lauren. I, um...I don\'t actually know anybody else. But they seem nice, right?\" She smiled broadly and took a seat between (as far as Sam could follow) Billy and Kyla. Sam looked around the table for an empty chair. On the far side of the table, in the middle of a group of very drunk-looking young men, one, who appeared sober for the most part, was pulling a chair from another table, looking at her inquiringly.

She smiled gratefully and carefully made her way around the table towards the guy.

\"Where do you want to sit?\" he asked, leaning in close to her ear to be heard over the noise. Sam looked around and shook her head. There was absolutely no space near Sarah, so she just shrugged.

\"Wherever, I guess,\" she said back into his ear. He smiled at her and placed her chair by his own.

\"Do you mind?\" he asked. \"I can\'t seem to keep that waitress from hitting on me,\" he said, pointing to a striking brunette in the corner. When she turned in their direction, he offered her a little wave, and she rolled her eyes disgustedly, turning and deliberately stalking off in the other direction. He turned back to Sam, apparently unfazed by the scene. \"It\'s really getting to be embarassing, not just for me, but for her too.\"

Sam laughed incredulously and nodded a little. \"That\'s fine, I\'d be more than happy to fend off the wolves for you.\"

\"I would be eternally grateful,\" he gushed, gallantly shoving a few people out of the way to make room for her. She took her seat happily and was about to lean over and introduce herself to her knight in shining armor, when she was interrupted by a frantic voice at her elbow. Turning, she saw a young waiter, his brows furrowed and his hands shaking as he asked for her drink order. His dark hair was dissheveled, hanging over his eyes in a haphazard manner, and Sam thought it was rather cute the way he kept having to shove it back, only to have it fall over his eyes again. His eyes were bright blue and a little frazzled as he anxiously awaited her response.

\"Um...a vodka tonic, I guess,\" she said, before turning towards her new drinking companion with a questioning glance. He shook his head slightly, and she turned back to the waiter. \"Thanks!\" she added, giving him a flirtatious smile. His eyebrows raised slightly, and he seemed to visibly relax for a moment before bustling off towards the bar again.

\'Poor guy,\' Sam thought with a giggle. \'Must be new.\' She thought back to her first waitressing gig and shuddered. She could only imagine the shit he must be going through with a crowd like this.

\"I\'m Mike,\" said a voice from her right. Turning towards it, she saw her rescuer smiling at her lazily. \"Nice to meet you,\" he finished, holding out his hand. She took it and shook firmly.

\"Sam. This is quite a place here,\" she said, gesturing at the room around them. Scattered along the wall was various musical paraphernalia: rusty old trumpets and trombones, flutes, clarinets, guitars, cymbals, and drumsticks.

\"Yeah, the owner is a stickler for jazz. Bird, Dizzy, Django, Mingus. Don\'t get him started on it, he never quits.\" There was a moment of silence as the two observed the madness surrounding them. Sarah had, by now, gotten halfway into her drink and was flirting outrageously with Billy, who appeared more than happy to return the favor. Eric, on the other hand, was looking particularly fed up with Kyla\'s advances, which were becoming sloppier and louder by the minute. The scene at the rest of the table was fairly similar. Sam took it all in slowly, wishing that she already had her drink. This was going to take some getting used to.

Certainly, she\'d done her fair share of partying before coming up here, but somehow things seemed quieter in Texas. People were a little less...eager to remove their shirts, apparently. She turned back towards Mike just as a girl\'s sweater was rather seductively slipped over her head by the young man who was now trying to see how far down her throat he could cram his tongue.

\"So, do you go to Berklee?\" she asked distractedly, trying to avoid staring at the ridiculous scene going on just a few feet away. Mike merely laughed, perfectly comfortable with allowing his gaze to fall upon the young woman\'s rather well-built body.

\"Yes, I do. You?\"

Sam was about to answer when her vodka tonic was placed in front of her. She turned to smile and thank the waiter, but was greeted instead by the snarling face of the woman Mike had pointed out a few minutes ago. At her shocked expression, the waitress sneered.

\"Excuse me, I hate to interrupt, but I need to have a little chat with your friend here,\" she said, glaring at Mike.

Sam gave him an inquisitve smile, and he smiled back easily. \"I hope you\'ll excuse me, madame. It appears that some business I thought I\'d settled has sprung back to life. Hopefully, I\'ll return shortly. However, I\'m sure you understand how these things can go sometimes.\" His voice hardened slightly at his last words and his gaze shifted to meet the eyes of the villainous woman who had interrupted them. He stood and bowed slightly towards Sam before escorting the waitress off to the side of the bar.

Sam took a long sip of her drink and went back to viewing the people around her. She stifled a laugh as the shirtless girl was carefully escorted from the building by a beefy bartender, and laughed out loud when the girl\'s temporary boyfriend immediately began hitting on the girl on his other side. Sarah was more than officially wasted, and was making out with Billy with great abandon. After a while, Mike hadn\'t returned, and she was beginning to become bored by her \"new friends,\" so she swallowed the last of her drink and stood, leaving money for her drink on the table. She tried to wave to Sarah, but couldn\'t seem to snag her attention.

She scanned the room a few times, and finally located Mike and the waitress. They were standing near the bathrooms, and Mike was rolling his eyes, frustration apparent on his face. The waitress, however, was crying, blubbering unintelligible, pleading words. Sam caught Mike\'s eye and offered a small smile and a wave. Just before she turned, she thought she saw him hold up a finger, asking her to wait. She decided to ignore it and head back to the dorm. She was already exhausted, and had no idea how she was going to deal with college life if it was like this.

She left the bar and took a deep breath, appreciative of the brisk, clean air. After a moment, however, she realized that she had no idea where she was. She\'d come in Sarah\'s car, and had automatically assumed that she\'d be returning in the same vehicle. She rolled her eyes at her own ignorance and turned to head back into the bar. Suddenly, she felt herself collide with something solid and warm. She looked up and began to murmur an apology, and found herself gazing into bright blue eyes.

The waiter smiled broadly when he saw her. \"Hi,\" he said. \"You okay?\"

When not inside the noisy bar, his voice was low and smooth, and set her heart racing at an embarassing speed. The chilly breeze gently pushed his hair to the side, and she got a clear look at him. He was, without a doubt, the most gorgeous man she\'d ever seen. Her voice faltered the first few times she tried to respond, but she managed to regain her composure (and her balance) in time to utter, \"Y-yeah. I\'m okay. Sorry, I\'m just...\"

He laughed, a ridiculously sexy chuckle, she noted, and put his hands on her shoulders to steady her. \"Wow, if I\'d thought you would get this drunk off of one vodka tonic, I\'d have gotten you two.\"

She smiled a little, unsure of what he was implying, and shook her head. \"I\'m not drunk,\" she corrected. \"Just frustrated. I, um...God, this is embarassing. I\'ve only been in Boston for four hours. I came here with my roommate, and now I have no clue how to get back to my dorm.\"

He laughed again and draped an arm over her shoulders. \"Don\'t worry, little girl, I\'ll help you find your way home.\" His arrogant smile softened when he caught the hard look she gave him. \"I\'ll get you a cab.\"

He pulled a cell phone out of his pocket and called the number, and she breathed a sigh of relief. She hadn\'t been looking forward to going back into the bar, and to make things even better, now she was getting a few moments alone with the hot waiter. Things appeared to be picking up a bit. Once he was off the phone, he smiled at her again.

\"Okay, it should be ten or fifteen minutes. You want me to wait with you?\"

She nodded gratefully. \"I don\'t want to keep you, but if you wouldn\'t mind...\"

\"Not at all,\" he said, leaning against the wall and pulling out a pack of cigarettes. He held out the pack, offering her one, which she declined with a shake of her head. He lit it and pulled, sighing mightily as he exhaled.

\"God, that sucked. I\'ve only been here for about a week, and they gave me your table to fuck with me. I think they had a pool going to see when I started crying like a little girl.\"

Sam giggled a little and leaned on the wall next to him. \"Yeah, it seemed like you were having a tough time in there.\"

He grinned and turned a little to look at her. \"I was, but seeing a pretty girl every once in a while has a tendency to make things a little easier.\"

Sam blushed a little and looked away. Her heart was now beating madly in her chest, and she willed it to slow down. \'Fuck off,\' it responded, beating even harder as his arm brushed against hers a little.

\"I\'m Brent, by the way,\" he said smoothly.

\"Sam,\" she responded, a little breathless at how much more confident he seemed when outside his place of business. Confidence had always been a sexy trait in her mind, and her attraction to arrogant men had almost gotten her in trouble a number of times. But she could tell that Brent was different. There was something beneath the surface - something strong, and kind. She realized after a moment that neither of them had said something, and just as she was opening her mouth to fill the silence, he began to speak.

They both broke off and laughed nervously. He put his cigarette out on the wall and flicked it to the street.

\"You know,\" he said, looking at the ground, suddenly a little shy in spite of his previous forwardness. \"I don\'t usually do this, but...you seem really sweet. And I\'m not going to say that you\'re not really nice to look at, either. I was wondering if I could maybe get your number?\"

Sam\'s heart damn near gave up altogether as she shakily and unthinkingly reached into her purse for a pen and a scrap of paper. Without a second thought, she wrote down her number and handed it to him. He appeared a little surprised when she handed it to him.

\"Wow, that was a lot easier than I thought it\'d be,\" he laughed, folding it up neatly and placing it in his back pocket. \"When\'s a good time to give you a call?\"

\"Tomorrow,\" she responded quickly. She laughed suddenly. \"Night. Tomorrow night would be good. If you\'re not working, that is,\" she finished shyly.

Brent smiled and nudged her with his elbow. \"You\'re in luck. I happen to be free tomorrow night. So I guess I\'ll talk to you again then?\"

Sam nodded, blushing a little again. She couldn\'t, in fact, remember the last time she\'d blushed so often in the span of one conversation, and mentally kicked herself in the ass for being so ridiculous about this. She turned her head away in time to see Mike leaving the bar, a slight grimace on his face as he headed toward the parking lot. When he noticed her standing there, however, he flashed her a smile.

\"Hey, Sam! Couldn\'t take it anymore, huh? I understand, most women find that they can\'t be in my presence for very long either. It\'s like...it\'s like trying to have a conversation with Adonis.\"

Sam was about to respond, when Brent cut in smoothly. \"She\'s fine. We got her taken care of.\"

Mike\'s eyebrows raised, an amused smile playing on his lips. \"Fair enough,\" he said, holding his hands up to acknowledge his defeat. \"Madame, it was a pleasure meeting you, even if just for a few short minutes.\"

She smiled at him and bowed her head a little. \"Nice to meet you too, Mike. Have a nice evening.\"

He continued his path to the parking lot, giving a little wave as he went. Before she could say anything, Brent spoke loudly, disgust apparent in his voice.

\"God, that guy\'s such a prick. I\'ve only been here for one week, and so far I\'ve witnessed him terrorizing damn near every woman he comes into contact with. And I don\'t get it, they just fall all over themselves around him. I mean, what\'s the deal with girls only going for assholes?\"

Sam\'s eyes widened at his little outburst. \"I don\'t know. I think he\'s funny.\"

Brent rolled his eyes. \"Of course you do. You\'re a chick. He comes stomping in here, using all these big words, and it\'s like he\'s Brad-fucking Pitt or something.\"

She shook her head a little, wondering how exactly this made Mike a bad guy. Luckily, Brent appeared to be a mind-reader, and the answer to her question came shortly.

\"The thing is, he could have any chick he wanted, any one, and most of them want him, but he just treats them all like shit until they go away. He really fucked up Shelley in there. She\'s going fucking crazy about it.\"

Sam placed a hand on his arm without thinking, causing him to stiffen, then relax into her touch.

\"Stop. You\'ve convinced me. You had me at \'prick\'. Don\'t worry, I\'ll stay away from him.\"

Brent\'s eyes softened as he looked at her. \"Sorry, I did get kind of carried away, huh? It just really infuriates me to see a guy treat women like that. I couldn\'t imagine deliberately making a girl cry.\"

Sam smiled again and sighed. She tried to think of anything to say that wouldn\'t be terribly corny, but luckily the cab arrived at that moment. She sighed again, this time in disappointment. Brent also looked a little disappointed, but he patted the back pocket that contained her number.

\"So I\'ll call you tomorrow night. You\'d better be there to answer, or I\'ll be very upset.\"

Sam smiled and nodded. \"Thanks a lot for calling the cab...and for waiting here with me. I hope I didn\'t keep you from anything.\"

\"Nothing I could be doing right now is more important than helping a pretty young thing out,\" he drawled, opening the backseat door for her. \"Good night, Sam.\"

\"Good night, Brent,\" she responded. The door shut, she vaguely gave the driver the dorm address, and the car pulled away. She shut her eyes and thought about those eyes on her the whole way home.


A/N Okay, so this is it: my first chapter! What does everyone think? I want to hear all opinions, and all critiques. Please be mean, I can take it, I just want to make this as good as it can be. Please help a struggling writer.