jamie and eric-6-meeting Bridgett

* * *

Mr. Gransley tried to move people around on tasks as much as possible, but the fact was that the campus was large. When it was time to weed flower beds, everyone was weeding flower beds for a month. So Eric was picking up his hand tools to pack up for the day when he saw the bright bouncy personality come down the path. She was coming from town. She seemed intent on him. Eric waffled, dragging his feet gathering his things. He wasn’t sure if he knew this girl or not. He had slept with so many girls…

“Eric!” Dropping her suitcase she leaped at him, a hug that almost knocked him over.

“Bridgett?” It seemed to fit.

“You didn’t think I’d be gone forever did you?” She looked at him accusingly.

“No…”

“Oh, you’re filthy. What are you doing out here?” She backed off shaking out her vibrant blue dress. “Come on, let’s head in and find Jamie.”

So she knew Jaime too. Unlikely that he slept with her. She must be one of Jamie’s friends then… Oh my god, she was Jamie’s best friend ever. How could he forget that! Well she had been gone a long time… He couldn’t remember when she left. Eric showed her the hand trowel he was holding, “Uh… I need to put my tools up.”

She giggled, “Is that a hand trowel in your pocket or are you just happy to see me? I’ll walk with you.”

“Oh kay.” Eric stammered.

She spun around in a circle, her suitcase swinging out dangerously far, “It’s so good to be home. I guess I was this excited to be back in {country name} too. Somehow neither of these worlds really fit me anymore. Both of them have certain things you just don’t do and it gets tiring watching yourself all of the time. Here I can wear whatever I want. Speak whenever I want.”

Which was apparently quite often.

“But there everyone has the same difficulties learning magic as I do. We have a shared pain. You know?” She looked over at him. He wasn’t listening that well, and made a non-committal noise. She hit his arm, “Oh come on! I’m sure it’s the same with you and Jamie. What’s it like being bonded?”

“I dunno.” She hit him again. “What? It’s just… He’s just my bonded. I dunno.”

“Hmm. Well you’re a wealth of information. At least you’re fun at parties.” She giggled again. It was bizarre talking to this girl that kind of knew so much about him. But he had never been to parties with her… “I had a brainstorm about my project! Do you want to hear it?”

Eric shrugged. They had made their way to the shed, and she followed him in. There were a couple of guys on break inside. Bridgett definitely caught their attention. Eric appraised her again. She was still talking, her eyes slight gone away into that place of wonderful details of grain. Apparently her project was about grain. It was a cute sundress that hugged her curves. She wasn’t the type of girl he’d go for—too plumb—but he could see why she would turn heads.

Eric put his tools back into the appropriate bins, and bade goodbye to the co-workers. She was still talking. There seemed to be pauses, but every time he tried to listen it was about grain. He took her suitcase and led her out of the shed.

“Thank you Eric.” She stretched her arms out. “Will you walk me home? And then I want to come with you to see Jamie!”

“Sure.”

“It’s been so long since I’ve seen either of you! I can hardly get anything out of Jamie. All he wants to talk about is his project. Not that I’m one to talk. He just never seems to do anything fun, you know? It helps your brain store and sort information. You know the best way to study is with regular short breaks, because the brain transfers information from short term memory to long term memory starting with the most recent memory? So that means you want to have enough of a break that your brain gets all the back to the first thing you learned today.”

“That’s neat.” She was leading them back to the Masters’ building. So she lived in the same building as he did.

“The brain is really fascinating. Did you know that the way your eyes register light, it’s actually upside down in respect to the real world, so your brain has to flip it. “ Eric grunted. “In fact when you’re a baby you see upside down for the first three weeks of life. They’ve done experiments where people wear glasses that invert everything in your field of vision and in about three weeks the brain compensates for the adjustment. And then when you stop wearing the glasses it takes another three weeks- Oh this one.”

They were climbing the staircase, and Bridgett stopped him at her level. She was rather close to the ground.

“Hey Eric?”

“Yeah?” Eric never did anything with his evenings, but he didn’t want to spend all this time with her.

“Why doesn’t Jamie ever talk about you?”

“I dunno.”

“Eric?”

“Yeah?” The momentum of her thoughts had ceased her motion. Eric set down her suitcase. The bright afternoon sun illuminated the hallway.

“How much time do you guys spend together?”

“Dunno. Breakfast, but we don’t really talk.” Eric shifted his weight, uncomfortable with these questions, her tone of voice.

“What?” She shook her head, confused.

“Well what do you mean spend time together? If you mean like talk and stuff like this, we don’t.”

“What??” The wheels in her head were slowly bringing to an outraged place. This stop, indigent. “You and Jamie are bonded. Why don’t you spend time together?”

“I dunno. We just don’t.” Eric played with the suitcase handle.

“I knew it! What the hell happened? Jamie just stopped talking about you like five months ago.”

Eric tried to think back to five months ago. He shrugged, “Listen is your room anywhere near here.”

“Eric why aren’t you phased? Jamie should be the most important person in your life. Closer than your best friend.”

Eric didn’t have one of those either. “I’m gonna head to the showers. It was nice to see you Bridgett.” He slipped past her to the stair case, but she caught his arm.

The look in her was deadly intense. All of the folic in her expression was flat serious. “Eric something is seriously wrong. I need you to trust me and I need you to help me fix it.”