Maybe I Shouldn't Talk So Tough Before Art Gets A Chance To Teach Me How To Punch Not Like A Girl

So, there's this boy in philosophy class. Wait, stop right there, I know what some of you are thinking -- one eyebrow just crooked up, as you're imagining a romantic development, picturing me accidentally dropping a pencil and looking around, flustered, for it, while the boy leans over, picks it up, and hands it to me with a charming smile spread across his face. You are incorrigible. Hear me out before you start picturing what the bridesmaids' dreses will look like, will you?

So, there's this boy in philosophy class. And I am afraid of him. You see, I always sit in the second row, the second seat from the front, and Erika always sits in the seat next to me. Well, last week we walked in, and this boy was sitting in her seat. And not sitting in it innocently and unaware, either; he KNEW it was her seat, and yet he was violating the sacred Unspoken Seating Chart rule. That should have clued me in that he'd be the dangerous loose-cannon sort, but I didn't listen. And I couldn't have anyway, because the rule had been violated, and I would have had to fight him, loose cannon or not.

I asked him to step outside with me, so we could settle the score. He refused to. I thought that that would be the end of it. He didn't seem to be exactly INTIMIDATED by me, but maybe had learned his lesson anyway. I thought.

And then the next class, he was sitting outside, waiting for me. He asked me to fight right then. I laughed at him, certain he wasn't serious, and walked into class. I honestly forgot about him, except for the part when he said "Arrr," instead of "Here" when his name was called for attendance. That was at the beginning of class, though, and by the end, I was walking home in the cold, my scarf bright red against the dark wool of my coat, and my thoughts bitter toward the unfaltering devotion with which my professor regarded Descartes.

I felt a tap on my shoulder. It was the boy from my class. I asked him if he was following me home. He insisted that no, he lived nearby, on seventh and seventh.

My friends, he is not to be believed. He was trying to get me alone in an alley so he could work me over. Only my quick wit saved me that time. I won't be so lucky another time. He tried again today, but I was staying on campus to eat and then go to orchestra, and there were far too many potential witnesses milling about.

Would someone like to be my bodyguard?