Week 1: Monday

I still had four months, a week and two days to go before I would become a grown-up when I started my life as an university student. Though, if someone would ask me, I would always say I was already eighteen. I got a scholarship in high-school, so I could continue my education at a performing arts university. That meant that besides the usual statistics and rhetoric classes I would also have vocal and piano lessons and I attended performance class for popular music, which I was especially really excited about. I walked down the hallway, on my way to my classroom. I wanted to feel really mature, but it just resembled high school too much. As I was looking around, trying to prove to myself that I was actually walking through a university, I walked into a guy. I mumbled something that could be interpreted as "sorry" as I looked in a pair of the most gorgeous sea-blue eyes I had ever seen. For a second I wished I had dropped my books like they do in cheesy romantic comedies.
"It's okay." He said back. Apparently he understood my mumbling, which made me smile. I watched his eyes leaving my infinite stare, they landed on my books.
"Music Major?" He asked.
I nodded, following it up by saying "yes, you too?" I prayed upon every god he would say yes.
"What class do you have now?" He asked, ignoring my question.
"Performance for popular music."
Who's your teacher?"
I already started thanking the gods for hearing my prayers but I should have known that this was premature. "Professor Camden." I answered.
His eyes found mine again and I knew that mine must have reflected a hopeful glare. He moved his hand forward, never breaking eye contact. I took his hand.
He opened his mouth first." Nice to meet you, I'm Eric Camden."
I opened my mouth to replay when the realization hit me. My mouth dropped open further, which forced me to start talking sooner so I would not make a big fool out of myself.
"I'm Amy, nice to meet you, professor Camden." We shook hands.
"I guess I will see you in class then, Amy." He said, finally breaking eye contact. He walked past me and I stared at my teacher as he walked into his classroom. My mind felt completely screwed up.
I saw other students approaching and making their way into the classroom so I followed them. I took a seat in the U-shaped classroom that had a view straight at the board.

As more students had taken their seats the clock showed that it was time to start the lecture, so that was what happened. I couldn't help but notice, or imagine, that he looked at me before introducing himself to the class. "Good morning everyone! My name is professor Camden, I'm twenty-five years old, graduated two years ago and I will be your performance class professor for the upcoming semester. Are there any questions so far?" He talked fast and with great enthusiasm. Several hands were raised as a result of his question. He picked one of them to start. "Will we be performing solo or in a band?"
Eric Camden started nodding even before the question was finished. "You will be mostly performing in a band this class, that way you can learn a lot from each other and other instruments. You have the chance to apply the techniques you learnt in your individual music lessons in this class. I want you to feel comfortable with music and discover your own style. We will go over the syllabus in a little bit but I can tell you now that there will be a song performed every class, so be prepared for that." He smiled and so did I. I was glad that we'd have the chance to perform and it would not just be lectures on notes and tones all the time.
A second question interrupted my thoughts. "Do you have a girlfriend?" I felt a sting in my stomach as that question was asked, not really sure why I cared so much that I thought this was an inappropriate question. I looked at the person who asked it. Apparently it had been the unnatural blonde girl, on the very end of the U-shape. At that point I decided that I did not like her very much.
Eric Camden stayed really calm, in contrast to me. "No, I have been focusing on work and my studies lately, so no girlfriend." was his simple reply. I felt satisfied and immediately after that feeling got to me I felt ashamed and embarrassed because I knew very well that I should not feel like that. As I was making sense of those feelings, my mind at the same time tried to figure out whether to think about Eric Camden as professor Camden or Eric. It secretly decided to mentally call him Eric. I felt an elbow softly hitting my lower arm, which pulled me out of my brainstorm session.

"Hi, I'm David." I looked up at the handsome boy who apparently was the one to wake me up with his whisper.
"Nice to meet you, I'm Amy." We shook hands awkwardly, since both our hands were laying on the table.
"First semester?"
I nodded, "you?".
He shook his head, "third." I smiled, not really sure how much longer he was planning on keeping this conversation going in the middle of the teacher's introduction.
"Do you like it so far?" David continued. Eric looked up at us, he looked slightly irritated. "Would you like to share your thoughts with the class, mr.."
"Kingston, David Kingston."
well, David, would you like to share with the class what you and Amy were talking about?" Eric's eyes met mine, the moment he said my name. David smirked, clearly not caring about what the teacher thought of him. "We were just introducing each-other. So, sure I'll share that with the class. My name is David and this is Amy, but apparently you already knew that. We were just planning a dinner-date, no biggie." He theatrically took my hand, my cheeks felt extremely hot.
"We were not." I blurted out, not really sure if I did that to defend myself for talking in class or for planning a date with someone.
"Next time, please wait until after class, ok?"
I nodded and David shrugged his shoulders. I pulled my hand back from underneath Davids and crossed my arms. Eric cleaned his throat and looked around the classroom. "David has a good point though, why don't we do a little name-round, you all say your name, semester, age and a funny fact about yourself. You start." He pointed at the fake-blond girl, who apparently felt the urge to lick her lips before she started talking.
"My name is Jessica," Of course it is, "This is my first semester, I'm nineteen years old and I lost my virginity to a 22 year old man, when I was sixteen."
I could not believe she just brought her sex-life up, during a class discussion. The first class discussion. Eric's cheeks had also turned bright red as he cleared his throat again. "I'm not really sure that is appropriate information to share at his moment, but thank you Jessica." The people after that, thankfully, gave more sane answers. A girl could type 100 wpm, A boy that was once regional soccer champion, one that could play six instruments, another one that could speak six languages. A girl who could not stop talking about her cat and someone who loved theatre.
"Hi, I'm David. Obviously. This is my third semester and I am a singer-songwriter." I did not see that coming. For some reason, I expected him to give an answer that resembled Jessica's. Eric was however not very impressed by David's answer.
"You are a singer-songwriter? Then what are you still doing here?" Eric crossed his arms and frowned his eyebrows.
David shrugged his shoulder again, "Whatever, I just like to sing, play guitar and write my own songs. I'm not professional yet, or anything." Eric relaxed his arms. I felt the nerves in my stomach, I had no clue what a fun fact about me could be.
"Amy?" Eric encouraged me to start talking.
"Yes, sorry. My name is Amy, this is my first semester and I am eighteen." As I was thinking very hard on what would be something fun to say about me I noticed that Eric's eyes grew wider at the mentioning of my age. It was only then that I realized I did not say my actual age. I decided to leave it with eighteen, nobody had to know that I was here on a scholar ship fresh out of junior year of high school. "A fun fact about me is that.. I can balance a spoon on my nose." Eric laughed, I felt like hitting myself for coming up with something as stupid as that. "and I like to read.. a lot." I added, trying to make myself come across as little less of an idiot. Eric's laugh had turned in to a smile. After a second of extreme tension, his eyes left mine and moved on to the person next to me. A girl named Lisa, who apparently is eighteen and loves to surf in countries I've never been.

"Who of you does vocals as an instrument?" Eric asks as soon as everyone had introduced themselves. I raised my hand, together with three others. That was less than I expected.
"That is less than I expected." Eric said, as if he had read my mind. "I want to have four bands then, try to have a band with all instruments represented and one vocalist per band." The guy who played six instrument raised his hand again, after he had just lowered it after admitting that he does vocals. "Professor Camden, I would rather play an instrument than doing vocals, if that's okay?" Eric looked around the room and nodded his head. "Sure, we"ll make three bands then." I looked to my right, where Lisa was sitting. "So what instrument do you play?" I asked her.
"The drums." She proudly stated.
"Really, that's great! I wish I knew how to play the drums."
"I wish I knew how to sing." She smiled. "Do you want to be in a band together?" I nodded, of course I wanted that. What is more awesome than a band with a female drummer? I felt a soft hit on my arm again. I turned towards David. "So, you wanna be in a band together?" He asked, smirking. Did he not just hear Eric say that there is one vocalist per band?
I shook my head. "We are both vocalists, we can't be in a band together." He looked a bit confused before doing his trademark shrugging of the shoulders and turned to the girl at the other side of him. I turned back to Lisa. She was now talking to the guy with the six instruments who was standing next to her seat. Lisa turned to face me, "Amy, is it okay if Collin joins our band?" I smiled, It was perfect to have a guy in our band that could play six instruments. "Of course!"
We had a band of five people as the bell rang. We had Lisa for the drums, Stephan for the base, Nolan for the guitar and Collin, who could play basically any instrument. I was the vocalist, but I could also play the keys and a little bit of guitar.
I was leaving the classroom very satisfied as someone called me back in. "Amy, can you please stay a few minutes." I turned around to see Eric standing in the middle of the classroom with his hands in his pockets. He had a stern look on his face.
"Sure." I walked back into the classroom. I felt my heart beating through my shirt, unsure why I needed to get back in class. The moment everyone had left the classroom Eric walked pass me to close the door. I sat down on his desk. "Look, Amy. I appreciate the fact that you are making friends already, but I don't want to be interrupted by any of your conversation in class anymore. Understood?" He sounded really serious, which irritated me. It was not my fault David had started talking to me.
"But David.." I started to defend myself.
"David does not arrange a dinner-date by himself." He sounded really annoyed.
"That's what this is about? He made that up. He was just trying to, I don't know, make me feel uncomfortable."
Eric's face relaxed a little. "Okay, fine, you can go now." I jumped off his desk and walked towards the door. I stopped before my hand reached the doorknob.
"Wait, so, now everything is fine?" I turned around to face Eric.
"Sure." He said, without looking at me. I shook my head, confused by his reactions and left the classroom.