“I’m from Maine,” she said with a tone that told me I had just about reached my question quota.
“You’re a long ways from home,” I said. “How long have you lived here?”
“Two weeks,” she answered. “I’m going to school here.”
“You got a name?” I asked.
“Of course I have a name,” she replied, rolling her eyes. “It’s Tria. Tria Lynn. You?”
“Liam Teague,” I told her, and I held out my hand. She took it, shaking it briefly before she nearly tripped over her own feet on the flat ground. “I hope you don’t chew gum.”
I laughed at my own joke.
“Very funny,” she snapped back. “I’m not overly…coordinated.”
We walked the next block in silence. I felt kind of bad for picking on her, so I tried another approach.
“So what are you studying?”
“Economics.”
“Really?” I narrowed one eye at her.
“Why is that so surprising?” she asked, obviously displeased with my reaction.
“I dunno,” I responded with a shrug. “Just not what I expected.”
“What did you expect?”
“Um…teaching? Maybe nursing or physical therapy—something like that.”
“Why, because I’m a woman?”
“Uh…um…” I didn’t really know how to respond to that. I wasn’t really sure why I thought she would say something else; economics just didn’t seem to fit. “Well, why economics?”
“Because I don’t understand why some people have a ton of money and others don’t have anything,” she said simply. “It doesn’t have anything to do with how hard they work. I thought if I learned more about it, it would help me understand.”
I laughed again.
“I’m not a comedian,” she growled. “Stop laughing at me.”
“I’m not.” I shook my head. “I mean, I am, but…not like that. It’s just…weird.”
“I am not weird!” she yelled as she stopped in her tracks and snarled at me. “It makes perfect sense, and maybe you have just been hit in the head too many times to understand anything other than punching people, but I really don’t see how your opinion ought to matter to me!”
“Whoa!” I called out, stopping and turning to face her and holding my hands up in surrender. “Easy there! I just…shit…I just never heard of anyone wanting to study something like that. It’s cool.”
Her look softened but remained wary, so I turned it around on her.
“And now you have insulted me,” I told her.
“What? How?”
“I have not been hit in the head too many times—I fucking win.”
I grinned at her before I started walking across the street. She rolled her eyes again, but continued on beside me. We were quiet now with her speaking up only when we made a turn to the right and crossed another dark street.
“This is my street,” she said.