3. Sasha

Maybe it had all been a mistake. She was beginning to wonder. This new place that she had given up everything for didn’t seem to be welcoming her with the open arms she had assumed would be there. Sasha had bawled her eyes out earlier in the morning in front of the Graduate Offices. Her adviser had sent her there to figure out if she was getting credit for the classes she had enrolled in, and no one in the office would speak to her. They told her that the person she needed to speak with was on vacation, and wouldn’t be back until the end of the month. She had pleaded for help from someone, anyone, since the final day to drop classes was only a week away.
The stress had come upon her like a bully on the playground, pushing her to the ground for what seemed like no reason. She had been brushed off by the very people whose sole job purpose was to help her. Now she had no one to turn to. She knew no one in this town. No one that would listen. In desperation, she went back to the office of her adviser for help, and he had none to offer her. Her only choice was to drop as many classes as possible without losing her financial aid. She was watching her master’s degree disintegrate before her very eyes. And now she had nothing.
Sasha sat on the steps in front of the music building and watched people walking by. The number rose and fell periodically, as various classes began and ended. They were almost like molecules running around and bumping into each other and going in every direction. She found herself envious of them. They all had some sort of direction, somewhere they needed to be to get to where they wanted to go. She had been stopped at the border. How had all these people gotten through? Was she the only one that had been tripped up by big university red tape?
She knew she wasn’t in class, but she knew she was learning something. She had the ominous feeling that the events of the morning weren’t the anomaly, and most of her education here was not going to take place in a classroom. The next couple of years she was going to learn how to do paperwork.