After I turn around and see Nate, he says to me, "You're not gonna get as lucky this time."

I give him a puzzled look and say, "What do you mean?"

"This one doesn't have my number. But, I guess you didn't want it, huh?" His tone makes me think he's joking, but I am not entirely sure. I don't know what to say so I awkwardly grab another cookie from the table next to us and stuff my face. Then I try to give an explanation which must be super gross with me still eating the cookie and talking. God, I need to work on my social skills! I stop talking gibberish that I doubt he understands because I start coughing.

Fuck. I'm choking. I try spitting out the cookie into the napkin Nate give me but I still have something stuck down my throat. Nate's calling, "Is anyone here a doctor, EMT, anything? Please help her! I think she's choking!"

Suddenly, I feel someone squeezing me and attempting to help me stop choking. But, quickly I hear someone come up to the person who's trying to help. This other person yells, "Stop! You're doing it wrong!" The other person is a guy whose voice kind of sounds familiar. He has me lean forward and he starts giving me back blows. The cookie piece that was stuck down my throat comes flying out and hits the floor. Ew.

I feel lightheaded and my vision is a little blurry, probably because it took them a little longer to help me. But, I'm happy someone did. I know Nate didn't do anything but scream because he was in front of me the whole time. I guess him screaming for help did get me help. But who helped me? Who were the two people that practically fought over saving me? 

I turn around and see Ryan... and Josh. I see the two of them still bickering about the right way to handle a choking person. "You don't just squeeze them! You have to give specific back blows to ensure the pressure dislodges the blockage in their throat," Ryan says.

"Okay, man. I'm sorry. I was just trying to help."

"Josh, you were the first one to come up to me, so thank you. Seriously. Even if you were doing it wrong, at least you tried and Ryan, thank you for knowing what you were doing and helping," I say in a genuine tone.

"You called me Josh," Josh says with a small smile that quickly turns into a smirk.

"Don't get used to it," I say and then walk up to him and whisper in his ear, "mini dick."

I walk away with Nate and he asks what I whispered to Josh. I say, "Nothing. Just told him a little joke."

Rose runs up and finds us and says, "Oh my god. Did you hear some girl almost died from choking? The parody Geneseo account posted a meme about it!"

Already?! Damn, these meme pages work fast. She shows me her phone, and it says, "If she can't fit a cookie down her throat, she can't fit you." Rose is laughing at it. Thankfully, there's no picture of me. But, this definitely upsets me. I've only been here a few weeks and I'm already a joke? I walk away quickly without responding to her and hear her ask Nate, "What's the matter?"  I assume he tells her what happened because she runs up to me and says, "Oh my god, Genny. I'm so sorry. I didn't realize it was you. I shouldn't have laughed at it regardless of who it was, but I definitely shouldn't have laughed at one of my best friends almost dying! Are you okay? Do you need to go to the health center? I'll take you myself!" She keeps apologizing and I say, "Rose. I'm okay. I can take a joke," I laugh pretending the whole thing is funny. 

But, maybe I should go to the health center. Not for my physical pain which there's been a fair amount of lately, but for my mental health. It's not the same talking to my therapist once a week on the phone. I need to talk to someone in person. And I don't want to share my past with my friends. I'm not ready for anyone to know. 

Rose and I have been walking around the S.U and decide to go back into the main ballroom again, but this time I won't eat anything. The room is packed with people and tables that have posters on them. We walk around for a little bit and sign up to join the email list of a few clubs. 

Then I see tits.

No, not boobs. But a poster that says: T.I.T.S in huge font and then below it, it says: TEACHERS INSPIRE THEIR STUDENTS. "Hi! Are you an education major or do you like working with kids?" the girl next to the poster asks me. I respond, "Yes! I'm an education major and love working with kids!" The girl says, "then you'll love T.I.T.S!" She spells it out; she doesn't say the word tits. "Interesting name," I say. "Yeah, our club was founded right after the school was so it's been around a long time and 'tits' didn't use to mean anything like it does today." 

I laugh and say, "I'd love to sign up for your emails. When's your first meeting?"

After I talk to the girl whose name is Katie, I look for Rose and see her in the sorority section of the room. She looks like she's really enjoying herself talking to a blonde girl who has a genuine smile. But, I have to be wary of smiles. Ever since the Harper incident in Bio, I can't count on smiles to mean someone's nice. So I decide to walk over and find out.

"Hey!" Rose says. She introduces me to the blonde girl, "This is my roommate Genny. I think she'd love Sigma Zeta!" I talk with the two of them for a while. The blonde girl is genuine and her name is Tori. I didn't think I'd be interested in a sorority, but maybe I am. 

We go to one more club's table. I start saying, "Oh Rose, I think this is a frat. We can look..." I'm cut off by the guy at the table who says "We are a frat! That's true. BUT, we are co-ed so both guys and girls are members. Well, actually any gender is welcome. We're inclusive of everyone. Hi, I'm Dwayne and I'm a member of Phi Theta Xi."

Wow. That sounds really nice. Rose and I talk to Dwayne for a while and he explains that PTX is a co-ed service fraternity that is all about helping others. That's so cool. We sign up to receive the organization's emails and leave the club fair.

As we're walking back to the dorm, Rose asks, "So did you get Nate's number again?" Crap. I left Nate after choking and getting upset. I didn't get a chance to see him again to exchange phone numbers. "No, I forgot to. There was so much going on with me choking, Ryan and Josh arguing over it, you showing me the meme, me getting upset and then we looked around at all the clubs' tables. I blanked."

"That's okay," Rose says, "You'll have to see him again! It's like you two are meant for each other!"

"Meant for each other?! Rose, we just met and I know nothing about him. As of right now, all we have in common is our school. At that point, I'd be compatible with anyone!"

"Even Josh?" Rose jokes.

"Hell no. His nickname is mini dick for a reason."

"See! You're not compatible with everyone. But you do like Nate so next time you see him, ask him out!" Rose says in a super excited voice.

"Yeah, you're right. Next time I see him, I will!"

We enter our dorm, South, and walk into the main lobby. 

Across from the entrance is one of the vending machines and I look at Rose immediately when I see who is buying a snack.

"Shit."