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to wear. Apparently, just lounging in my surf shorts with no shirt on isn’t presentable to Chance.
    I roll my eyes at our earlier conversation. He’s always the mature, more responsible person. The person who thinks with his whole brain instead of one side like myself. He takes everyone’s opinions into account and cares for others where I only seem to care about my wants. In reality, he is the better version of me, and I wonder if I will ever be enough for someone one day.
     Grabbing a pair of brown Cargo shorts and a Henley tee off the floor of my closet I head straight for the shower. I check the time knowing that if I take my time and leave my soon-to-be roommates waiting at the door for a short time, that maybe, just maybe they won’t rent from us. An evil smirk forms on my face as I turn the water to hot and jump in. The water causes tingles to form over my body as the hot water washes away the sweat and hate I have for myself.
    Showers are my therapy, my way of dealing with my own ugliness. They give me a chance to clean away the insecurities that reside inside of me and to start over again, even when I know there isn’t a reset button for this thing called life.
    I’m twenty-two years old and still feel as if my life after graduation is undecided. There are two routes I could take after being on a one-way street for the past three years. What I really need is a road map to figuring out my next move. I could extend my pre-apprenticeship training, or cross my fingers and hope that I am assigned to a local union where I would work within a union carpentry crew, doing jobs as a First Year Apprentice while working my way up to a journeyman, and if I’m lucky a master carpenter one day.
    I look down at myself wondering where I went wrong. In the beginning it was all fun and games, everyone was experimenting their first year of college. Not saying I was inexperienced before then because I’m no saint, and I experimented a lot with a lot of girls that year, but I’m more than this playboy I have presented myself as. I just don’t know how to come back from it.
    In high school I stayed in trouble for being the class clown, teachers always said I didn’t take anything seriously. Being sent to the principal’s office one time too many landed me in a carpentry class. The principal felt I needed something to keep my mind and hands preoccupied, that way I wouldn’t have time to goof off. Four years spent in shop and I decided it was something I wanted to take further.
    When I signed up for classes my first year here at Auburn they were all general studies’ classes, but when my second year rolled around I was intent on making up for all the bullshit I did freshman year. I extended my general degree to an advanced college degree where I would take classes in new construction, restoration, and preservation carpentry fields. I was ready to make my mom and Dad proud, the same way Chance effortlessly did time and time again, but by then everyone knew my reputation. Guys wanted to hang around me and girls wanted to bang me. They used me to get themselves up the ladder and in return I felt useless when I wasn’t being used. So I became the user so I wouldn’t have to feel the loneliness when everyone walked away, and if I’m being honest that’s the worst feeling imaginable.
    Forcing myself to move on and forget the shitty thoughts racing through me all at once, I wash my body and then my hair. I can feel the time dwindling down to when I have to fake a smile and pretend like I’m not raging on the inside as I stand beneath the steady stream of hot water. Once all the soap is washed from my body, I walk out of the floor to ceiling glass shower and grab the brown towel from the hook next to the shower door.
    “Fuck!” I yell out loud as I grab my phone and see that I have three missed calls from Chance. Did the doorbell really ring and I missed it? Drying off in record speed I slip into my shorts and then throw on my