Free Guardian Girl (The Chronicles of Staffordshire) by NC Simmons Page A

trainers. All color coordinated, of course.
    Lenore was all in. The professional athlete would never again humiliate the professional model.
    The next morning the runway cat woke without an alarm at 4:55am. She dressed in the dark, slipping into her sexy, white T with the powder blue piping, her oh-so-sexy running shorts, (powder blue with black tiger stripes), and her new running shoes with the powder blue accents. At 4:59am Lenore crept across the floor, cranked the volume on Lena’s clock radio, snapped on the lights, and threw the tennis pro’s stinky, day-old gym clothes in her face. Lena flailed.
    “HEY! What the hell are you doing, Lenooore?”
    “You said you wanted me to push you, Mah-lee-na. Well… Consider yourself pushed! ”
    Lena grumbled, threw on her clothes, and headed for the door in a huff. “Okay, human stick figure! Get ready to get your skinny ass spanked! It’s ON, sister!”
    The girls race-walked in silence to the end of the hallway, scowling at each other the entire way. At the stairwell door, Lena raised her hand in, “Allow me,” style, pressed the breaker bar, and offered Lenore a head start.
    “After you, bitch,” she whispered.
    Lenore took off running. Lenore lost again. By half a step. And ten feet from the door to the gym Lenore gave Lena a good shove.
    It was only a matter of time. One day the pro athlete would go down and go down HARD!
    From their second morning together, Lenore “got” Lena and Lena “got” Lenore.
    The slob was more disciplined than she appeared. Her on-court, racket-breaking antics were just a part of the act.
    The uptight supermodel just needed someone to help her loosen up and have a little fun for a change. Her posture-perfect persona masked the hungering heart of a playful little girl dying for someone to play with.
    Lenore forgot all about wanting another roommate.
     

     
    On Labor Day Monday, the girls sat down to compare schedules. To their shock and glee, the two pre-law students arrived at Paulson having selected from exactly the same buffet of core, major, and elective classes for their first term.
    Lenore gushed over her live-in study partner, calling the miraculous alignment, “the hand of fate.” Lena demurred, calling it, “a major frigging co-ink-ee-dink.”
    By the first day of class, the duo’s daily regimen was carved in stone. Workout at 5am, shower at 7:15am, breakfast at 7:45am, first class at 8:30am. The girls moved through their days in synchronized perfection, filling gaps with shared study time. They ate lunch together each day - usually at a table by themselves - and ended their classes together at 3pm. From 3 to 6pm they went their separate ways. At 3pm, Lena hit the school’s indoor tennis courts for three hours of practice. Lenore hit the gym to pursue her new passion; the school's nationally ranked women’s fencing team. Meeting up in the locker room at 6pm for a shower and a change, the girls then proceeded at precisely 6:30pm to the dining hall, where they enjoyed a fashionably late seating for dinner.
    Back in the dorm from 7 to 10pm, the girls studied together, conjuring questions to outwit their professors. If time got away from them — which it often did — the exotic eggheads heatedly debated philosophy, political theory, or who was sexier – Rick Springfield or Shawn Cassidy - until collapsing for the night.
    (The Shawn Cassidy poster hanging over Lena’s bed eventually swayed Lenore’s vote. Lenore swore he winked at her.)
    Lena remained an accomplished slob, helping Lenore appreciate the silly sport of “hamper basketball.”
    Lenore remained a control freak, helping Lena appreciate the efficiency of “a color coded system for organizing assignments.”
    Within weeks, Paulson’s paparazzi-magnet undergrads became inseparable; polar opposites in personality, twin sisters in spirit. The rest of the Paulson community knew better than to intrude upon the world dominating work-a-holics in 1426 Stilson