Roofstomp

I hadn't known Clark even went to this college; nevertheless, there I was in the cafeteria and there he was, looking all-elbows gawky and terribly awkward, stretching to find a place to sit. There was a moment of mutual recognition that passed swiftly into acceptance and we peeled away from the crowds and out of the cafeteria. "I know a place where there are chairs," he said, proud of knowing something I didn't, "nobody knows about this place," and he lead the way to a quiet corner of the third floor of the college where all the chairs go to die. There, students go to study, but mostly sleep, and we kept our voices low and spoke mostly of nothing-much, work stuff, school stuff. When we ran out of things to talk about (we have nothing in common save for workplace), we fell into staring at a snoring someone-or-other across the room.

"I'm going to see if there's a way onto the roof from here," I announced eventually.
"Okay, sure," Clark said, and in his sarcasm was a challenge, so I nodded and beelined to the stairwell, up one flight, up another flight, past a metal door that should have been closed, "What are you doing?" from Clark, "Going to the roof," a door that should have been locked was open instead and there we were, on the roof, and the wind laughed proudly (the wind hates closed doors) and the sun stared down uneasily, sure that we weren't supposed to be there,  "Holy shit, we're on the roof," said Clark.
"Yeah."
"We actually went to the roof."
"Mm-hmm." I hadn't previously explored that area, hadn't previously known there was access to that area, although of course there's access to every roof if you know where to look, so I dropped my bag into the door and padded away, leaving him there to decide whether or not to follow. It was only a moment's wait and then Clark thumped along after me, which I hadn't actually expected. A pleasant surprise, that.
"Susie."
"Yiss."
"We're seriously not supposed to be here."
"Nonsense. If we were not supposed to be here they would have locked the door, don't you know anything." On top of a college, on top of the world, it really is only a matter of perception, "sweet, c'mon," and we dodged between the air vents and climbed a ladder, found our way to another roof and a higher ledge and Clark asked, "Do you do this kind of thing a lot?"
I shook my head and answered, "Not since last semester, look, Roya's office, say hello to Roya, she's not there right now."
We sat on the tarred roof for awhile with our backs against a vent, then wandered our way back, stopping from time to time to make comments meant to indicate to ourselves how much more awesome we were than the people who chose not to be on roofs that day...

...because it is a choice, you see...

and when we parted ways, Clark grinned without meeting my eyes and said, "Well, I guess I have a story now."

and all I could think was, holyshitImadehimastory. But I figured the sorts of people who take you up on your very first illegal roofstomp aren't the sorts of people who get all squealy about that sort of thing so I grinned, feeling cool, and said back, "Always walk like you know where you're going, man."