It was the second time that day that Rahel felt she should've just stayed home.
The first had been in dealing with her family on the phone just as she was going out the door. Somehow news of her marrying a seventeen year old didn't sit so well with the relatives and couldn't she do something to fix it? By the time the phone had been passed back and forth from her brothers to her mother and back, she was on UW campus and half-way to the Botanical Gardens. She hung up politely but not without an ounce of resentment. All she wanted was to enjoy her Saturday - so here she was, surrounded by the world's biggest stink and people she didn't know.
She had a name and many sported nametags, but with the number of people present, it was much like searching for the proverbial needle. Her goal was to ask the first organizer or faculty member who happened to be free and just ask. It would save her the trouble of spending one minute longer in uncomfortable circumstances.
It would figure, of course, that for once her luck would hold and the man she approached would be the man she was looking for.
"Hi, I'm Dr Verma," she introduced herself, one hand outstretched and the other folded around the strap of her bag. It was habit. "We spoke a few days ago..." He was much taller than she'd imagined, but otherwise, he had the faculty air about him. She wasn't sure if that was such a bad thing.