Marcus’ joke was met with a blank stare for several long, uncomfortable moments, as Esperanza worked it out in her head. Having spent most of her life underground, surrounded by the dead and the dying, social interaction might as well have been some sort of alien language. Her brow creased in thought, before suddenly clearing as her smile returned. 
“Oh. It was a joke.” Esperanza laughed, scratching her forearm. “That was very funny.” 

Professor Lovette cut in before more- awkward or otherwise- could be said, and Esperanza obediently turned to listen through the duration of the speech. For the most part, the list seemed reasonable enough, and she nodded along to each point in an effort to show the professors how good she was at listening...although the darkness of the room obscured the action almost entirely. She was still nodding even after the presentation, and only came to a stop upon hearing that they would be displaying the dorm pairings. Dorm pairings! She would finally be able to meet the person she would be living with for the rest of the semester. Esperanza’s mind ran wild with possibilities- maybe they would become friends, or even the legendary [i]best[/i] friends, and eat snacks together and stay up late when they were supposed to be sleeping and tell scary stories-

Esperanza paused. Her smile dropped, replaced by sheer confusion as she turned to her table companions.

“Helena, you do not have a roommate. Do you know why they did that?”

There were many, many names listed upon the screen. Most were paired up, as Esperanza was, and some were even in threes- but Helena held the only solo dorm. Even if they weren’t friends yet, Esp didn’t want the girl to be all alone. 

[@VitoftheVoid][@LokiLeo789]