I gasped and shot up out of my chair, practically slamming my laptop closed on the way up.  Instantly, I began searching Ashley’s face for any hint that she saw what was on the screen.  But she seemed just as startled by me reaction, as I was by her sudden appearance.

“What the hell!?  What’s wrong with you?”  she exclaimed.  

“Nothing…I’m just – don’t you know not to walk up on people like that?”

“I didn’t just ‘walk up on’ you. I called your name like three times.”

Trying to recover, I paused for a few seconds to catch my breath.  Ashley simply stared at me until I was finally able to respond,

“Oh, sorry I must not have heard you.”

She looked down at my closed laptop, then back up to me.  The move made me even more uncertain.

“Yeah, I noticed,” she stated matter-of-factly, then continued to stare as if she was expecting some kind of response.  Now, I was doubly worried about the possibility of being caught snooping.  If she did see me, as frank as she is, I don’t think she would ignore it.  But as close as she was, is there anyway should could not have seen it?  There was just no way to be sure.  I didn’t want to drag out the silence too long, in case she was waiting for an opportunity to question me about it, so I changed the subject.

“Did you need something?”

“Yeah, I forgot to tell you earlier, I mean, I wanted to let you know that we’re —“

“Practice partners. I know.”

“Oh…how did you find out?”

“Rebecca told me”

“Oh yeah,” she said sounding a little too interested. “I saw you guys at dinner, looked like you were arguing about something.”

I opened my mouth to respond, but stopped as I began to wonder how closely you would have to be watching someone three tables away to know they were arguing.

“So you saw us?  In the cafeteria?”  I asked, unable to hide my surprise.

At this, she began backing away to her side of the room, before she smugly replied, “Yeah…so what?  You didn’t think I was going to come over and actually talk to you guys did you.”