The Tale of the Dropped Pen

I think I've mentioned before that I kind of have this thing for Shakespeare, so in my sophomore year of college I signed up for "Intro to Shakespeare."  In this class I was flanked mostly by a variety of thespians.  Most were of the funny and outgoing variety, and a few were of the more hardcore dramatic (and socially awkward) type.  As for me, I was of the random non-thespian few.  Acting has never been my thing, but I bit the bullet for Shakespeare's sake.

Anyway, there was one guy in particular in my class who was the epitome of hardcore dramatic (and socially awkward).  He had this weird dramatic British accent, which would have been fine had he been British.  But he wasn't.  He also liked to throw around the word "quasi" whenever he commented in class.  Quasi?  Seriously?  Who says that?  A quasi-Brit, I guess.

One day I was sitting one desk behind and to the side of the quasi-Brit.  All was well until he lost control of his pen.  I watched it fly from his fingers and land neatly inside the purse of the girl sitting in front of him.  He casually moved to retrieve it, then suddenly froze in midair.  He quickly withdrew his hand with a look of anxiety on his face.  It appeared that it had only just occurred to him that reaching into a girl's purse would frame him as the quasi-klepto.

He gripped the sides of the desk and frantically glanced back and forth between the girl and her purse.  It was at this point that the purse girl innately sensed that something weird was going on behind her.  She turned around and saw the quasi-Brit gazing intently into her purse.  He looked back up at her and saw that he'd been caught, so he leaned back in his chair and feigned intense interest in our professor's lecture.

After the purse girl drew her purse closer to her feet, the quasi-Brit gave a resigned sigh and reached into his backpack for a new pen.