Charmed Thirds (35 page)

“You were gone all the time,” he whined when I questioned him about the black thong I found in the folds of his unwashed sheets. I’m aware that this is just so cliché.
So
excruciatingly uncreative and cliché it made me want to take a long, slow drag on a tailpipe. “I missed you, and you weren’t around so . . .”

“So it’s
my
fault you fucked your ex-girlfriend!” I screeched loud enough for everyone in Morningside Heights to hear.

“According to your take on monogamy, I was just fulfilling my human instincts. Don’t blame me. Blame the traditional model of relationships.” His face was the picture of newborn baby guilelessness. The only thing missing was his mommy’s teat in his wanting mouth. It’s this put-on innocence that has allowed him to get away with such bratty, self-absorbed behavior his entire life. All I could do was shut up and storm out because I was afraid of saying something equally stupid that would somehow come back to haunt me in the future.

So ended my relationship with Kieran. The relationship I never would’ve had if I’d stuck to my first impression. I have long acknowledged that my first impressions are always for shit, so I figured I was safe. But no. This time I was right all along. He really was a pompous, pretentious assclown who used the oh-so-sensitive trappings of emo to mask his sadism. I was
so
right when I told Bridget that he was nothing,
nothing
like Marcus. Marcus never hurt me on purpose.

With no boyfriend and, more significantly, nowhere to stay in the city, I’m back in Pineville with my parents. This is appropriate punishment for a semester-long lapse in judgment. I am trying very hard to look on the positive side of things. For example, I was grateful that when I opened the door to my parents’ condo, they weren’t bumping elderly uglies on the couch. That was good.

I guess another good thing is that I’ve got a job here that actually pays better than anything I could get in the city. I’ve been working for ACCEPT!, the Accelerated College Coaching and Educational Preparedness Tutorial! ACCEPT!’s motto:
YOU
ARE
YOUR
APPLICATION
.

The awkwardly named strip-mall institution conducts a series of get-into-college classes during the school year, followed by a longer get-into-college camp in the summer. Test prep, AP class counseling, campus tours, mock admission interviews—none of this is unusual in this übercompetitive college market. But ACCEPT! doesn’t leave
anything
to chance. For example, a skill that high schoolers should have mastered in first grade—Perfecting Your Penmanship!—is part of the curriculum now that handwritten essays count for one-third of the new
SAT
. Every lesson is intended to give an edge to those who are already considered the best and the brightest. And at almost $3,000 per session, the richest. Five years ago, Pineville was too blue-collar (okay, white-trash) for ACCEPT! to set up shop around here. But times have changed and Pineville is—however improbably—becoming a bedroom community for new-money families from Manhattan who are buying up all the waterfront property. So my mom was right, the new house is an investment that will make me very wealthy thirty years from now
—if
I survive that long on the streets.

I’m still in training, but in five days I start working with a small group who signed up for the presummer minisession. This is the three-week-long after-school presummer-session session for those who want a jump start on their jump start. In other words, the most neurotic nutcases of all.

My teaching credentials? I got into Columbia. I am who they want to be. Of course, they’d demand a refund if they had a clue as to who I really am.

the sixth

I walked purposefully into the university-style classroom and headed for one of the stadium seats facing the immaculate dry-erase board. Then I noticed that three front-and-center spots were already occupied by students with open laptops at the ready.

I’d forgotten that
I
was the teacher here. Oops.

Could it also be so easy to forget what it was like to be sixteen or seventeen, at the top of one’s class, with stellar standardized test scores and a transcript maxed out on athletic, academic, and philanthropic activities?

Apparently so. Otherwise my students wouldn’t annoy me so goddamn much.

“If you didn’t take the new
SAT
, how do we know how smart you are on the 2400 scale?” asked Will. Number one in his class. Captain of the forensics team. Champion hurdler.
AIDS
activist. Wants Harvard.

“Were you a National Merit Scholar?” asked Geoff. Has already earned twelve college credits. Scholastic Poetry Award winner. Founded school’s archery team. Taught English in Kenya. Wants Harvard.

“Why didn’t you go to Harvard?” asked Maddie. Intel science talent search semifinalist. Classically trained pianist. Varsity tennis player. Volunteers at a homeless shelter. Wants . . . you guessed it . . . Harvard.

These kiddies need to unclench.

And this is coming from someone who has been grinding her teeth down to the nubby nerve endings for years. The only students enrolled in ACCEPT! are those who, at least back in my day, would’ve been the only ones who didn’t need it. And yet they—or more likely their parents—are convinced that none of it is enough. Their paranoia is contagious, which is why “college preparedness training” is one of the fastest-growing sectors in education.

“Colleges rely on standardized tests to help them weed through twenty thousand applications,” said Will. “If you’re not at the top, you get tossed.”

“There are eleven in my class who have GPAs over 4.0,” said Maddie. “I need something that will help me stand out in a district where
everyone
has something that makes them stand out.”

“Students who wouldn’t have gone to college twenty-five years ago do now,” said Geoff. “Which puts the Ivy League at an even greater premium.”

Christ. The kiddies almost had me convinced that Columbia would retroactively revoke my acceptance. I never thought I would be thankful for coming from a high school where most students went to community college or not at all. All my get-into-college stress came from within. If I had gotten external pressure from my fellow classmates, my noggin would have imploded in a quick but powerful puff of brain cells and smoke.
Pffffffft!

When I think back to that time, I was certain, just like these kiddies (even though they are only four, maybe five years younger than I am, they are still children) are certain, that my college choice would have an irrevocable effect on
THE
REST
OF MY
LIFE
. And so, nearly every decision I made was with one question in mind: Will this look good on my college application? And once I made my tortured decision to apply to Columbia, it was Columbia or nothing. Success or failure. Live or die. It was all very dramatic and important in the way that all things are dramatic and important when you’re in high school and never will be again. And now that I’m entering my last year of college in a homeless, boyfriendless, clueless (as to what I want to do after graduation) state, I think it’s safe to argue that I might have been better off if I’d had my heart set on somewhere else. Or at the very least, equally bad off.

But these kiddies need to relax because they’ve already got it made. They were born into a fancy-schmancy suburban advantage in what is already the most privileged place on the planet. The gift of hereditary meritocracy practically guarantees that whether they excel in life has less to do with what they do than what life they were born into. For that advantage alone, they will always lead very charmed lives.

This reminds me of one of many arguments I had with Kieran, this one about the concept of free will. He believed that all men are responsible for creating their own fate. I told him that I agreed to a point.

“Some are freer than others,” I said, slipping out of my Chucks.

“We’re all free to exercise our autonomy,” he said, pulling his T-shirt over his head.

“What about the tens of thousands of babies who were wiped out in the tsunami? Or the comparable number who die every single month from totally curable diseases like malaria? How can you tell me that they have free will?” I said, unbuttoning my jeans.

“They can choose how they wish to perceive their reality,” he said, unzipping his pants.

“They’re
babies!”
I shouted, unhooking my bra.

“They’re
human beings!”
he shouted back, sliding on a condom.

“You’re an assclown,” I said, stepping out of my skivvies.

(I’m not proud to say that arguments like this fueled the hate fucks that were the cornerstone of our sham of an ex-relationship.)

Later, when we were finished and Kieran was asleep, I lay awake and thought about my brother, Matthew, who died when he was only two weeks old. What free will did he have?

It’s Matthew, and more recently, William, who remind me how lucky I am to simply exist. Though I might have trouble remembering that next semester when I’m bunking on a bench in Riverside Park with a crackhead named Shifty-Eyed Pete.

the eleventh

I was startled out of my slumber this morning by the sights and sounds of my mother waving an unidentified object in my face.

“Jessie. Jessie! JESSIE!
JESSIE!!!”
my mother yelled with escalating urgency.

Despite a long history of her needlessly waking me up in this manner, I instinctively sprung out of the sheets, ready to make an emergency evacuation in my underwear. “Holy shit! What’s wrong?! Is everyone okay?!”

“Phone for you,” she said sweetly.

I fainted into the goose down duvet. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” I said. “I know I don’t get many phone calls, but do we really need all the drama?”

“She said it was of crucial importance,” my mom said, handing over the cordless. Her eyes shined with excitement. She lives for this ridiculousness. She really does. I am a big disappointment in this arena because I keep my melodrama to myself.

“Who is it?” I asked.

My mother gave a thoughtful pause. “I don’t know.”

I pressed the phone to my ear. “Hello?”

“Omigod!!”

I waved at my mother to let her know that her presence was no longer required. She pouted before descending the stairs.

“Sara?”

“Omigod! Who else would it be?”

Uh. I could name about a bizillion people I would expect on the line instead of her. I cannot remember the last time Sara called me. Definitely not in this millennium. I’m pretty sure Ricky Martin was still livin’_ la vida loca_ at the top of the pop charts.
That’s
how long it’s been. Considering how his career is faring these days, I would have been less surprised if Señor “Shake Your Bon Bon” himself had called to say,
“Hola.”

“Have you heard?” she shouted into the phone. I could barely make out what she was saying. It was like talking to a faulty squawk box.

“I’m sure I haven’t heard or you wouldn’t be calling me,” I said as I scraped the polish off my toenails for amusement. “Let’s end the suspense.”

“Len and Manda broke up!” she shouted.

I took a deep breath and exhaled loudly and deeply, trying to extend the sigh as long as I could. Then I inhaled and did it again. That’s how bored I was by this conversation.

“Len and I were over three years ago. Why would I care about this?” I was about to hang up.

“Manda cheated on him!” she shouted.

“Again, none of this is surprising,” I replied, flicking the red specks of nail polish onto the city-country (or was it country-city?) bed quilt. They looked like dried blood.

“
MANDA
CHEATED
ON
HIM
WITH
A
GIRL
.”

“Oh, whatever,” I said with a yawn. “Straight girls kiss each other all the time. It makes guys hard.” I’ve never gone girl-on-girl for show, but I’d seen enough drunken faux-lesbo makeout sessions to speak with authority.

“Okay,” she said tartly. “But how many straight girls
GO
DOWN
ON
EACH
OTHER?”

If I were able to speak, I would have apologized to Sara for doubting her all these years. Because it was clear to me that the entirety of our fake friendship had existed merely to set us up for this exquisite moment.

“
DID
YOU
HEAR
ME?”

How could I not? “I’m just a little shocked is all.”

Sara’s voice took on that very pleased-with-herself tone I know so well. “I thought you would be. Can you believe it? Manda is a total
quote
carpet muncher
unquote.
EWWWWWWW
.” If Sara is any indication, gay relations have a long way to go in this country.

According to Sara, who is rarely wrong about these types of things, Len finished his finals early, drove down to New Brunswick from Ithaca, and showed up unannounced at Manda’s apartment only to find her tangled up in a Sapphic 69. Now that’s what I call taking Women’s Studies to a whole new level.

“Omigod! I bet Len just wants to
die!”
Sara said gleefully.

I’ll bet he does. At least I didn’t walk in on Kieran and Re-girlfriend in a compromising position. (Though even that couldn’t have been any worse than the infamous
coitus interruptus parentis.
Ack. I just threw up in my mouth.) Then again, Manda not only deserted him but his whole gender. Even if she’s only taking a college gaycation, there’s nothing Len can do now to change himself into the woman she wants. (Well, nothing that doesn’t involve a trip to a sexual reassignment clinic in Thailand.) There’s got to be
some
comfort in that.

As interesting as this news was, I didn’t quite understand the urgency.

“Sara, why did you call me about this?”

“Omigod! I figured you’d want to be the first to know.”

Of course she would. Sara is like someone who unexpectedly wakes up after a decade in a coma and can’t get her mind unstuck from the last clear-eyed moments right before the accident. Petty Pineville High gossip is as much of her present as it is her past. I suppose it’s because she feels she’s got so little to look forward to. I’m so over it, which isn’t surprising because I was over it while I was still in it. While my Columbia years have been anything but perfect, I still believe that one of the greatest advantages of college is that I’m officially allowed to not care about high school anymore.