Personal Statement (5 page)

“What the
fuck
?!”

Emily is walking five paces ahead of me, storming back to her car like a woman possessed. She literally has not stopped pissing and moaning since we left the governor’s press conference.

“What the fuck what the fuck what the FUCK?!”

I hate when she’s like this. And it’s been getting worse the last three months.

“He hijacked my idea, Rani. Fucking hijacked it! On national television!”

“I think there were only local stations in there,” I say, but she doesn’t seem to hear me.

“So instead of being
appointed
to the task force, like I wanted—I mean, HELL-OO?! It was
my
friggin’ idea in the first place, he never would have thought of something like this on his
own.
So shouldn’t the person who
came up with the idea
be the one allowed on the task force? Yes! Of course! That would be the
logical
thing the to do. The morally
correct
thing to do. But now—
now
I have to compete with an entire
state
of over-sexed half-wits dying for their fifteen minutes. Uggghh! There is no justice in the world!”

“Yeah,” I say. “It’s a bummer.”

Emily finally stops walking in the middle of the empty street and turns to face me. “You know what this means, right?”

“We can go home?”

“We’re gonna have to work
ten
times as hard to win those spots.”

“Aw, man. Seriously?”

“Otherwise,” she says, grabbing me by the shoulders and looking me dead in the eye, “no killer personal statement—and no Harvard! Are you with me?”

I let out a long sigh. I want to tell her,
No, Emily—I’m NOT with you. This is the stupidest idea since the ‘flying tank.’ I was barely with you when we left my house for Cawdor, and I was even LESS with you when you decided to crash the governor’s press conference to somehow get us appointed to their task force. How ludicrous is that idea? It’s pointless, unnecessary, and a total waste of time. We’re seventeen years old. It’s still August. We should be on a beach drinking flat beer and making out with dumb boys who smell like ChapStick and s’mores.

But I don’t say any of that. Because she’s my best friend. And also because when she gets like this… I’m kind of afraid of her.

“Of course,” I say. “Totally with you.”

Emily hugs me super tight, with more desperation than affection, and then she’s off again, five paces ahead, beelining to her car, chattering all the way about how to strategize and brainstorm. I immediately regret staying.

§

The entire ride back to Cawdor, Emily doesn’t stop talking. She talks about where we should stay: “I have my mom’s Hampton Inn Rewards Card. We should stay at a Hampton Inn—we passed one on our way up to Hartford.” She talks about using social media to our advantage: “Not only integrate it into our plan for the governor but also tweet and update what we’re doing live… like document it and maybe cite the tweets and status updates in our personal statements!” She talks about her
self
ad nauseam: “I feel like there’s a big fat target on my back, ya know, like everyone either wants a
piece
of me or wants to take me
down
. I guess that’s the way all visionaries and trailblazers feel. I should read the Steve Jobs biography.” I listen in and out (mostly out), secretly wishing I could go back home and lay on my bed reading
Horse and Rider
.

Then I realize: I
can
go home.

It’ll be so easy. After we settle in at the hotel, I can wait until Emily is in the shower (she
always
showers before bed, it’s part of her O.C.D. about being super clean all the time). Then I can sneak out to the train station and catch the Northeast Regional back to Stamford. It’s the perfect plan. The only “rub” will be dealing with Emily at school for the next nine months before we go off to college. But it seems a small price to pay for my freedom at this precise moment.

We make the fifty-five mile drive back to Cawdor in under an hour and get a room on the “top floor” of the Hampton Inn—which is the second floor. We drag our overnight bags up the stairs (no elevator) and walk along the outdoor balcony/hallway. Emily slides our key in the door and heads straight for the bathroom, still yammering.

“Oh my God, we should enlist some
celebrities
to tweet about the hurricane prep and recovery effort! But, like,
young
celebrities. Emma Stone and Andrew Garfield. Ooo, what about Chloe Sevigny… isn’t she
from
Connecticut? And John Mayer is from Fairfield. Oh this is perfect! Can you Google those guys and try to find their, like, agent or manager info? I’m sure they’d totally be into helping out a good cause like this. Eek! Exciting!”

And she’s off, closing the bathroom door behind her and turning on the shower. I give her a few minutes to make sure she’s not going to rush back out with another brilliant idea. When she starts singing John Mayer’s “All We Ever Do Is Say Goodbye,” I grab my stuff and head out the door.

And it’s exhilarating. The night air seems fresher. The sounds crisper. My feet step in time with my pounding heart. My head is buzzing. I can hardly contain my excitement as I walk to the station. I bang off a quick text to my mom, who has been pestering me for updates every hour since we left.

Then I realize there may not be another train until morning. Emily will figure out where I went and come find me and badger me with her oh-so-convincing-ways, forcing me to stay with her. I pick up my pace. For the last block and a half, I’m in a dead sprint. I bang through the doors of the tiny station house, breathless, and look up at the old-fashioned announcement board. A southbound train is scheduled to arrive in four minutes, departing for Stamford (only a ten-minute cab ride from home). I should be back in my own bed before 2 a.m. It couldn’t have worked out better if I’d planned it.

My phone buzzes with a text. I freeze with fear, terrified that it’s Emily wondering where the hell I am. Thankfully, it’s just my mom.

I hit send, slip the phone in my shorts pocket, and sit on a wooden bench, still catching my breath. Looking around for the first time, I’m surprised to find that I’m not the only one in the station. There are three other people—a family of some kind that I guess to be a brother, sister, and their grandmother. He looks like he’s around my age. The girl looks to be 11 or 12, and the woman is in her seventies and uses a walker.

“Excuse me,” I say to the group, but sort of direct my attention to the boy. “Is this the right place for the Amtrak train to Stamford?”

“I think so,” he says. “There’s only one more train tonight, the 11:17 to New York. I think it’ll stop in Stamford, too, but you should check with the guy at the counter…” He points to the empty ticket counter. “If there
was
a guy at the counter. Uh…” He smiles and sort of laughs as he digs for his phone. “Hold on—I can pull it up it two seconds.”

“Oh, no—it’s cool. I’m like ninety percent sure it stops there. I was just double checking.”

“Right on. So you’ve only got like a ten percent chance that you’ll end up in Canada.”

“Which would be cool because I love ice fishing and riding moose.”

“Do people ride moose? I’d think the moose wouldn’t really dig that.”

“No—they hate it. But I ride them anyway. Show ‘em who’s boss.”

He smiles and laughs again, and I feel like I’m living someone else’s life. Who
am
I right now? Witty, charming, dynamic? Starting and leading a conversation with a total stranger? I have
no
idea what’s gotten into me. Maybe it’s the freedom of being out from under Emily’s thumb, out from under my parents’ thumbs. Whatever it is, this guy seems to like it and he’s definitely easy on the eyes. Messy curly brown hair. Strong nose and chin. Blue eyes and a slightly crooked smile. Like a younger Seth Meyers from SNL. If he’s funny too I may just ask him to marry me on the spot. I know my dad would love it. I think his biggest fear when he had two girls was that we’d bring home a boy he wouldn’t know how to talk to. If I brought home an Indian boy (even one born in America like me), Dad wouldn’t know what to say to him. And even though my father gave thousands of dollars to
both
Obama campaigns, I don’t think there would a quicker way to give him a heart attack than to tell him I was dating a black guy.

My mom is even more of an enigma. Even though she married a white guy, she’s been on this Indian kick for the last two decades. It started when she named me and has gotten deeper and more absurd ever since, culminating with the Bollywood-themed fundraiser she organized for my school this past April. Ever since her
Titanic
fundraiser was such a huge success, she’s been reluctantly topping herself each year. This time she had a group of “Bollywood Funk” instructors from the city headline the evening’s festivities. During the interactive performance my mom turned to me, mid-Backward Bhangra Pivot Step, and said, “Why don’t you marry a Tamil Brahmin, Rani? You’d make the most exquisite babies. And Indian men are far more refined than Americans, your father included.”

Aside from the open dig at my father, I found the notion extremely offensive. Why do parents think we can
control
who we like? Why would I block out an entire race of potential mates just so my parents can be more comfortable at Thanksgiving?

All of this races though my mind in an instant—but apparently not instantaneously enough, because the boy at the train station is looking at me expectantly.

“I’m sorry—I totally spaced out for a second. What did you say?”

“I said, my name’s Tyler.” He stands and crosses over to me from the bench he was sitting on so we can hear each other better. “What’s yours?”

“Oh,” I say dumbly. “Rani. Rani Caldwell.”

“Good to meet you Rani. You from Stamford?”

“Close. Fairwich.”

He leans in and drops his voice, presumably so grandma and sis can’t hear. “I figured you weren’t from around here.”

“Why—because I’m Indian?”

“Uh. No. Because I would have noticed a pretty girl like you before.”

“Oh… Did I mention I have racist Tourette’s? It’s very rare but it makes me say stupid things to cute white boys.”

“Lucky me.” And he smiles his charming crooked smile and I get goose bumps all up and down my left arm. Oh man, is he cute. I should sit across the aisle from him on the train. Or maybe right next to him? His sister will sit with his grandmother and I can sit with him. It’s almost too perfect.

“So,” I say, trying the keep the conversation going. “Where are you headed?”

“Oh, I’m not going anywhere. I’m just getting my little sister and grandmother on the train. Out of the storm’s path. My parents are in New York already—so they’ll ride out the hurricane with them.”

“You’re not going?”

“Nah—I’m gonna stick around. My grandmother’s lived here her whole life, so… I’ll board up her windows, get the house storm-ready. Then see if there’s anything else I can do to help out in town. Seems kind of selfish to just run for higher ground if I’m young and able-bodied, know what I mean?”

“Yeah… Totally.”

“What about you? What’s in Stamford-slash-Fairwich for you at one in the morning?”

“Um… my parents?”

“Okay…”

“Yeah. I came up to help out with the hurricane—volunteer and stuff?”

“Oh, that’s awesome! Good for you.”

“Yeah… it was.”

“So you did your part, now you’re headed home. That’s cool.”

“It is. Isn’t it?”

He turns toward the track. An approaching headlight reflects in the window.

“Guess that’s your train,” he says.

“Guess so…”

“Well it was nice to meet you… Rani.” He holds out his hand and I shake it. It’s soft and strong and feels like hot cocoa by a warm fire, like picking apples upstate, like a carriage ride through Central Park.

“Yeah… um. Actually. I think—yeah, I’m probably gonna stick around… another day or so?”