Page 32 of Advanced Chemistry

My parents thought it would be a no-brainer for me and Sebastian to wind up together. The truth was, I’d had that thought before. How could I not? My best friend was sexy, sweet, and we had our rhythms down. Of course I’d wondered about life with Sebastian as my boyfriend.

And even though I told Sebastian and the whole world that I didn’t want to be in a boring relationship, that wasn’t the full truth.

Here was the truth, in all its ugly glory: I wasn’t smart enough to date Sebastian, or any worthwhile guy.

Sure, I could wow them with my charm and good looks. And then I could wow them even more once we got in the bedroom. But once the initial high wore off, what else could I offer them? I couldn’t have intellectually stimulating conversations like my parents, unless sports or beer were considered intellectual topics. I was a master at the sales smalltalk that enabled me to close deals, but I stumbled at anything deeper.

What if I let myself fall for a guy, but I only wound up boring him? How humiliating would that be, to be rejected for being an uninteresting person?

People stayed together because they found their significant other interesting. They could spend time with them for the rest of their lives. Ninety-nine percent of my friends were surface-level hangs. We did shots at parties. We liked each other’s posts. We played a pickup game of basketball. But when the fun times were over, we didn’t have anything to talk about except recalling crazy stories of past fun times.

Sebastian was my only friend who I had something real with. And he was smart. Really smart. College scholarship smart. Whatever feelings were bubbling up inside me from our night together with Chase couldn’t be acted upon.

It didn’t matter that Chase thought I was smart…or did it? Did he actually mean what he said, or was he trying to reverse psychology his way into my pants?

I stared at his picture in the yearbook, and I could’ve sworn he was staring back at me, nodding at me that he meant it. I looked up and caught the dopey smile on my lips. Chase was certifiably smart. And he thought I was smart. He thought I had the chops to be a chemist.

Maybe I had a nerdy side dying to get out?

I snorted a laugh at the thought. Fat chance, but it was nice to dream. I reshelved the yearbook, leaving said dream in the past.

What if Sebastian thought I was a fun friend, but not serious boyfriend material?

It was better to be a player than to face that kind of defeat. At least I was smart enough to know that.

11

SEBASTIAN

Sometimes, I thought about the path I was supposed to travel. In an alternate world, I was finishing up my third year of college. There was an alternate version of me hanging on the quad with friends, wrestling at the collegiate level, maybe rushing a fraternity. It all seemed ideal.

Until I met up with Savannah.

“Why the fuck do I want to be a doctor?” Savannah slammed her head onto her thick textbook, which was open on top of four other open textbooks, which were next to a laptop, a notebook, and a half-drunken can of Monster Energy Drink.

“Because you want to save lives?” I ask.

“Ugh.”

Savannah was one of my closest friends from South Rock High. I had taken the train up to Ithaca to visit her at Cornell. Her curly brown hair was wrestled into a messy bun. Her gold necklace spellingSavannahin gilded cursive, found on a field trip to New York City, hung down and touched the textbook. She and I were on the yearbook committee, where we spent most of our time snarking about the supremely anal editor-in-chief Ronna Rogalski who shot down any idea that wasn’t hers with her trademark “I’m just not feeling it.”

Savannah was pre-med and hating it, while also loving it in some twisted way. She and her uber-challenging coursework were in a toxic relationship.

It was finals week, so I was meeting up with her at her college’s library where she told me she almost had to fight some girl for the private study room we were in. As with any girl she didn’t like, she threatened to punch her in the tit. I was very curious how her personality would translate to bedside manner. Threatening to punch patients in the tit for not listening to her advice seemed not to jive with the Hippocratic Oath.

“How the fuck does he expect us to remember all of this? Maybe if I wear a low-cut top to the exam,” she said. “I’m kidding.”

“Of course you are,” I said with a smirk. I leaned back and kicked my feet onto the table in the meager space not subsumed with books.

“You sure you don’t miss this?” Savannah’s voice was laced with sarcasm, but I detected a hint of genuine curiosity, too. She was as shocked as my parents when I turned down my scholarship.

Would I rather be chained to a library desk for four years or hustling in the world? I chose the latter.

“Business is booming,” I said. “Anton and I are in the process of closing our biggest client ever. We had a great initial meeting, and things look very positive.”

“Aw, that’s wonderful. I’m proud of you guys. I mean, I think you’re kinda weird for wanting to sell vending machines, but you’re making it work.”

Savannah came from a family of doctors. There was one path that’d been laid out for her since birth, and she couldn’t fathom anyone who diverged from the college pipeline.

---