Page 36 of The Way I Am Now
I frantically search for their previous email.
I’d barely read it the first time. My eyes scanned for the word “unfortunately,” and then I immediately closed it—never even looked at it again. But it wasn’t a rejection. They told me I was waitlisted. I go back to today’s email. Yes, it clearly states:We are pleased to offer you admission for the fall semester.
“Oh my God,” I whisper.
“What?” my brother, Caelin, says as he shuffles into the kitchen, where I’m standing frozen, with the microwave door still open, my burrito getting cold, still in my polo shirt and visor from the Bean, the scent of coffee clinging to my hair and my skin.
“I—I got in,” I stammer, looking up at him. “To Tucker Hill University.”
“Holy shit, Eeds.” He smiles as I hand him my phone, and I realize how long it’s been since I’ve seen him smile. “Seriously, this is amazing. I didn’t even know you applied there. Tucker Hill is a really decent school.”
“I know. Which is why I thought I’d never get in in a million years.”
“Congratulations,” he says, and he holds his arms out like he might lean in to hug me, but then he stops short.
“Well, but it’s not like I can really go, can I? I mean, it’s expensive and far away—”
“Eden, you have to go,” he interrupts. “It’s really not that far away; it’s not even out of state. It’s gotta be four or five hours, max.”
“Okay, but itisexpensive.”
“Oh, fuck money,” he says, dismissively waving his hand through the air. “There’s financial aid and scholarships, grants . . . loans.”
“It’s so soon, though. I don’t have enough time to get ready, and with everything else going on.” The trial is supposed to start in the fall, which we haven’t discussed, the two of us. What it’ll be like for him to see his former best friend like that . . . his sister.
“Yeah, that’s all the more reason you should get out of here— you can come back when you need to,” he says, conveniently not sayingfor the trial. “And you have over a month. That’s plenty of time.”
“Mom and Dad won’t think this is a good idea at all. Me, being on my own—they don’t even trust me to borrow a car to get to work. And that’s another thing . . . I don’t have a car.”
“Stop, stop, okay?” He brings his hands together like he’s praying. “First, since when do you give a shit what they think . . . or whatIthink, for that matter?” He laughs, and so do I, because, of course, that’s true. “And you can find a car. Hell, I’ll give you my car!” he shouts. “Stop making excuses.”
“You need your car.”
“What do I need a car for? I’m taking the semester off,” he reminds me. “You’re doing this.”
I’m trying to picture how any of it could work, how any of this is not crazy. I let out a laugh and cover my mouth, shaking my head as I look down at my phone again. I suddenly feel giddy and nauseated with the overwhelming sense of possibility blooming in my chest.
“Tucker Hill,” Caelin says. “Isn’t that where Josh Miller goes?”
I nod slowly.
“So, does this mean you and him are like a thing again or . . . ?” he asks awkwardly.
“He has a girlfriend,” I hear myself automatically reply. It’s the sentence that has been constantly running through my mind for months, even if that’s not exactly what he asked. “I mean, we’re just friends,” I conclude.
I bring my lukewarm burrito into my bedroom and close the door, open my laptop. I want a cigarette so badly, because I’m feeling all these emotions bubbling up, fear and excitement and joy and dread, all fighting for top billing.
But I take a breath, slowly in, slowly out, and I open my email, double-checking, as if the message would’ve changed from my phone to my computer. It didn’t. I follow the link to the English department grants and scholarships. English, I’d said my intended major was English. I try to picture myself there, as one of the people in these idyllic pictures online. Maybe I could be that girl there, sitting under a tree with a blanket and a book, reading. Or that kid smiling in the lecture hall. I could be in that group of people walking together, talking, laughing—friends. I close my eyes and try to dream it: big buildings and vast libraries, living in a real city.
And then there’s the other part. I close my laptop. The Josh part. The whole Josh . . .thing, as Mara said the night of the concert.
I’m picking at the salad on my dinner plate that evening, trying to find the right time to bring it up. Caelin keeps looking over at me, waiting for me to say something. Mom is reading on her phone. Dad, who barely speaks to me these days, is hunched over his chicken, eating in silence, as usual.
“So,” Caelin announces, “Eden got some really good news today.”
Mom looks up from her phone and brings her napkin to the corner of her mouth. “Good news? We could use some good news around here.”
“Uh, yeah. So, it turns out I got into Tucker Hill University for the fall.”
