Essay #2: Write a note to your future roommate. Describe an experience or a person that has had a special influence on your life. Do not exceed 300 words.
Nina sat in her living room and looked over her list of possible candidates.
Mom and Dad. Pros: Good to say that m&d inspire, very touching. Also, biracial relationship shows built-in diversity. Cons: Cheesy to say that m&d inspire. Seems like I have no one else to write about. Exploitation of parents’ brave and romantic biracial relationship for essay purposes could seem cheap and obvious and make admissions people hate me.
Steve. Pros: Want to write about Steve. Cons: Admissions committee will think I am insane and boyfriend-obsessed and will do no work, spend entire time in school planning wedding and monitoring b-friend’s every move.
Mel and Avery. Pros: Want to write about them. Also, probably truest answer. Cons: Admissions people may not be interested in the story of how we used to buy coordinated underwear and wear it on the same schedule as a joke, which for some reason is the only thing I can think of right now.
Gandhi. Pros: Who isn’t inspired by Gandhi? Cons: Know almost nothing about Gandhi except that he was a good man who worked for peace but wore almost no clothes.
Nina groaned out loud and put her hand over her eyes. Everyone else applying for early decision was going to ace this one. They would all have pithy, unbelievable experiences to describe. “My six months in the rain forest made me who I am today….” “As a professional ballerina, I have always been accustomed to discipline….” “My friend Maggie is 106 years old, yet she seems younger than me….”
It was probably a good thing that Nina heard a car door shutting in her driveway and looked out her window to see Avery heading for her front door.
She set her laptop down on the couch next to her and got up to let Avery in. Avery dropped heavily onto the chair-and-a-half and jutted her legs out straight in front of her. She examined her red Chucks for a moment with a dissatisfied expression. Nina waited for her to say something, but Avery had nothing to offer but a view of the soles of her shoes.
“Something up?” Nina finally said.
“No.”
Avery puckered her lips and exhaled deeply. Nina glanced over at her computer and wondered if she should pick it up and keep working. She poked at the keyboard to keep it awake and looked at the hopeless fragments of her essays.
“I know Mel likes to cheer people on, but sometimes it’s kind of too much,” Avery managed to blurt. “She’s always asking me about applying to music school.”
“It just sounds like Mel is being Mel,” Nina replied nonchalantly.
“It’s different now,” Avery argued.
“How?”
“Well, the reason she’s asking me about music school in New York is because she wants to know where I’ll be living.”
“That’s not weird,” Nina said. “I want to know where you’ll be living.”
“Yeah, but you just want to know. I think Mel is making her plans based on where I’m going to be.”
Nina felt a strange pang of jealousy at this.
“How do you know that?”
“I can just tell,” Avery stated with a sense of authority that only a girlfriend would have. “It’s the way she asks.”
“How does she ask?”
“Remember how Spaz always used to message you to find out where you were going to be, and it was just kind of creepy?” Avery asked.
Spaz was Avery’s nickname for Mark, a guy Nina dated for two weeks in sophomore year. He texted Nina all day long and used to freak out if she didn’t reply right away.
“Mel’s not like Spaz,” Nina said.
“No, but she’s kind of getting there. And the other thing is, when I practice, she always wants to be there. Which is kind of fine, but then she interrupts me.”
“No, I mean she wants to … do things.”
The obvious fill-in was that Mel wanted Avery to stop for snuggle time, and as much as Nina wanted to be open and accepting, she didn’t really like picturing Mel’s attempts at seducing Avery away from the piano. She had her limits.
“What are you working on?” Avery whimpered, shyly playing with a thin, thready patch that was developing in the knee of her jeans.
“Admissions essays.”
“Right.” Avery exhaled deeply. “I forgot you have all this stuff going on.”
The thought of admissions essays visibly depressed Avery.
“I should let you finish,” she said.
“You should stay,” Nina said. “I’m just working. We have ice cream. You want some?”
“I’m good.”
Avery sat for a few more minutes, saying nothing. Nina put her computer back on her lap. It was scorching hot on the bottom, so she layered a few of her mother’s law journals under it. Nina wanted to talk more, but she had no idea what to say. If she got any deeper in this, she wasn’t sure she could really handle the details.
“You want to watch TV?” Nina offered.
“No.” Avery fished around in her pockets. “I’m going to head out.
Nina didn’t try to stop her this time.
She already had a very clear snapshot in her head of Mel and Avery making out, but now she saw a different angle of it. It wasn’t like they just kissed and that was it. They had a relationship. They noticed things about each other. They probably even dressed up for each other, just like she would dress up to get Steve’s attention. They read into each other’s signals, and they probably marked little anniversaries. Their relationship was a hundred times more complicated than the plain old Triangle stuff.
She shook her head, blinked, and focused back on the screen.
Stanford. Early decision. That was her goal. She couldn’t change what was happening with Mel and Avery, but she could make sure that she would spend the next four years with Steve. This was a long, shaky bridge, and she just had to cross it.
She sighed and highlighted the word Gandhi.