Sophomore Switch (2 page)

The plain walls are totally clear except for a color-coded study schedule and reading list — pinned to the board so perfectly, she must have used a ruler to arrange them. The desk is set with a sheet of notepaper and two pens at precise right angles. And the nightstand — home
to the universal “goodie drawer” — holds only a container of vitamin pills, a pocket pack of Kleenex, and a small dictionary.

I sink back down on the bed, this time in disbelief. I think of my own apartment, overflowing with junk, clothes, and noise, and then look again at this temple of order and precision.

Emily Lewis. Just what kind of freak are you?

“. . . And I was like, ‘No way,’ but she says, ‘Hell yeah,’ so we totally started grinding in the middle of the dance floor! Uh-huh . . . No . . . Totally! And, like, he was all crazy jealous . . . Ha! No, totally!”

I shut my eyes tightly, but when I open them, I’m still here: staring at a wall full of foreign photographs while my new flatmate continues her fascinating analysis of modern sexuality.

“No. Way!” she squeals, perfectly audible even in the next room. “Omigod, I can’t believe you let him do
that
!”

With a sigh, I swing my legs over the side of the bed and survey the task awaiting me. I’ll need cleaning supplies for a start, and some kind of flat edge to scrape the debris off the walls. She probably used Blu-Tack to keep
all this up, and I know what kind of grease marks that will leave. Warming to my project as Morgan keeps up her steady stream of “like” and “totally!” in the next room, I methodically begin to peel the layers of magazine clippings and photographs away, bringing order to the chaos until pale cream walls are revealed beneath, soothing and cool.

“Hey, Em!” Morgan pushes the door open without knocking. She’s cocked her head to trap the phone on her shoulder, halfway done painting her nails a violent shade of raspberry. “We’re heading out to eat — wanna come?”

“It’s fine.” I shake my head quietly. “I need to unpack. But thanks.”

“Sure, cool.” Morgan shrugs, but she doesn’t leave. Instead, she turns to the huge vanity mirror, finishing her nails and then starting on a fresh coat of mascara. Her blond hair has platinum highlights and is twisted into loose ringlets that fall halfway down her back, shining synthetic and bright against her pale-blue tank top. With the tan and careful makeup, she looks only half real — like some kind of perfect doll. And she’s not the only one. This city seems to be home to some sort of junior Stepford experiment.

“No, she’s staying.” Morgan’s voice drops as she turns back to the phone. “No . . . uh-huh . . . no, she’s kinda quiet. I know . . . she’s
cleaning.
”

I ignore her hushed comments and keep working until she leaves, settling into a blissful rhythm of lift, wipe, repeat, and then unpacking my own things, a warm breeze rippling the curtains and a familiar pop song drifting up
from the apartment downstairs but nothing else to break my peace. And, at last, my new room is neat and clean, Natasha’s many belongings tucked away under my bed, my clothing and study materials in their place.

There.

I pause for breath, regarding the order I’ve magicked out of thin air and teen-girl offcasts with a warm glow of satisfaction. I can’t concentrate when things are out of place. Everything else about the exchange may be a monumental disaster, but this mess I can control.

My own phone begins to ring, not with the heavy rap music that Morgan’s cell has spewed forth a dozen times already today, but a normal beeping tone.

“Hi, Elizabeth.” I collapse onto my crisp new bedding and notice a stain on the ceiling I’ll have to deal with later.

“Santa Barbara? Emily, have you lost your mind?” My elder sister doesn’t waste time with “How was your flight?” pleasantries, her disapproval echoing clearly down the line from England. “It’s not even Ivy League! What possible use could it be to waste three months in a school for beach bums and party girls?”

“It’s not my fault,” I argue, kicking my bare feet in the air. I may as well get in a few toning exercises with the criticism. Constructive use of all available time, that’s the key. “Professor Tremain forgot about my application. He didn’t send it until after the deadline, and by then all the good schools were booked. I was lucky to get this place at all. They’ve already started term.” I gave silent thanks for whatever slutty prank had sent Natasha fleeing
to England. Morgan had babbled about hot tubs and TV stars when I first arrived, but I’d been too jet-lagged and bitter to pay much attention.

“Lucky?” Elizabeth exclaims. I hear the sound of pans clattering and picture her in her sleek granite kitchen, whipping up a three-course meal after a fifteen-hour shift at the hospital. “You shouldn’t have gone at all. Your second year isn’t time to slack off, you know. It’s when you should be going to extra classes, getting involved in student politics and debate.”

“I know.” I’d heard this all before. Elizabeth was repeating my father’s lecture practically word for word.

“So why jeopardize everything by disappearing?” Elizabeth switches from disapproval to exasperation as a kettle hisses. “I don’t understand.”

“It’s not such a big deal.” I neatly avoid the question. “Study-abroad programs are a legitimate enrichment activity. It’ll show I’m resourceful and adaptive to change.”

“Of course they are.” Elizabeth sighs. “But what possible enrichment are you going to find in that place? It’s hardly Harvard.”

Harvard. Just the mention of it burns. I’m supposed to be there right now, walking through neat red-brick quads to seminars on international relations and political philosophy, surrounded by the most brilliant minds in the country. I had it all planned out, right down to my study schedule and lecture list. The pamphlet is in my suitcase, tucked inside a travel guide to Boston my father gave me for Christmas. I suppose I won’t be needing them now.

“. . . Will you? Emily?”

“Hmmm?” I blink out of the reverie.

“I was saying that it’s not too late; you could come home. Go back to Oxford.”

“But my place is taken already. The other girl is there.”

“We’d be able to work it out, I’m sure.” Elizabeth munches on something. “Dad said he could find you a room to rent in Oxford until you get your old one back; you could go to all your classes as normal. He would even give you a living allowance.”

“I’m sure he would.”

“Don’t say it like that.” She sighs again. “He’s just concerned. We all are. This isn’t like you at all.”

“And what is like me?” I ask, wary.

“You’re responsible, focused.” Elizabeth tries to make it sound like a good thing. “You wouldn’t just take off and risk your grades, your chance at a good internship.”

“I’ve already applied for the internships, and besides, why is everyone so sure they know what I’ll do? I’m eighteen years old, not some middle-aged spinster!”

“Spinster?” Elizabeth perks up. “Emily, is this about Sebastian? Because —”

“It’s not about him!”

“Fine.” She sighs again. “Just think about it, OK? It wouldn’t be like you were admitting defeat.”

“I’m not coming home,” I tell her determinedly, the memory of Sebastian giving me new resolve. “I . . . like it here.”

“You do?”

“Yes,” I say carefully. “My roommate is really nice, and there are lots of interesting courses I can take.”

“Oh.” She pauses. “Well, I guess you know what you’re doing. . . .”

“I do.” I finally let my legs drop, thirty repetitions later.

“Then look after yourself. And call Dad. He’s worried.”

“I will. Love you.”

“You too.”

I roll over and catch sight of the exchange information pack on the desk. I haven’t yet brought myself to look at my class schedule, despite what I told Elizabeth. I can only imagine what Natasha — amateur lingerie model and table dancer (according to the photographs on the wall) — was signed up for. Intro to Early Education, probably, or Remedial English.

But flicking through the stapled pages, I see with horror that I’d overestimated her. Film Crit: The Modern Blockbuster? Teen Movies: Brat Pack and Beyond?

The girl is a bloody film major?

I catch a shuttle bus from our apartment and then practically power walk across campus to catch the international office before it closes. It’s one thing to alienate my family, risk my chance of a top-five law firm internship, and voluntarily spend twelve weeks in a confined space with Morgan, but take that joke excuse for a class schedule? Even I have my limits.

All around me, tanned and happy students are sauntering in the sunshine, completely oblivious to my plight. It’s a mass of activity I’m still adjusting to; there are four hundred undergraduates at Raleigh, but here they number closer to twenty thousand. I’ve gone from recognizing every face I pass to being completely lost in a sea of tanned strangers.

But to my surprise, I don’t feel as alone as I expected. In fact, weaving my way through the crowds, the ocean sparkling in the distance, I find a strange sense of satisfaction begin to form. This anonymity, this freedom, is something new for me. I can’t cross the Raleigh campus without somebody stopping me to talk about classes or events, but here nobody shows a flicker of interest as I speed by. I could be anyone, not just Emily Lewis, future lawyer and study fiend, the person I have been half my life. As far as anyone here knows, I could be somebody who usually does things like this: a girl who takes off to the other side of the world, a reckless adventurer.

Reckless . . . I have to give a hollow laugh at that. The first truly adventurous thing I do in my entire life, and it’s because of a boy. Pausing in the afternoon sun, I remember my sister’s comments and what Sebastian had said, just a week ago, the night he broke up with me. Because I was a control freak. Because I was afraid of intimacy. Because the conversation was taking place
on
my bed, instead of
in
it, wearing more clothing than he would have liked. Other girls would have gone out and spent too much money on a low-cut dress or cut their hair off to show how spontaneous they were, but not me. No, I had
to pick up the phone the very next morning when that Global Exchange lady rang, and I had to tell her yes. Yes to the last-minute switch. Yes to California. Get me out of England.

As much as I — and my liberated, post-third-wave feminist self — hate to admit it, my sister was right. This is all because of Sebastian.

Ignoring the dull fear in my chest that comes whenever I think of what he said, I cut past a group of boys in too-low denim tossing a Frisbee around and push into the air-conditioned cool of the International Students building. It didn’t matter how I ended up here: I’m stuck. Until April. I suppose I might as well make sure I get a proper education while I’m here, at the very least.

So this is what studying is like.

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve worked hard before. SATs, term papers, finals — just because I’m not an honor student or anything, it doesn’t mean I haven’t put the time in. But there’s a huge difference between cramming stuff you kind of know (but just need to know better) and working flat out for three days trying to get your head around concepts you haven’t even heard of. And even then, after all that work, knowing your paper still sucks.

I’m back in Professor Elliot’s badly lit study, this time with only a couple of other students for company/camouflage. Sporty girl and blond boy, aka Carrie and Edwin. Yes, Edwin. They call their kids things like that here. Anyway, I’m bundled up in my warmest sweater because for some reason, English people are, like, morally
opposed to heating, and it’s still raining: gray and gloomy outside the slim windows. Carrie has just finished reading her essay aloud, which involved a lot of phrases like “basic ideological dichotomies” and “inherent value systems,” and now Professor Elliot is looking at us expectantly.

“Any thoughts?” she asks as I try to avoid eye contact. This is becoming a routine for me, but maybe that’s not so bad. Aren’t routines supposed to give your life structure and purpose?

“Well, actually yes.” Edwin speaks up right away, flicking back a few pages to the start of his notes and launching into an attack of everything Carrie just said. “. . . And finally, she’s completely overstating the intrinsic value of democracy as an end.”