Upper East Side #6

by Ashley Valentine

  Yasmine tried to keep quiet, but Mekhi's little half-baked speech had moved her, even without the mention of her arms. "No one's going to miss me either," she declared, keeping her face pressed firmly against the viewfinder so they couldn't make eye contact.

  Mekhi ashed on the ground and rubbed it in with the heel of one of his scuffed blue Pumas. It felt weird to be talking to Yasmine in such a removed way when a little over a month ago they'd been in love and he'd had sex for the very first time.

  "I'll miss you," he admitted quietly. "I already miss you."

  Why'd he have to be so goddamn cute?

  Yasmine turned off the camera before she could say anything too revealing. "Camera's out of juice," she told him quickly. "Maybe you could come back another day," she added, wishing she didn't always sound like such a bitch.

  Mekhi pulled himself to his feet and hitched his messenger bag over his shoulder. "Good seeing you," he replied with a shy smile.

  Unable to restrain herself, Yasmine smiled back. "You too." She hesitated. "Promise you'll come back when you hear any news?"

  It was kind of nice to see her smile at him again. "I promise," Mekhi said earnestly, before loping back down the promenade.

  Maybe she was only adjusting the lens, but it kind of looked like Yasmine was checking out his butt through the camera as he walked away.

  3

  "So nice of your brother, Mekhi, to stop by," Elise Wells commented sarcastically to Bree Hargrove. She stretched her long freckled arms up over her head and then let them fall to her sides. "I think he's afraid of me."

  Bree removed her feet from Elise's lap and examined her freshly painted toes. Elise had smeared red polish all over her pinky toe, where the nail was super tiny, and it looked like she'd bludgeoned her foot with a hammer. "Mekhi's been acting like a freak lately," she noted. "And I hate to break it to you, but I don't think it has anything to do with you. He's supposed to hear back from colleges this week."

  The two girls were seated on the opposite side of Bethesda Fountain from where Yasmine had set up her camera. Bree shielded her eyes from the sun and peered over the fountain's rim to see what was going on. Yasmine was filming Nicki Button now—another Emma Willard senior. It was common knowledge that Nicki had had two nose jobs. If you lined up her yearbook picture from the last three years, you could totally tell.

  "She's only interviewing seniors," Elise stated. She tucked her thick black bob behind her freckled ears. "I asked her at school during recess.”

  Bree frowned. How come the seniors always got to do all the cool stuff? She pulled her bra down where it always rode up under her arms. Trickles of sweat had collected in the bra's cups, making it feel more like a wet suit than one of Bali's super-supportive comfort bras for big-breasted women. "It's not like I want to be in her stupid movie anyway," she muttered.

  "Right," Elise scoffed. "Like you don't always try to copy everything Chanel Crenshaw does?"

  Hello, meanness?

  Bree hugged her knees to her chest and glared at Elise defensively. Was she an internationally renowned model? Was she tall and beautiful? Did she wear a knee-length Burberry trench coat and smoke imported French cigarettes and walk around looking clueless while boys stared at her with their tongues wagging? Was she secretly the smartest girl in her class? No!

  Actually, Bree was the smartest girl in her class, but it was no secret.

  "Name one thing I've done that Chanel's done."

  Elise unscrewed the little jar of nail polish that was resting on the fountain's edge and began painting her fingernails. The color looked garish and inappropriate against her pale light skin. "It's not really what you've done..." Her voice trailed off. "It's just how you're always so buddy-buddy with her during peer group. You know, like you want everyone to know you're friends with this model. And how you're always trying on all these fancy clothes in stores, like you'd really have anywhere to wear them, the way Chanel does." She didn't even mention Bree's brief dalliance with Kaliq Braxton, which had been such a blatant case of a freshman girl getting in over her head with an older guy, it was too embarrassing to bring up.

  A soccer ball suddenly appeared out of nowhere and bounced off of Bree's curly head. "Ow!" she exclaimed angrily. She stood up and shoved her tiny feet into the pink suede flats she'd bought at the latest Bloomingdale's sale, messing up her still-wet toenails even more. "I don't know what your problem is," she snapped at Elise, "but I'd so much rather hang out with my freak of a brother than listen to you criticize me."

  Infuriatingly enough, Elise kept on painting her fingernails.

  "Fine," Bree huffed, stomping down the steps and away from the fountain toward Central Park West. Copy Chanel, she scoffed, her stupendous double-Ds bobbing with each step. Like I could even come close. But Bree wasn't one to take challenges lightly, and nothing would please her more than to prove to Elise that she wasn't just some wannabe, hopelessly trying to copy Chanel and failing every time.

  A boy whistled at her as she bobbed by, and she flipped her naturally curly hair back from her face, pretending to ignore him. She might not be six feet tall and gorgeous, but boys still whistled at her. That meant she had something, didn't it? And not all models were necessarily tall and gorgeous.

  She lifted her chin and added a little strut to her walk, imitating the way the models walked in the runway shows she'd watched on the Metro Channel. Elise was going to eat her words when she saw Bree's face on the pages of Vogue and Elle. She'd be such a success, even Chanel would be jealous.

  Although Chanel wouldn't be too jealous of the pile of dog poop Bree almost stepped in while trying to be the next Naomi Campbell.

  4

  "Oh my God, I can't breathe," Porsha gasped dramatically. She hugged one of her stepbrother Tahj's bed pillows against her stomach. "I'm going to throw up."

  It wouldn't be the first time.

  "Calm down," Chanel advised, arranging two little piles of white, cream, and manila envelopes on top of Tahj's hemp bedspread. Her instincts in the park the other day about this little letter-opening party had been dead accurate. Porsha was simply way too competitive to be civilized about the whole thing.

  "I'm going to die," Porsha moaned, clutching her stomach.

  The two girls sat cross-legged on top of Tahj's bed in his bedroom, which was actually Porsha's room from now until she went away to college. Her real bedroom was being made over into a nursery for Yale, her new half-sister, due to arrive in June. Tahj had moved in with her little brother, Brice. Porsha despised the room's ecofriendly decor and the persistent odor of stale soy hot dogs and herbal cigarettes. She was even thinking of petitioning for a suite at the Carlyle Hotel on Madison, at least until graduation.

  Talk about the perfect setting for a post-getting-into-Yale rendezvous with Kaliq! But first things first: she had to get in.

  On the bed between the two girls were two piles of envelopes, stacked facedown so that the return addresses were hidden. There were seven in Porsha's stack and five in Chanel's, yet Chanel's stack was taller. There was no question about it: Chanel's envelopes were suspiciously fatter.

  It was all due to the annoyingly dumb idea the U.S. Postal Service had. Apparently last year at this time, the postal service had gotten millions of calls from college-bound seniors accusing them of losing their admissions letters and even tampering with the content of the letters.

  Right, like some mailman really cares if you got into Princeton or not.

  So this year they decided to try something called the National College Admission Letter Pool, which sounded a lot more intelligent than it really was. Basically it meant that colleges were required to send their acceptance letters out in bundles according to zip code so the post office could deliver them all at once.

  As if the kids haven't already suffered enough.

  "Okay. Ready?" Chanel asked. She reached across the bed to give Porsha's hand a little good-luck squeeze.

  "Wait!" Porsha grabbed the bottle of Ketel One vod
ka she'd swiped from her stepfather's nightstand and opened it with her teeth.

  "The longer you drag it out, the more painful it's gonna be," Chanel replied, beginning to lose patience.

  Porsha took a swig, then closed her eyes and reached for the first envelope in her stack. "Fuck it. Okay. Let's do it."

  Rriipp!

  Dear Ms. Sinclaire,

  The Office of Admissions is sorry to inform you that we have reviewed your application and cannot offer you a place at Harvard University next fall.

  Rriipp!

  Dear Ms. Crenshaw,

  The Office of Admissions has reviewed your application and is pleased to offer you a place at Harvard University...

  Rriipp!

  Dear Ms. Sinclaire,

  Thank you for your application. Princeton University had an outstanding pool of applicants this year. The admissions decision is always a difficult one. We regret to inform you that we cannot offer you a place in the class of...

  Rriipp!

  Dear Ms. Crenshaw,

  Thank you for your outstanding application. Princeton University is pleased to offer you a place in the class of...

  Rriipp!

  Dear Ms. Sinclaire,

  We regret to inform you that Brown University cannot...

  Rriipp!

  Dear Ms. Crenshaw,

  The Office of Admissions was impressed with your application. We are pleased to invite you to join Brown University's class of...

  Rriipp!

  Dear Ms. Sinclaire,

  We have reviewed your application and have decided not to offer you a place at Wesleyan next fall. We wish you well.

  Rriipp!

  Dear Ms. Crenshaw,

  The Office of Admissions at Wesleyan University is pleased to offer you a place...

  Rriipp!

  Dear Ms. Sinclaire,

  Vassar College is a small school and can only accept a limited number of applicants. We regret to inform you that we cannot offer you a place at Vassar next fall.

  Rriipp!

  Dear Ms. Crenshaw,

  Thank you for your application to Yale University. We are very pleased to invite you to join the class of...

  Rriipp!

  Dear Ms. Sinclaire,

  Thank you for your application to Yale University. The Office of Admissions has added your name to a wait list. The office will inform you of your status on or before June 15.

  Rriipp!

  Dear Ms. Sinclaire,

  We have reviewed your application and are very pleased to offer you a place at Georgetown University next fall.

  Porsha tossed the last letter on top of the bedspread and seized the bottle of vodka. Wait-listed at Yale, and she only got into Georgetown? But that was her safety! No way had she thought she'd ever actually wind up there.

  Drink up and think again, honey-pie.

  She took a panicked gulp and then handed the bottle to Chanel. "How'd you do?" she demanded.

  Chanel could tell from the scary look on Porsha's face that the news was not good. She didn't know what to say. "Urn, I got in...um...basically...everywhere?”

  Porsha stared disbelievingly at the sheaf of acceptance letters in Chanel's hands. On top was a cream-colored letter marked with the distinctive blue Yale University letterhead. Her vision blurred. "Wait, you applied to Yale?"

  Chanel nodded. "At the last minute I just decided, why not, you know?"

  "And you got in?"

  Chanel nodded again. "Sorry." She reached for the remote and flicked on Tahj's TV. Then she flicked it off again. The way Porsha was glaring at her with her teeth bared was making her nervous.

  Porsha kept on glaring. Back in first grade she'd accidentally chopped off a foot-long swath of Chanel's long silky hair with a steak knife. All these years she'd felt sort of guilty about it—until now. Now she wished she'd cut Chanel's entire fucking head off.

  She snatched up the bottle and took another angry swig of vodka. What did Chanel have that she didn't? She was in the top of her class at Willard and took every AP course they offered. She'd aced the SAT. She did charity work. She ran the French club. She was a ranked tennis player. Her entire high-school career—practically her whole life—she'd been working toward getting into Yale. Her father had gone there. His father had gone there. Her great-uncle had donated two buildings and a playing field.

  Chanel had been kicked out of boarding school that fall. She took no APs at all, did hardly any extracurriculars, was purported to have mediocre grades and even lower SAT scores than Kaliq. Chanel's dad had gone to Princeton and Brown, two of Yale's biggest competitors. Still, Yale had accepted Chanel and stuck Porsha on their fucking wait list! Was there something Chanel knew that she didn't even after twelve two-hour sessions with Ms. Glos, the uptight wig-wearing guidance counselor, and one hundred and fourteen weeks of SAT prep??

  "I probably won't even go," Chanel faltered in an attempt to play things down. "I have to...you know...visit all the schools before I decide." She gathered her luxurious hair on top of her head and frowned. "Maybe I won't even go to college right away. I could stay in the city and try to do some acting or something."

  Porsha scooted off the bed, scattering her pile of rejection letters. So Chanel got into Yale, but she didn't even really want to go there? "What the fuck?!" she cried, sloshing vodka all over the natural-sea-grass mat beneath her feet.

  Chanel collected her letters and held them behind her back. "What about the other schools? You must have—"

  All of a sudden Porsha's stepbrother, Tahj Campbell, poked his smug, Rasta, into-Harvard-early-admission head into the room. "I thought I heard shouting." He squinted at the letters in Chanel's hand. "Accepted at Harvard!" He walked into the room and held his hand up to give her a high five. "Nice!" He grinned over at Porsha. "What about you, sis?"

  Porsha wasn't sure whether to kill them both or kill herself. "I'm not your sis," she spat back. She slammed the half-empty vodka bottle down on the top of Tahj's organically grown beechwood dresser, nearly breaking the glass bottle. "But since you're both obviously so interested, I got fucking wait-listed at Yale. The only place that accepted me is Georgetown. Fucking stupid ass Georgetown."

  Chanel and Tahj stared at her for a moment, their eyes wide with a mixture of disbelief and fear of the Mighty Wrath of Porsha.

  "That's not so bad," Chanel murmured finally. She didn't know much about Georgetown, but she'd met some cute boys who went there, and it might be kind of cool to live in the same city as the president. "I'm sure Yale is just playing hard to get. And if you don't wind up getting in, at least you have backup."

  It was easy for Chanel to talk about backup when her backup schools were Harvard and Brown. Porsha stuffed her feet back into her new flats and snatched her black cardigan off the bed.

  "Come on, Porsh, don't be such sore loser. New Haven's a dump anyway. You'd probably hate it there." Tahj hooked his guitar-playing-callused thumbs into the pockets of his army green cargo pants. "At least they have a Prada in DC."

  Of course the only thing Porsha had heard him say was the word loser.

  "Fuck off," she hissed to both of them as she stomped out the door on her way over to Kaliq's house. Chances were Kaliq had only been accepted at some lame stoner school like Hobart or UNH. At least he could sympathize. He'd probably even have sympathy sex.

  Not that she was even close to being in the mood.

  5

  No one else was even home, but out of sheer habit, Kaliq stuffed a rolled-up bath towel into the space between the hardwood floor and his closed bedroom door before sitting down on his bedspread and lighting up. He took a big hit and then reached for the first envelope in the short stack on his bedside table. He tore it open.

  Congratulations, Mr. Braxton,

  Brown University is pleased to offer you...

  Score!

  Kaliq dropped the letter on the bed, took another hit, and then tore open the second envelope.

  Dear Mr. Braxton,


  The Office of Admissions has reviewed your application and would like to invite you to join Boston University's class of...

  Double score!

  He sucked on the joint and then balanced it on the edge of his bedside table. Next envelope.

  Hampshire College had a strong and interesting pool of applicants this year. Yours stood out. Mr. Braxton, we are pleased to offer you a place at Hampshire next fall.

  Triple score!

  Last envelope—he'd only been able to deal with applying to four schools.

  Thank you for your application. Yale University's office of admissions is pleased to offer you a place in the class of...

  Quadruple fucking score!!!

  Kaliq couldn't wait to tell Porsha. They could go to Yale together, live in the married people's housing just like she used to dream about. They could even get a dog, maybe. A Great Dane.

  Kaliq examined the other paperwork stuffed inside the envelopes. Along with the acceptance letters from Brown and Yale were extra letters from the schools' lacrosse coaches, promising him a starting place on the team.

  "Holy shit," Kaliq breathed, reading the letters. They didn't just want him. They wanted him bad.

  Join the club.

  He reached for his cell and was about to speed-dial Porsha's private line when the phone rang in his hand. The name Porsh with a heart emoji beside it appeared on his screen.

  "Hey. I was just about to call you," Kaliq chuckled. "How'd it go?"

  "Buzz me in," Porsha replied in a clipped tone. "I'm like two doors away from your house."