I spend the next hour looking straight ahead, feeling the hairs on the back of my neck prickle as if it were cold in here. Actually, it is cold in here. I’m a bit nippy.
Of course that could be because of Blue Eyes.
Maybe when the bell rings, he’ll smile at me, and we’ll chat about school and then he’ll ask me to get a coffee and I’ll say sure and we’ll grab a cup to go and park ourselves under a tree on campus. He’ll spread out his jacket so my beige pants won’t get stained with dirt. Damn, I don’t think he has a jacket. What will I sit on? His lap? Wrong. Too early-I don’t want to repeat the Jamie experience. I guess I could sit on my notebook. Anyway, we’ll smile shyly at each other. The wind will blow through my hair. And then we’ll sit together in all our classes and fall madly in love. (Then I can sit on his lap. His chest. Anywhere I damn well please.) We’ll spend the next two years studying in the library, giggling together. He’ll explain to me all the things I don’t understand. Like Pricing Arbitrage.
Pure bliss. One day we’ll tell little Blue Eyes Junior how we met on the first day of orientation.
Once again, I might be getting a smidgen ahead of myself. He might have taken a look at my fat ass and decided I was repulsive. Or he might already be married. He might already have a Blue Eyes Junior. I should know by now that you have to look at a man’s left hand before you look in his eyes. Unfortunately, since he’s sitting diagonally behind me, two seats over from Jamie, from my position there’s no way I can get a good look at his ring finger.
He doesn’t look married.
“Okay, guys,” the class leader says, “it’s time for you to divide into groups of five. Remember, you’ll be working with these people for every group assignment this semester. LWBS’s policy is to allow students to choose their own work groups within their Blocks. Some B-schools assign the groups, but LWBS believes you are capable of making the decision. I would suggest that you talk among yourselves, to get better acquainted. Each group should be made up of people of diverse backgrounds so that you’ll be able to attack assignments from various angles. For example, you don’t want five engineers in one group.”
Panic. This must be how the heavy girls felt in gym class. No one will pick me. What can I add to a group? Uh, nothing? How’s this: two accountants, one engineer, one banker…and a diaper model. I slouch in my chair. Through the slits in my eyes I watch my fellow students mill about. I don’t look up in case they’re pointing at me and shaking their heads. No, not her. No morons in this group.
What happens to the people who don’t get picked? Will we be rounded into the corner to become the loser group? Maybe I’ll be the only one left. I’ll have to do all the assignments by myself. First I’ll struggle to understand them, then I’ll fail them, and then I’ll get booted back to Arizona.
“Psst, Kimmy.”
I practically pirouette at the sound of my name. Jamie. Sweet Jamie.
“Want to work with us?”
As far as I can tell, us includes himself, (gulp) Blue Eyes who has now moved to sit next to him and a skinny bleached-blond guy making a beat with his pen on the edge of his desk.
“Sure,” I say, way too quickly to appear nonchalant. Wow. They want me. They want me to work with them. Maybe there’s some merit to being the class slut, after all. Three boys and me. One boy who wants me, one who’s a stud, and one who looks like fun in the musical I-have-a-garage-band way. This will be awesome-until they realize that I’m totally useless and start to hate me. What if they have secret meetings and vote me out of their group, Survivor-style?
But awesome until then.
I catch Blue Eyes’ gaze and exude my best come-hither smile. He grins back.
Jamie jumps out of his chair and sits on the table. “Excellent. She’s Kimmy, by the way,” he says to the other guys.
“We figured,” Musical Blond Boy says, smirking.
“The smart ass over there is Nick. The beautiful Lauren is on his right-”
Lauren? No one said anything about a gorgeous Lauren. I take one look at the stunning African-American beauty and want to cry. She towers over Nick and is sitting with perfect posture, her perfectly perky breasts at attention. Her hair cascades in jet-black curls down her back.
I noticed her when I walked in. How could I not? Every eye in the room followed her when she strutted to the back of the room, parading through the rows like she was on a catwalk.
Bitch.
I know it’s wrong to hate women just because they’re better looking than I am, but I don’t care.
“Hey,” she says, leaning into her palm, her elbow on the desk.
“Hi,” I say, trying to infuse my greeting with enough suspicion so she’ll know I’m on to her.
“And,” Jamie continues, “the ugly guy sitting next to me is Russ.”
Russ. I smile and lock eyes with Blue Eyes once again.
“Nice to meet you,” he says, extending his right hand to shake. His fingers are soft and warm. And how is his left hand?
Ringless.
The year is looking up.
russ omits one significant detail
Sunday, September 7, 1:20 p.m.
Need better reading material. But I feel like a hoser walking to the washroom with a newspaper. Everyone on the floor doesn’t need to know when I’m planning on pinching a loaf.
“Hey, Rena,” I hear a chick say. I know Rena from Toronto. She’s a friend of Sharon’s older sister. She’s a second year, but lives on my floor. I’ve been told I’m supposed to call her and get together, but she’s seriously annoying. Speaks in a nasal voice and wears ties. Thinks she’s Avril Lavigne. Why would a woman wear a tie if she’s not in a music video? I think she thinks it’s sexy. It’s not.
“Hey. How are you?” she replies in a voice so nasal, if there were any windows in here it would shatter them.
Oh, man. Just what I want to listen to. Nasal female voices while I’m taking a dump.
This whole coed deal is not for me. Yesterday I watched a chick from my Block tweeze her eyebrows. Did Superman ever watch Lois Lane groom? I don’t think so. And then she took a People magazine to the toilet. That’s just gross. I don’t want to picture chicks taking a dump.
In junior high I had the unfortunate experience of watching Linda Stalwart, a girl I worshiped from afar, burp the alphabet. It was nasty. Not that she cared-she wouldn’t have looked twice at me then. Ha. She should see me now. Well not now, as in on the throne. Now, as in at LWBS. Built. No longer known as Pizza Face.
My little cousin once called me that. Wasn’t trying to be obnoxious. He was only five. Came over for Christmas dinner and pointed to my face and told me I looked like a pepperoni pizza. My aunt tried to shut him up, but he was laughing and pointing and jumping up and down.
Oh, man, my aunt felt so bad. Tried to convince me it was a compliment. Pepperoni pizza was my cousin’s favorite, she said. I hid in my room for the rest of the night with my comic books, picking my face. Disgusting habit, but I couldn’t stop. Once there was a piece of available skin I’d play with it and end up pulling it off. When I finally went on medication and kept my hands in gloves to stop picking, my skin took a year to heal.
Linda Stalwart. I wonder what she’s doing now. Probably married and fat and teaching little kids how to belch.
Once when I stopped by Sharon’s, she opened her door with that white stuff on her lip. You know, mustache bleach. “That’s something I wish I hadn’t seen,” I said, shielding my eyes.
“Then don’t come over uninvited.” She slammed the door in my face.
I apologized a million times. Then she went on a rampage about how she could stop bleaching if I preferred, let it get dark and style it.
The talking chicks finally leave. To keep myself occupied I stare at the bathroom wall graffiti. You’d think that by this age, people would stop using the wall to express their inane thoughts, but no. In green marker, it says:
Sweet Kimmy,
Violets are blue
Roses are red
Let me marry you
And I’ll please you in bed
Yours forever,
Jamie
What a hoser. The way to get the girl is not by writing cheesy-ass poetry on the back of the bathroom door. I’m not sure if he’s kidding or serious. Kimmy knows he wants her. Everyone knows he wants her. Thursday night a bunch of us went out for dinner, and he dove into the seat beside her and kept telling her how hot she was. She laughed and smiled at him, but I doubt she was interested. She didn’t go home with him, that’s for sure. He was back in Nick’s room after dinner, watching us smoke joints.
Yesterday, one of the get-to-know-your-group activities was a scavenger hunt through Maplewood. We were given questions like, What address is city hall? How many floors are in the library? How much are ten wings at Moe’s? Six bucks. That one I knew. But anyway, Jamie wouldn’t stop bugging her the entire activity. He asked her to marry him four times and serenaded her with Air Supply songs. I’ll admit, it got laughs from the rest of us, but does that act work?
How do I know? Sharon’s the only serious girlfriend I’ve ever had. And Jamie did manage to get two of the best-looking chicks in the class to be in our group. According to him, Lauren is bi, and currently prefers females. How hot is that? Lesbian eye-candy.
I flush, wash my hands and let them air-dry as I head outside. Think I’ll take a nice Sunday afternoon nap. Not that I’ve done anything today to merit a nap. I woke up at eight, stared at the ceiling, had brunch with Nick, bought some pharmaceuticals at the drugstore and spoke to Sharon.
As I push back the door, Kimmy is pulling it open. She’s looking pretty damn hot. Wearing tight black spandex shorts, a black bra that exposes her flat stomach, a red sweatshirt slung around her hips, little white socks, bright white runners. My guess: Going to the gym. Her brown hair is pulled back into a high ponytail, exposing soft-looking triangular ears. I love women’s ears. I can spend hours running my fingers through Sharon’s hair and playing with her ears.
“Hi, Russ,” Kimmy says.
“Where you off to?” I ask like an idiot.
She smiles. “The gym.”
“Yeah? Have you been already? I’ve been meaning to check it out.” I can’t believe I haven’t gone yet. Any build I have is going to melt if I’m not careful.
“I’ve gone a few times this week. It’s pretty good. There’s a wait for some of the machines, but not too bad.” The sweatshirt slips down her body exposing a fine-looking ass, but then she reties it. “Want to come with me?”
Why not? Sounds like a constructive way to spend a Sunday. “Sure. Do you mind waiting two minutes for me to grab my gym stuff?”
She smiles and takes a sip from her water bottle. “No problem. I have to use the bathroom anyway. Why don’t I meet you in the courtyard and then we’ll head over together?”
“Give me five,” I say, trying to mentally block out the bathroom part. I sprint back to my room and grab the gym shorts and T-shirt I wore yesterday to play basketball with some of the guys. I suck, but it’s fun. I started playing postcollege to help pump up.
Wonder if Sharon would care that I was going to the gym with a chick. Probably, eh? What should I have said, no? I can’t go to the gym with you, I have a girlfriend? She wasn’t hitting on me. Probably knows about Sharon, anyway. I must have mentioned it.
I spot Kimmy staring into the sunlight in the courtyard. She’s wearing sunglasses. I need to buy new sunglasses. Left mine in Toronto.
“Let’s go,” she says, now wearing the sweatshirt. Shame.
It’s getting cold. Wish I had a sweatshirt. “Where is this place?”
“At the back of the Student Services Center. Not far.”
She walks fast for a girl. Her ponytail swings from side to side like a tennis ball in play. Sharon is the slowest walker ever. If I don’t pay attention, I leave her a half a block behind.
“So how do you like school so far?” she asks.
“It’s cool. I went to University of Toronto, so I lived at home.”
“Were you in a frat?”
“No, no frat. Not my thing.” I decide not to tell her that I didn’t have much of a life in college. I preferred my calculator and comic books to beer kegs. Of course, that changed in my last year, when I met Sharon. “I bet you were in a sorority, eh?”
“No way. I’m not a gamma, gamma, gamma, can I help ya help ya help ya type girl.”
I can’t help mentally casting her as one of the sorority girls in Revenge of the Nerds.
“How do you like the dorm?” she asks, and takes another sip of her water. “Want some?”
I shake my head. “The dorm is all right. Not used to sharing a floor with so many people.” Not used to sharing a water bottle, either. Sharon doesn’t like when I take sips from other people’s drinks in case any of them are sick and then I get her sick.
“I know. I feel like I’m eighteen again.” She motions to a sprawling stone building. “We’re here.”
We climb the stairs to the top floor and show our student cards to the scrawny kid at the front desk. The gym caters to the entire school, not just the business school, so it’s packed. Puffing women on treadmills are lined against the window.
“Do you lift weights?” Kimmy asks.
“Yeah.” Truth is, I’ve been slacking on my workouts. I feel a wave of panic that my muscles have all disappeared.
She stretches her leg in front of her. “Do you want to run with me?”
Even though I’m feeling anxious about the state of my muscles and want to get to the weights, the idea of watching her jiggle beside me is too appealing to pass up. I stretch out my hamstring beside her. “Sounds good.”
We find two unoccupied treadmills in the corner, facing the window. She sets her speed to seven. I set mine at nine.
Shit. That’s fast.
We run in silence. The sun beats through the glass, and I’m starting to sweat faster than usual. Oh, man. I must be out of shape. The wall of window makes me feel as if I’m running off a cliff. I wonder if the miniature students below us can see us. Maybe the windows are tinted. I’ll have to check next time I walk by.
It’s interesting watching below. Groups stopping, laughing. Someone doing a handstand against the side of a building. What is that guy doing? “Is that Jamie?”
Kimmy peers out the window, then grabs the handlebars and ducks. “Yikes, hide me.”
“Hide you? Why?”
“I can’t escape him. What’s he doing?” A group of three girls are standing around him, laughing. He flips over and sits on the pavement. Two of the girls sit next to him. I think one of them is Rena.
“Gymnastics of some sort. Maybe he’s working out.”
Kimmy smirks. I’m pretty sure we’re both thinking that he doesn’t look like a guy who works out. “So does that mean you’re not interested in him?” I ask.
Her mouth flies open. Closes. Then it opens again. “Jamie? Nooo.”
“What about what happened last week?”
She’s flushed from my question. Or from the workout.
She bites her lip. “You know about that?”
“Ah…no?”
“Very funny. Did he tell everyone?”
“Didn’t you see the ad in the LWBS paper?”
“Hilarious.”
I’m worried that I’ve upset her, but then she laughs and adds, “What a blabbermouth.”
Now I feel bad for Jamie. “Don’t be mad, we forced it out of him. Tortured him, if you want to know. Tied him up then performed Japanese water torture.”
She raises an eyebrow. “I’ll bet.”
“So, you interested in him or not?”
She shakes her head no, and her ponytail swings again. Game, set, match. “That night was a mistake. He’s not what I’m looking for.”
“What are you looking for?” I ask, now watching her pump her arms. She gets very into her workout.
She turns toward me. “Exactl
y what I’m looking at, actually. You.”
I miss a step and almost trip into the handlebars. As I steady myself, I think, me, eh? This hot chick, breasts heaving, is interested in me?
Now might be a good time to mention Sharon.
Okay, now.
Now.
Kimmy reaches over for her water bottle, pulls up the tab with her teeth and sucks the water into her mouth.
Now.
“Do you want some?” she asks.
I nod. I know, I know. Shouldn’t share water bottles. She hands me the bottle and our damp fingers touch. I swallow a mouthful, not unmindful of the bulge in my gym shorts. I’m hoping for those tinted windows. I wouldn’t want this entire scene being described to Sharon via her sister via Rena.
Bad business this sharing of water bottles.
first semester
jamie comes late (literally)
Monday, September 8, 9:13 a.m.
Love that I’m late for my first class. Partially my fault, partially my mother’s. She called me at eight-thirty this morning to complain about the new development in my sister Amanda’s love life.
Mother: Apparently Amanda has a secret boyfriend. Did you know that, Jamie? I’m not a happy woman.
Me: I thought you wanted her to meet someone.
Mother: I do, but I’m worried because he’s not Jewish.
Me: I thought you were worried because you didn’t think she’d ever get married. You certainly have a lot of worries.
Mother: Don’t be a smart mouth. How’s school? Are you going to screw it up and not go to class?
Me: If you let me off the phone, I’d go to class.
Mother: Sue me for wanting to talk to my son who lives on the other end of the country.
Me: I thought my being accepted to B-school was the proudest moment of your life.
Mother: I am proud, but that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t have been prouder if you had gotten accepted to school in Florida.
Me: Oy. Great talking to you, Ma. Always love hearing first thing in the morning about all the things I’m doing wrong.
Monkey Business Page 4
