To: Navarro, Nick
Date: Saturday, October 3, 5:40 a.m.
Subject: Re: Missing assignments
I have to say, I’m a little surprised you’re spending your Friday night emailing me about this. I appreciate how devoted UCLA’s professors are to their students’ success. It gives me a lot of hope for the future of our country.
My sincerest apologies. Looks like there was an internet outage in my neighborhood—those pesky Santa Anas knocked out power for a while.
They should be there now.
RW
From: Navarro, Nick
To: Wilder, Ramona
Date: Saturday, October 3, 7:15 a.m.
Subject: Re: Missing assignments
Looking forward to reviewing them. And I could say the same thing about you, but I’m happy to see you’re this committed to your education, even on a weekend.
-N
From: Navarro, Nick
To: Wilder, Ramona
Date: Saturday, October 3, 8:22 a.m.
Subject: Re: Missing assignments
Also, I have to ask—does your email address really imply the existence of 16 other R. Wilders in the UCLA system?
From: Wilder, Ramona
To: Navarro, Nick
Date: Saturday, October 3, 10:19 a.m.
Subject: Re: Missing assignments
And you don’t sleep in either? I’ll try not to look too closely for undereye circles on Monday.
Guess so. I tried to get [email protected], but it was already taken.
7
So she’d lied about submittingher assignments, then stayed up all night dashing off a few half-baked paragraphs about perception, whatever the hell that means in the context of psychology. At least she finally figured out the class portal. She’s behind on the reading and she won’t make a habit of it, but extenuating circumstances, and all that. A onetime thing.
Ramona used to seek out praise like candy.You want to be easy to work with so they keep booking you,her parents would say. She memorized her lines faster than anyone else on set and gave her directors exactly what they asked for and more, grinning through take after take.
Until she got older, wrapped her self-worth entirely in her work. She’d see empty seats at her shows. Her albums dropping in the charts. A bad review. All of it spelled outFAILUREin bold red letters.
After the call from Petra, Ramona spends most of the weekend in a mental state one notch above catatonic. She indulges in her favorite procrastination habit, scrolling online productreviews of things she doesn’t plan to buy. Lounges on the couch with Janet.
Then Sunday night is the VMAs. She was nominated just twice this year, in categories she knew she wouldn’t win. Though she’s never really cared about them, she watches a little, just to torture herself, with the Behavior and the Brain portal still open on her laptop in front of her. She’s not expecting the FOMO as she sees her former acquaintances and semi-friends strut across the stage. She texts congratulations to Arlie J, the night’s big winner, who toured with her a couple years ago.
