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“Right here is fine,” I say when we reach the campus. I could use the walk to clear my mind, even if it might make me a few minutes late for class. “Thanks for the ride, Cole. And bye-bye Beastie girl, I hope we get the Faerie tomorrow.”
“Anders, why would you jinx me like that? Now you know we’re going to get nothing but Beastie for a week!” Cole groans.
I snort and close the door, waving farewell as he pulls away. It’s cold enough to see my breath as I hurry along the path to my first class, but the chill does me good, chasing thoughts of guilt from my mind. Today, I’m going to focus on my classes and stash the spinning tornado of my current life to the back of my mind.
Classes pass in a blur. My attention keeps drifting from the lectures. I’m going to have to ask Susan for her notes again since I probably missed some important points of the last lecture, caught up in thoughts about the situation between Cole and Ty.
Normally, I hate group projects because I don’t want to rely on anyone else, but it’s almost a relief when Professor Abrams splits us up in pairs to work on a presentation in Ethics class. Pauline Simonds sits down next to me. I don’t know her well, but we’ve worked together a few times before and I know she’s quite intelligent.
“Thank God you’re my partner,” Pauline says, sliding into her chair and popping open her laptop. “I swear, on my last project I did all the work and the others only complained about the end result. I didn’t even see my boyfriend for almost two weeks because nobody on my team wanted to do anything. Can you tell I’m still upset?”
I nod. “A little. Should we start with an outline?”
A boyfriend? How is it even possible for anyone to manage to fit one in with our insane homework assignments? She pulls up the case study we’re working on and turns her laptop toward me. I tug on the zipper of my backpack.I need a new pack, I mumble to myself as I struggle with the zipper. When the zipper finally gives up its fight, I reach inside for my notebook and jot down my first few ideas. I wonder if it’s ethical to secretly date your best friend’s brother when you know he’s kind of an asshole. Is it more or less ethical than being honest with everyone, even though it might hurt some feelings?
“Oh, good idea. I was thinking the same thing.” Pauline points at my notebook as she lifts hers and shows it to me.
I cross off the repeat. “Sorry, I didn’t sleep well.”
I need to focus. Maybe I should’ve grabbed another coffee before class.
“No worries. I’ve been fighting with my boyfriend, so I’m all over the place too. We’ll get through it together.” She writes down a few more ideas of her own, and when we are done brainstorming on our own, we work together scratching out the bad ideas and picking a few of the best ones while Pauline interjects a few expletives about her boyfriend.
Boyfriends are more hassle than they’re worth. They require more attention than a puppy, and I don’t even have time for one of those.
“Don’t you find a relationship interferes with your schoolwork? I can’t imagine trying to juggle a boyfriend on top of everything we already have to do here. For me, it’s one or the other, and school is way more important to me.” I scratch the last idea out so aggressively it tears the page beneath my pen. “Oops.”
She eyes me up and down, pulling the notebook toward her to begin ranking the remaining ideas. “Got some feelings to get out?” Sighing, she adds,” It’s hard sometimes, honestly, but we’ve been together for two years and it’s worth it. He knows sometimes I have to focus and can’t go out much, so he’ll come over and play video games while I study. Stuff like that.”
“And you still get good grades?” I don’t know why I’m asking all these questions. It’s not like I want a boyfriend, anyway. At all.
She shrugs. “Yeah, for the most part. They’re not perfect but I want to have a life too, not just work myself to death with school. Even when I get my MD, there’s going to have to be some balance, or what’s the point, you know? Life is for living.”
I mull over her words. Her ‘for the most part’ is what scares me. I have scholarships I can’t afford to lose and they depend on my grades being exceptional. Average won’t cut it. Maybe having a boyfriend works when your parents are paying for school, but my parents have done everything for me already and it’s up to me now. I can’t keep depending on them forever. They need to be able to rest and retire some day.
“Yeah, but there’s time for that after school. Once we are doctors, then I’ll have time for a relationship.” I point at the idea in my notebook that I think has the most merit. “I think we should go with this one.”
“Me too. Let’s get the outline done for now,” she says, pulling open a new document on her laptop. “Would my grades be better if I had nothing else going on? Maybe. But I wouldn’t be happy. That’s just no way to live. Like, when I have a big exam coming up, I know he’s going to be there cheering for me. And he makes sure I eat, which I sometimes forget to do when I’m caught up in homework.”
“I have a friend like that,” I reply, thinking of Cole. “He even helps me study. He’s a doctor, too.”
“Is he cute?” She grins. “But either way, it’s not the same. There’s something about a relationship that feels like a safety net. I know I can rely on him.”
A safety net. I can rely on Cole, but she’s right, he’s not there in the middle of the night to calm me down when my brain is spinning with stress and keeping me awake. He’s not there to cook me breakfast in the morning. Pauline’s phone buzzes three times in rapid succession.
“Ugh, speak of the devil.” She starts texting rapidly and I try not to read her flurry of messages, but I spot the little heart icon next to the contact name at the top and know it must be her boyfriend.
“Maybe you should spend a little less time on your phone and a little more time with your books, Ms. Simonds,” Professor Abrams says as he approaches our table, setting down Pauline’s latest graded assignment on the table next to her.
“Nice work Ms. Anderson,” he continues.
“Thank you.” I take the sheet from him and smile at the red A circled at the top.
Pauline groans as she takes hers. “Damn, a C. Like I said, we’ve been in a rough spot lately and I spend more time arguing than I do studying.”
So much for thesafety netargument.
“We’ll kill it on this project and that grade won’t even matter,” she says, with a chipper but unconvincing tone as she tucks her phone away into her bag. I can hear it buzzing on the floor.
