Finding Mr. Brightside

She points to the corner. I nod, but I still have no idea how she got in without a rip. “You do good work,” I tell her, and she’s more accepting of this compliment than most of my others combined.

“Are you not going to college, or what?” she asks.

“What? Yeah, I’m going.” I open the envelope halfway, stop. “I’ve just been … deferring the decision-making process.”

“Until when? Someone else makes it for you?”

“Probably,” I force myself to admit aloud, take the embarrassment like a mature person who would’ve never procrastinated this much in the first place.

“Have you taken the SAT yet?”

I nod, relieved to have this to say for myself: “Think I got, like, a thirty-one or something.”

She sighs. “That’s the ACT.”

“I should get us another round,” I say, picking up our empty shot cups. “What was your score?”

“Thirty-something.”

Juliette

ABRAM’S ACT SCORE is just a few lackadaisically smudged pencil marks away from my own. Safe bet he didn’t force himself to take a month-long online prep course before test day, either.

Abram hands me my refill and then sits back down to explain. Turns out he was waiting to apply because he wasn’t sure about committing to the te

“Plus, I wanted to see where you were going first.” Him smiling like that, with his eyes downcast and hesitant to see my reaction, makes his admission seem extra cute. I pinch the bridge of my nose, reach down, and take my shot.

“You’d rather go your separate way?” he asks.

“Not necessarily. But I can’t even commit to watching a movie with you, Abram—do you really want to be basing your first major life decision around my crazy whims?”

“Pretty much,” he tells me. “Can’t help it. Even before we started hanging out, I always hoped we’d end up at the same college, that things could maybe be different once we were away from everything. Like they are now. C’mon, let’s matriculate somewhere together.”

Could things really be the way they are now, all the time, if we attended the same university? Not as if I’d mind having Abram around. It’s almost fun to picture him stopping by my dorm during one of the three times I’d allot him per day. He’d encourage me to leave my computer and go see what’s on the menu at the dining hall. I’d act a

None of the above is ever going to happen. Ben Fly

“I can’t,” I tell Abram. “My dad.”

34

Juliette

“SAY THINGS WERE DIFFERENT with your dad,” Abram says, sliding an envelope over to me, “would you consider going to this school?”

“Yes. Already applied there, pointlessly.” I flick a tiny speck of Adderall off the stamp, left to wonder what might’ve been ingested. “But that doesn’t mean it’s the right college for you.”

He smiles. “I trust your taste.”

“Thanks, I’m still suspicious of it.”

Abram opens the envelope and takes out the application, sca

ABRAM

THIS STARTED SUCKING shortly after I wrote my Social Security number in the second box. Helps to have my hopefully college-bound incentive right in front of me, checking on my progress every once in a while, in between staring at the laptop she somehow squeezed into her bottomless purse. When she thinks I’m far enough along, Juliette sweetens the pot by bringing up a hypothetical vacation with her and me this summer, preferably during the freshman orientation she’s theoretically pla

“What if we went to Russia?” she says, pulling up the streets of Moscow to the screen, via Google Earth. “Never mind. Something’s off.”

We start trying to come up with the best tourist-attracting slogan for Moscow, writing each down on the back of one of my envelopes.

She goes first: Moscow, because you gotta kill yourself somewhere, right?!

My first attempt: Moscow, because we solemnly swear our Internet’s not frozen anymore.

Her turn: Moscow, because your prostitute’s waiting … don’t forget your rubles, sexy!

Me: Moscow, because, wouldn’t you know, the pits of hell are completely booked up this season.

The last one has the unfortunate side effect of being clever enough to make her think I can write my own essay, a task I was angling to get her help on.

“What about Paris?” she says, telling me she’s always wanted to go, only not with our weird, just-one-of-the-students French teacher and a group of fundraising classmates. We take a virtual stroll along the Champs-Élysées until she accidentally lands us in a narrow alleyway—“A mugger’s paradise” is how she describes the dingy ambiance, rather accurately. I take her hand in mine. “For safety purposes,” I tell her. She smiles at the laptop, but it bounces back up to me, the intended recipient, from the screen.

“Excuse me … Angela?”

I glance up to see a short, overeager woman in her late twenties standing in front of the table we’re using. Juliette’s still looking down at Paris.

Juliette

I’M BEING CONVERSATIONALLY MUGGED, and there’s nothing Abram or anyone else can do about it. My attacker is waving now … as if me ignoring her from two feet away is a big misunderstanding. If she says “Yoohoo!” or “Google Earth to Angie!” I’m throwing my coffee at her neck, fingers crossed it’s still hot enough.

“Angela?”

Finally, I look up. Janette the barista is wearing her off-duty sweatpants and a knit cap (with tassels!) she’s mistaking for quirky-cute. I shoot her an impatient look like the rude wa

“Janette,” she says in her American chipmunk voice, pointing to herself. “Remember me from the other day?”

“Yes, I think so.…” I say, leaving as much room for doubt as possible—too much and Janette will feel compelled to provide an eyewitness account of our transaction (Are you sure? You were wearing the same black zip-up jacket with a similar pair of black…). She glances over at Abram—looks back at me like, So this is the guy!—perhaps expecting me to introduce them. Then she realizes how long she’ll be waiting for that.

“I don’t mean to bother y’all during your coffee. I almost said something the other day, but I looked up and you were gone. You’re a really fast walker.”

There’s a gleam in Abram’s eye like, Yep, that’s my girl (problem).

Janette points to my venti cup. “You look so similar to this nice woman who used to come in here and order that exact same drink,” she continues. “She was so tiny but could drink enough coffee for someone twice her size. Actually, she’s why I’m rocking the long-bob these days, although it didn’t turn out quite the same as hers.…” She removes her cap so we can examine the hair failure underneath.