The Sleeping Beauty Proposal (12 page)

I twirl my chair around to survey my framed photos. And there Hugh and I are behind glass, blissful and in love.

I keep a select group of photos on a low bookshelf so students being interviewed will glean that I am a human being and not an automaton.There's a deceptively normal group shot of my family, windblown and tan on Cape Cod, that does not display the beers my parents are clutching behind their backs. Another of Jorge in someone's lap, before he became clinically obese. A picture, for some reason, of just Jason and Lucy (probably because they frame and send so many photos of themselves, I'm overloaded at home). And exactly two pictures of Hugh and me.

One is of us at Thanksgiving, still glowing from our nor'easter snowbound lovemaking weekend in Hugh's apartment. He is kissing my red cheek and I am smiling broader than I think is possible for my mouth.

The other is of the two of us on a ski slope in Vermont. Hugh is wearing a totally ridiculous yellow and chartreuse cap that he refused to take off. And I am looking positively terrified at the prospect of heading down that mountain. My eyes are bugging out, my jaw is to my feet, and I am clutching Hugh, the expert skier, who is laughing good-naturedly.

Applicants love that photo.They can relate to abject terror.

Applicants.Yes. Must get to work. I cannot sit in my office all morning mooning over what might have been. I suppose I
could
check my messages, but that would involve facing the possibility of hearing Hugh scold me. And scolding would interrupt my Zen tangents.

I open the file that Cory, one of our zillion admissions clerks, prepares for us every Monday. It is filled with the latest statistics about how various “indicator” high schools across the country scored on a bunch of tests, including subsections like AP math and AP history and AP biology.There's a bit about the incoming class at Swarthmore (another alleged rival school), an article about Harvard doing away with early admissions, and then a memo from the dean—another—in a series I like to entitle Calling All Dicks.

Because boys, boys who score high and play sports and participate in civil projects and don't run their cars into telephone poles, are akin to holy grails for small liberal arts colleges.We have a crisis in this country of under-performing, verbally challenged men and this does not bode well for all the over-performing, verbally superior women I see coming through my door. Unless these smart gals don't mind hanging out with guys who are stumped by instructions on how to wash their hands before returning to the Burger King fryer, they are going to have a hard go of it.

I have a theory, like everyone else, about the dumbing down of men, and that's this: Most video games are geared toward males. There are precious few written for females. So while the video game industry has taken off (taking our boys with it), the girls are outpacing them on grades, tests, and extracurricular activities, though their skills at
Halo 2
suck.

Coincidence? Don't think so.

Knock, knock.
My door opens before I can say “Come in,” which means it's Alice. And she still has that stupid smirk on her face as if she knows something I don't. “Busy?”

There's nothing I love more than gossiping with Alice—unless I'm currently faking my engagement.“I kind of have a lot of work to do.”

“'Cause I've got a kid downstairs, Adam Crawler from the Bronx, New York, who has a nine thirty appointment with Kevin. Kevin was really eager to meet him, only he's stuck in a conference with Bill in Boston. I'd pass him off to Connie, but, you know she's ...” Alice wiggles her penciled eyebrows suggestively.

“Out of the country. You told me.” Well, at least Adam Crawler won't be asking me questions about where she went. “I'll see him.”

“You're a star. Here's his file. I'll give you five so you can act like you're prepared.And I'll get you some coffee.This kid is high-test. You'll need it.”

Quickly, I flip through Adam Crawler's file looking for the pertinents: SAT score—2380. Almost perfect score. Grades? Pulling a 3.9 average. I scan for where he “screwed up” and see a B in Domestic Science. Couldn't flip a pancake, huh? Extracurriculars: tennis, chess, and bowling.That's brave. Organizations: Math Club; Debate Club; president,
Star Trek:The Next Generation
Official Fan Club, Mid-Atlantic Chapter.

That he had either the guts or the naïveté to include that last one says volumes. Oh, what about his essay: “Why Thoreau College?” Good. He personalized it. That's a check in his corner. Admissions counselors everywhere despise mass essays prepared by professional college counseling services. So, what does our friend Adam have to say about Thoreau?

This job never ceases to surprise me.

Really? Where's he getting his information?

Unreal. I toss the essay aside. If it were my call, I'd accept him early admin sight unseen. No wonder Kevin was eager to meet him.

Alice enters with a boy in an ill-fitting blue suit and yellow tie that only a geek like the kid who wrote this essay would have chosen. He's right. He is short. As Alice places a cup of coffee on my desk, she points at my blinking phone.

“You have a message.”

“I know.”

“It might be Hugh.”

I nod at Adam to take the leather chair opposite.

"Yes. Well, then ...”

“It might be important. He said it was.You know, that insanity business.”

I give her a meaningful look, the kind someone as smart as Alice would easily understand as
time to go.

"All right, Alice,” I s ay. "Don't worry. I'll handle it.”

"Either that or it could be the Publicity Department. They're writing up a press release about Hugh and they want you to call extension 504.”

I smile at Adam, who is surveying my small office with disdain, as if trying to figure out if he's been passed off to a lesser admissions officer. “Right. I'll give them a call as soon as I'm done here.”

At last Alice leaves and I sit down to face the already infamous Adam Crawler.

“Sorry about that,” I say, retrieving his essay from the edge of my desk. "So, let's talk about this essay and your reasons for choosing Thoreau.Very unorthodox, wouldn't you say?”

Adam pushes up his glasses. "Who's Hugh?”

Ah, yes, the old let's-create-a-personal-relationship interview technique. Seen it many times before.“Hugh is my boyfriend.There.” I point to the pictures behind me and turn back to his file. “Aside from getting laid, as you put it, do you have any idea what other academic activities you'd like to pursue if you are accepted here?”

Adam is squinting at the one of us at Thanksgiving. “That's Hugh Spencer, the writer. Mom's all thrilled that he teaches here.”

“Yes.” I smile politely. What were the chances? “Did you read
Hopeful, Kansas
?”

“God, no. But Mom did. Cried all the way through and made me watch him on TV Saturday night. I was stuck in a hotel room with her so I had no choice.”

A hotel room? “Then I assume you're going on a tour of colleges. Any others that have caught your fancy?” I take a bogus note and pray Adam went to the lobby to swim or play arcade games before Barbara Walters signed off.

"Didn't he . .. ?”

Oh, brother. Here it comes.

“Didn't he ask his girlfriend to marry him?”

Just my luck. First applicant of the day, and he's a total loser who watches bedtime TV with Mother.

“Did he ask her to marry him? I'm not sure that's
exactly
what he did.”

“You mean that was bull? It was all staged? I knew it. You could tell. I told Mom that he did that just to sell books and she said I didn't know what I was talking about. I knew he was a complete phony.”

"No, no. Hugh's not a phony.” Cripes.This kid is smarter than I thought. “That was a genuine proposal. He asked her to marry him.”

“He asked
her
to marry him.” He sits back and grins. “You mean he asked
someone else
and that's why you're not returning his messages.You got served, cold, on national TV.”

My hand under my desk involuntarily balls into a fist. Adam Crawler I'm not liking so much now, even if he is a precocious genius. Of course the guy can't get laid.Tossing aside his essay, I turn to his file and run my finger down to the B on his transcript.

“Now, Adam, your parents didn't drive you all the way here from New York to talk about me.We're here to talk about you. So, how do you explain this B in Domestic Science?”

“You must have wanted to punch his lights out. I mean, I've been served by girls lots of times, but not on national television. Whew.That's gotta be, what? Two million people.”

Four point one.

“Or is it that he dumped you long ago? And you can't let go and you keep his picture there, which, you know, is megapathetic. You should get help, man.”

I hear a
snap
and look down at the two pieces of yellow Ticonderoga number 2 in my hand. Adam should be glad it wasn't his neck.

To hell with it. “Okay, Adam. Here's the skinny. Hugh and I are getting married. I said yes and that's that. Now, we've wasted a lot of time discussing my life, which happens to be none of your business. Let's try to fit in yours, starting with this transcript. ” I tap his transcript so hard I make a dent in the paper. “An A in Algebra II. Not an A plus? What, were you slacking off that semester?”

“Then where's your ring?” He absolutely will not let this go.

“We haven't picked it out yet.”

“Right. I believe that.” He shakes his head. “What does it say about our society when an aging spinster has to invent a fiancé?”

Aging spinster!

“What happened to individual self-fulfillment, women's liberation?”

I check my watch as my temper is about to explode the top off Billings Hall.“Whoops.That's it. I've got another appointment waiting.” And before Adam can so much as argue that the standard admissions interview lasts twenty minutes, not five, I have buzzed Alice to retrieve him.

“I hope you won't hold our conversation against me,” he says cockily as Alice leads him out the door.

“Not at all.” And, in fact, I mark up his folder with incredibly flowery praise. Far be it from me to be accused of bias. I've been an admissions counselor long enough to know that backing me into a corner was likely his strategy all along. Lucky for him the corner was so ready and waiting.

"How did it go?”Alice asks, getting Adam's folder.

“Fine. Fine young man.”

“Really? 'Cause he seemed like a snot to me.You gonna pick up that message? If it's bad news, you might as well get it over with.”

Alice is right as usual. I should just get it over with.

I wait until she leaves to press the message button and type in my code. Five messages.The first is from my mother, who is in some sort of fluster about ordering invitations and registering and securing a church and then a club for the reception. I have no idea what I was thinking, letting her get involved with planning this bogus wedding.Talk about enabling!

The second is from Todd, apologizing for being so hard on me the night before and hoping I'm not mad at him for what he said about my loser life. (Right.Will do,Todd.)

In a weak attempt to make amends, he ends the message by inviting me to the Bob Dylan contest he enters every year that is hosted by my friend Steve, who, in addition to being the lead singer of the Wily Coyotes, is also an absurdly popular disc jockey at FM 107.

“A whole bunch of people are stopping by to see me do ‘Rainy Day Women,' ” Todd says, proceeding to list a whole bunch of people I've never heard of until he gets to Nick. “He specifically wanted to know if you were coming. Said he had to ask you about this information he found about something called pure-method house building, whatever the hell that is.”