Early Decision (30 page)

It was so bitter and so true, she played it over a few times to be sure.

It was not the name she would have expected: so simple and uninteresting. What did a Lynn look like? She knew only one, her third-grade teacher. Wide cheeks, pinned hair.

“Oh,” Anne said aloud.

“What?” asked Martin, pretending to be half asleep, but even he couldn't sustain the lie. “I don't know why I just said that,” he added easily. “That was ridiculous.”

“Who's Lynn?”

“There is no Lynn. That's what I'm saying. It's ridiculous.”

“No Lynn?”

“No. I don't even know a Lynn. Anne, come on—it's me. It's Martin. Listen to me. I don't even have anyone by the name in my life.” He switched on the light and rubbed his eyes. “I was half asleep. I was already dreaming. I just snapped. I'm sorry. Can we just go to sleep, please?”

The light illuminated Anne's room: the floral wallpaper her mum had insisted on; the set of doors across the shallow, overfull closet; the curtains intended to soften the grimy, wire-hatched window that faced the fire escape. What was remarkable about being called Lynn was not even that it evoked another woman, who Anne had always half believed was there anyway. It was the way he had said it, in practiced exasperation: he fought with this
Lynn,
too. They were in deep enough to argue, plain as day. Anne wasn't special even in that way.

“You just called me by somebody else's name.”

“It's nobody else's name.”

Upstairs, April Penze dropped a book or a shoe, causing a thump just over their heads. Her proximity in this raw moment was more than Anne could take. She lay back down. On the floor in the hall, Mitchell turned and sighed, licked his long teeth.

Martin pulled her close. “Sweetheart,” he said. “I'm an actor. I run lines for a living. Every day, I'm a different person. Every day, I have to remember names and then forget them. And sometimes they just stick, like some number you memorized, a license plate or something, sitting in traffic. Like some song you can't get out of your head. I'm sorry. I know that was crazy. But, love, there's nothing there. There really isn't. Even you, with your big imagination, can't turn that into something it isn't.”

As hot as her emotions could be, as anxious and riled as she felt moving between students and her parents and the looming emptiness of the rest of her life, there were also moments of nonfeeling. Almost of nonbeing. Had circumstances been a bit different, Anne might have recognized in her own blankness the nullifying sentences of her students. She might have recognized how false a note was sounded by the “I” in her own mind, the same “I” she saw over and over in those churned-out essays the kids knew their parents would tear up and rewrite. Anne lay there and studied the ceiling as Martin repaired her. “I'm here, and I love you,” he said smoothly. “I love you. Now let's sleep here in this bed together and be happy to have each other, okay? Please?”

“Turn it off,” she asked. Martin leaned for the lamp.

The sodium alley lights came through the window. The fire escape was frozen tonight. The wood had sung beneath her heels when she walked Mitchell up for the last time. It would be Christmas soon. Then her birthday—she would be twenty-eight.

“My God, I'm going to be twenty-eight,” she said into the darkness.

“Hmm,” murmured Martin, hugging her in. His lips were on her ear. “Perhaps I should marry you, then.”

Anne said nothing.

“You think?” he asked.

“Think what?”

“In fact,” Martin continued, nestling even closer, “in fact, well, why not. Why don't you sit up?”

He scooted out of bed and into the hall, where his suitcase was spilled across her floor. She heard him rummage and return. He hopped back up beside her. “How about something like this?”

Her eyes still adjusting to the alley light, she studied his hand. There was a sparkle, a lone glint. He held up his fingers. She felt for the ring. “Oh God,” she said. “Really? Now?”

“I think it's probably time,” he answered. “I think you're right. Let's just do it.”

She was holding up the ring, examining it. She knew by its weight that it was not the one she'd tried on, but no matter that. And she knew better than to turn on the light and expose them both, but not better than to say yes. After all this time, how could she say no?

“Should I put it on?” she asked him.

“If you want.”

He watched her press it over her knuckle. She'd imagined a key in a lock, when the little diamond slid into place. But no such feeling attended. Instead it felt like something she should remove before bed, like a watch or a barrette. She fingered it with her right hand. It was as awkward and hard as a lost tooth.

“My God, Martin,” she said, buying time.

“Are you happy?” he asked her.

“Yes.”

“All right, then.”

“Should we call our parents?” she asked.

“At this hour?”

“No, you're right.”

“Love you,” he said. He lay back. She tucked up under his arm. He adjusted a hand over her waist. She felt herself breathing into his palm, which was large and warm, wonderfully so. And all too soon limp with sleep.

 

I
N THE MORNING
she found him at her desk, waiting. His suitcase was beside him on the floor. It was closed.

She wandered into the center of her tiny living room and stood there. He studied her body, the short nightshirt, her undies, her storky legs with their dry skin and peeling pedicure. His eyes were pitched up in the center and full of sadness.

“Oh, Annie.” He sighed hugely. “There
is
a Lynn.”

“I know,” she heard herself say. Then she couldn't hear anything else, because a kind of rushing filled her ears, the cottony panic of a doomed flight.

He'd hugged her, suitcase in one hand, and he'd bent to hug Mitchell. He'd taken up her hand with the ring and kissed it, and promised her something about sorting it all out, about not coming back until he'd done so. About doing right by her forever. About not wasting any more of her time.

Sitting there, folded up into her shirt, alone on the cold love seat, Anne looked at the morning and thought that all she had was time. It was actually, now, the only thing she had, and it was all around, oceans of it. But it felt thinner than water, even thinner than that—it was vinegar. It was lifeless and clear and there was nothing at all she could do except sit there, crinkle up, and weep.

DECEMBER

A
S IT TURNED
out, heartbreak was a fabulous state from which to understand the mind of a teenager.

All the puerile melodrama that previously had made Anne crazy now seemed quite appropriate in a world in which nothing good came true. “April is the meanest month,” wrote Sadie Blanchard, opening her new essay draft, “. . . because it's when colleges make a decision that will decide the rest of your life, even though they've usually never even met you.”

Seemed about right. But: “Why ‘meanest'?”

“Oh, because T. S. Eliot said ‘cruelest,' ” answered Sadie.

“Yes, and—”

“So I had to change it. Otherwise that's plagiarism.”

Oh, honey, you should talk to your father, thought Anne. “Still is,” she said. “You don't want to just cite the original?”

Sadie gave her a withering look. “The Common App doesn't have room for footnotes.”

Fair enough. See? Teenagers were right. Life was just obstacle after obstacle.

Sadie's voice came to Anne through the haze that had lowered the morning Martin left. That haze had a specific gravity and a low, static sound, and it seemed to fill her belly, crowding out appetite. It even had something close to a smell, metallic and cold, like the street-side doorknob on these December mornings. He had not been in touch since the latch had closed behind him. She replayed that last clacking note over and over. Six years, and this. Her entire twenties, and this.

Oh, and
Lynn
. Lynn was Everywoman now: blond or brunette, tall and slim, short and curvy. Because Anne knew nothing, she imagined everything, as though to see which phantom hurt the most. That one would surely be correct. Intuition had sorrow's nose.

“Okay, next sentence,” Sadie said. Finally proud, she was actually, at her own instigation, reading her essay aloud. She sat curled on her bedroom sofa with Tassel sleek in her lap, both of them posed as though for a seventeenth-century Dutch portrait. Winter light softened their lines and made Sadie's skin glow. It was a Saturday. No one else was home.

“I am the person who has been taught since being small that it is necessary to disregard the opinions of other people and to consider my own conscience and moral compass. Except for my parents and teachers, I have always worked hard to ignore the feelings of other people because they do not know the real me, and their opinions can only make me be someone I'm not.”

Anne was surprised to hear that Sadie, for all her graces, was uncomfortable with the phrasing of her own words; she read as though she'd never encountered an essay before, let alone this one. She paused before commas and ran out of breath before her sentences ended. She even seemed surprised by some of the words she came to. Anne wondered if her parents had ever read to her when she was little. Come to think of it, had anyone read to her? When would she have heard the written word aloud?

Something came into clearer focus about the way the Blanchards had raised their girl, about the gifts they had attempted to give her, while overlooking the most ordinary things: taking her to visit refugee camps, for example, though they were never home for supper. As though they had taught her hang gliding while neglecting that boring bit about walking. In the Blanchard home, other people's tragedies were useful, but one's own, everyday feelings were inconvenient at best. Sadie's heart was in hiding. As was Hunter's, though he had been railroaded by a more typical pressure to achieve. As was William's, though for an even more ordinary reason still, which was that he desired the wrong sex. Alexis, by contrast, suffered a surfeit of want, but it supported her talent and drove her success; her bewildered parents, long outpaced by her gifts, could only watch. They policed her prepositions with all the utility of a farmer swatting at a rising flock of birds. And Cristina? No one had had the time to interfere on her behalf. The adults worked all day and night, or they left. On balance, it seemed to Anne that a kind of benevolent neglect might be the best form of parenting available. Provided, of course, that every now and then you sat down and listened to your child talk.

Sadie continued: “This is a lesson my parents reinforced by choosing to have major careers even though that meant not a lot of time with my brother and me. When you come home from school and do your homework alone every day before putting yourself to bed, you learn to be self-sufficient and not to rely on others for things.”

Inez had been erased. Anne considered this. Inconvenient? Or was this punishment for her attachment to Cristina? When in fact it was neither; Sadie was anticipating her parents reading her words, and she was protecting them from the quite accurate image of their only daughter spending her every day with the housekeeper. Anne would later reflect that she might have caught this instinct for filial propriety and directed Sadie's revisions accordingly. But it was late in the game, and Sadie had finally taken charge.

“But I see April in a different way,” she continued. “April, like spring, is an opportunity for new growth. Every year high school seniors have the chance to take the opportunities given to them and make the most of it. College is a privilege. This is a lesson I have learned through years of volunteer service performed in communities around the world.”

“There it is,” said Anne. “I like it. Right there.”

“It's really true, don't you think?”

“I do. I love that you're thinking of college as a privilege. And it'll give you a great platform for discussing your volunteer work.”

“Well, just think of it!” Sadie said, visibly excited. She cast her eyes quickly about her room. “Like, for example, take the dining hall. There are, like, a dozen places you can go to for every meal. Pizza or Chinese or sushi or whatever. And in college, it's free! You don't even pay! The whole thing is just amazing.”

“A rich offering, I agree.”

“Okay, so let me finish,” Sadie said. She picked up her page. Anne was relieved. They could work with this essay. It posed the problem of privilege and handled it, openly. It recognized educational opportunities as legitimate gifts, which would charm Duke. And it might well disarm readers at other schools, too.

Anne listened quietly. The house was silent. A few cabs went by on Delaware outside. Sadie hadn't remarked on the date, December 14, one day before the traditional response date for early-admissions applications. This year, the fifteenth fell on a Sunday, and no one knew if the colleges would give their answers on Saturday or wait until Monday. Some of them were using online notification systems, while others still sent proper envelopes, large or small. Anne had heard from a few remote students the day before—all good news, kids headed to Johns Hopkins and Northwestern and Tufts—but today she was on high alert. She was eager to leave Sadie to her rewrites and get home to her phone, just in case. In case of Harvard and Amherst. Also Martin.

Sadie could have been speaking for both of them when she read her concluding lines: “I hope that I will always believe that every new beginning, no matter whether it's what I hoped for or not, is an opportunity to grow.”

 

T
HE CALLS CAME
just after dark.

“Ohmygod ohmygod ohmygod!” said Alexis.

There was laughter behind her, the whole Minnesota family.

“Well, congratulations,” Anne said.

“I can't thank you enough!” Thank-yous echoed around.

“I didn't do a thing.” Anne replied, truthfully. “You are a fantastic student and they are lucky to have you.”

“Well, yes, but now I'm really excited to go there, too. So, thank you.”

So it was always Harvard, then.

“What about Yale? Stanford?”

“What?” Alexis laughed. Getting into Harvard had that effect on a kid. “Oh, right! Well, we'll see!”

“Going to be a marvelous Christmas,” Mr. Grant called out.

“We wish we could have you over!” called Mrs. Grant.

“She's the first to get in from her school in nine years,” he said.

“The principal just called!” added Alexis.

“You'll make them proud,” Anne said. “Already have. I can't wait to see what you choose to do once you get there. And afterward.”

Anne pictured their home: lit Christmas tree, thick carpet, maybe a cat. Snow piled against plate-glass doors. Sky as bleak as the Chicago night and even a few degrees colder. Something braising in the kitchen.

“Are you drinking champagne?” she asked.

“Sparkling juice!”

“Right.”

“They have blood orange at the Cub Foods now!” added Mrs. Grant. “It's delicious!”

Absurdly, Anne found herself tearing up, which often happened when the colleges said yes. When the college in question was Harvard, and the season was right, on an evening like this it seemed the apotheosis of a young person, and it made Anne feel her work might be worthwhile after all.

“Wish I were there,” she told them, and meant it.

The feeling gave her the briefest repose from the crisis of Martin's betrayal and the grim everything of her life that remained. “Briefest” because the next call came almost immediately, and the tone was of morbid urgency.

“Anne.” It was Mrs. Pfaff.

“Yes?”

“I thought I'd best call.”

It seemed Hunter had been not just deferred from Amherst—which was to be expected—but, somewhat alarmingly, flat-out
rejected
. There was no chance, the fine school reported, that he would be competitive for admission with the pool of general applicants. They wished him luck in his search. They wished not to waste his time while they considered their options through the spring.

Rather like Martin, Anne reflected.

“We're not sure what to do now,” said Mrs. Pfaff.

This had only happened once before in Anne's career. That Amherst had said no was not a surprise. That the school had said
not ever
was a dark sign for the rest of Hunter's applications. “Shall I come by?” she asked.

“No, you'd better not,” replied Mrs. Pfaff. “Gerald is home.”

In light of the pull they'd accessed, Mr. Pfaff would be royally offended that the school had not offered the WASPish courtesy of a deferral. Such deferrals were almost a kind of etiquette, like saying, “We're so busy this month” when what you mean is, “I'd rather die than give you a Saturday night.” White boys from certain families might not make the cut come spring, but they weren't to be pitched into the deepest dark space of the early rejection. This sort of candor was usually reserved for big state schools, which, as everyone knew, used complicated algorithms to make their somehow less critical decisions. Wow, Anne thought. Little Amherst was showing some muscle.

Still, she knew that what would sting the most was the fact that Hunter's cousin was already a Lord Jeff. A family that set its pride on one heir at such a school could not simultaneously forgive the rejection of another. Blood is thicker than water and all, but for blue bloods, one's strongest fidelity is to the notion of the meritocracy, so Hunter would have to be tarred, however silently. It meant shame, false or true condolences, and a real rift that would be detectable at family gatherings for years. Perhaps even this year. Anne tried to remember where they'd said they were going for Christmas. Was it east?

“So you'll have to step it up with the remaining applications,” continued Mrs. Pfaff. “We have to get them in. We leave for Jackson Hole on Tuesday.”

“They're complete,” Anne told her. “We need only to go over them one last time. You might read them now; Hunter's okay with that, he said. I'd like your thoughts. Especially now.”

If they were going to blame her, she needed them to see that what remained to be submitted was as strong as could be. And it was.

“Fine,” said Marion Pfaff.

Anne waited. Then she said, again, “I am so sorry.” Though, of course, she'd never encouraged this application; though everyone in a position to know had, in fact, discouraged it. Hunter had been set up to fail and he had.

Mrs. Pfaff did not reply. Anne let sit her apology awhile longer and then asked, “How is Hunter?”

“Oh, he's fine. A little shook up, but I don't think he was wedded to the idea. Not sure what he's interested in, frankly, except that Nicole. They're together now. Christmas shopping.”

It made Anne smile to hear that Mrs. Pfaff had bought the oldest trick in the suburban teen's book: “We're going to the mall.”

“Well, good,” Anne said.

Another moment passed, during which Anne cast about for a way to end the call, and then Marion Pfaff could be heard crying gently into the phone. It seemed rude to interrupt her. As silently as she could, Anne tapped out a text message on her cell:

TO HELL WITH THEM. NO BRAIDED RIVERS IN AMHERST, MASS.

Mrs. Pfaff's crying grew louder. So she wished Anne to hear.

“Please don't be so sad,” Anne told her. “There are wonderful schools out there. He's going to be fine. He's going to do great.”

“I'm not sure I can handle this,” Marion wept. Her voice was guttering. “I'm really not. I have never. I mean, never.”

To which Anne thought, rather uncharitably, Never? This is the worst that has happened to you? And you're sobbing?

But she did not yet have her own child, so she could not imagine how it felt to have some stranger tell your little boy no. Even if it had been a long shot. And it wasn't, in the end, the prospect of the gloating sister or the awkward graduation parties next year that had Mrs. Pfaff so rattled. It was that a door had, for the first time, been closed forever on her child. He was growing up. And the world was hard.

“I'm so, so sorry this is so difficult,” Anne said again. “But Hunter is really terrific. He's a great kid, and he's going to have a wonderful life. He really is. Amherst is tiny and uptight and they wouldn't have helped him flourish there in any case. Let's just take a few days and then regroup and figure out how to go from here.”