Penelope (12 page)

“Yes,” said Penelope.

“You really aren’t going to change your mind?”

“No,” said Penelope. “Trust me, you would hate it. All you do is sit in on classes.”

“OK. I would hate that,” said Penelope’s mother. “Bye, Penelope. Let me know how everything goes.” And then she hung up.

“Hey, Catherine, I have to ask you a question,” Penelope asked, she thought, very casually.

“Hmm?” said Catherine.

“Have you ever heard of a guy named Gustav?” asked Penelope. She was sitting on the futon. Catherine was lying on her stomach on Penelope’s floor. She was wearing her slippers, tiny navy-blue athletic shorts, and an uncomfortably long tank top that was at once too short to be a dress and too long to be a shirt. She was heavily made up.

“Is he a freshman?” asked Catherine. “Because I know a guy named Goose who’s a freshman. He’s really funny. He lives in Grays with me and he’s on the water polo team. Everyone on the water polo team is like hilarious.”

“I don’t think he’s a freshman. I think he’s like a sophomore or a junior or something,” said Penelope. “He’s from Europe kind of.”

Even after Facebook stalking and another discussion section, Penelope still had no more real information about Gustav. Once she overheard a cell phone conversation he had right before he went into section in which he referred to demography as “too too sick-making.” Penelope could not agree more.

“How do you know him?” asked Catherine.

“He is in my Counting People section.”

“I have never heard of him, I think,” said Catherine, who was looking out the door into the hallway. Someone was coming up the stairs. It was Penelope’s upstairs neighbor Harold, already the president of the model train club. Catherine went back to her reading.

This was the third time this week that Catherine had burst into Penelope’s suite and asked to study with her. Penelope was starting to wonder if this was going to be a nightly occurrence. Already, it had started to fall into some kind of routine. Catherine would lie on her stomach, limbs splayed everywhere, on the cold, wooden floor. Penelope would offer her a seat, which she would refuse. Then Penelope would go back to studying and Catherine would get distracted by every single person who came up the stairs.

“I was thinking I might try out for the literary magazine,” said Penelope.

“What?” said Catherine. She was highlighting her textbook.

“The literary magazine?” said Penelope. “Maybe I won’t.”

“Oh, the
Advocate
,” said Catherine.

“Yeah,” said Penelope.

“You want to comp the
Advocate
?”

“Excuse me?” said Penelope.

“That’s what you call trying out clubs here. ‘Comping.’ I am comping like six things right now. Nikil told me that I was almost comping more things than him, which is ridiculous because he is comping like ten things.”

“Oh,” said Penelope.

Catherine sighed and repositioned herself on the floor so that she was looking at Penelope, but her torso was still pointing toward the door. “Penelope,” she said, “I need to ask your advice.”

“Why?” said Penelope, frightened.

“I don’t know what to do about Ted. At all,” said Catherine.

“What were you thinking of doing?” asked Penelope.

“Well, I told you how we hooked up and everything, right?”

“Oh, yeah,” said Penelope. Penelope knew everything about this fleeting hookup that one could possibly know.

“Well, now I don’t know what to do. I mean, I think he really likes me, but I can’t help feeling like, what if he wants to be in a relationship? Do you know what I am saying? I am not sure I want that.”

“Well,” said Penelope, “the good thing is that you aren’t in a relationship with him.”

“True,” said Catherine. She did not seem as satisfied by this as Penelope thought she would be. “What are you doing right now?”

“Well, there is that paper for Images of Shakespeare due tomorrow, so I am writing that.”

“Oh, right. That is the class you are in with Ted. What is yours on?”

“ ‘Fat but Fit? The Mad Scottish King and Shakespeare: A Comparative Study.’ ”

“That’s interesting,” said Catherine in a bored voice. They were silent for a while. Penelope wrote two paragraphs about King James’s distant ancestor James the Fat.

“Do you think he wants to be in a relationship with me?” asked Catherine suddenly.

“James the Fat?” asked Penelope.

“Ted,” said Catherine.

“Oh, sure,” said Penelope.

“You do? Really? Why do you think that?” asked Catherine. “Hold on, what is that singing? It’s so high.” Someone was singing “I’ve Been Working on the Railroad” in a really high voice, and it sounded as if that person was coming up the stairs.

“That’s Ted,” said Penelope.

“No, it isn’t. That sounds like a girl,” said Catherine.

Suddenly Penelope saw Ted’s face in her doorway.

“Hola, Penelope,” he said. He kicked her recycling bin out of the way and stepped through the door. “Where is that cat of yours?”

“In the bathroom,” said Penelope.

“You should tell Lan to get rid of the cat,” said Ted rather loudly. Penelope was glad that Lan had soundproofed her door.

“Maybe” said Penelope. “She almost got it to pee in the toilet the other day. It’s a very smart cat, especially considering its feral antecedents.”

“Or the fact that it is feral now,” said Ted.

“Hey, Ted,” said Catherine, batting her legs together like a 1950s teenager.

“Oh, hi,” said Ted. He sat down on the futon next to Penelope. Penelope could smell alcohol on him from where she was sitting, two feet away.

“Are you drunk?” asked Penelope.

“I was drinking with the chorus people. How is your ear infection?” asked Ted.

“It’s really good,” said Penelope.

Ted gave her a wondering look.

“Did you do the EC 10 problem set?” asked Catherine. She moved onto the futon and sat between Ted and Penelope.

“Not yet,” said Ted.

“It’s pretty easy,” said Catherine.

“I’m not too worried,” said Ted. “Penelope, why did you have to get an ear infection right before the chorus tryouts? That
Cats
girl got in instead of you.”

“You can never tell when sickness will strike,” said Penelope.

“She said she was going to comp the
Advocate
instead,” said Catherine.

“Not instead,” said Penelope. That was the thing about Catherine. Every time Penelope thought she wasn’t listening, she was in fact actually listening.

Catherine turned to Penelope and placed her hand on Penelope’s arm. “I wasn’t going to say anything before but, Penelope, that’s pretty ambitious. They don’t let anyone get on when they are a freshman. I don’t think it’s the best idea.”

“Oh, really?” said Penelope.

“When did you decide to do that?” asked Ted.

“Yesterday,” said Penelope. Ted looked hurt, but Penelope didn’t care very much. Ted was wearing unseasonable shorts again. Penelope realized that not everyone could wear a rumpled suit, but at the same time, you could at least try to wear a rumpled coat.

“Well,” said Ted. “I am super-tired.”

“Me too,” said Catherine happily.

“OK,” said Penelope.

“I should probably go to bed,” said Ted, who stood up. He threw his hands over his head and yawned, causing his T-shirt to ride up and expose a small, quaggy expanse of skin. Penelope averted her eyes.

“Before I go to bed, I also should probably tell Nikil something about the EC 10 problem set,” said Catherine, looking at Ted.

“Bye, Penelope,” said Ted. He walked out of her room.

“Bye!” said Catherine. “I should probably go do that! Ted, wait for me!” In a flash she was gone, a soldier for romance.

The
Advocate
had its own building—a small white one that looked as if it used to be a barn. There was an unobtrusive basrelief of a winged figure near the roof that implied that this was indeed the font of soaring literary ambitions; but if Penelope hadn’t been previously informed that this was where the
Advocate
was situated (by Lan, who knew where everything was situated, even though she never went outside), she would never have seen it.
The disinclination on the part of the Puritans for florid showiness, though admirable and moral, did make things needlessly confusing
, Penelope thought.

Penelope climbed up the stairs to the second floor (the first seemed to be an elongated corridor of small, unoccupied rooms—the stables, Penelope figured). When she got to the top of the stairs, she walked into a crowded alcove where someone was making a speech. Penelope was late. She sat down Indian style in the back.

The room was sparsely furnished. Two shabby couches were pushed up against facing walls and one disarmingly long table was shoved next to a window, but that was about it. The floor was littered with cigarette butts. Affixed to the walls were countless wooden tiles with gold writing on them. Penelope looked at them closely. Written on the tiles were the names of all the past officers of the
Advocate
in each year. Penelope did not see the name of anyone famous.

“OK,” said whoever was talking. “You guys know, I think, the basic premise of what this place is. Let’s sit in a circle.”

Everyone assembled in a circle. Penelope noticed that there seemed to be two leaders of the meeting. One was an impossibly small brunet male in a commodious navy-blue cardigan, flannel shirt, and matching driving cap. The other was an emaciated
blond female wearing a dirty slip, huge glasses, and Victorian boots. They were both holding decanters of red wine.

“So this is the fiction board. Hey, guys,” said the small guy.

“Hey,” said the girl.

“Let’s try to make this less scary, I guess, and start with going around the room and saying your names or something. Or what about”—he looked at the girl—“playing an icebreaking game? What do you think? I mean, that’s what they always did in elementary school anyway.” Penelope had often wondered why a defining attribute of her generation was a nostalgia for things that happened in elementary school. What was so great about elementary school? Penelope always wanted to know. She had had a terrible time.

“OK,” said the girl. “What should we ask.” Although this seemed to be a question, it was not said like one.

“I don’t know. Hmm. What should we ask them? Maybe everyone should go around and say what their favorite bad French action movie is. Like if you’re a
Nikita
fan or not. If you’re not a
Nikita
fan, just get out right now, OK?” said the small guy.

“I think it should have something to do with fiction,” said the girl.

“OK, OK, I got it then,” said the guy. “Let’s go around and say what fictional character you would fuck if you could. That’s awesome. OK, say your name, concentration, where you live, what kind of literature you like, and, uh, who you want to fuck.”

Everyone else in the group tittered nervously.

“OK, I’ll go first,” said the guy. “My name is Scott. I’m a VES concentrator. Live in Adams House. I would definitely most want to fuck Margherita Erdman from
Gravity’s Rainbow
. Because she was so hot in that.”

“I’ll go next,” said the girl. “I’m Gwen. I’m a lit concentrator. I live in the co-op. It’s a pretty great place. Uh, I specialize in postwar French poetry and literature, but I like anything that plays with structure in any language. I guess I would want to fuck Borges, the character.”

“That’s a good one,” said Scott. “Wow, that’s such a good one. OK, who wants to go next, guys? And then we will go in a circle.”

“Uh, I’ll go next,” said a girl with very short, dark bangs and tiny wire-rimmed glasses like a World War I staff sergeant’s.

“OK, Lisa,” said Scott.

“My name is Lisa. I’m a junior. I’m VES with Scott. I live off campus, on Story Street, so not too far away.”

“God, I remember when Gary Sherman lived there,” said Scott. “That place was just, insane.”

“Gary Sherman was insane,” said Lisa.

“Remember when Gary came to
Advo
initiations dressed as a panda-opticon? So funny. You remember that, don’t you, Gwen?”