Misadventures of a College Girl (Misadventures #9)
Lauren Rowe
Prologue
My stomach is doing somersaults. I stare at my computer screen, reading the words of my admissions essay to NYU one final time.
Dear Sir or Madam,
The first time I read Romeo and Juliet, it made me ponder the role of fate versus free will in my own life. Is my fate written in the stars as it was for Romeo and Juliet, or do I have the power to forge my own path, paved with my deepest desires? Juliet declares, “O Fortune, Fortune! All men call thee fickle. If thou art fickle, what dost thou with him. That is renowned for faith?” I’m paraphrasing here, but Juliet then goes on to beg fickle Fortune to keep its grubby paws off Romeo because, well, he’s a great guy and she loves him. Obviously, fickle Fortune didn’t wind up heeding Juliet’s plea. But, hey, points for trying.
I’m not sure why Romeo and Juliet has always resonated with me so much. Maybe it’s because my own parents were star-crossed lovers. My mother died in a car accident when I was two, and I truly believe my father would have followed his young wife into the grave were it not for the toddler she left behind for him to raise. A little girl with blue eyes and a dark mop of curly hair who was the singing-and-dancing spitting image of his ill-fated Juliet. Or perhaps I was so fascinated by Romeo and Juliet because, by all accounts, my mother loved me more than life itself. And yet, when it came down to it, her love wasn’t enough to persuade fickle Fate to keep its grubby paws off her.
I take a deep breath at those last words. But I press on.
I’m honestly not sure what I’ve concluded about the role of fate versus free will in my life. But I’m convinced that, whether everything is predetermined or not, I belong at NYU. I’ve believed NYU to be my future alma mater since my grandparents took me to visit New York City at age ten and told me that attending your fine university had once been their ill-fated daughter’s dream. But even if my attendance at my dream school isn’t written in the stars, then I implore you to take me anyway, if only to settle the fate-versus-free-will debate, once and for all. What better way to show fickle Fate who’s boss, right?
I know I’m a small-town girl from Nebraska, and you have the entire world of talented applicants to choose from. Indeed, the smallness of my life sometimes feels like an immutable gravity, weighing down my very soul. But I’m writing this application because I know in my molecules I’m meant to defy gravity. Not just for myself, but for my mother, too.
In another part of this application, I’ve submitted my grades and test scores for your review, and I think you’ll conclude based on those numbers, I’ve got the brains and work ethic to excel at NYU. With this essay, I’m hoping to convince you of something far more important: I’ve got the heart and soul, too.
Thank you for your consideration,
Zooey Cartwright
I stare at my computer screen for a long moment, holding my breath, and finally press Submit. Instantly, the enormity of what I’ve just done slams into me. I throw my hands over my face. “O, I am Fortune’s fool!” I blurt, quoting Romeo.
“Huh?” my dad says from the couch. He’s watching a football game on TV. Eating Doritos. Drinking a beer. “What’d you say, Zo?”
I clear my throat. “Nothing. I’m just being a dork, Dad. Carry on.”
Dad returns to his game and Doritos, completely unfazed. I don’t blame him. I act like a dork quite frequently.
When I’m sure my dad’s attention is focused on the TV again, I steeple my hands under my chin, close my eyes, and whisper in the tiniest voice possible so my sweet father, a Nebraska man through and through who’s never understood his daughter’s obsession with all things New York City, won’t overhear me. “Please, God,” I whisper. “Let me get into my dream school. And then, please, if you’re feeling particularly magnanimous, help me figure out a way to pay for it, too.”
Chapter One
“I don’t know how you’ve held out this long, Zooey,” my new roommate in the dorms, Clarissa, says. “If I were still a virgin at this point, I think my clit would explode like a rocket at lift-off every time I so much as looked at a hot guy.”
“That’s quite a visual.”
We both giggle.
It’s a warm September evening, two days before the start of classes at UCLA, and I’m sitting in my new dorm room at Hendrick Hall with my randomly assigned roommate, telling her things I’ve never told anyone, not even my best friends back home. Why am I divulging my most intimate secrets and fantasies to a girl I’ve known for two days? I have no idea. All I can figure is Clarissa Michaelson must be some kind of witch, because I simply can’t resist opening up to her.
“Is being an eighteen-year-old virgin that weird out here in California?” I ask. “Back home it’s not that weird.”
“It’s probably about fifty-fifty, I’d guess. I’m just saying if it were me, I’d be losing my mind. But that’s just ’cause I’ve always been insanely boy-crazy.”
“Oh, so have I,” I say. “I just haven’t been able to act on my boy-craziness because my dad’s always been super strict with me. But now that I’m finally away from home, I’m going to let my boy-crazy run amok, come hell or high water.”