The building had five floors but the party was only taking place on the first two. I had heard that the top floors were the members’ bedrooms. I wondered what it felt like to live there. I wondered if it meant you could constantly feel better than everyone else. I passed by the staircase on the second floor and brushed my hand along the iron banister, then one of the balusters. All of this old-world glamour either contrasted with or complemented the hordes of students dressed in their skimpy outfits. I couldn’t tell you which. A couple women were stumbling down the stairs, giggling over something on one of their phones. Startled, I removed my hand from the staircase.
We left the party shortly after midnight. We all agreed that it had been mediocre, and I didn’t admit out loud that I was glad for the chance to at least have found that out for myself. We went to the gay bar on 110th that served Long Island iced teasthat somehow appeared to be even stronger than a regular Long Island iced tea. I could safely say that the gay bar was at least ten times more fun than St. A’s. It was karaoke night and we danced and belted songs by the Cranberries onstage until a drag queen politely kicked us off for her set. None of us had cash except for Alex, who let us borrow their dollar bills, and we handed them one by one into the drag queen’s white-gloved hand. We didn’t understand how Alex had so many dollar bills and asked if they were secretly a stripper. Alex claimed it was because they just went to the halal carts a lot. “I give them a ten and they always give me two ones in change,” they said with a shrug.
—
I didn’t remember how Igot back to my dorm, but I woke up in bed to the smell of pizza. A half-eaten jumbo slice of pepperoni sat on my desk on a paper plate. Both the pizza and my forehead were covered with a thin layer of oil. The fuzzy memories started coming back, the security guard in my dorm commenting on my loopy grin as I handed him my ID.
I spent the next day burrowed in my room, only leaving to shower and grab food from the dining hall. There was too much reading to catch up on, too many papers to write. I started to read Foucault and found myself just repeating the word “panopticon” out loud over and over again. Finally, I closed the book and conceded to a five-minute break. I unlocked my phone and skimmed through my emails, glancing at announcements about fellowship opportunities and homework assignments. I refreshed my inbox one more time out of habit and was about to set down my phone, but a new subject line caught my eye.
Sender:Harvard Law School admissions.
Subject:Your application status has been updated.
I unzipped my backpack and pulled out my computer, only to have it fall directly on my left foot. “Ow!” I cried, trailing my yelp with a few obscenities.
“Are you okay?” Eunjin shouted through the wall.
“Fine! All good!”
I picked up the computer and pulled up the application portal. I typed in my username and password and clicked submit. My fingers tripped over the keys and it took three tries to log in. Finally, my applicant dashboard appeared. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath before opening them again.
The Harvard Admissions Committee has completed its evaluation of this year’s candidates, and I am genuinely sorry to—
The first image that appeared in my mind when I found out I had been rejected by Harvard was Arnold Schoenbackler’s face. His beady little eyes that took in Eunjin’s and my body parts one by one like he was assessing a used car. I didn’t know much about Arnold but I knew he was well credentialed, and I remembered thinking that if the upper echelons could accept him and his general air of grossness then surely they could also accept me. Clearly, I was wrong.
The second image that appeared in my mind was a McDonald’s Quarter Pounder with Cheese Deluxe. Side of fries and Dr Pepper. It had been my go-to order at McDonald’s since the moment I graduated from Happy Meals. I had one just a fewweeks ago, on the day I submitted all of my law school applications. It was to celebrate the fact that once I became a high-powered corporate lawyer, I probably wouldn’t be eating much McDonald’s anymore. Wrong again.
I had not gotten into Harvard. I had not been accepted into the upper echelons of society. There would be plenty of McDonald’s in my future. My hands were numb and tingling and I tried to move them but I couldn’t; that was when I realized I had been sitting on them this entire time, and I pulled them out and shook them in the air. I felt faint, like I was about to pass out. How was any of this possible? I had a 99th percentile LSAT. 3.94 GPA. Sparkling letters of recommendation. People like me didn’t get denied. People like me got in everywhere they applied to.
I wondered if I was experiencing a bout of sleep paralysis. Sometimes when I was asleep I would hallucinate myself waking up, but at the same time understand that I was not truly awake. During these moments I would try to will myself to full consciousness but find that I couldn’t move, that I was stuck in my state of sleep. Maybe I was asleep now and only hallucinating this email. I willed myself to wake up by using the tricks that would usually get me out of sleep paralysis. I tried moving each of my toes one by one. Then I tried suddenly slapping myself in the face. None of my efforts prevailed. I was still on the same plane of consciousness, staring at my computer screen.
I had no choice but to accept that I must not have been hallucinating, and the shock of the rejection felt like it was burrowing a hole into my chest and my abdomen. I didn’t realize that I had moved so far forward in my chair in my attempt to stare at the words on the computer screen until I lost my balance and fellknees-first onto the floor. I gripped the corners of my desk and pulled myself back up, ignoring the sharp pain that it sent into my palms.
My mind went into fix-it mode. I told myself that there was no point in panicking. I was too level-headed and rational for that. The only possible explanation was that they received the wrong scores in my application. I pulled up my email and typed a note addressed to the admissions office. “I would like to confirm that you received the correct LSAT score, which was a 178 out of 180, and the correct transcript, which showed a 3.94 out of 4.0 GPA.” My fingers were so numb that it took me an entire minute just to type this one sentence.
Wait, everyone’s going to be emailing them at this point. Even the people who genuinely didn’t deserve to get in.I closed out of my email and took three deep breaths.This is just a mistake. I’m going to get all of this sorted out in no time. They just need to know that they made a mistake.
I looked up news articles of universities who mistakenly sent rejection letters to accepted applicants and vice versa.This is super common. Maybe it wasn’t an error with your LSAT scores and transcript. Maybe it was actually a problem on their end. Just wait an hour or two and they’ll have figured out their mistake and sent you another email congratulating you.
I lay down on my bed and tried to calm my breath. I felt a tightness in my chest that I never experienced before. My breathing grew rapid. Suddenly, I felt like I couldn’t breathe. The world began to close in on me and I could barely see anything, only a small circle of white from the ceiling that appeared fuzzy on the edges.Am I dying?I began to wonder.
I jumped out of bed and rushed to the hallway. I knocked on Eunjin’s door until my knuckles turned red.
“What’s going on?” she asked.
It was close to midnight, her usual bedtime. But when her eyes met mine, the irritation dropped from her face.
“Jesus, Liz, you look really pale. Are you okay?”
I pressed an arm against the doorframe to keep myself from collapsing. “Eunjin, I think I’m dying.”
“Are you on drugs? Did you take acid?”
“No!” I wailed. “I’m not on anything, I swear. Eunjin, I don’t know what’s going on. I need help.” My hand slipped from the doorframe and I nearly tripped. Eunjin put both arms around me and led me into her room.
“Okay. Stay right there. Give me one second.”
I watched her dial a number on her phone while I sat on her bed and gasped for breath. The room spun around me; I expected to fall unconscious at any moment. I wouldn’t mind, as long as it made the feeling stop. Eunjin helped me stand up and beckoned me to the hallway. She guided me to sit against her door. Then, she sat next to me, holding my hand. My heart still pounded.
