On mozzarella stick night the lines would wind their way outside the building onto the street outside, and the dining hall employees were instructed to serve only two sticks at a time. People would be sitting at their tables with six, seven, even eight or more plates towering and clattering on the tray in front of them. Just one of those funny things I remember.
On that first night, though, they served up cookout food: hot dogs, hamburgers, potato salad. It felt like summer camp. I remember feeling very annoyed by the efforts of the university to make us feel like kids at camp. We were at college, for Christ’s sake. There were posters all over the dining hall announcing a bonfire to be held that night on the football field to welcome us. It was called the “Freshman Jamboree.”
That gives an idea how good the football team was.
Skipping the questionable meat products, I loaded my plate full of near-wilted salad, and a bowl of Cap’n Crunch to be safe, and found a table where Molly’s Extreme Friends were sitting. They were a loud, rugged looking group of fleece vests and Birkenstocks.
Hippies. I was starting off my college social career at the hippie table. Good God.
Ben was there. Plus the dark-haired kid, and three girls. Molly squealed something unintelligible and squeezed herself in next to a blonde girl named Alex.
Remember Musical Chairs? Remember that feeling of being the kid without the seat, standing there adrift when the music stopped, while the other players squirmed gleefully in their hard-won chairs?
Ben looked up from his plate of potato salad, and seeing me standing there, pushed over to his right.
“Thanks,” I said, and sat down, knee to knee, with him.
Across the table, I noticed the girl in the green sweatshirt with the biggish sort of nose elbow the girl named Alex in the ribs. But before I could introduce myself, the squawking began.
“This is my roomie, Greer!” Molly gushed to the girls. They stared at her as if she had just farted.
“This here’s Alex,” she said to me without missing a beat. “And Bonnie, and Sarah. They’re all best buds from Connecticut.”
Molly talked like one of those voices out of Seventeen magazine. She used words like “buds,” and “fave,” and “hunky.” Except that coming out of her, the words acquired the surreal twang of an East Texas accent.
I smiled meekly at the three friends and went about silently eating my salad. They were New England girls, like me, and we all understood how to shut one another out. The fact that the weird Molly Maloney brought me to the table was reason enough for them to cast me off.
But when Ben turned to me and started a conversation, I could see all three tense up and hone in on what we were saying.
“So, Greer,” he began, his blue eyes relaxed and friendly, “that’s an interesting name. Does it mean anything?”
“It means vigilant,” I told him, eyeing the Pissy Posse. “My mother named me after the actress, Greer Garson.”
“Would I know anything with her in it?”
“Goodbye, Mr. Chips,” I answered.
He stared at me blankly, and I wasn’t sure if I wanted to break the moment, though I had no idea what to do with it.
Alex knew exactly what to do with our moment.
“Nobody watches those lame old movies anymore,” she laughed, throwing her long, albeit stringy, blonde hair over her shoulder. Sort of the female equivalent of peeing on something. “Remember when we saw Ghost last week at that little theater up in that backwoods mountain town?”
And just like that, the conversation turned and I was back out on the fringes.
As I have already mentioned, boys were a foreign land to me at that juncture of my young life. I was also relatively new to the world of being cute, as I had only dropped my baby fat that summer. I wasn’t tall, but I was fit from hours spent on the tennis court. My hair has always been so dark it appears black, with thick waves. My standout feature, though, are definitely my green eyes. Penny used to call me Betty, because she thought I looked like Betty Boop.
Being fashionable was always second nature to me. I have loved clothes ever since I can remember. I was the first to wear knickers and argyle socks in fourth grade, the first to pull on a pair of leg warmers over my Jordache jeans in the fifth grade, and tied with the first pair of Candie’s high top sneakers in the sixth.
Once Penny and I met up in the sixth grade, on the day we each wore our new Candies, we founded a solid friendship on a shared love for Esprit clothes and British pop music. For seven years we were the pinnacles of fashion in our little corner of the world, even during our Black Period. We were also a bit chubby and weird, so it never really earned us any popularity points. We were generally accepted by everyone in our class, and generally ignored as well.
So while Molly’s strangeness was partly responsible for my ostracism, the part where I threatened Alex was confusing to me. I could see she liked him, but aside from sitting next to him, what had I done to inspire such sidelong looks and rolled eyes?
By some social blunder or sense of guilt, we were invited to go along with them to a campus production of Pippin. Even as I write this, I have no idea what prompted me to go. The company, with the exception of Ben and his dreamy eyes, was less than hospitable. And I am not really a fan of musical theater. It must have been the rush of sitting next to him, knees touching, elbows knocking a couple of times. The sense that something lay ahead, and these people could get me there.
After a quick detour back to our room to change into long pants, Molly and I were to meet the others outside the theater. I pulled on the perfectly faded Levi’s I had picked up at a vintage boutique in Boston and my black penny loafers with the dimes in the slots.
Walking across campus was the first time Molly and I really talked. She missed her home, her parents, and her brothers.
“But mostly, I miss my horse,” she chirped. “I want to bring him to New Hampshire next semester, but I need to get myself settled before taking care of him.”
“I had no idea that you could bring a horse to school,” I replied, wondering if I had ever seen a horse anywhere near campus. Cows, yes. Horses, no.
She laughed at me, and explained that our school had one of the best equestrian sciences programs in the country. She was apparently a big name in junior equestrian circles, winning competitions in Texas and Oklahoma since she was six years old. She wasn’t annoying when she talked about horses.
But then she began to gush about Ben, and the enormous crush she had on him. Her face fell after the initial surge of excitement, and she alluded to Alex.
“I think she has a thing for him, too, and they got awfully close this past week on our trip,” she informed me. The behavior of Alex and her Pissy Posse at dinner suddenly made a lot more sense.
At this point, I decided to give up on Ben, and place him in the “pretty to look at” category. There was no sense driving down a dead end street, I told myself.
***
The theater building was another ode to modernism on a state university budget. Approaching it by way of the woodsy center of campus, you have to climb about ten or twelve wide, curving steps to a cement platform in front of the entrance. I imagine it was envisioned to be a gathering spot for the artsy crowd during intermissions, but in reality served more as a throughway from the dorms on the north end of campus to the liberal arts buildings now behind us.
Standing on the platform were Ben, Alex, and the others, including some people I had not yet met. Next to Ben was a rather large boy who looked as out of place among the group as I did. He wore a black Depeche Mode t-shirt, black Levi’s, and a silver, metal ankh on a satin cord around his neck. I noticed his Doc Martens right away.
Alex met my eyes as Molly and I approached, and suddenly lifted Ben’s t-shirt and tickled him, which set off an embarrassing scene of tickle-wrestling between the two. I did my best not to flinch at the display, though I may have snuck a peek at his very flat abs.
The others busied themselves with
chit-chat about hometowns and summer jobs. I looked around for someone to talk to, but even Molly was involved in conversation with the dark-haired guy.
“You don’t look like the camping and hiking type,” Depeche Mode said to me. He leaned in, and said it as if it were a secret between the two of us.
“I could say the same about you,” I retorted, though a small smile did creep across my lips. I was relieved to have someone, anyone, to talk to.
“And you’d be correct,” he finished. He was six feet three, a full foot taller than me, and at least two hundred pounds. I held out my hand, and introduced myself.
“I’m Greer,” I said.
“John.”
“Nice ankh,” I said with a sarcastic lilt. For some reason, this guy made sense in the sea of Hackey sacks and hippies. I sensed I could be myself.
“You are the first person to know what this is,” he said, fingering the jewelry hanging from his neck.
“I’m familiar with the contents of the punk rock starter kit,” I teased. He laughed.
“What are you doing here?” he asked outright.
“My roommate, Molly,” I answered, motioning toward the little mouse. “You?”
“Ben was my roommate during orientation back in June,” he told me. We both gazed at the spectacle of Alex and Ben for a moment.
“Not to sound too tired and cliche,” he said, turning back to me and flashing a Cheshire cat grin. “But where are you from?”
And so it continued for nearly twenty minutes until it was time to enter the theater. It turned out John and I had grown up only forty-five minutes from one another, and had even hung out at the same mall.
I sat watching Pippin with Molly on my left, John on my right. I stared straight ahead and watched the lanky blonde girl on stage sing her heart out for a group of ill-mannered freshmen, and I wondered where exactly this strange experience was going to take me.
***
After the performance, we funneled out of the theater and into the fading sunlight of the early September evening. People milled about, fulfilling the architect’s dream for his cement platform, and discussed the next plan for the first Saturday night at college. Nobody suggested the Freshman Jamboree.
The upperclassmen were scheduled to move into the dorms the following day, but there were plenty of students already moved into their fraternity and sorority houses, off-campus apartments, and such. A number of parties were rumored to be taking place, and deciding which to attend was the biggest problem now facing the group of eighteen and nineteen year olds I now stood a part of.
“I just want to get drunk!” Alex exclaimed emphatically.
Though I am essentially an ethnic mutt, when it came to heritage in our household, the Irish had all the luck. This being the case, alcohol held no allure for me, no sense of rebellion.
I liked beer and wine, and was crazy for the lime daiquiris my parents would make by the pitcher on hot summer weekends. They called them Frozen Bullfrogs. So maybe I wasn’t very good at being the typical teenager, but the allure of a $3 plastic cup and a keg in someone’s dank and musty basement missed its mark with me. Though I had seen my share of drunkenness, I had never been drunk. I thought it was beneath me. I was far too sophisticated to go carrying on like that.
“So, what do you think, Greer?” John asked, pulling me back into the circle I was slowly fading out of. He seemed remarkably comfortable with the group of strangers, and I envied him his calm, easy demeanor.
“Uh, I don’t drink, so I think I’m going to go back to my room,” I stated flatly. I figured it was best to get it out in the open, give them all a reason not to like me, and get back to the Pit. No such luck.
“Aw, you can’t go back to your room on our first night here,” Ben taunted, putting an arm around my shoulder. The Pissy Posse glared at me in the twilight. I felt John’s eyes on me, waiting to see how I would react under pressure.
I have never liked all eyes being on me. I tend to say things before I think, in an effort to deflect the conversation and keep the awkward silences at bay.
“I think there’s a comedian upstairs at my dorm. I was going to check that out,” I offered weakly.
“What time?” John asked.
“Nine, I think,” I answered. Inside, I was groaning a loud, long groan. I wanted to be rid of these people.
“Well, that still gives us time to get to that party on Main Street afterward,” John assuaged the group.
“And y’all can check out my room before we go!” Molly twanged with delight. She had to take two steps for every one step taken by the rest of us, just to keep up. It gave her the appearance of that little dog in those old Bugs Bunny cartoons, jumping over the big dog, yipping incessantly.
John and I walked in front, leading the herd. I must have seen at least a dozen kids from my class in high school. We all felt the obligation to say hello, even if we wouldn’t have last spring. Any port in a storm, I guess.
John and I talked about music. We shared the same taste for The Cure and The Smiths, though he was more inclined toward the gothic sounds of Sisters of Mercy or Joy Division, where I was more likely to be listening to the Ramones or The Clash. I told him that Depeche Mode were a bunch of posers, and he teased me for liking Guns n Roses. By the time we got to room 107, the group had trailed off to only seven, plus myself.
We made small talk. I handed out cans of soda my mother had supplied me with, for just such an occasion. Under my bed were neatly arranged rows of Diet Coke, Sprite, root beer, and ginger ale cans, like little metal soldiers waiting for deployment.
John made a comment that I had a cooler CD collection than his own. Molly taught Ben to play Tetris on her computer. The Pissy Posse made plans for the next day, which did not include anyone else in the room.
I don’t remember the comedian, so I cannot say if he was funny or not. After the performance I slipped away quietly, while John spoke with a former buddy from high school. I don’t think any of the rest of them noticed I was gone.
***
I never hung out with Alex or her friends again after that night. Neither did Molly. She never said anything, but I know that first night was the prototype that inspired her first year of college, two thousand miles from familiar. Oh well. Water under the bridge, and all that.
As for me, I was eager for classes to get started. I was taking two writing classes, intermediate French, and a computer programming class for the beginner. That last one sounds ambitious, but my father was a computer whiz, so I figured I could breeze right through it and get a science credit with minimal effort. Not a single class started before 10 am.
Molly and I went to the dining hall together in those early days; it was better than going alone. Gripped with fear by the dreaded “Freshman Fifteen,” I was known to tote my own bottle of fat-free ranch dressing from my tiny fridge and back again at mealtime. I ate mostly salad and Cap’n Crunch for two weeks. That, coupled with long walks around campus every day, worked in my favor. Instead of gaining weight, I dropped nearly ten pounds.
Weight has always been one of those issues for me that won’t go away. I know, not terribly original, but what can I say? McDonald’s introduced the Happy Meal in my hometown on my seventh birthday, for Christ’s sake.
So when I explained my new found slimness to my mother over the pay phone in the lobby of the Pit, she instructed me to take my Mastercard and get myself to the nearest mall. She hated the thought of her daughter swimming in too-large clothing like some kind of Dickensian co-ed.
Chapter Two
Campus is a large, sprawling display of classic New England brick buildings, with young, modern structures cozying up to the more formal designs in a seemingly random, patchwork manner. As I mentioned earlier, there is the requisite clock tower and rolling green lawns, with wooded trails snaking around buildings and over babbling brooks. The library sits like the Buddha in the center of it all. There were at least four or five separate clusters of dormitories forming a sort of
crescent around the edge of our little academic world, not including the on-campus apartments or married housing. And the parking lots. Lots and lots of parking lots.
On the edge of campus, heading up Main Street, a little downtown area sort of sneaks up you. It is much cuter now than when I was there, but it was charming nonetheless. It held a quaint diner, a pizza pub, and a little Chinese restaurant, among other mom-n-pop establishments. There was a store called Memories which sold candles and incense and clever greeting cards. I used to spend oceans of time finding just the right card to send to Penny as she began her new life at college in Massachusetts.
Behind Main Street was a small shopping plaza, which held a grocery store, a drugstore, a bakery, and a Burger King. It was not so charming.
On the sidewalk separating campus from town there was a bus stop. This is where I found myself, credit card burning a hole in my back pocket, the next time I spoke to John Cunningham.
***
We were two weeks into our freshman year. I was less than impressed with the experience at this juncture. I didn’t know what I was doing in this little town, when I had always envisioned myself as more of a city girl. I was having a hard time warming up to the girls in the Pit. There was one girl, Gretchen, who I liked. She was a friendly blonde from Wisconsin; my dad would have said she was built like a brick shithouse. She went on to play hockey for the US Olympic team in 1996.
But she and I really didn’t have anything in common more than the concurrent bouts with insomnia and a love for the grainy reruns of The Dick Van Dyke Show at 2am on the old console television in the study lounge across from my room.
It was a Tuesday, mild for late September. I was reading the latest issue of the Boston Phoenix, an alternative newspaper with the best club listings and music reviews. I was planning a visit home to see my family and Penny on the upcoming weekend. She and I were going to spend Saturday afternoon shopping in Boston and go to a Red Sox game that night, courtesy of one of her father’s business partners. I wanted to see if there was anything I should do or see before returning to school on Sunday evening.
Beware of Love in Technicolor Page 2