In that vein, one of the biggest drawbacks of attending so many recruiting events was that she was beginning to see how much alcohol affected her. She’d always been so proud that she had never blurted out a secret crush or gone on a crying jag when drunk and had thought the high she got was worth any sort of emotional fallout. However, recently, Ryley had begun to dread the after-moments, where drunk Ryley found herself trapped on her couch, completely unable to escape from a mental loop of her own making.
Had Mark meant to cut her off when she had been speaking to a partner at the firm? Was David purposefully avoiding her? Was Cassidy? Cassidy always seemed to be in deep conversation with some attorney or another at the opposite side of the room for all the recruiting events. And David and she hadn’t much spoken at all over the last week; he hadn’t come to any of the recruiting events and when Ryley wasn’t networking, she was studying. She’d yet to reach out to Cassidy, Mark, or David to see if she could rejoin their study group. She needed to find her own voice first.
At least Winter Formal was tonight. She just needed to get through the last class of the day.
“Hey, only recognized you by your bag. You are completely bundled up,” Olivia said as she sat down next to Ryley. They had been put into the same smaller twenty-person section for the Negotiation Workshop and had easily fallen into the habit of sitting together over the last couple of weeks.
“Yeah, I was going to take off my beanie and my coat, but then I got too tired. I decided I’d let myself overheat instead,” Ryley said.
Olivia laughed. “Feeling okay?”
“Yeah. Still two more months of this awful weather and three more months of feeling like I should be doing more and just being better.”
Ryley froze as she heard words tumbling out of her mouth that she only ever said to her mom. Although they’d gotten off to a rocky enough start—Ryley was still resentful that Olivia had told David Ryley wasn’t interested—she realized Olivia was easily one of the best listeners she’d ever come across. Olivia made her feel comfortable in a way no one else at the school did—not even Mark. Olivia’s whole body seemed to involuntarily lean into Ryley, communicating how intent she was on listening to and better understanding Ryley. Even if Olivia sometimes offered Ryley her unsolicited opinion in an effort to push her toward enlightenment she didn’t necessary want, Ryley found herself telling Olivia things she didn’t tell anyone else at the school, letting herself ramble rather than censoring herself.
Olivia opened her mouth, closed it, and then opened it again to say, “Want to get on a plane to Bora Bora and ditch for the rest of the semester?”
Ryley gave a half-hearted laugh, and Olivia looked at her with a soft smile before squeezing her wrist lightly and saying, “Well, at least we like this class, right?”
“Yes, at least we like this class.” Ryley shot Olivia a full, beaming smile, enormously thankful that her display of vulnerability hadn’t been met with pity. She’d liked how Olivia grouped them together in a way that felt true and showed that Olivia noticed how Ryley tended to perk up and how she actively volunteered in the class.
Professor Poomin started speaking, breaking the girls out of their bubble, as she launched the class into the newest exercise. Professor Poomin was the only female professor Ryley’d had all year, almost unbelievably nurturing and feelings-oriented when contrasted against Ryley’s eight male professors, six of whom were older and white.
These male professors had emphasized logic and coherence within the Court’s opinion, kind enough but fundamentally Academics at their core. One took the law so fully out of context that he argued a case that greenlit lynching was considered justifiable because it ostensibly preserved the larger public’s trust in the Court. It was consequently jarring to come to the Negotiation Workshop and have context matter, have identity matter, and have feelings and intention matter.
In fact, Ryley had stayed up late last night finishing one of the books (of which they’d only been assigned a chapter), undeniably drawn to any book that encouraged understanding of self. Back in the day, her college friends had used to joke that Ryley would most definitely write a self-help book someday. She couldn’t see it.
After a quick overview, Professor Poomin gave them their assigned pairings. Ryley walked with her partner, Zeke, to an isolated conference room for the negotiation. Although she tended to sit with Olivia in class, she liked Zeke well enough; they both simply recognized they needed the larger group to successfully hang out together.
By the end of the mock negotiation, she liked him less. He’d made her work for everything and forced her to walk out with something barely above her bottom line so as to come to some sort of deal before they ran out of time.
She was sullen on the walk back and sullen during the debrief, staying quiet in the class in a way she normally didn’t. Professor Poomin glanced at her more than a couple of times, and when she finally wrapped up the class, she looked at Ryley when she said, “Let me know if anyone has questions or wants to talk through anything.”
Ryley packed her bag rapidly, not wanting to linger and wanting to begin pre-gaming; she’d almost lost her calm and simply walked out during the negotiation. She was never anything but in control and the anger she’d felt startled her.
Over the last month, her sense of self had begun to feel increasingly fragile as everything about her began to feel like a lie. The assigned reading had caused even more cracks to form. The book asked her to explicitly think about her identity, think about what made her Ryley, and she, who had become so used to submerging anything other, anything foreign to the narrative she wished to spin, found emotions and thoughts welling up that she was used to pushing down. Taking herself as she was as given, rather than telling herself that she didn’t quite fit the mold just yet, she’d felt angry when she saw the presumption with which Zeke interacted throughout the negotiation. He’d made it clear he expected her to come to him, listening to her without listening at all.
The sprint down the stairs regulated her somewhat, and when she exited the stairwell and saw Olivia exiting the elevator, she felt slight remorse. Over the last few weeks, they’d fallen into a pattern of walking out together, but Ryley had been too focused on getting alone time to wait. First semester, when she’d convinced herself she didn’t need or like her alone time, was a distant memory.
Olivia paused when they made eye contact but only gave her a simple nod and a “See you later?” Ryley could have hugged her.
“Yep, see you later.”
“Okay. Bye, Rye.”
Ryley didn’t know how she felt about the nickname itself, but she liked the sense of closeness it conveyed.
* * *
Ryley looked down at her outfits once more. She wondered how many hours in total she had spent taking clothes from her closet, laying them on her bed, trying them on, and hanging them back up. She would be meeting David, Mark, Cassidy, and a couple of others on the edge of campus in ten minutes to walk over to the pregame.
She decided to go with a black jumpsuit; unfortunately, she wouldn’t even get the benefit of not having to shave. She was pretty sure she’d be having sex with David tonight. She felt bad for waiting so long; she had just wanted the connection to click and for the stress to leave her whenever they got too intimate. At this stage in the relationship, though, they’d made out and done everything but have sex. Although he never explicitly pressured her, he hadn’t been able to hide his frustration the last time she’d slept over, muttering to himself after he thought she’d fallen asleep. He knew she’d had sex before, that it wasn’t like she was a virgin. In fact, he’d explicitly asked to exchange relationship histories on their fourth date. He had been with the same girl all through college and had just dated casually in the three years since. She had said she dated around in high school and college and left it at that. She didn’t discuss the litany of failed dates or talk about how she’d instinctively shoved multiple past partners away when they had kissed her neck.
Ryley met up with her assorted friends at eight on the dot and arrived at Harrison’s place shortly thereafter. It was still too cold. She’d put on her thickest marshmallow coat again, prompting Mark to say, “If it isn’t my favorite roly-poly” when she rolled up. Ryley hadn’t bothered with a response, too busy seizing up every time a cold gust hit her under the ears.
As she waited for Harrison to buzz them in, Ryley glanced around at her friends. Everyone was dressed crisply with the men wearing pressed suits and the women in formal black dresses of varying length. Mark and Cassidy were keeping themselves busy with a rapid back and forth about A Star Is Born, but David was on the quieter end, flipping his phone from hand to hand.
Finally, the buzzer sounded out, and they were stalking up the staircase to the fourth floor of the four-story walkup. This building was no different than any of the others she’d been to in Cambridge. The carpet was old and a faded dusk gray with beat up off-white walls. As they reached the fourth floor, Genie theatrically swung the door open, holding one arm up in welcome. Genie was rather ordinary-looking in her oversized sweater and black leggings now—nothing like the glamorized photos of her Instagram.
Ryley immediately stepped forward, stretching out her hand as she said, “Hey, I’m Ryley.”
Genie gave her a wide grin and instead wrapped her arms around Ryley in a bear hug. Ryley only barely prevented herself from flinching away; she would’ve appreciated some warm-up icebreaker first. As Genie exchanged greetings with the rest of them, Ryley stepped farther into the apartment, looking around at Harrison’s vinyl record player in the corner, the lovingly arranged posters of street art, and the carefully curated coffee books on what was clearly an expensive glass coffee table. Harrison had laid out appetizers on said table: a plate of crackers with cheese, grapes, and prosciutto.
“Wow, Ryley, looks like Harrison is the host of the family,” Mark said, laughing. Ryley gave a shrug of indifference. She didn’t know when her brother had transformed into such a gentleman, but she couldn’t deny the truth of Mark’s words.
Harrison exited the kitchen then, shouting out a happy “thanks” to Mark, while pointing everyone to the glass bar cart. Harrison had truly become a fully functioning adult. As Ryley admired the bar cart, Olivia came out of the bathroom. She looked beautiful, wearing a tight, black backless dress, with her hair twisted into a bun. She’d exaggerated her eyes with wingtips and her lips were painted a delicate pink. She usually never had makeup on and Ryley was shocked by her transformation. One of those eyes winked at Ryley now as Olivia caught her staring.
Ryley blushed, looked away, and then hung back, watching all the introductions take place. Harrison stopped to size David up, but nothing else of note happened, if that could even be counted; David was unperturbed, speaking in the slightly heightened, self-assured way he’d adopted since grades came out. As Genie hugged everyone, Harrison shook everyone’s hand, and Olivia gave everyone a nod and a smile, Ryley realized she was the only person who knew everyone there. She didn’t give herself enough credit; she was a real Mark Zuckerberg.
When Harrison finally got to Ryley, he said, “Hey, Ryley, glad you could make it! You and your crew are the first ones here.”
Ryley noted Harrison didn’t count Olivia as a guest. Olivia gave her a small smile when they made eye contact again but made no move to come closer, staying by Harrison’s side. A small part of Ryley’s brain had thought they had a special connection, that Olivia might even prefer Ryley to Harrison; she was bothered that Olivia remained at Harrison’s side and was bothered that it bothered her. Ryley kept her bothersome feelings to herself before looking over to Genie to see if she had any reaction to Harrison’s proclamation or to Olivia’s hovering. Genie did not, too busy looking down at her phone.
However, as the group settled into a large semi-circle of sorts, Harrison ended up next to Genie. Harrison easily and skillfully guided the conversation through weather before making Genie the next natural topic of conversation. Genie was someone new and different, existing outside the law school bubble to remind them that a whole other world still existed. They were all eager to spice up their dialogue beyond law and their now irrelevant lives before the law, and Genie knew how to tell a story, throwing in a self-deprecating joke here and there to offset the way in which she so easily dominated the conversation. So others, even Cassidy, were more than happy to stay on the topic of Genie and her glamorous life in New York, though Cassidy managed to bring up her boyfriend who worked at New York-Presbyterian, their three-year relationship, and how he’d begged for her to get back together.
At one point, Harrison wrapped his arm around Genie’s waist like a man in a 1950s suburban couple, turning to look at her to whisper something when she yawned a couple of times in rapid succession mid-story. He kept his gaze intensely, potentially lovingly, trained on Genie as she muttered something back, and Ryley found herself uncomfortable with the sheer intimacy of the moment. She couldn’t imagine ever being so lost in someone as to gaze at them like that; absence must have made Harrison’s heart grow disproportionately fond.
Ryley fidgeted, shifted her feet to the right to rest her left foot slightly against David’s, looked down at her phone, and then looked up to see how Olivia was coping with Harrison and Genie’s display of intimacy. Yes, she’d promised to move on from wondering if there was something more going on between Olivia and Harrison, but she promised herself a lot of things. Surprisingly, Olivia was looking at Ryley’s feet, with her brow slightly furrowed; Ryley shifted her foot away from David’s. Irritated for being so impressionable, she glared at Olivia when Olivia looked up at her though Olivia just smirked in response. Fortunately, by the time Ryley and Olivia were done playing out their little skit, Genie and Harrison had come to a resolution.
Taking a step back, Genie said, “Sorry, guys, I had to get up at five a.m. for a marketing disaster that occurred at the agency, and then my train got delayed, so I literally got here five minutes before you all did and haven’t had the chance to regroup or change. So, I might do that now, but before I go, Ryley, come with me into the kitchen.”
Ryley disliked being ordered around by someone she barely knew, but Genie was already walking away and Ryley would look needlessly difficult if she didn’t follow, especially when Genie had delivered the command with such a nice smile.
Once in the kitchen, Genie didn’t keep her waiting. “Tell me about you! Harrison has obviously mentioned how close the two of you were growing up, so I’m so happy to finally meet you!” Ryley kept the snort inside; she would buy into this pretense too. Besides, it was a fundamentally different Ryley who had had such a big fallout with Harrison, and she supposed they had been close enough before everything with Josh happened.
Giving Genie a light, polite smile, Ryley said, “Not much to tell. I’m at the law school now with Harrison but finishing up my first year. I like it. I like how much everyone cares though it’s definitely competitive.”
“Oh, I’m sure everyone at this place is so studious. I’ve had a couple of friends who were law students and they were so serious. You must barely go out what with being a first-year law sch
ool student.” Genie delivered the statement soothingly.
“It is serious, but I go out. Good stress relief,” Ryley answered, disagreeing with the girl only so she could align them more. She didn’t want Genie to draw a contrast between her fun New York City life and Ryley’s study-filled law school one; Ryley was fun. Ryley accordingly expanded with, “I like music. And running.”
Genie merely looked at her, silently asking her to do better.
“And I’m seeing someone here. David.” She hated how quickly she went to David as if she didn’t have enough to offer on her own, but at last Genie’s eyes lit up.
“Oh, look at you finding yourself a nice Harvard boy. He seems like a darling.”
“Yeah, he is a da—he’s a good one. We’re in the same section.” There was absolutely no way Ryley could pull off saying darling.
“Well done, girl.” Genie gave her a gentle nudge with her arm.
Ryley genuinely smiled, appreciating Genie’s validation. Feeling charitable, she asked, “Aren’t you tired? It’s impressive you have so much energy after the day you’ve had.”
“Yeah, but I’m going to rally. I have such little time with Harrison that I want to push through it. I’ll change into a dress now to look a bit more formal.” Genie took a step back before calling over her shoulder, “I’m going to make you take shots with me in ten, so be ready! Harrison said you’ve become quite the little party animal, so let’s bring that out tonight.”
If Harrison had said Ryley was a party animal, it was interesting Genie had implied Ryley didn’t go out not two minutes ago, but Ryley didn’t call her out on it and just gave a large smile in response. Breaking the nerd typecast was her bread and butter.
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