by Glen Robins
To make up for it, Collin worked harder to make Emily happy. He would leave a rose stuck in her locker or a note in her Government book. Sometimes he would draw a funny face and glue it to one of her folders.
Feeling like she was wound up too tightly and controlled too closely by her mother, Collin pulled little pranks and devised schemes aimed to loosen her up and make her laugh. Most of the time it worked and helped them stay close. She seemed to appreciate the sometimes-awkward attempts at humor and always enjoyed a good laugh when one of his tricks hit the mark.
The first of his senior year pranks was when he taped Batman photos all over the pull-down screen in Ms. Lyman’s classroom. She was an avowed worshipper of the “caped crusader.” When it came time to start her customary PowerPoint presentation, she pulled on the cord and the entire class erupted. Having a great sense of humor, Ms. Lyman fawned and pawed at the photos, then fanned herself until the laughter died down.
Collin’s second strike was the time he duct-taped an airhorn underneath Mr. Harris’ adjustable office chair during lunch, so when he finished another one of his boring lectures and sat down at the end of a long, dull fifth period, the blare of the horn woke everyone up—in his classroom and every classroom down the hall. Even though Emily was next door, it made her laugh knowing who was behind it.
There was also the time Collin brought a bag of Oreo’s in his lunch and shared them with everyone in the group and slyly watched their faces as they bit into them and tasted minty toothpaste instead of the usual cream filling.
Emily’s favorite, however, was the way Collin asked her to Senior Prom. He sent Charlie to the front door with a basket strapped to his back, making his phone call as Charlie trotted up the steps, informing her that there was a special delivery waiting on the porch. When Emily answered the door, Charlie excitedly greeted her with kisses and a wagging tail. Inside the basket, Emily found carefully arranged cupcakes, each with a letter scribed in frosting: “PROM?” The note inside the basket informed her to send Charlie back to the truck with just one cupcake—either the one with a “Y” or the one with an “N.” As expected, Charlie came bounding back to the truck with the “Y” cupcake, which spilled onto the pavement as he leapt up to meet Collin who was sitting on the tailgate, taking in the scene with his digital movie camera.
That was April. Collin had managed to keep the relationship vibrant for months despite Emily’s displeasure over his lack of drive. Maybe he could figure out a way to make it last until the pieces of his long-term game plan fell into place.
Chapter Ten
Senior Year—Emily
Edison High School
Huntington Beach, California
“That boy will only be a burden to you.”
“He’s just looking for a free ride.”
“Does he push you to excel or is it the other way around?”
“You’ll be happier with someone who shares your passion for medicine and science.”
Her mother’s words, spoken during brief moments of intentional and sometimes affectionate parenting during their long summer travels, replayed over and over in Emily’s already-overloaded head during the opening weeks of her senior year.
With her mother’s gently uttered cautions playing in the background, Emily paid close attention to her charming and playful boyfriend. She loved his boyish zest for life and his carefree, sanguine ways. But she was starting to notice things that bothered her. Differences were becoming starker and she was having trouble reconciling her heart with her head.
While Emily spent every spare minute thinking about and working toward her college education, and preparing for a meaningful career, Collin wandered around with his head in the clouds, pulling pranks, getting laughs, and avoiding the serious decisions in his life. He was aimless and disengaged.
Despite their differences in mindset and focus, deep down, Emily loved Collin dearly. But she understood what her mother meant and worried that she would be disappointed with her own life if she ended up married to him. Doubts began to creep in, and she felt that prolonging their relationship would only hurt both of them worse.
She knew she had to break it off. She just didn’t know how to do it, not when he was so good at making her laugh and forget her troubles. Not when his smile made everything inside melt. Not when he held her hand and listened to her every problem. Not when he looked at her in a way that made her feel like a queen.
Emily was conflicted. She couldn’t end something that felt so right. She didn’t want to, and he kept proving why she needed him. First it was how he proved to be a rock for her around the time of Tommy’s passing, his funeral, and its aftermath. She leaned on Collin more than ever during those dark weeks. Then it was his hijinks aimed at cheering her up and all the effort Collin put into making her forget her problems. Finally, it was Charlie and the cupcakes and the Prom invitation.
She loved him and loved spending time with him. How could end it? Why would she when he was so good at filling the empty parts of her life. Maybe she didn’t have to end it like her mother said. Maybe she could make it work.
Or maybe she could just let things run their course naturally. Once they were separated by a continent, both would drift until they weren’t “a thing” anymore.
For her part, Emily was truly excited about Senior Prom. She knew Collin was putting together major plans. Curiosity and anticipation built as the big day drew near.
Collin made good on his promise to make it fun and first-class, while their group of friends remained safe and sober. A ride in a limo, a nice dinner at an expensive restaurant before the dance, a fun and romantic evening at the dance, followed by a “Back to the Future” marathon and ping pong tournament at his house with the whole gang afterwards. His dad whipped up a batch of his famous crepes, home-grown strawberries, and fresh squeezed orange juice for the after-Prom party. It was a hit. The family room, back porch, and pool house were crowded with other teens who were mostly sober and shared Collin’s values. They (and their parents) wanted to return home in one piece at the end of the night.
Although the evening was a hit and Emily enjoyed it as much, if not more, than anyone, things still weren’t quite right. She bit her lip and decided to save any serious discussions for another time. Why ruin a perfectly good evening such talk?
The conversation did wait, at least until the night of their graduation.
Collin spent a week, she later learned from Rob, planning and preparing a special dinner for Emily. He adorned the pool house with lights, candles, flowers, a fancy tablecloth, and his mother’s fine china. He even had floating decorations in the pool. His mom helped him prepare a gourmet meal that included all of Emily’s favorites—feta and herb crusted salmon, braised potatoes with garlic, lightly grilled vegetables, and chocolate truffle pie for dessert. He couldn’t have tried any harder to make the evening perfect for her.
But that’s the evening “the talk” just kind of happened and blew everything up. It was obvious she caught Collin unaware. It surprised her, too. She wasn’t planning on it—not that night, anyway.
The graduation speeches laced with inspiring thoughts about shaping the future and of accomplishing great things must have combined with the brew of suggestions and doubts her mother had continually sprinkled in for the past two years. Her emotions were jumbled up. She didn’t want to talk, but Collin kept insisting she tell him what was wrong. In that moment, everything Emily had been holding back for months rushed out, like a dam bursting, destroying everything in its path.
As Emily spoke, she realized she sounded more like someone giving a rehearsed book report than anything else.
“I have something I need to tell you,” she said. “This is not going to work.”
Collin, looking bewildered, said softly, “What are you talking about?”
“You and me. It’s not going to work.”
Collin set down his utensils, his face showing his stunned comprehension. He sat back in his chair, bewildered.
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br /> “We’re two different people who want totally different things out of life. We have different approaches and different ambitions. It’ll never work out.” She was talking fast.
Collin had no rebuttal. What would he say? She had just ripped his heart out and stomped on it.
“We come from very different families were raised very differently. It will never work out,” Emily added.
Collin swallowed hard and looked out through the sliding glass door at the candles floating in the pool. The color drained from his face.
While he wasn’t looking at her, she hurried and finished her planned remarks.
“I think it will be better for us both if we just end it now and not pretend this relationship is going to last. I mean, it’s obvious, isn’t it? You like surfing and sports and movies. I like math and science and music. I would rather go to an opera or play. You would rather go to an Angels game. I want to be something and somebody. Make a difference. Stand out. Contribute to the advancement of mankind through science. You don’t even have the foggiest idea what you want to do or become. All you’ve managed to figure out is that it would be cheaper to live at home and go to Mount SAC. That’s the level of your ambition? That’s the sum of your career planning? That’s pathetic. We’re just not right for each other. It’s time we face the facts and move on.”
With that, she spun out of her chair, ran out of the pool house, and exited the yard through the side gate.
Emily sobbed the whole way home and hardly came out of her room for two days.
Chapter Eleven
Collin—Freshman Year
Mount San Antonio College
Walnut, California
It was a miserable start to summer for Collin, lost in his pining over Emily. Every dream he’d had blew up the night of graduation. Life without her was unchartered territory. She’d been a staple all through high school. He had loved her since that day she rushed to his aid, tissue in hand, and called out the school bully.
Had she changed from being that tough but sweet girl?
Or had he changed from being a defender of the weak to just being weak?
Not only was he without a girlfriend, but a friendship had also been vaporized. A pillar of support and promise in his life gone.
For two weeks Collin barely left the house, except to go to work. When he was awake, he moped about like a lost puppy. He was wallowing in a sea of self-pity.
Though Sarah and Henry tried their best to cheer him up, even taking him to an Angel’s game and spending a day at Disneyland with him, nothing worked. He was as melancholy as any jilted lover could possibly be. It seemed that nothing could pull him out of it.
Sarah called in reinforcements. Once they had returned from their graduation trips, Rob and Lukas came to the rescue. They forced Collin to realize he couldn’t languish forever in the quagmire of unfulfilled expectations.
“Get up, you lovesick waste of space.” Rob was in Collin’s room at 6:30 a.m. on a Saturday morning late in June. “This is no way to show the girl of your dreams how wrong she was.”
“Yeah, she would not be impressed with this,” said Lukas. “You can do better. And you must.”
Collin groaned and dug deeper under his covers.
Rob and Lukas moved in, each taking a firm handful of blanket and comforter and pulling and wrestling until Collin’s head emerged. “Stop being so pitiful,” barked Lukas in his Germanic accent. “You’re going to get up and take us surfing. Now.”
Collin tried to resist, but realized it was useless. These guys cared enough to wake up early and force him into action. They weren’t going to just leave.
“Come on, man,” said Rob. “The breakers are setting up like you wouldn’t believe. There’s a nice swell coming up from Mexico, just like the weatherman predicted. Now, let’s go claim our spot before those newbs from Newport beat us to it.”
Lukas was rifling through Collin’s drawers, tossing him a pair of swim trunks, a hoodie with the surf shop logo on it, and an old, faded T-shirt. Rob kicked Collin’s favorite pair of flip flops toward the bed. “Get up. We gotta go.”
“We’ve got donuts and OJ in the car,” added Lukas. “No time to waste.”
Ninety seconds later, Collin was practically being dragged down the curved, oak-trimmed staircase toward the front door by his two best friends. Sarah Cook stood in the hallway between the family room and the garage, just off to the side of where the stairs emptied into the front foyer. She held a coffee mug with both hands. She smiled at Rob and Lukas and mouthed the words, “Thank you.”
Similar scenes played out frequently during that summer. Collin was not allowed to be idle for too long. If he wasn’t working or surfing, he was with Rob or Lukas or both. Most of their get-togethers revolved around some sort of physical activity—a workout at the gym, volleyball on the beach, a bike ride on the strand, or a weekend of hiking near Lake Arrowhead—and ended with food. Had it not been for all the exertion and the high metabolic rate of the young, the burgers and shakes and ice cream and pizza would have turned Collin into the Michelin man with rolls of fat everywhere.
The coaxing from Rob and Lukas had succeeded in aiming Collin in a good direction and pumping him up about reaching his potential and getting the most out of life. They helped him reestablish goals and got him excited about them. Surfing, earning money, and improving his conditioning were just a few to get him started. From there, he took off on his own.
While working forty hours a week at the surf shop during the summer, Collin found time to ride the waves before and sometimes after his shift most days to keep his mind off his broken heart. At his boss’s urging, he entered a pro-am surf competition, where he placed third for amateurs.
Nearly every dollar he earned found its way to his savings account. Collin knew life would get more expensive once he was done with junior college. Staying focused on preparing for a better future became an obsession that summer, like proving himself to an invisible onlooker.
Collin also spent hours reading, developing a voracious appetite for all kinds of books. Many of the chosen tomes were geared toward self-improvement. Collin studied the fine art of setting and reaching attainable goals and celebrating milestones. As a result, he began to set goals for nearly everything: the number of waves he could ride in an hour; the number of times he could rip the lip on a three-footer; how long he could stay under water as he deck-dived below the waves. He started jogging on the beach almost every day. Time in the gym, even without Rob or Lukas, became part of his routine, as well. Anything to distract him from the void inside where Emily had once resided.
But, like all good things, the last summer had to end. Rob left for Arizona in the middle of August to get moved into his dorm room and prepare for the first week of classes. By the end of August, Lukas headed out to Massachusetts for Freshman Orientation at MIT.
A week after Lukas’s departure, Collin arrived on the campus of Mount San Antonio College in Walnut, an hour’s drive up the 57, full of mixed emotions but ready to open a new chapter. As therapeutic as his time with his two best friends had been, and despite their urgings to “let her be dead to you,” he still couldn’t shake the images of Emily storming out of the pool house or the sting of her rebuke. The mourning process had not yet finished its course. How he wished she was with him. How he wished he could call her and borrow some of her inner strength like he used to do when life got overwhelming.
Collin sat in the cab of his truck in the student parking lot, drawing in one breath after another, steeling himself. A stream of other cars followed him and found parking spots. Doors opened and shut, people he didn’t know shouldered backpacks they hauled out of back seats and trunks. They all looked eager, ready to go. He watched them, trying to absorb their energy. Despite the well-kept beauty of the gardens and grounds of the campus and the buzz of activity in the parking lot, the heartache lingered, exacerbating just how small and alone he felt as he stepped out of his old truck and followed the others toward
campus.
He closed his eyes and prayed for strength.
He wanted more than anything to make himself something that Emily would want, even though he had spent the whole summer trying to block her out of his mind.
* * *
For his first semester of junior college, Collin loaded up on general education classes like History, English, College Algebra, Physical Science, Geography, and a music class for some elective credits. With his friends all scattered around the country, Collin dedicated himself to his future success, spending ten to twelve hours a day either in class or studying.
Finally, he had some direction in his life—and something to brag about in terms of his grades. A month into the semester, he shared his new-found academic prowess with his friends. “Lukas,” he said in a group email to him and Rob, “got an A on my Algebra test. I’m pretty stoked. The FOIL method you taught me stuck and finally makes sense.”
Lukas responded late that night. “Awesome. Don’t know why you sound surprised. I always knew you were bright enough to be a 4.0 student.”
Rob’s response was classic. “Way to show me up, bro. I barely got a B on my last test. Let’s wager on the semester, k? He with the worse GPA buys dinner for the other one. Not you, Lukas. You’re not part of this bet. We already know you won’t be buying.”
“You’re on,” said Collin.
Though he would have denied it if anyone had asked him, he hoped that somehow Emily would be curious enough to ask about him and maybe find out that he was turning things around and working on a plan.
In his mind, he thought about trying to get through to her at Christmas. Maybe I’ll send Charlie to her door with a copy of my transcript.
After thinking that one through, he concluded that it would be pretty unimpressive to show off his JC report card to someone who was killing it at Harvard.