The Columbia alum lives in one of those grand mansions on the west side of town. She’s a tall, willowy, dark-haired woman dressed in an African print kaftan with black leggings underneath. She greets me with a kind smile and a handshake.
“Welcome, Kennedy!” she says. “I’m Geraldine Watkins, but you can call me Watts. All my friends do.”
“Thank you … Watts,” I reply as she leads me into the house.
The first thing I see when I step into the living room is her wall of diplomas. And I literally mean an entire wall. She must have every degree there is to get. The spaces that aren’t occupied by PhDs or master’s degrees are filled with framed photographs of Watts in all sorts of exotic-looking places. Rain forests and mountains and deserts.
I suddenly become ten times more intimidated than I was when I pulled up to the curb a few minutes ago.
“Wow!” I say, stopping to look at a picture of her posing next to a cactus, surrounded by sand dunes. “Is this New Mexico?”
She stops in her tracks, her body visibly stiffening. “That’s the Kalahari Desert.” Then, as if she’s afraid I might be extra clueless, adds, “In Africa.”
I immediately feel my face flood with shame. “Oh,” I fumble. “Right. Well, it’s a beautiful photograph. That must have been a wonderful trip.”
Her face pales. “We went on an anti-poaching mission and stumbled upon over twenty slaughtered elephant carcasses.”
“Oh,” I say again, berating myself. But honestly, how was I supposed to know that from a stupid picture? It’s not like she’s standing next to one of the elephant carcasses. “That’s very … sad.”
Sad?
I’m a writer and I couldn’t come up with a more creative adjective than sad?
“Hmm,” Watts says ambiguously as she takes a seat on a large red armchair in the center of the room and gestures for me to take the couch across from her, next to a droopy potted plant.
“I think your ficus needs some water,” I say with a chuckle, trying for a joke.
But Watts clearly doesn’t find it amusing. I can actually see her jaw clench. “That’s not a ficus. It’s a Ceropegia woodii. It’s a South African flowering plant. I brought it back from Swaziland. It’s supposed to look like that.”
The terseness of her tone makes my stomach seize. Apparently instead of studying interview questions I should have been studying exotic plants and anti-poaching expeditions. I wonder if I should just throw in the towel and leave now.
But then, a moment later, the most adorable fluffy white dog comes galloping into the room, and my spirits lift. I love dogs! And dogs always love me.
I smile and bend down. “Hello, there! Aren’t you the cutest thing I’ve ever seen?”
The dog makes a vicious snarling face and snaps at me. I let out a yelp and jump back onto the couch.
Great. Now I’ve pissed off the dog, too.
“Sorry about that,” Watts says, scooping the little white fluff ball into her lap and scratching his head. “This is Klaus. He doesn’t like to be approached by strangers. Unless you have organic duck treats. And he only speaks German.”
I clear my throat awkwardly. “German?” I confirm.
“Ja. Ich habe ein Jahr in Heidelberg studiert und spreche jetzt mit Klaus Deutsch, um die Sprache nicht zu vergessen.”
Oh God. I have no idea what she just said. Did the interview already start? Was that the first question? Was I supposed to learn German? None of the websites said anything about an interviewer asking questions in a foreign language!
Watts laughs. “How rude of me. I’m sure you don’t speak German.”
I sag in relief. “No. I’m sorry. I don’t.”
“I was saying I studied abroad in Heidelberg for a year and I practice the language with Klaus. So I don’t lose it.” She turns her face back to the dog who gives her a wet kiss on the lips. “Nicht wahr, Klaus? Nicht wahr? Runter!”
The dog dutifully jumps down from her lap.
“Sitz!” Watts says. The dog sits.
“Braver Hund!” Watts praises as she takes a piece of mystery meat from the pocket of her kaftan and gives it to the dog. I’ve never seen anything devour something so passionately as Klaus devours that treat.
Watts laughs again. “He simply loves those organic duck treats. I buy them at the farmers’ market. They cost a pretty penny but he won’t do tricks for anything less.”
I nod as though I understand. As though I, too, have a small yappy dog with expensive taste who only speaks German.
“Hol dein Spielzeug!” she says to Klaus, and the dog scuttles out of the room, returns a second later with a stuffed pineapple, and begins gnawing on it.
Watts turns her attention to me with a smile. “That’ll keep him busy for a while.” She grabs a manila folder from the nearby coffee table and flips it open, glancing briefly at my application inside. “So tell me, Kennedy. Why do you want to go to Columbia?”
I take a deep breath and sit up straighter. This is one of the questions I anticipated. And I am ready. “Well, I want to be a journalist and Columbia has one of the best journalism programs in the country. Plus, I’m a huge fan of the East Coast and the significance that the city of New York has played in our nation’s history.”
I release the breath. Excellent start. Just as I rehearsed. Watts nods and jots down a few notes on my application.
“And have you always wanted to be a journalist?”
I’m prepared for this question, too. “Actually, no. I’ve always loved to write, but I stumbled upon journalism by accident. You see, on the first day of freshman year, my best friend Laney and I were looking for the debate team meeting…”
My voice trails off.
My best friend Laney.
More like my traitorous, backstabbing former best friend Laney.
“Go on,” Watts prompts me.
I blink, feeling the moisture begin to pool in my eyes.
Get it together, Kennedy! Do NOT cry in this interview.
“Sorry, where was I?”
“You were saying you were looking for the debate team meeting,” Watts prompts with a friendly smile.
I clear my throat. “Right. Sorry! We were looking for the debate team meeting and instead we wandered into the newspaper office and…”
And then she stole my boyfriend and lied to my face for three months, all the while pretending to be my friend.
No! Stop it! Stop it! Stop it! Do not let Laney ruin this for you.
“And the rest was history!” I finish quickly, adding a grin so big and fake that it feels like my cheeks are going to break.
Watts smiles and writes something down. “So, I’ve been reviewing your application and I have to say, I’m impressed by all that you’ve accomplished.”
I beam. “Thank you.”
“I mean, editor in chief of the Southwest Star? It’s an excellent paper.”
“You’ve read it?” I blurt out, feeling my muscles uncoil. Maybe this isn’t going as horribly as I thought.
She laughs. “Yes, and it’s extremely well done. Especially that story in the last issue about the feral cats living in the park.”
My face falls. That was Laney’s story. And apparently she was already hooking up with Austin when she wrote it. Was she lying in his bed with her laptop while she typed it? Was he kissing her shoulder while she emailed it to me with her signature smiley-face-with-glasses sign-off?
“So tell me,” Watts goes on, setting the folder down on her lap. “You’ve accomplished so much in such a short time. You must have made some sacrifices in order to do all of that. What would you say is your biggest regret thus far?”
I knew she’d ask this. I just knew it. I puff up my chest and refresh my smile. “I would have to say my biggest regret is…”
Not going to the Windsor Academy and choosing a stupid boy who turned out to be a two-timing scumbag.
I clear my throat and start again. “My biggest regret would have to be…”
Trusting my best friend and believing her when she told me she didn’t even want to go to Austin’s stupid house to watch the stupid comedy special.
Watts smiles and nods for me to continue.
“My biggest regret,” I try for the third time, “is probably working too hard and not taking enough time for myself…” I trail off again, my vision clouding over.
“What do you mean by that?” Watts prompts. She probably thinks I’m a total moron by now. I can’t even finish a freaking sentence!
I look down and realize my hands are shaking. I tuck them between my legs. “I mean, my biggest regret is not thinking of myself. Or of my future.”
Wait, no. That’s not in the script.
“Go on,” Watts encourages.
“I’ve made some pretty crappy choices,” I say before realizing I just said crappy to my alumni interviewer.
Watts looks startled but composes herself quickly. “What kind of choices?”
“All the wrong ones!” I blurt out, throwing my hands in the air.
Oh God. Stop talking. Stop talking NOW.
But I can’t. I can’t stop now. It’s all tumbling out of my mouth faster than I can even comprehend what I’m saying.
“My entire high school experience was a mistake. One giant, freaking mistake. I didn’t do what I was supposed to do. I didn’t choose the right path. I chose the wrong one. And now I’m at a crappy public school where the locker doors don’t even stay on and the grass is itchy and the desks are broken and you never remember which desk is broken, so you sit in it again and again, and it tips over every time and everyone laughs at you while you think about how you could have been somewhere else. You could have been at the best school in the state. But you aren’t. You chose the boy. The stupid, stupid boy who misuses simple phrases and laughs at fart jokes. Because you were fourteen! These kinds of life-altering decisions shouldn’t rest in the hands of people who have barely finished puberty. They can’t handle it. They choose wrong. And now I’m stuck in this life that I wasn’t supposed to be in to begin with, and you’ll probably reject me because that’s what my life has become. So I might as well get used to it, right?”
When I finish ranting Watts is staring at me. Even Klaus has stopped chewing on his stuffed pineapple and is gaping at me with his head tilted.
Apparently, he does understand English.
“I should probably go.” I stand and grab my bag. Watts doesn’t even make a move to stop me or walk me to the door. She just sits there with her mouth open, gawking at me like I’m some poached animal carcass left to rot in the desert.
Which, believe me, is exactly how I feel right now.