Status: Perhaps, Indefinitely Paused?
Who Said Life Was Easy?
Chapter Five
The year is 2008, the summer before my senior year. I was seventeen, sitting crisscrossed on my bedroom floor talking on the phone with my best friend.
"You're fucking nuts, y'know that?" Her smoldering voice hiding a hint of amusement.
Nena felt a smile creep onto her face, she couldn't help but to object, "Am not. It's not that crazy!"
"Nena, one minute you're a die-hard science nut, next you're a devoted Catholic. Now you're telling me the universe is sending you signs. What, now you're a hippy?"
"First of all, I have to be a die-hard science nut in order to get into med-school. Second, I'm always Catholic, not just when I choose to be. And yes, the universe is sending me signs."
"Do you realize how that makes no sense? Everything you just said contradicts itself!"
"What science doesn't explain, religion fills in the gaps, and when they both fall through, the universe is more than glad to step in." Nena laughed, she couldn't deny how full of holes her logic was.
"Alls I'm sayin' is that you can't have sex and be a Catholic, or believe in evolution and creationism at the same time. OR that the universe is sending you signs! No one is sending you signs, and if they are, they're all leading to la-di-da nutsoland."
Both girls burst into laughter.
Nena enjoyed the pointless conversations she had with her childhood girlfriend, while they didn't always make sense, they gave her good laughs.
A nice escape from everything else.
A chance to not be judged for acting her age.
"I never said I was a good Catholic." Nena giggled.
"I know" More giggles. "I still think you should broaden your horizons, what if you don't get it?? What then?"
Nena paused. Applications for university was this year. And her heart was set on one, and she was going to apply to just that one. No back up schools. No back up plans.
"Then that's the universe's sign that I'm not suppose to go to college."
"Seriously?"
"Yes!"
Nena's heart turned. She wanted nothing more to believe that if she was accepted into this school, it meant something.
That she was meant for something.
That she had some unknown purpose to fulfill.
That it was fate.
A stepping stone to something more.
A reason for all of her suffering.
"I know what you're thinking, Nena. No, this is not what determines your destiny. Sometimes you can be sooo...fucking nuts. You realize that with over sixty-thousand applicants every year, they only accept like ten thousand, right? C'mon be realistic. I don't understand how you can be so sane with all the fucked up stuff you have to go through and yet so, I dunno, diluted when it comes to this."
"I'll think about it."
"You better fuckin' think about it." Her words were harsh, but her tone was loving. "And no signs! Unless they tell you to apply to at least three more colleges, at least"
She heard the front door downstairs slam shut.
Followed by the heavy stampede of feet heading up the stairs.
"Look, I gotta go." Nena whispered into the phone. "I'll text you."
There was roaring laughter and a wafting burning smell slipping underneath her doorway.
She flipped her cell closed.
She heard a deep slurred voice, "Let's have a house party, and get FUUUCKED UP BRO!"
Cheering.
Nena got up and locked her bedroom door.
She wasn't going to have any drunken apes paying her uninvited visits tonight.
Perhaps that was her sign.
She needed a ticket out of this house.
Something full-proof.
Thank you, universe.
"You're fucking nuts, y'know that?" Her smoldering voice hiding a hint of amusement.
Nena felt a smile creep onto her face, she couldn't help but to object, "Am not. It's not that crazy!"
"Nena, one minute you're a die-hard science nut, next you're a devoted Catholic. Now you're telling me the universe is sending you signs. What, now you're a hippy?"
"First of all, I have to be a die-hard science nut in order to get into med-school. Second, I'm always Catholic, not just when I choose to be. And yes, the universe is sending me signs."
"Do you realize how that makes no sense? Everything you just said contradicts itself!"
"What science doesn't explain, religion fills in the gaps, and when they both fall through, the universe is more than glad to step in." Nena laughed, she couldn't deny how full of holes her logic was.
"Alls I'm sayin' is that you can't have sex and be a Catholic, or believe in evolution and creationism at the same time. OR that the universe is sending you signs! No one is sending you signs, and if they are, they're all leading to la-di-da nutsoland."
Both girls burst into laughter.
Nena enjoyed the pointless conversations she had with her childhood girlfriend, while they didn't always make sense, they gave her good laughs.
A nice escape from everything else.
A chance to not be judged for acting her age.
"I never said I was a good Catholic." Nena giggled.
"I know" More giggles. "I still think you should broaden your horizons, what if you don't get it?? What then?"
Nena paused. Applications for university was this year. And her heart was set on one, and she was going to apply to just that one. No back up schools. No back up plans.
"Then that's the universe's sign that I'm not suppose to go to college."
"Seriously?"
"Yes!"
Nena's heart turned. She wanted nothing more to believe that if she was accepted into this school, it meant something.
That she was meant for something.
That she had some unknown purpose to fulfill.
That it was fate.
A stepping stone to something more.
A reason for all of her suffering.
"I know what you're thinking, Nena. No, this is not what determines your destiny. Sometimes you can be sooo...fucking nuts. You realize that with over sixty-thousand applicants every year, they only accept like ten thousand, right? C'mon be realistic. I don't understand how you can be so sane with all the fucked up stuff you have to go through and yet so, I dunno, diluted when it comes to this."
"I'll think about it."
"You better fuckin' think about it." Her words were harsh, but her tone was loving. "And no signs! Unless they tell you to apply to at least three more colleges, at least"
She heard the front door downstairs slam shut.
Followed by the heavy stampede of feet heading up the stairs.
"Look, I gotta go." Nena whispered into the phone. "I'll text you."
There was roaring laughter and a wafting burning smell slipping underneath her doorway.
She flipped her cell closed.
She heard a deep slurred voice, "Let's have a house party, and get FUUUCKED UP BRO!"
Cheering.
Nena got up and locked her bedroom door.
She wasn't going to have any drunken apes paying her uninvited visits tonight.
Perhaps that was her sign.
She needed a ticket out of this house.
Something full-proof.
Thank you, universe.