Brittany graduated high school as its sole valedictorian and received a full scholarship to a local university. College began a time of genuine triumph for Brittany. During her first year, she finally shed her excess poundage and with the extra money from her scholarship, embarked on a complete makeover of her wardrobe. She also acquired a temporary boyfriend who was tall and blonde. And while he may not have been well-endowed intellectually, Brittany tolerated him long enough to return home and parade him at the high school homecoming because he was composed of flesh and blood rather than sighs.
Brittany herself was blessed with an acute intelligence which she applied to science and math with equal success. She did tend to reinforce certain stereotypes about style-challenged female science students: ski vests paired with ill-fitting jeans, feet clad in the occasional mis-matched socks, but after all, who noticed? She was still one of the few of Euro-American women who was reasonably attractive. Thick around the bones, perhaps, a bit brash. But still she had naturally sandy blonde hair.
Unfortunately for Brittany, intelligent, Euro-American boys in the math and sciences were insufficiently numbered. She sniffed that her professors couldn’t speak English properly: words like “jacket” came out “jicket” and the students were apt to display an embarrassing degree of abject enthusiasm. And the labs. Always located in the basement. Ugh. Yet despite the lack of available men, Brittany forbore these trials because, frankly, she enjoyed the work itself.
Now as is common knowledge, every undergraduate must endure a minimum of introductory sciences, even for Bio-Chem majors such as Brittany. Thus it was that Brittany found herself in an Intro to Chemistry class, prepared to utilize the spare time for other homework.
By happy chance, the first day of class also ushered in a decidedly cute male specimen.. She sat near him and he flashed her a shy smile. Brittany felt her stomach flutter. During the rest of lecture (which Brittany ignored), she planned her next outfit: something that would show herself to advantage. Perhaps a dress, demure yet decisive.
Next class Brittany found a seat next to the same boy, one over for discretion. She threw a smile his way. Occasionally she crossed her legs; after all, she had worn a dress.
As for Tony, he primarily noticed that the girl next to him didn’t take notes. At the end of the hour, Tony leaned over the vacant chair, “So, don’t you need to take notes?”
Brittany gave a becomingly impish grin, “Well, actually, no. I’m actually a Bio-Chem major but I need this for my G.E.’s—isn’t that stupid?”
Tony agreed. “Yeah, that’s why I’m taking it, too. So, I guess you already know this stuff?”
Again, Brittany smiled. She twirled a bit of hair around her finger: “Well, I guess you could say that,” she admittedly coyly. “I guess this is kind of a ‘mick’ [-ey mouse] class for me.”
“Really?” Tony’s brain began to click, “You know, I’m having a little trouble with the formulas—maybe we could get together sometime and you could help me?”
Brittany hesitated strategically.
“We could meet at Larston café in North campus—I don’t want you to think I want free tutoring or anything.”
She acquiesced. “Okay, we can do that. How about later today? I’m free after two.”
It was Tony’s turn to hesitate. “Oh, well, actually I’m getting together with some friends…” and for the first time Tony witnessed the downturn of Brittany’s mouth. It was extremely becoming. Tony found himself wavering.
“Oh, well,” Brittany replied airily, “I suppose we can meet some other time.”
“Well, how about later on tonight? I’ll treat you to a burger and then we can study at the student union lounge after.”
*
It was Brittany’s dream come true. As every one who has had a “study” date knows, it is more date and far less study. And so it was, as red-blooded young Americans will do during study dates, they talked. The mutual history revealed was less important than the process of sharing, lasting through the early morning hours. Throughout, Brittany tilted her head to the side, her giggles punctuating the night. Finally, Tony walked Brittany home and watched as she unlocked her apartment door. He gave one last smile and waved goodbye.
Inside her bedroom door, Brittany exhaled an entranced sigh. She was lovestruck. He was intelligent, fair of hair and skin and he harbored no suspicious genes. He was, like Brittany, an admirably pale-skinned “mutt”. He also seemed on his way to something great. Blonde hair in a man is practically a guarantee of success. That he was currently in the architecture program could be an added bonus.
*
Brittany finished her undergraduate career with none too few accolades. Unfortunately people with undergraduate degrees in pure math and sciences find it difficult to find gainful employment in their chosen fields. These fields do tend towards requiring advanced degrees. But Brittany was not inclined to continue on to graduate school.
Tony planned to graduate the same year and although it was without the honors bestowed on Brittany, he had a promising career ahead. Brittany knew that she could not pursue glory in the sciences, having finally settled upon the insurance industry as safe, if not entirely riveting. However she decided that Tony could achieve notoriety building grandiose monuments to Western superiority, thus satisfying her own career ambitions vicariously.
But after Tony graduated, he embarked upon an occupational detour Brittany thought was decidedly unsavory. Unwarranted, in fact, for if travel was what Tony desired, there was a perfectly acceptable package tour through western Europe beginning not three days after graduation ceremonies. Why did he want to go to China, she wondered peevishly. Come to that, what was in China but toilets that didn’t flush, a glaring lack of motorized transportation, and foods incorporating suspicious cuts of beef? Haggis at a local Irish pub, this was what Tony needed. Come to that, this was what Brittany needed, a good dose of European romance before she embarked upon her less than lustrous career as an insurance actuary.
Tony insisted, however, on pursuing this “China adventure,” and not simply for a respectable American vacation of two weeks, or even for a post-graduation celebration of three months. No, he had decided to travel throughout China for a year, had even lined up a job as an English teacher in a far off village in some province called Hebei, of all things!
“I’ve wanted to go to China for some time, Brittany. And this is the best time to go. After college.”
“What’s so great about China? What’s wrong with Europe? I want to go to Europe!”
“I told you that I was interested in the culture there. You remember that class…”
Brittany cringed at the memory. It had dominated their date conversations for weeks after.
“…and I want to see it for myself.”
Brittany gave a small hrrmph. This was clearly an impulse that required nipping. She began her entreaty with judiciously placed threats combined with enticing alternatives. None of these worked, but she had not yet demonstrated her full arsenal: a spectacular waterworks display. At first it was a delicate tear or two rolling silently down her cheek, then a dainty snuffle into a crumpled tissue, and finally a crescendo of sobbing that would have put Scarlet O’Hara to envy.
Surprisingly for both Brittany and Tony, he withstood this onslaught with firmness. Despite her sniffling, Brittany was enchanted—she realized that Tony was a better catch than she had imagined heretofore. Tony was of admirable parentage and now it was clear that he actually possessed something of a backbone. Not that it would be good to encourage its exercise in her defiance. Yet, molded properly, this could translate into great success. Brittany imagined a large house, surrounding acreage that was modestly sizeable and the envious faces of her friends, neighbors and, most of all, her high school tormentors. For her dream house resided in the upscale neighborhood of the “popular” set in high school. Brittany didn’t believe in dreaming far from home.
She hiccupped strategically and then sniffled with finality.
“All right. You’re clearly being stubborn.”
Tony, surprised that she capitulated with relative ease, immediately felt chastened. He relented, “Well, honey, it’s only for a year. Then I’ll come back and everything will be the way it was. I promise.”
“Really?” Brittany felt hope surging once more, “Well, alright. You have to promise not to see anyone else, okay? I mean, I want us to be faithful this whole time. And we’ll have to buy you a phone card, can you call long distance in China? We’ll talk on the weekend, right? And we should plan what you’re going to take, especially medicine. You never know what kind of diseases they have over there!”
And so it went, with Brittany usurping the arrangements. She decided that the trip might prove beneficial after all because it would finally excise this exotic obsession from Tony’s system. He would be ready to tackle the world of architecture with a fresh attitude. In fact, his trip to China might add a certain caché to his resume, an extra selling point that few other architects would possess at such a young age. Suddenly, Brittany was glad for her Tony’s trip, the depth it gave him and the added air of sophistication it vicariously lent her.
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