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  “That’s if I graduate,” I said, sighing. “If it’s already this hard—and I’m not even taking the hard classes—how am I ever going to get through the rest of college?”

  “You’re going to get through it by getting the help you need until you’re in a major where everything makes sense,” Ashley replied. “And I am going to help you with that.” She paused. “You know—I’m going to make a deal with you.”

  “Oh god, what’s the deal?” I sat up, interested in spite of myself.

  “I want you to do my hair—you did such a good job on Jessica’s and I’m totally jelly,” Ashley said, grinning. “And in exchange for you helping me dye my hair pretty colors, I’ll help you on the next essay.” I stared at her for a moment and then began to laugh. It was true that Jessica’s hair had turned out gorgeous; I had always had a knack for hair.

  In fact, I had originally wanted to go to cosmetology school to do hair. When I had been dating Dillon, my plan had been to graduate high school and go directly into cosmetology. But he’d told me over and over again what a waste it was, and how he couldn’t see himself ever being serious about a woman who couldn’t even manage to pull off a degree. I’d believed him—and I had wanted to stay with him for the rest of my life at that point.

  So I had applied to colleges instead, and by the time I’d managed to find the courage to break up with him, I’d been accepted to West Central. Even though I’d managed to reject most of what Dillon had drilled into my head while we’d been dating, I’d never shaken the idea that a degree was better than a certification. Especially since my parents were so happy to hear that I had gotten into college, and that I wanted to get my degree.

  “Okay,” I said, smiling a little. “I will do your hair if you’ll help me write my next essay.”

  “I’m going to need to look at the one you got the grade on to know where to begin,” Ashley told me.

  She looked at me steadily until I got off of the couch and walked across the room to where I’d thrown my backpack. I took a deep breath and unzipped the bag, reaching in to grab my paper. It was right on top of the rest of my things, so it only took me a moment to find it. I didn’t even look at it as I handed it to Ashley.

  “Whatever you think about it, just…please don’t laugh too hard,” I told her. “I know I’m an idiot already—I don’t need to know it any more.” Ashley smiled.

  “I swear I won’t laugh. Why don’t you go down to the Student Union? I think one of the clubs is giving out snacks.”

  “Maybe I can find a worthy offering for the college gods there,” I said ruefully. If nothing else, I thought, it would take my mind off of my terrible grades for a little while. I grabbed my purse and made sure I had my keys and my ID and my phone and went back down to the lobby; I took the stairs instead of the elevator, and by the time I was out of the building, I was already starting to feel a little bit better.

  I ran into Ty halfway across campus. “Hey, babe!” Ty gave me a quick kiss on the forehead, shifting his backpack on his shoulders. “Where you headed to?”

  “To the Student Union to drown my sorrows in free snacks,” I told him. Ty put an arm around my shoulders and fell into step with me, both of us walking toward the Student Union building.

  “Drown your sorrows? What’s wrong?” I half-smiled.

  “I got a D on my history paper,” I told him. “Ashley is looking it over now so she can help me do better on the next one, but I’m pretty sure at this point it’s hopeless.”

  “It’s never hopeless until final grades are in,” Ty said, smiling and giving me another quick kiss. “Did I ever tell you about my freshman Literature class?” I shook my head.

  “No, you didn’t,” I replied.

  “I’m making okay grades now,” Ty explained, “but I swear I nearly failed Introduction to Literature. My first three grades were a D, a C and another D.” He shook his head. “Even if I had ever thought of studying something else than Accounting, that first semester almost destroyed me.” I smiled a little bit.

  “Yeah, well, Literature is the only class I’m doing halfway decently in,” I told him. “I’m barely keeping my head above water in any of my classes.”

  “You’ll get the hang of it,” Ty told me, giving my shoulder a squeeze as we approached the Student Union. “It takes time to adjust. Besides, you haven’t chosen a major yet—once you find that thing you’re awesome at, you’ll do great.”

  I nodded, thinking to myself that I’d already found the thing I was awesome at: hair. I had never in my life stressed out as much about dyeing or cutting or styling someone’s hair as I had in the past nine weeks over my classes.

  We went into the building together and I tried to forget all about my bad grade, telling myself that Ashley and Ty had both told me that there was still time for me to pull my GPA up. I gathered up as many free snacks as I could, sampling a little bit of everything, and thought about what Ty had said about finding my major. I knew for a fact that I was great at hair; but had I really given anything at the college a chance? I’d been so busy wishing that I could do something that I really, truly liked that I might have been sabotaging myself just to be stubborn.

  I should look over the course catalog, I thought to myself as Ty and I headed back to the dorms together. There had to be something that the college had to offer that would get me just as excited as cosmetology school had, didn’t there? I would find whatever it was, and go into that major, and that would make all of it so much easier.

  Chapter Two

  “The test will now begin,” the proctor said at the front of the classroom. I bent my head and looked down at the scantron in front of me, pencil in hand. “You may open your test booklets.”

  I took a deep breath and opened the test booklet, breaking the seal with the end of my pencil. I had been preparing for this moment for weeks; I hadn’t told anyone—not even my father, not even Nicole—about the practice CPA exam, but I’d been working toward taking it.

  I wanted to have some kind of solid, concrete evidence of how ready I was to take the exam at the end of the year, when I graduated. I had told myself over and over again since scheduling the practice exam that I was going to be fine; even if I didn’t get a great score, I would just know where I needed to improve, and that would be fine.

  I knew that Nicole was curious about what I was so busy with so often. I’d had to cancel a few dates over the previous few weeks to take time to prepare for the practice exam. The actual exam was a fourteen-hour marathon test—the practice exam in front of me would only be three hours.

  But it was split into the same sections as the real test: Auditing and Attestation, Financial Accounting and Reporting, Regulation, and Business Environment and Concepts. The practice test was broken up into two portions: the scantron multiple choice part was 108 minutes long, while the simulations part at the end was 72 minutes long.

  As I went through the multiple choice questions one by one, I tried to focus on the test itself. I’d always been a good test-taker; I had gotten a great score on my SATs, only 200 points away from perfect, and did even better on my ACTs. But just knowing how much rode on me passing the CPA exam made me more nervous than any other test I had ever taken in my life.

  I could feel the sweat forming on my back, at my armpits, as I went over one question after another, racking my brain to try and remember a particular regulation, or to come up with a solution to an auditing problem, or balance a financial sheet. I took a deep breath and checked the time every so often, reminding myself that I had been studying the content of the test, that I had been taking mini-tests for months. This is all information you know already, Ty, I told myself as I started to feel a little overwhelmed at the complexity of the questions.

  When I had finished the multiple-choice portion, the proctor gave us a fifteen-minute break and I stepped outside to get some air. It was heading into late fall, and starting to get chilly outside in the afternoons; it was a big contrast to the stuffy air in the clas
sroom where I was taking the test off campus. I took my phone out of my pocket and turned it on, and immediately missed text messages from Nicole flashed across my screen. I smiled to myself. So I managed to do a little bit better on the new History paper than I did on the last one! It’s a C+, but that’s better than a D. I texted back a huge smiley-face emoji and a heart and a kiss.

  That’s great, Nicki-baby! I’m so proud of you. I checked the time; fifteen minutes was going fast and I still needed to go pee before I had to sit through the section with the simulations. I sent Nicole a text telling her I had to be off the phone for a while and then hurried to the bathroom.

  Then I was back in the classroom, my phone turned off and on the desk—to prove it was turned off—and the second part of the test in front of me. I took a deep breath; at least the simulations wouldn’t be as long as the first section. Once I had finished the test, I’d have to wait around for another thirty minutes while a computer scored the exams. The Scantron sheets were already in the process of being scored—there would just be the time it took for the simulations to go into the computer and the computer system to score them.

  And then I would know—reasonably well—how prepared I was for the exam when I graduated in another semester. If I did well enough on the practice test, I could go into final exams for the semester without having to worry so much about the CPA accreditation for a while. I could go home for winter break and actually relax a bit. That’s only if I get a medium-high score or better. Don’t get ahead of yourself, Ty.

  The proctor explained the section according to the test booklet and passed out the booklets and the answer sheets. I listened carefully, listening to the rules for that section. As before, I had to do it on my own—no checking my phone, no cheat sheet, nothing. The goal was to treat the practice test as much as possible like the real exam. Finally I started on the second portion of the test.

  I felt more confident of the simulations than I had during the multiple-choice section, and I got through each question more quickly. By the time I got through all of the questions, I had only three minutes left; I went through the answer booklet and made sure that I had answered everything as correctly and as thoroughly as possible.

  Then all that was left was to turn in my answer sheet, provide my practice test booklet to be destroyed, and wait. Fortunately I was able to use my phone once the test was over and I spent the waiting time texting Nicole and Alex and the rest of my friends; I didn’t tell any of them what I was doing or where I was, but it was a relief to have something to do to take my mind off of the test I had just taken. Whatever your score, it’s okay. You’ll be that much more prepared for the exam after you graduate. It’s just a practice test anyway; nobody is ever going to see it except for you and the practice test company.

  “Score sheets are printed, folks,” the proctor said, and me and about a dozen other people hurried back into the building and into the classroom to collect our score summaries. The proctor called out our names one by one, and one by one we went up and took our score sheets.

  I took mine and left the room right away, just like everyone else; I walked to my car, resisting the urge to sneak a peak until I was alone, reminding myself over and over again that whatever the score was, it wasn’t hugely important—I still had plenty of time to get ready for the exam. I unlocked my car and climbed in. I closed the door behind me, and then I finally, finally looked at my score sheet.

  My stomach fell down to my knees as I stared at the results. I hadn’t exactly failed, but the fact that I’d only gotten a low-medium score hit me harder than I would have thought possible. After months of studying, I had barely done well enough on the practice exam to certify as an accountant—if the test had been the real one. Ironically, the simulations had come out on average more poorly than the multiple-choice, in spite of the fact that I had felt more comfortable with that section.

  I groaned, scrubbing at my face and reading the breakdown over and over again. I had done all right in Regulations; at least there was that. I had done more poorly in Business Environment and Concepts—especially in corporate governance and IT.

  “Fuck,” I said, shaking my head as I read through the details one more time, convincing myself that they were real. “Fucking hell. It would have been better if I’d failed the damn thing.” I threw the score sheet into the passenger seat and started the car. My phone lit up with a text message from Nicole.

  Where are you, anyway? I was hoping to see you to celebrate the fact that I am at least hopefully passing American History. I gritted my teeth; I wanted to spend time with Nicole, but I was in such a miserable mood that I knew I’d just drag her down. She didn’t even know that I was taking the practice exam, but she would notice I was in a bad mood, and she’d pull the details out of me just by being her own sweet, concerned self.

  I decided that I was going to stay away from campus for the rest of the day; I didn’t want to talk to anyone at all about how the practice exam had gone. I just wanted to get the whole thing out of my mind and start studying again the next day. I took a deep breath and wrote a response to Nicole.

  Sorry, babe. I’m running some errands for my parents, I’m a good hour or two away from campus and I think it’s going to take me the rest of the day. I sent it, feeling like a traitor. I was only twenty minutes away from campus; I could just as easily spend a couple of hours with Nicole.

  Instead I went to a bar between campus and the practice test site and had a beer—just one. I drank it as slowly as possible and tried to sort out how I felt about how I’d done on the practice exam. It wasn’t the worst thing that had ever happened to me; but it was definitely a big blow to my ego.

  After all the time I’d spent studying and writing up practice tests from my textbooks, I had barely managed to scrape up a qualifying score on a practice exam. How the hell am I going to get through the fourteen-hour exam if I could just manage to pass the practice? I finished off my beer and decided not to have another one. I had to stop feeling sorry for myself. I had to brush off the low score and get back on top of my exam preparation.

  At least I know I’m doing fine in my classes, I thought wryly as I went back out to my car and started it up to head back to campus. I could practically skip the finals for three of them and still get a decent grade in the classes. I wouldn’t of course—that would be stupid—but it would free me up to get in more study time for the CPA exam.

  I briefly considered texting Nicole and telling her that I would be on campus after all, to suggest that we study together; but I knew that if I invited her to my dorm I would just get distracted and we’d end up having sex. On the one hand, that would definitely cheer me up. On the other hand, I wouldn’t get anything done. I would have to keep to my cover story of being away from campus.

  I sighed and started off toward campus, figuring out the best way to get back into my dorm without anyone noticing me. Fortunately by the time I’d get there most everyone would either be in night classes, the dining hall, or at an event—the dorms would be almost completely abandoned, and it was likely no one would see me. I felt terrible about lying to Nicole, but I couldn’t think of any way to get myself out of it other than just sticking with the lie. I’d see her again soon enough, maybe even the next day. I’d have to make it up to her later.

  Chapter Three

  I was sad that Ty was off campus for the day; in spite of the good news I had gotten on my American History essay, I was still stressing out over my classes. Ashley was on a date with someone, and I was sitting in the dorm room alone, feeling a little sorry for myself. I had decided to go over my Introduction to Psychology chapters again, just on the hope that I might actually be able to get a high enough score on the final to pass the class. I switched the TV over to Ashley’s Apple TV controller and set it to play the first season of Supernatural just to have something on in the background, and settled in to get some studying done.

  I opened by textbook and my binder full of notes and flash cards and took
a sip of the coffee I’d gotten from the dining hall at dinner. I checked my phone, more out of a desperate sense of not wanting to have to study than any real expectation that anyone would have texted me; but Ty had. I smiled to myself, reading his message. I wish I was with you right now. I thought about him, out running errands for his parents, or maybe having dinner with them. I wished he were in the room with me, even if I knew that would mean that I wouldn’t get any actual studying done.

  Me too, I wrote back. I’m trying to get through Psych studying. So far it’s just as annoyingly difficult to understand as ever. I thought about my classes and cringed. It seemed absolutely impossible that I would manage to pull through at the end of the semester with anything better than a low C average—and that was assuming that I could manage to pull off good scores on my final exams and essays. I had next to no room for any lower grades on anything for the rest of the semester.

  You’re doing okay overall, Ty messaged back. And as long as you don’t land yourself on academic probation, you still have plenty of time to get your GPA up. You’re a freshman! I smiled glumly at my phone, thinking about what Ty had written to me—what he had told me every time I had worried about my grades. I reminded myself that at least in the mandatory freshman classes—Introduction to Academic Life and Freshman Seminar—I was getting a solid pass, on a pass-fail grading scale. It wasn’t much, but it might bolster my GPA. From what I understood, a “Pass” counted as a solid B.

  But I was barely making a C in Psychology. I might make a C in American History if I managed to do well on the final paper and final exam. Literature I would have a C+ or a B in. Statistics I was going to be lucky to get a C- or more likely a D in. Part of me wanted to scream that it wasn’t fair—all of my professors seemed to assume that I had come to college knowing a lot more than I had. But considering how many of my classmates just nodded along, looking confident and as if they understood everything just fine, I felt like I was the slow person in the gifted class.