Page 20 of Spectacular Things
Summer Chaperone
“Remember who you are,” Liz reminds Mia when she drops her off outside the coffee shop in Portland. Now a senior in high school, Mia is there to meet Ronald Cork, a Yale alum who has agreed to interview her as part of her college application.
After Liz drives away, Mia checks her watch—she has forty-five minutes to spare. Her mom had needed the car today, so rather than risk arriving on Liz Time, Mia lied to her about when the interview started. Better early than late.
Eventually, Ronald Cork arrives by bicycle. His long, white beard makes him look like Santa, especially when he smiles.
“Mia!” he says, extending one hand as he unsnaps his helmet with the other. “So good to see you!”
“Very nice to meet you, Mr. Cork,” Mia says.
Still shaking her hand, he leans in and confides, “It’s technically Dr. Cork.
” Mia’s cheeks flush—she’d done so much research, and she knew he had a PhD in ethnomusicology, she just hadn’t—“But please, call me Ronny,” he says, interrupting her spiral.
Peering through the coffee shop window, he tells Mia to grab the open table in the corner, and he’ll order their Americanos.
In the last few days, Mia read on half a dozen websites not to let the alumni interviewer pay for anything but also not to come across as uptight.
She freezes, conflicted, until Ronny gestures for her to hurry up and claim the table.
Mia rushes to the corner and reserves their seats just in time, edging out a polished young couple.
From his place in line, Ronny pumps his fist in the air and Mia snaps the hairband on her wrist to reset.
“So what are your plans for the summer?” Ronny asks twenty minutes into the interview.
Mia forces a smile to compensate for the embarrassment roiling in her stomach as she predicts his disappointment or, worse, his pity. Mia’s AP classmates have either unpaid internships that require suit jackets or international volunteer trips involving dinosaur bones in Namibia.
“I’m chaperoning,” Mia says, lifting her eyebrows to acknowledge its mundaneness.
“Chaperoning?” Ronny repeats. “Is that the new terminology for camp counselor?”
“Not exactly.” Mia shifts in her chair, clawing for words that fail to come.
“Are you working at a sobriety house?”
“No,” Mia says with a sigh, defeated. “It’s just—”
“A retirement home!” Ronny suggests. “You’re leading excursions for the elderly?”
“No,” Mia says, her tone sharper than she’d intended. “I’m just taking my sister to soccer tournaments all summer so my mom can work.”
“Really?” Ronny leans forward. “How old is she?”
“Thirteen,” Mia answers, feeling herself land safely in familiar territory.
“But everyone thinks she’s going to be in the Olympics someday.
” Mia finds it easier to talk about Cricket than herself—her sister’s talent is so obvious, so concrete.
She would get into Yale no problem if she promised to play for the Bulldogs.
Ronny tugs on his Santa beard as he processes this, and Mia blushes, because he’s probably wishing he were interviewing the soccer star right now, not the bland older sister with straight A’s and glowing recommendations but unassorted mush for talent.
Mia is just a responsible hard worker who happens to be naturally gifted in STEM.
And while Yale isn’t known for accepting future middle management, Mia agreed to apply to the Ivy because her college counselor had suggested it.
Your scores are remarkable, Ms. Donilon had said on more than one occasion.
Her mother had been ecstatic at the prospect of Mia attending an Ivy League school, especially one with need-based tuition, which in their case would mean free.
“I have an older brother,” Ronny says now, apropos of nothing as he stares out the window at a skateboarder weaving between cars. “He’s gone now, and I miss him terribly, all the time, and you know why?”
“Because he’s your brother?”
“Precisely!” Ronny booms, slamming his fist into the table as if Mia has just answered the hardest question on Jeopardy! His eyes are bright as he explains, “My brother instilled a faith and a confidence in me, and a love for me, that made me who I am today.”
Mia nods and tries not to stare at the crumbs of blueberry scone trapped in his beard.
“What you’re doing, Mia, with this chaperoning business all summer”—Ronny downs the last of his coffee like it’s a much-needed shot of something far stronger—“there’s nothing interesting about it, or exciting, or the least bit academically enriching.”
Ronny’s observation rings all too true, but his need to say it out loud feels like he’s swatting her on the nose with a rolled-up newspaper.
Shame on her for taking up his precious time with her flimsy ambition.
Mia looks down at her lap and tells herself not to cry, not to fall apart under any condition.
Remember who you are, her mother had said.
“But it’s also selfless,” Ronny says, tapping Mia’s coffee cup with his own. “What you’re doing for your sister demonstrates maturity. Taking care of your family, sacrificing your summer for their benefit—it’s noble, and it’s refreshing, and I’m very, very impressed.”