Shelly Part 1 The Good Girl

The smell of the sea. It seeped in through the open window, a miasma of boiled cabbage blended with week-old fish and salt so strong it stung my eyes. I drew a deep breath, letting the scent work its way into me. I was suddenly overcome with sweet nostalgia, of returning to a place of youthful bliss. I remembered cool green water under a boundless sky, the gritty touch of sand between my toes. It was hard to believe that the last time I had been to the ocean, my parents had still been together. It seemed too long ago for something so fresh in my mind.

“Shelly?”

I jumped at the sound of my mother’s voice, at the trace of irritated reproach. I had learned that tone long ago, the slight slowing of the second syllable for emphasis that signaled I was about to meet the hard edge of discipline. Funny how my mom never lost that with me. Even at eighteen, the child in me never forgot. “Sorry. What’d you say?”

The edges of her lips quirked down. “Which dorm are you in, honey?” was what she asked me. You’re wasting my time, her tone said.

“Uh.” I picked up a scrap of paper, flipped it over. “Anacapa.”

My mother turned her head to relay what I’d said to the man in the booth. Left here, down a few blocks, turn right, unload there, park around the corner. I listened without really taking notice. My mother would take care of it. She always took care of everything.

I leaned my head against the edge of the window, letting the wind grab and twirl the long brown strands of my hair. After only a few hundred feet, the car slowed and turned down another street, giving me my first view of the dorm. It was an odd building, a squat cinder block of an entrance with taller arms reaching out, one going right and then bending left towards us, the other coming out and then bending off to the left. By the campus map, I knew that there were two more like it on the other side. From above, it would look something like a swastika, or an angular, four-armed squid. It was all very drab and gray and uninspired, but perhaps that was the point.

My mother pulled up to the curb and put the car in park but left the engine running. “Let’s get your things out right here. You can stay with them while I go park, ‘kay?”

I circled the rumbling SUV to the driver’s side, where she was already unloading the last of my possessions into a neat row on the sidewalk. My whole life had been sifted and condensed down into two suitcases, a handbag and a cardboard box. Leaving so much behind had not been easy, but deep down, I really wanted it that way. Starting over made life seem like an adventure again.

My mother climbed back in and rolled down the window. “Just wait here for me, okay?”

I nodded wordlessly, wondering if she thought I might wander off on my own.

Off to my left was the ocean, the cliff dropping down to the sand not fifty steps from the southeast wing of the dorm. The university had been built on the grounds of an old World War II army base, on a fat finger of land that jutted out into the Pacific. Lab buildings and lecture halls peeked out from behind the trees here and there, an amazingly discordant picture of the dominant building styles from the last fifty years.

The front of the dormitory was abuzz with activity. Students and parents lined the concrete entryway and the grass to either side. It was in that moment that it finally hit me. A whole new world had just opened up to me. For the first time in my life, I was in command of my own destiny. The thought was strangely blissful and sobering at the same time.

My mother bustled toward me from across the parking lot. I doubt she even noticed the ocean smell and I know she didn’t realize what it meant to me. “Come on, let’s get you settled in,” she said, as though she had been the one waiting for me. Between us, we managed to carry everything inside.

After a few missteps, we found the hall I to which I had been assigned and marched along the corridor to the door that had my number. Sure enough, the key fit the door and we pressed through the door into the room. Short, gritty carpet, plain walls, nice big window, bed, desk, a chair and closet--nothing else.

“Looks like your roommate isn’t here yet,” My mother said, glancing at the empty bed. “Too bad. I’d hoped to meet her. Do you need help unpacking?”

“No, I’m fine,” I answered, knowing she had no intention of wasting her time on something so trivial.

“Don’t forget orientation on Monday.”

“I know.”

“If you decide you need one, you can get a bike on your credit card, but let me know so I remember to pay it off before the month is up.”

“We talked about that. I think I’ll be fine.”

“And don’t wait ‘til the last minute to get your books.”

“I’ll get them today,” I promised.

She stopped. At first I thought she had run out of things to remind me, but then she began to speak more slowly. “Listen, Shelly. I know you’ve tried hard to stay out of trouble through high school, but things can be really different in college. I need you to promise me you’ll make the right decisions. No drugs or alcohol.”

“Yeah, mom,” I said dismissively, “you know I’m not into that stuff.”

“And be careful around boys. I know you’ve been saving yourself and you really need to keep it up. Wait for the right one to come along. Try to wait until you get married.”

I felt a rush of heat creep into my face. It was the first time I could recall my mother mentioning sex in even an offhand way in front of me. And how could she be so certain I was still a virgin? It made me wonder if my mother possessed some kind of ESP. No, I decided. She was just stating the obvious. The only way I could have had a worse social life was if I had taken up Dungeons and Dragons. “Uh—yeah,” I stammered.

We just sat there in silence. Neither of us was willing to look into each other’s eyes. Finally, she stood up. “Good. Well, I’ve got to get going to beat rush hour. Study hard, honey.”

I felt the tension leave me the moment she stepped out of the room. I let out of long exhale as I flopped back on the bare mattress. I was finally here. College life had begun.

The first week slipped past, the days melting one into another with little to tell them apart. My roommate, Kim, arrived the day after I got there. She was east Indian, though her name and mastery of English marked her as native to the U.S. The most I could say about her is that she was short, slight, and very, very quiet. I attempted on a few occasions to engage her in conversation, but soon gave up in the face of her terse, though polite, responses. I never even figured out what her major was.

I tried, that week of orientation, to thrust myself out into the great, wide social pool. I had never had many friends in high school. In fact I had gotten along better with most of my teachers than with the rest of the student body. My grades had been stellar, but I had graduated with a vague sense of loss, feeling as though I had squandered something I would never be able to get back.

I resolved that things would be different in college but then, one by one, I let opportunities slip me by. Over a month went by and still there was no one I could truly call my friend, whereas my Calculus professor already knew me by name in a class composed of four hundred students. He even asked me if I’d be interested in heading up a study group.

And so, with a mental shrug, I threw myself into my studies and never looked back. Many students change their major at least once after starting college, but I never doubted what I wanted from the beginning. I’d fallen in love with physics from the very moment it was introduced to me. To me, it was the purest science of all, a discipline that sought nothing less than to understand how everything worked. Each law or equation was a journey of rediscovery and insight into the world around me. It was little wonder that for the first midterm, I tied for highest score in the class.

“Oh, that’s so wonderful, honey,” my mother congratulated me on the phone that night. “I’m really proud of you.”

I felt a warm glow at the praise that I knew was heartfelt and twisted the phone cord around my finger. “Yeah, the only thing I missed was in the bonus problem, but I even got partial credit for that.”

“I knew you’d do great. Hey, let me call you back later and talk, okay? I’ve got a meeting with a client tomorrow and I need to get some work done tonight.”

We said our goodbyes and hung up. I didn’t really expect her to call me back, that night or any other for some time. My mother was too busy. At least in that, we had an understanding, I suppose.

Now, settling down for bed, the euphoria of my accomplishment began to die down. It was hard to stay excited about something when there was no one else to share it with. I thought of my mother once more, sounding so happy. Even that wasn’t real. Oh, she was happy, but not for me. To her, it meant nothing more to her than a moment’s bragging to her colleagues at work.

I lay in bed for over an hour, my mind racing, never seeming to find a comfortable position to lie in. At a quarter past eleven, the door creaked open and paused, light spilling in from the hallway casting shadows on the folds of my pillow. The door shut softly and Kim padded over into view, setting her books down carefully on her desk.

I watched with half-lidded eyes as she unfolded a set of pajamas from her closet along with a towel. She glanced my way, I suppose to make sure I was still sleeping, and then began to undress. Oddly, she had never done that in my view before, either waiting until I had left the room, or stepping behind the closet door to change. I watched her pull her sweatshirt over her head and wiggle out of her pants. The clasp of her bra was next. She shrugged out of the filmy garment and let it fall to her lap, exposing the darker patch of her nipples at the tips of moderate but well-formed breasts.

I felt my breath catch in my throat and a flush crept into my face. Kim’s hands came up to cover herself and she peered at me carefully from across the room. I took a deep breath and let it out slowly, settling back into a rhythm that would convince her I was still asleep. She waited for several tense seconds, then let her hands drop back down.