“I’m happy to hear it. I’ve long since given up on my other siblings.”
“But please don’t misunderstand me. Building a border wall. Gutting healthcare. Criminalizing abortion. Keeping down the shithole countries. Very much not okay with me, so if you’re going to do it, do it for yourself. Don’t delude yourself that it’s on my behalf, or anyone’s behalf but your own. You really are a bit of a bastard, Harrison, you know.”
He shrugged. He downed the last of his juice. “There are worse things to be.”
“And possibly a bit of a racist.”
“Now that,” he turned to me, “is completely untrue. I’m race-blind. My best friend—”
“Is African American. I know. Blah, blah.”
“No,” Harrison said shortly. “He is not. Eli is American, full stop. Are we German American?”
I smiled. I was actually sort of enjoying this, I realized.
“The real racism is the assumption that some ethnicities need a leg up.”
“Or a handout.”
“Or a handout. Precisely. It’s what Eli has been saying since he was seventeen.”
“And what Eli says…” I left him hanging. Then I sat back against the couch, arms folded tightly and looking for all the world like the petulant child he apparently thought I was. When I finally looked at him, he was actually smiling at me.
“You’ve got a respectable brain there, Phoebe. What are you planning to do with it?”
“Help people and make the world a better place. It’s what I’m planning to say in my application essay, anyway. What are you planning to do with yours?”
“Show people how not to be such pathetic idiots.”
“Awesome.”
Harrison said nothing for a moment. Then he said, thoughtfully: “How do you feel about chickens?”
“How do I … what?”
“Tell me, what are the college advisors advising you to do?”
“Oh, they keep giving me lists of places to research and telling me to read this book called Colleges That Change Lives.”
Harrison smiled. “And have you?”
“What? No. Of course not.”
“Phoebe. You are an idiot.”
He got up abruptly, leaving me to stare after him as he padded away, across the off-white carpeting, in his socks. A moment later he was back with a blue paperback in his hand. He tossed it into my lap. “My own copy. Take it. It’s yours.”
Colleges That Change Lives: 40 Schools You Should Know About Even if You’re Not a Straight-A Student. There was a boy on the cover, looking into a reflecting pool. A graduate in cap and gown looked back.
“What makes you think I’m not a straight-A student?” was all I could think of to say.
“No grades at Walden. Doesn’t matter. There happens to be a chapter about Roarke.”
I opened the paperback at random to a description of Grinnell’s educational philosophy. Shura was “completely in love” with Grinnell, I recalled.
“I didn’t even read it back when I was applying to college. I read it when I found out I was going to Roarke and someone told me it had a chapter. Besides, I didn’t think Mom brought this home with me in mind. I think she figured Lewyn and Sally might need some off-brand place to go.”
I nodded. I was still turning the pages. “Pretty ironic,” I said.
“What is?”