“Couldn’t afford anything else.” I noticed she was wearing a badge with Greek symbols. “What about you? How come you don’t live in the sorority house?”
She pointed at the badge over her breast. “Oh, this? It’s fake. Well, it’s not fake; I stole it. I live here ’cause I’m too dirt-ass poor to live anywhere else. My parents don’t have any money to contribute for tuition, and it’s hard for me to keep a job since I have to practice so much. I use this to get free meals at the dining hall on 14th street.” She held her fist up and punched the air. “Pi Beta Phi, mac and cheese for life!”
She was adorable. “I can’t imagine this place will be too boring with you here.”
“Thanks.” I looked up to catch her blushing. “I really don’t have that much school spirit, but my music buddies will come over and liven things up for us once classes start and everyone is back in the city. I lived with a bunch of people in a crappy apartment over the summer and I got used to having a lot a friends around. It’s been really quiet here. So far most of the residents keep to themselves.”
“Why didn’t you go home over the summer?”
“No space. My parents’ house is small and I have three younger sisters and a brother. They all still live at home.” She hopped off the desk and moved to the other side of the room to look through the items I had unpacked and stacked on the floor. “Shut up!” She held up Grace by Jeff Buckley. “He’s practically the reason I came to NYU.”
“He’s a genius. Have you seen him play?” I asked.
“No, I’m dying to, though. I guess he lives in Memphis now. I moved all the way to New York from Arizona and then spent my first three months here searching for him in the East Village. I’m a total groupie. Someone told me he left New York a long time ago. I still listen to Grace everyday. It’s like my music bible. I like to pretend he named the album after me.” She chuckled. “You know what? You kinda look like him.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, you have better hair, but you both have those dark, deep-set eyes. And you both pull off a scruffy jawline pretty well.”
I brushed my knuckles over my chin and felt a tinge of insecurity. “I need to shave.”
“No, I like it. It looks good on you. You have that thin build, too, but I think you’re a bit taller than him. How tall are you?”
“Six one.”
She nodded. “Yeah, I think he’s much shorter.”
I sat down on my bed and lay back, propping my hands behind my head, watching her in amusement. She held up A Portable Beat Reader. “Wow. We’re soul twins for sure. Please tell me I’ll find some Vonnegut in here?”
“You’ll definitely find some Vonnegut. Hand me that CD over there and I’ll put it on,” I said, gesturing toward Ten by Pearl Jam.
“I should go practice in a minute but will you play “Release”? That’s my favorite from this album.”
“Sure, as long as I can photograph you.”
“Okay.” She shrugged. “What should I do?”
“Do whatever feels natural.”
I popped the CD into the stereo, reached for my camera, and began snapping away. She moved around the room to the music, twirling and singing.
At one point, she stopped and looked grimly into the lens. “Do I look lame?”
“No,” I said as I continued pressing the shutter. “You look beautiful.”
She flashed me a shy smile and then her tiny frame dropped to the hardwood floor, squatting like a child. She reached down and picked up a button. I continued taking picture after picture.
“Someone lost a button.” Her voice was sing-songy.
She looked up from the floor, right into the lens, and squinted, her piercing green eyes twinkling. I pressed the shutter.
She stood, reached out, and handed me the button. “Here you go.” Pausing, she glanced up to the ceiling. “God, I love this song. I feel inspired now. Thank you, Matt. I better run. It was really nice meeting you. Maybe we can hang out again?”
“Yeah. I’ll see you around.”
“I’ll be hard to miss. I’m right next door, remember?”
She skipped out of the door and then a moment later, just as Eddie Vedder sang the final lyrics, I heard the deep strains of a cello through the thin dorm walls. She was playing “Release.” I moved my bed to the other side of the room so that it would rest against the wall that Grace and I shared.
I fell asleep to the sound of her practicing late into the night.
MY FIRST MORNING in Senior House consisted of eating a stale granola bar and rearranging three pieces of furniture until I was happy with the tiny space I would call home for the next year. On one pass, I discovered a Post-it note stuck to the bottom of the empty drawer in the desk I had brought from home. It read: Don’t forget to call your mom in my mother’s handwriting. She wouldn’t let me forget, and I loved that about her.