Dr. Wilson is presumably somewhere on the East Coast, though for the life of me I can’t remember where. Connecticut, maybe. I picture him outside, perhaps on the veranda of a country club, a gin and tonic in hand, a sweater tied daintily around his shoulders. Then I remember it’s December and likely cold. I revise the image in my mind’s eye. He’s by a fire in a fancy lodge sipping bourbon. He’s the kind of jerk who would wear loafers, without socks, and I bet when he goes on vacation, he shoots large animals and calls it a sport.

“Thanks,” I mumble.

“We’re all systems go at this point. I just need your common app log on,” he says.

“Why?”

“Because it’s my job to make sure this all goes off without a hitch. That all the proper paperwork is in, all the boxes checked. I’ve learned from experience that it’s best if I do it myself,” he says. I hate his condescending tone, the insinuation that I can’t manage to get my own applications in without somehow screwing it up.

“But it’s done,” I say. “All I really need to do is press submit. I was waiting for the final go-ahead from you.”

“Chloe,” my mom says in her warning tone, the one that means stop being a pain in the ass.

“This is how everyone does it. I do the final send-off. That way I can sleep at night knowing we made every deadline. Senior year at Wood Valley is no joke. Let me take this small thing off your plate,” Dr. Wilson says. I don’t bother arguing, because I see no harm in it. Maybe he’ll have better mojo somehow.

“Okay, just please make sure you have the right essay,” I say, and then give him my password.

“Of course,” he says.

“So, wait, does that mean I’m done? Like done-done? I’ve officially applied to college?”

“Yup. I’ll email you confirmation tomorrow morning when everything has been sent in, but yeah. You wait for the acceptances to roll in,” he says, and I snort. Despite all the professional help and the SAT bump, none of us believe I’ll have a large number of schools to choose from. My list, as Mrs. Oh has pointed out innumerable times, is full of mostly reaches. “You worked hard, Chloe. You should be proud of yourself.”

“Thanks,” I say, accepting a compliment I’m not sure I deserve. I sometimes think about what would have happened had I put in the hours over the last few years on my schoolwork, like Levi and Shola obviously do. I decide not to dwell on that. As our meditation teacher taught me, no need to stress about that which we cannot change.