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The auction idea had spawned froinity Manifesto I honestly had posted it to open the conversation on reclai from a woman’s purity And yes, I’d wanted toused for ain I firmly believed in those ideals butmost of my loansaved up for medical school

My only option was to hockit down under the burden of iraduate o into three years of residency and throw in an oncology fellowship on top of that?

I slipped an ice cube into the piping hot cup of tea and sipped at it while I broke out e Ad that accompanied my study sessions of late I’d started out this year so hopeful that, with a retake, I could improve my abysrew harder and harder to be optimistic

The test was a little over three months away and there was still soin and went over the topics for this week: hydrocarbons and oxygen-containing compounds I checked the clock I was due toThe group study would be the next day and, as always, I wanted to be ahead If I didn’t walk in to that session extra-prepared, I always felt as if I was ot to work

That night, I met Jon at the university library at our usual study carrel And truthfully, I was grateful for the distraction fro preoccupation with the auction

"So?" Jon said as I settled into my usual chair

I scrunched my brows at him "What?"

"Can you co baby blues

Jon and I hadthe previous year of premed at Chaphty Ivy Leagues I never did get the full story on what happened there It wasn’t like he was savingto Chapraduate tuition had been covered by my academic scholarship and I had worked extra hard to finish the requireraduation in three and a half years instead of the usual four, so this last semester was dedicated to work and study If I didn’t iht and I’d be looking for soy

Because of the low score on the test, I was forced to work in a gap year I hadn’t planned on because no medical school would have looked at h her score in order to apply to ht side of things There was no denying that I needed the tiaze flitted across the table to my study partner with more than a little envy Jon had no financial concerns and was headed straight toh "Did you forget to charge your phone again?"

I reached intoand pulled it out Dead as a doornail I sent hi h his curly blond hair "Mia, you need to enter the twenty-first century First of all, only old people have phones like that," he said with a disgusted wave of his hand

I pulledinwith a prepaid plan? And dare I tell him that the reason I hadn’t received the text was not because I had forgotten to charge the phone but because I was out of minutes and had no money tostudent He just didn’t know quite how much because I never ever invited him to my place One look around my dive studio and he’d know uys at my place, aside from Heath, but even he usually sniffed down his nose at my converted studio We had been roommates until the year before when he and his steady boyfriend had decided to ether Due to my financial constraints, I’d had to trade doay down, to e on one of those cute vintage craftsman homes Unfortunately, it was hotter than hell in the summer and a deep freeze--if that was possible in Southern California--in the winter