I'd looked up the Shakespeare garden and found that its official name was "The Garden of Shakespeare's Flowers." I learned other facts, including that the garden, by whatever name, had over 200 plantings of different flowers like roses, poppies, lilies, and violets. John came to the door to pick me up, received congratulations from Grandpa, and brushed my lips with a hello kiss. I had to admire his guts; most guys wouldn't do that in front of a girl's family. "You look wonderful as always, Leia," he said, and escorted me down to his car. No need for the seat warmers today; highs were forecasted to be in the low 60's and sunny. As usual, there was no shortage of conversation and we held hands on our way to the garden.
Our plans received their first setback there; the garden was closed for a wedding. "We could go to the Conservatory," John suggested, and that sounded good to me. We oriented ourselves and strolled along the walkway to the immense white Victorian structure, which wasn't that far. It was warm and humid in the conservatory, but I forgot about this as we strolled through the different areas, exploring aquatic plants, highland and lowland tropic areas, and extraordinary potted plants. In the highland tropic area hung a wonderful warm, lush, fruity fragrance that a helpful volunteer said was from the egg magnolias, and showed us the small yellow flower, which blooms for only a day. We wandered around for a couple hours, until we started to get hungry, and John proposed lunch at a restaurant. But I knew from my frantic research to plan our first date that there was a Whole Foods nearby, and I proposed a picnic. He liked the idea a lot, so we diverted, got a little of a lot of things to sample and went back to a meadow in the park where we ate and talked. It was harder than I expected not to talk about college; our pact not to discuss until we'd all made our decisions was a lot easier to adhere to before we had started getting the news back.
After we ate, I started to get too warm, so I pulled my hair back and was going to braid it. "Will you show me how?" John asked. "I adore your hair. It's such a beautiful color, so thick and soft. I love to play with it." So I had fun teaching him how to do a basic braid, then a French braid. We didn't want to go just yet, so we went down to the carousel first and rode it twice. He helped me onto an extraordinary sea dragon, taking the horse next to me for the first time, then we sat in one of the little carriages for the second. It was fun and lighthearted. But eventually we had to leave; he had a lot of schoolwork to catch up on. And while our grades wouldn't impact college, we still had to to concern ourselves with our final class rank. And John had family expectations to meet. No way did I want to get his folks mad at me because I distracted him. Although it was kind of nice to think I could. It just wouldn't be responsible.
Sunday I went out to buy a few posters to liven up my room. I'd tossed the ones I'd brought from Michigan when they wouldn't stay up, and in any case, my tastes had changed a lot. I bought one that looked like a retro travel poster of the Golden Gate Bridge, a beautiful black and white poster of the drum bridge in the tea garden, a picture of the Great Wall, and a couple botanical prints that I liked. I spent the afternoon deciding how best to hang them, then Grandpa and played some cutthroat Monopoly. That evening I did some homework, but my decision to have a study hall this semester was really paying off, and I spent most of the time reading in the living room with Grandpa and the cats. I was a little surprised how much I liked just being around somebody else, even if we were doing different things. I didn't forget to make the cupcakes.There were plenty for everybody; I increased John's allotment to three and even made a small batch of buttercream frosting for my brother. Grandpa is like me, he loves the white downy seven minute frosting.
Sooner than I'd thought, it was Wednesday. I stealthily logged into the USC admittance portal, like many in calculus. Ms Starmore sighed and told us just to get on with it. Cell phones came out from under desks all over the room; guess we hadn't been as stealthy as we'd thought. I was more relaxed than I'd been a week earlier; that admittance to UCLA was valuable in taking pressure off from other decisions. But USC had also admitted me. I was going to get a choice. John turned around, smiling, and we showed each other our acceptances. It would not be cool to smooch in class, but I brushed his lips with my fingers.
"Congratulations," I said, and he grinned.
"You too, Leia. I told you that UCLA wasn't going to be the last." He picked up a lock of my hair and tickled my nose with the end of it. Then Ms Starmore cleared her throat and we got back to calculus. That night Stan came over with some mail, including the rejection letter from San Diego, which I just pitched into recycling. I didn't need to dwell, not when new vistas were opening up to me. On Friday, one of the faculty members in the USC Earth Sciences department called during my independent study. They didn't have a climate change major, but they did have both earth sciences and environmental sciences and there were classes that did address climate change.
And from there, it was just a few days until my last set of decisions came in: I was accepted at Santa Clara, Pomona, and Stanford. I could not believe it. Now that I had all my information, I updated a spreadsheet that I'd made with rankings from a couple of lists, tuition and fees and residence information, my probable major at each one, read through the program information on each one again, and made my decision.
It turned out to be pretty darned easy.
I logged into the admissions portal and accepted UCLA and registered for Bruin Day as well. Then I sat there feeling wild emotions. I had decided. My future was within my grasp. I printed out a list of things I needed to bring with me. It was surprisingly short; in fact, the list of what not to bring was far longer. "Residents should bring towels, pillows, linens to fit an extra long twin bed (36" x 80"), and a non-halogen desk lamp. Residents may also wish to bring a stereo, television, clock, fan, computer, printer, power strip/surge protector and a mini-vacuum." I also shot off a text to all my friends saying that I'd made my decision and to contact me when they had too. Then I went out to tell Grandpa. He was thrilled for me and gave me a huge hug, then we went out for dinner to celebrate. He told our server that I'd just decided on UCLA, and the dessert that we were going to split came out with a blue candle.
When we got home, I called my brother, who was sincerely thrilled for me, both that I'd been accepted at the last three schools and that I'd chosen UCLA. I enjoyed his excitement as much as I had when I had accepted my admission, then, with less enthusiasm, called the parents, leading with the information that I'd been accepted at Stanford and the other two colleges before telling them that I'd decided on UCLA. It was petty, but I couldn't bring myself to care. They seemed pleased, certainly better-behaved than the earlier debacle. Then I emailed Naomi, noting her university address and grinned, knowing that I'd be getting one soon. I took my laptop out to the living room, and Grandpa sat with me at the kitchen table and we talked as we looked at the page that had my program information, general university information, and housing options.
The next day I went to school early to tell the guidance counselor what I'd decided, and she was excited for me, sending me away with pages that described resources for entering freshmen, suggesting ways to smooth the transition to independent living and the new responsibilities of college. I was at my locker when arms went around me and I turned around for a kiss from John, unexpectedly leisurely and thorough, considering that we were at school.
"Oh, god, break it up," Paul groused. "There are impressionable youths around who don't need to be seeing the PDA." I flushed a little and John amiably smacked his brother's arm.
"I also have made my choice," John said. "Where are you going?" I told them, and John grinned, his solemn eyes warming. "That was where I accepted," he said.
"That makes it convenient," Paul said. "If I visit my brother, I can also see you, General. Congrats. Why did you decide to go there?"
"The program aligns best with what I want to do," I explained. "And then there was cost. Room and board are similar across all my choices, but tuition and fees are about $13 thousand whereas at USC, they're about $55 K. Stanford, Pomona, and Santa Clara are also right around $50 thousand. It's ridiculous. But then the others are all private institutions."
A couple of days later, Maya said that she was going to Texas A&M, Zayna accepted the University of the Pacific, Cass was going to San Diego, Keshondra chose USC, and Carol wanted Davis. It was a huge relief to be able to finally talk about what we considered when making our decisions and we spent Friday evening chattering excitedly over dinner and coffee, which we took to the city park, where we sprawled on blankets on the grass until it got too cold and clammy to ignore and we went home.
The next day, John and I went to the park, which I was starting to think of as our place, and we homed in on Stow Lake, taking a paddle boat around, having lunch at the cafe, and walking around, admiring Huntington Falls, walking around Strawberry Hill and over a beautiful stone bridge. We fetched up in the elegant Chinese pavilion, looking over the water. I took his hand, then he stepped behind me and put his arms around me. "I love this place. It's so peaceful. And now that I've made my choice about college, it all seems to be coming at me so fast. About two more months of school, then that's over, a couple months of summer, then starting study at a very competitive, demanding school. I'm worried about it."
"I think we're all kind of worried about it," I said after a moment of reflection. "But at least you've got grandparents down there who you can visit for support."
"Yeah," he said, brightening his tone. "Maybe I can get Grandma to make me barbeque more often."
"For most of us, college is the first real big test of our talents and ability," I said after some thought. "You're an Olympic and world champion. You've achieved a lot, you have the focus and the drive to be successful. I'm going to have to nut up or shut up." John started to laugh, then stepped back, dropped one of my hands, and twirled me, kissing my other hand.
"You're amazing, Delia," he said. "I'm in love with you."
I almost tripped and I was standing still. My heart began to swell as what he said sank in. I tightened my grip on his fingers and touched his face. "I love you too." He drew me to him and we kissed until somebody said "Aw." We broke apart self-consciously and exited the pavilion, holding hands.