Paying for College - The Novel Read online

Paying for College – The Novel

  Kenneth R. Szulczyk

  All characters, places, and situations that appear in this work are purely fictitious, created in the writer’s mind. Although the places in the novel do exist, any resemblance to real people – living or dead – are entirely coincidental.

  Paying for College – The Novel

  Copyright © 2016 by Kenneth R. Szulczyk

  All rights reserved

  Cover design by Kenneth R. Szulczyk

  Chapter 1

  Oh brothers! How did I turn into a thief? I prowl around neighborhoods and businesses, scoping for telltale signs of a safe that sits within quiet walls, waiting for me to rob its contents of cash, valuable gems, and gold jewelry.

  I’m not even sure how I became a burglar. One day, I did a quick job to pay my college tuition. Then I did another job, and another, until I had reached a point where I couldn’t stop myself. Sometimes while sleeping, I even dream of cracking safes, where I jump up and down like a football player who scored another touchdown for the team win, as the safe’s door opens slowly and reveals its booty inside.

  Oh brothers, how did my life choices lead to this rotten dead-end? Could you point to any student who would run to the high school counselor’s office and inquire how to become a thief. Of course, being a thief is one of the lowest of life forms such as the slime that grows around a toilet seat.

  Once family and friends discover who you are, they stop answering your phone calls. They turn the other direction in the mall if they spot you from a distance. They even stop inviting you into their homes for the holidays or Sunday dinner, and somehow the invitation to the family BBQ is lost in the mail.

  Brothers, I’ve always been willing to work and earn my way in this crazy world. I want to contribute to my community and help the unfortunate, but somehow I became the unfortunate one, as life’s cruelty shoved me in this wrong direction. Life has a way of twirling, like a merry-go-round, taking a person on a dizzy ride for a while, then tossing the person to the other side.

  Here I sit, brothers, on a hard wooden chair – the consummation of my life choices. The cop-slops accused me of breaking into a house and also of robbing the university bursar, but I sat quiet as they stood over me with their physical threats. I just sat there, staring ahead at the gray brick wall, and kept my mouth shut.

  One cop-slop looked like a nice guy with his kind brown eyes and warm smile, but he slapped me several times during the interrogation when I refused to answer his probing questions. Bastard! I felt a trickle of blood drip, drip, dripping from the corner of my lips, as I gagged from the strong bitter copper taste in my throat, but I just sat there, as if this illegal punishment didn’t bother me. I refused to show these donut chasers any weakness.

  He screamed, “You’ll talk! We know you did it. Confess now.” Then he slapped me on the back of the head jerking my head forward.

  The other officer with his military crewcut and massive, chiseled muscles shoved a blank sheet of paper across the table with a pen lying diagonally on top. The other cop grabbed my hand, forced the pen into my hand, and squeezed my hand hard over the blank paper.

  “Write!” he screamed. He put his other hand on the back of my head and pushed my tired head down to look at the paper.

  I wrote: Have a beautiful day! Then I jabbed the paper with the pen to dot the period, dropped the pen, and looked away. I’m not innocent. I am as guilty as the hundreds of other criminals who sat on this wooden chair and took their beating, but my stubborn defiance refused to let the cops win, even if these two officers beat the living crap out of me. Perhaps I deserved this punishment, the price of making the wrong choices.

  After an hour of intense interrogation, the large muscular cop kicked the back of the chair, and I went soaring in the air. My face skidded along the tiled floor as I came to a stop. Then both officers stood on each side of me, picked me up, and dragged me to a dank cell. Approaching the cell door, they both flung me hard towards the cell door, bruising my face as it crashed against the heavy metal. A sharp pain shot up through my broken nose. As I fell, a river of blood poured onto the floor.

  A metallic screech exploded from one ear to the other as the officers slammed the heavy metal door shut.

  Brothers, I laid on the floor for a while. Perhaps thirty minutes. Perhaps thirty years. The blood, gushing from my nose, slowed to a trickle, then eventually stopped.

  After an eternity, I scooted toward the metallic sink, grabbing the base with my tired, weak hands, and worked myself up to a standing position. I turned on the water with one hand, braced the sink with the other hand, so I wouldn’t fall, and slowly washed the blood from my face and hands. Then I leaned against the cell wall and slid along it until I came to a concrete bench.

  I gradually lowered myself on the bench and laid down on my back. The icy cold cell helped soothe the throbbing pain in my nose, cheeks, and other injured parts.

  I don’t know why, but I started laughing, and it reverberated back and forth across the walls, until it sounded as if a hundred criminals were in here with me, laughing at the same time.

  Brothers, how did I become a damn burglar? I just wanted to attend college, get that degree, and somewhere in between, I would kill a few million brain cells at the frat parties and date a college girl or two. Then I could run to the abysmal job market and score that perfect job, where the doors of opportunity would swing open to a new life. I could turn around and slam the door of poverty that followed me around since I was born. No matter how hard I studied, no matter how hard I worked, I could never get ahead. I was stuck in a gerbil cage running on the wheel that never went anywhere. Each time I made a couple of steps upward on the ladder of success, poverty would grab my feet and yank me down several rungs.

  I remember the first day I saw the university. Mom dropped me off at the bus station early in the morning. I rode a crowded bus for six hours as it strode through the countryside and small towns of Michigan. As the bus had entered the city limits, a lightning bolt of excitement energized my body. The bus snaked through the main artery of campus, and I studied the monstrous buildings that spanned a whole block or two. I would spend the next four years running back and forth within this labyrinth of knowledge, as I walked along the extra wide sidewalks between the manicured lawns, trees, and bushes passing from one building to the next.

  Then the campus faded from view as the bus drove through several blocks of spacious, two-story mansions with Greek letters.

  Finally, the bus approached the downtown of this small, quaint, college town where nothing of significance happens unless the hapless hockey team accidentally makes the NCAA playoffs. No murders, no robberies, no serious felonies had marred this tiny town. Most people didn’t bother to lock their doors or carry their jingling house keys, or at least until I arrived.

  The bus’s brakes started squealing while the bus shivered to a stop.

  The bus driver turned and yelled, ”Welcome to Marquette: the gateway to upper Michigan.”

  All the students stood up and grabbed their overstuffed backpacks, laptop cases, and handbags from the overhead baggage racks. I grabbed my things and withered into the slowly moving line as the occupants made their way out of the bus. Once outside, I slung my backpack over my shoulder, pulled out the handle bar to the suitcase and rolled it behind me for the two miles to the dormitory.

  I walked and walked and walked. As I passed the mansions of the fraternities and sororities, I pronounced every Greek letter in my mind. Over time, I will figure out which fraternity threw the best parties and which sorority had the sluttiest women, and who knows, maybe I would wake up the next morning in a strange bed.

&nb
sp; I finally arrived at my dorm – Wentz Hall, a ten story, tan brick building. From one open dorm window, Ozzy Osbourne was blaring, while a group of male students leaned out from another open window and screamed at pedestrians passing by.

  I walked into the lobby, checked in, fought my way onto the elevator, and hauled my stuff to my room.

  As I walked in, a pile of clothes covered one bed while the other bed had a suitcase propped open with a mound of discarded wrappers from potato chips and candy bars.

  “What the heck?“ I muttered under my breath, as I rubbed my sweaty arm against the pile of clothes and pushed them off the side of the bed.

  The bathroom door burst open and my roommate appeared, “What’re you doing?”

  “I’m grabbing a bed.”

  “But that’s my bed.”

  “I don’t think so.” I pointed at the other bed, “Besides, you already marked your territory with your litter.”

  “That’s my bed, too.”

  “Really? Where am I supposed to sleep then if you take both beds?”

  “That’s not my problem.”

  “Look, I paid my room and board just like you did, so one of these beds belong to me.” Skiddy-cock, can’t believe?

  I pushed the remaining clothes off the bed. Drew bent down, grabbed his clothes, and tossed them into the closet.

  I placed my suitcase and backpack on the end of the bed, pulled out a corner of the bedsheet, and used it to wipe the sticky sweat from my forehead. I turned to face my roommate.

  I nodded my head, “I clearly marked my territory. By the way, name is Jax.”

  My roommate grinned and squinted his eyes, “Yeah dude. I see. My name’s Drew.”

  I looked around the room and noticed a stack of drawings on the desk. I walked to the desk and picked up the first chimerical drawing that had a man wearing a dark suit and fedora hat as he pointed a gun outward at whoever was looking at the drawing. The facial expression seemed so real, so angry while the gun seem to pierce outside the paper and into the real world.

  “Put that down. Don’t touch my stuff.”

  I dropped the drawing onto the stack, “Excuse me. I didn’t mean to offend you.”

  “You’ll ruin my drawings by contaminating the paper with the oils from your dirty hands.”

  “Come on. Cut me some slack. I didn’t know.”

  “Just leave my stuff alone.”

  “No problem. Then you must grant me the same respect too.”

  Drew just shrugged his shoulders.

  “If you have a problem with me, we can take it outside. I don’t have to put up with your crap.”

  Drew looked downward and ran to the bathroom.

  I didn’t want a fight my first day in college, but knew that some men are Chihuahuas. They bark more than they bite.

  I knew. I won the challenge.

  Next, I went exploring the campus, like a puppy exploring a new home. I walked by every building, along every sidewalk, and every bush and tree. Once I knew the breadth and girth of my gerbil cage, I returned to the dorm.

  I ran into my roommate again as he hunched over at the white laminated desk and sketched another graphic scene. I asked, “How’s it going?”

  Drew continued sketching as if he didn’t hear me.

  “You don’t talk much, Captain America.”

  “Not much to say,” as he looked up at me.

  I didn’t know it then, but I had met Drew on his bad day. I found the shredded rejection letter in a trashcan a week later in the bathroom. Another publishing company rejected his graphic novel.

  I continued, “I hear ya. So you going to the Dean’s welcoming party?”

  “Yeah. Of course.”

  “Me too. The party starts at six. We should probably start heading there.”

  Drew scrutinized me, “Are you seriously going to wear a t-shirt, blue jeans, and tennis shoes?

  “Yes, of course. You don’t agree with my choice of attire.”

  “I heard the Dean’s very strict.”

  “Oh come on.”

  “I’m serious. Well anyway, just give me a minute.” Drew went to the bathroom and returned several minutes later wearing a white dress shirt, blue dress pants, and a red tie. Then he slipped on black polished dress shoes.

  Sure enough. We arrived at the freshman reception party. And brothers, no one wore a t-shirt and blue jeans except for me. All the men wore polo shirts and slacks or dress shirts and ties. Half the women copied the men and wore the same attire while other women wore skirts and dresses and showed off their smooth, youthful legs.

  Then I saw her standing behind a table with her long blond hair as she handed students their nametags. She placed her cell phone on the table, and the Beatles sang, “Hey, Jude.”

  Drew nudged me, “Who’s that?”

  “I have no idea. But she deserves a closer scrutiny.”

  “Oh brothers,” I thought, as I approached, my eyes lusting after her body as I studied her exquisite hourglass shape. Oh koi no yokan. I could tear off her clothes and toss her onto that table, and ravage her body, but I’m no savage. The ability of man to suppress and delay his primal urges is what separates man from the beasts.

  I fandangoed towards the table and mustered one courageous word that would change the fate of mankind, “Hello.”

  She turned to look at me. “Hi.”

  Then I looked into her blue eyes.

  “Name,” she asked.

  “Name?” I repeated.

  “You have a name don’t you?”

  “Of course I do. Just call me Jax.”

  “I need your last name too.”

  “Jax, Jax Thompson.”

  Then her naughty fingers glided over the name badges until they stopped at my badge.

  “Here you go,” as she picked it up and handed it to me.

  “Thank you.”

  I turned to go, but I turned and looked at her again. Then I glanced at her cerulean eyes that were as real as the blonde streaks in her hair. Of course, it was a quick glance, so she would never notice. “You have me at a disadvantage. You know my name, but I didn’t catch yours.”

  She smiled and looked at me, and her eyes twinkled a little naughtiness.

  “Very well then. I’ll just call you the mysterious nametag girl.”

  “Maybe I never gave you my name.”

  “Very well then. Then how should I address you?”

  “Phaedra.”

  “Nice to meet you, Phaedra.” Then I reached across the table to shake her hand. “Perhaps we’ll bump into each other in class.”

  “Nice to meet you too, but I don’t think we’ll see each other around.”

  “Really? Aren’t we both students?”

  “I’m pre-law, unless you’re planning to switch majors.”

  “I don’t think that’ll happen. I’m Mr. Business all the way. Once I finish college, I’ll become the CEO of my own company, as I help people invest their money and plan for their financial future.”

  “Ambitious, aren’t you?”

  “Perhaps, a bit, but I’m the guy who never wastes any opportunities. I make a plan and then follow through with it.”

  I switched the spotlight from me to her. “May I ask: if you’re not a business major, what are you doing here?”

  “I’m helping my father.”

  “Father?”

  She pointed at a large man whom I thought looked like Sasquatch wearing a blue pin-stripe suit with half his fur shaved off.

  “Who’s he?”

  “Father.”

  “I got that part, but what’s his role here at the university?”

  “He’s the Dean.”

  “Oh.”

  “Yeah. Will you still talk to me?”

  I studied Phaedra’s father, and then I turned to face Phaedra again. No way did Phaedra come from his loins. I would need a DNA test that a thousand scientists authenticated. Of course, I stopped myself from asking whether she was adopted, becau
se I would offend her. Perhaps the Dean adopted her, or the mailman entertained the misses while the Dean was busy at work.

  I replied, “Of course. It would take a hundred bigfoots to stop me from talking to you.”

  Then someone tapped me on the shoulder. “You’re taking all day, bro?”

  I turned and looked behind me and saw a squad of surfer nerds with reddish angry faces.

  Then I faced Phaedra again, “Well, I gotta go. It looks like I’m holding up the line.”

  “Bye.”

  “Bye.”

  Drew caught up with me, “Nice, bro.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I saw your little conversation with the nametag girl.”

  “Oh, that’s the Dean’s daughter.

  “Oh, you live dangerously.”

  “Of course. What’s the point of living if life never throws any challenges in one’s way?”

  We walked to the refreshment table and grabbed some macadamia-nut cookies and plastic cups of Kool-Aid embellished with a lemon wedge and bobbing apple pieces.

  I stood there and ate my cookie. I caught Phaedra’s naughty eyes checking me out from time to time, as I drank that Kool-Aid as if I was drinking the swankiest wine. I felt a rush of kilig sweep over me as I snuck glances in Phaedra’s direction.

  Drew glanced at Phaedra a couple of times.

  “Are you enjoying the Kool-Aid?” I asked.

  “The Kool-Aid is a little too sweet.”

  “The Kool-Aid is alright.” I lied but nobody likes a complainer, “I see the university does not hesitate to splurge on refreshments.”

  I saw several students standing around the Dean. I placed that exquisite Kool-Aid on the table and looked at Drew, “Here’s my opportunity to make a first good impression.”

  “Good luck.”

  I approached the Dean and stretched my right hand out for a handshake. “Good afternoon, sir.”

  The Dean just stared at my hand as if I were dangling a slimy snake at him.

  Brothers, what could I do? I had done nothing to bring this rudeness upon myself. I said, “That’s okay. You probably should not shake my hand. I’m not even sure I washed my hands after doing my little business a little while ago.”

  The Dean scanned the faces around him and stared coldly at me. Then he said, “Good day, gentlemen,” and walked away.

  The other students stared at me. Who could blame them? My interruption ended their ass kissing prematurely. So I pronounced every syllable clearly in a pompous manner, “Good day gentlemen.” Then I walked away as if I had a large tree limb wedged up my ass and sauntered over to Drew, who was laughing his ass off.

  As I approached, Drew said, “Nice one.”

  “So much for a first great impression.”

  Drew and I headed to the front row of folding chairs that formed a grid spread across the lawn. I wanted to sit dead center because I know these educated types can’t get enough of themselves to hear themselves speak.

  The stentorian Sasquatch walked up the temporary stage and approached the wooden podium. He adjusted his red silk tie and began his monotonous discourse.

  “Welcome freshmen to Northern Mackinaw University. The time you will spend here will…”

  From his sniffy eloquence, I knew the Dean could speak for centuries standing behind that mike. Blah. Blah. Blah, until the audience was ready to guzzle down poisonous Kool-Aid or slit their wrists to numb the pain in their ears.

  I started yawning and stretched out my hands and feet. Oh brothers, I stretched out my hands and feet so wide as if I were reaching for the sky.

  Drew moved several seats down to distant himself from me.

  Then I stood up and stretched my hands one last time and yawned so loudly, students from the other side of campus probably could hear me.

  The Dean paused and stared at me. I turned and glanced at the audience as a hundred eyeballs gazed at me. Some students smiled but they lack the courage to join my crusade.

  “Oh, sorry chaps. Please carry on.” Then I walked away with that imaginary tree limb stuck in my butt again.

  One sour handshake and a little coarse rudeness on both sides could doom a budding relationship, but serendipity always sends travelers on a reckless path with many twists and turns. One chance greeting with a poppin-licious woman and the repugnance of her rude, pompous father would send me down the wrong path. If I never had met this woman, my life would have turned for the better, but brothers, this woman drew me in. I could not stay away from her and her charming father.