Who: Gracie Rhodes, her roommate Angela (NPC) What: Being forced to watch MTV... but ultimately thankful she did. When: Way back in the day -- January 17th, 2006 Where: Her Boston College dorm room.
By sophomore year at Boston College, Gracie Rhodes knew what she wanted out of her college experience, and though earning a B in biology wasn't her highest priority, it was what she had to deal with at the moment. Wasn't that how people survived life's challenges, by dealing with them head on, one at a time? In a few short days, she'd be on the other side of an examination for a biology class she hadn't wanted to take in the first place, but was required for graduation as part of the school curriculum. It was designed to make all the graduates into well-rounded individuals with at least peripheral knowledge of subjects outside the field of study they chose as a concentration. Gracie didn't care much for even an vague understanding of theories on cell division or for memorizing ways of animal classification. She'd rather be working on her project for her Fiction Writing class, but the fact of the matter was, her short story would practically write itself once she set her brain in the right mode, but no number of creatively crafted adjectives would help her earn a B in biology.
Sitting cross-legged on her bed in her dorm, Gracie planned on putting her highlighter to good use, smearing yellow lines across any bolded vocabulary terms or theories she might wish she'd remembered later. Her roommate, Angela, couldn't take a hint. Gracie needed a quiet space to study, but trying to get Angela to turn off MTV in the afternoons after her dance class was an uphill battle that Gracie never won. Oh well, at least is was music playing, instead of canned laughter of some syndicated sitcom.
The most she could do was turn her back to the television set and will herself to focus. If it didn't work, she'd hit the library, or reach for her own headphones to drown out her roommates shrieks and running commentary as each video in the countdown played. On days when there were video premieres? Forget it. Angela was unstoppable. Some new band had shown up on the program to show off their new video. As much as she loved music, Gracie never cared much about videos. To her, musicians and professional athletes were way overpaid. The upcoming video probably cost more than her out-of-state tuition for the semester.
"I love this song," she said, obviously expecting Gracie to react somehow.
She rolled her eyes, and figured she'd throw Angela a bone. "Yeah, I've heard it. It's not too bad. This is the one about the wedding and the whore, right?"
"Oh my god, yes. But I swear, if any guy ever came up to me wearing a red coat and a top hat, I'd follow him anywhere."
"Well, that seems a bit unlikely. You probably shouldn't tell people that, Angela. They'll try to lure you onto the railroad tracks or something."
Angela made a face and threw a stuffed animal across the room, which hit Gracie square in the back of the head. The video continued, and Gracie kept her gaze trained on her biology book, successfully avoiding the television at all costs. The sound of a studio applause crept over the music as the show decided to cut the video short. The crowd on the screen bordered on downright ridiculous, and the poor host tried to regain control of the program over the squealing of teenage girls in homemade t-shirts.
"He's even cuter in that little vest thing. Oh my god, they're all wearing vests, and they're all cute!"
"Please don't go out and buy a vest, Angela," Gracie replied.
"Shhh!" Angela hissed, shooting her a look. "Shut up, I want to hear what they have to say!"
Gracie wasn't even going to point out the irony in the situation. The fact that Angela was the one telling her to shut up was hillarious. Fine. Don't have to tell me twice, she thought. All the pictures in her biology textbook had started to look the same. Illustrations of embryos and food chains blurred together, but she was damned determined to get something to sink in. Maybe flipping through pages would help. Maybe not. Gracie didn't really have any better ideas.
"It's really wild being here. I started watching this show when I was in high school, and I never dreamed I'd be here."
In an instant, any remaining ounces of concentration she'd held onto were obliterated into nothingness. The voice filtered into her ears, and Gracie's head shot up. Her eyes flew to the screen, and there... there he was.
Zeke?
It was like the edges of her world started to blur and any commentary from Angela faded into white noise. Gracie couldn't even hear the words coming out of the television set, though she saw mouths moving and saw the four young guys clowning around, hamming it up for the window in Times Square and talking to the host. She wished she'd watched the video. Why the hell had she been so stubbornly focused on her goddamned biology that she couldn't take three minutes to watch a music video? It wasn't like she was actually succeeding in learning anything about cell division.
Things might have been different if she would have ever expected in a million years to see her baby brother on the television screen. It was the first time she'd seen him in almost two years.
"You make a better door than a window, you hoebag," Angela said, her voice quite annoyed. Gracie had moved closer to the television and had leaned her head forward. Relative television proximity wouldn't make her physically any closer to Zeke, but try telling her subconscious that.
Angela didn't exactly appreciate her roommate's sudden interest in the figures onscreen. "If you lick my television, I'll kill you in your sleep."