Four hundred dollars. A cab ride from LAX to USC costs $40, and I’m left with $360 dollars to my name. I haven’t eaten since I left Devin’s house, so my stomach rumbles. I’m too nervous and scared to eat. The cab driver is a huge, burly, silent black man with thin dreadlocks hanging to his shoulders. He doesn’t say a word. When we arrive at USC, he simply points at the fare meter and waits expectantly. I pay, parting with the money reluctantly.
USC is huge. I follow other young-looking people around my age, some equally as scared. Most of them have their moms or dads with them, some both. No one notices me. I follow the crowd to an office swarming with people. There’s an orientation, a tour of the campus. Maps are handed out along with cheap day-planners. My dorm room is a box with bunk beds on one side; a thin, shallow closet; and a tiny computer desk, which I assume belongs to my roommate. It’s off-white, and there’s a thin window in one corner with dirty white blinds tilted to one side, letting in a dull glow from outside.
My roommate is already there, sitting on the bottom bed, flipping through an issue of Vanity Fair. She’s a few inches shorter than me, several sizes smaller, and model-gorgeous. Her makeup is perfect. Her platinum blonde hair is sleek and polished and perfectly coiffed in a French twist. Her clothes are expensive, and perfect. Her nails are French manicured, and a Dooney & Burke purse sits on the bed near her, an iPhone peeking out of the top. She smiles at me, takes in my outfit, off-brand but not cheap clothes—a knee-length skirt, a fitted but modest V-neck T-shirt, much-worn dance flats—and her smile dims a bit. She’s clearly unimpressed.
“So, are you an actress?” she asks. She sounds like a movie version of someone from “The Valley.”
“No. I’m going into production.”
“Oh, like, those behind -the-camera people?” She oozes disdain as she says this.
“Yeah, I guess.”
“You’re from the South,” she points out.
“Yes. I’m from Macon.”
“Is that, like, in Alabama?”
I stare at her, and I wonder if she’s joking. “No, it’s in Georgia.”
“Oh. I’m Lizzie Davis.” She doesn’t offer to shake my hand.
“Grey Amundsen.”
“Grey. Like the color?”
“Yeah, well…except it’s spelled with an ‘e.’ G-R-E-Y.”
“Oh. Like Fifty Shades. ”
I shrug, not wanting to admit I don’t know what she’s talking about. She smirks self-righteously and goes back to strumming her guitar. Her phone chimes, and she sets the guitar aside, crossing her legs and tapping at the phone. This goes on the entire time that I’m unpacking. I have no posters, no decorations at all except the photograph of Mama and me in New York. I don’t have a laptop, or a phone. I see a laptop on Lizzie’s desk, a big silver MacBook.
When I’m unpacked, I’m at loose ends. Lizzie is still texting or whatever she’s doing. It’s four o’clock in the afternoon on Wednesday, and classes don’t start until Friday, and then we have the weekend off before the semester really gets under way. I climb the ladder then lie on my side and stare at the wall, missing my Mama. She’d tell me to stop moping and find something to do. Explore the city, dance. Make a film.
Instead, I lie on the top bunk and wonder if I’ve made a mistake coming here.
Chapter 5
The rumbling of my stomach becomes a constant over the next year. The stipend my scholarship gives me to live on is tiny, barely enough for the meals at the cafeteria, which are generally awful and far between. My classes take up most of my day from morning to evening, and I often only have time for a bagel in the morning and something quick and nasty in the evenings. I make good grades, a 4.0 for the first semester, 3.9 for the second. I study film, and I dance. My haven, my sanctuary away from everything, is a quiet room on the top floor of one of my lecture halls. I’ve never seen
USC is huge. I follow other young-looking people around my age, some equally as scared. Most of them have their moms or dads with them, some both. No one notices me. I follow the crowd to an office swarming with people. There’s an orientation, a tour of the campus. Maps are handed out along with cheap day-planners. My dorm room is a box with bunk beds on one side; a thin, shallow closet; and a tiny computer desk, which I assume belongs to my roommate. It’s off-white, and there’s a thin window in one corner with dirty white blinds tilted to one side, letting in a dull glow from outside.
My roommate is already there, sitting on the bottom bed, flipping through an issue of Vanity Fair. She’s a few inches shorter than me, several sizes smaller, and model-gorgeous. Her makeup is perfect. Her platinum blonde hair is sleek and polished and perfectly coiffed in a French twist. Her clothes are expensive, and perfect. Her nails are French manicured, and a Dooney & Burke purse sits on the bed near her, an iPhone peeking out of the top. She smiles at me, takes in my outfit, off-brand but not cheap clothes—a knee-length skirt, a fitted but modest V-neck T-shirt, much-worn dance flats—and her smile dims a bit. She’s clearly unimpressed.
“So, are you an actress?” she asks. She sounds like a movie version of someone from “The Valley.”
“No. I’m going into production.”
“Oh, like, those behind -the-camera people?” She oozes disdain as she says this.
“Yeah, I guess.”
“You’re from the South,” she points out.
“Yes. I’m from Macon.”
“Is that, like, in Alabama?”
I stare at her, and I wonder if she’s joking. “No, it’s in Georgia.”
“Oh. I’m Lizzie Davis.” She doesn’t offer to shake my hand.
“Grey Amundsen.”
“Grey. Like the color?”
“Yeah, well…except it’s spelled with an ‘e.’ G-R-E-Y.”
“Oh. Like Fifty Shades. ”
I shrug, not wanting to admit I don’t know what she’s talking about. She smirks self-righteously and goes back to strumming her guitar. Her phone chimes, and she sets the guitar aside, crossing her legs and tapping at the phone. This goes on the entire time that I’m unpacking. I have no posters, no decorations at all except the photograph of Mama and me in New York. I don’t have a laptop, or a phone. I see a laptop on Lizzie’s desk, a big silver MacBook.
When I’m unpacked, I’m at loose ends. Lizzie is still texting or whatever she’s doing. It’s four o’clock in the afternoon on Wednesday, and classes don’t start until Friday, and then we have the weekend off before the semester really gets under way. I climb the ladder then lie on my side and stare at the wall, missing my Mama. She’d tell me to stop moping and find something to do. Explore the city, dance. Make a film.
Instead, I lie on the top bunk and wonder if I’ve made a mistake coming here.
Chapter 5
The rumbling of my stomach becomes a constant over the next year. The stipend my scholarship gives me to live on is tiny, barely enough for the meals at the cafeteria, which are generally awful and far between. My classes take up most of my day from morning to evening, and I often only have time for a bagel in the morning and something quick and nasty in the evenings. I make good grades, a 4.0 for the first semester, 3.9 for the second. I study film, and I dance. My haven, my sanctuary away from everything, is a quiet room on the top floor of one of my lecture halls. I’ve never seen
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