January 4th, 2011
Dear Jimmy,
I came back from school to find letters from all of the colleges I applied to in the mailbox. My heart was pounding as I observed the different sizes of envelopes. Big ones mean that you're accepted and the school was sending you more information about their school. Small ones were rejection letters. There were mostly large envelopes, which was a good thing, but there were several small ones.
My phone buzzed in my pocket. Looking at the screen, I saw it was Ethan.
"Did you get the letters too?" he asked. I nodded, and then realized I was talking on the phone so I said, "Yeah."
"Do you want to open them together?"
"Yeah. Come over now. I don't want to wait."
Ten minutes later, Ethan pulled up to the house. He was carrying several different sized envelopes. A few names I recognized but most of them were schools in England that I had never heard of. We sat down together in the living room.
"I suppose we should start with the large ones first", Ethan offered. We began opening letters, smiles growing on our faces. I had been accepted to Temple, Edinboro University, Bloomsburg University, and Penn State University-Main Campus. Ethan was accepted to the University of Bath, University of Bristol, and the University of Portsmouth. We looked at our small letters, both of us with two envelopes.
"I suppose I'll go first", I said, ripping open the first letter from Eastford University, my top school even though it was a private school that I had serious doubts of getting into. Wait a second….
"I got in!" I yelled, jumping up and down. "I can't believe it!" I thought that my scores hadn't been high enough compared to the range they normally accept from applicants, but something in my application seemed good for them.
Ethan opened his letter from the University of Nottingham, his top school. A few seconds of silence and…
"I got in!" he said, jumping up with me. All this scare about envelope sizes were all for nothing.
Except the final two letters.
Ethan and I looked at the letters in our hands with apprehension. The thing about these schools was that the one in my hands was from the University of Nottingham and the one in his hands was from Eastford. Back in November while we were both applying for schools, we decided to apply to the top school of the other person. Both schools had great programs in what we wanted to study, mine being Medicine and Ethan's being Pharmacy. If we were both accepted into the same school, then there was a chance we didn't have to say goodbye in June.
"Ready?" Ethan asked quietly. I nodded and we opened our envelopes at the same time. The first sentence was all I needed to read.
We regret to inform you…..
I sighed and sat down on the couch. Ethan looked shocked and sat down next to me. We exchanged letters and it turned out Ethan was also rejected. I sat back and blew out a burst of air. Neither of us could find the right words to say.
June is coming sooner than we thought.