There was this one girl in my high school class.

She was Miss Popular, but not someone friendly and nice, more like the mean kind of popular from the movies. She was really nasty, downright cruel for fun, loved to brag about how great and pretty she was, and sucked up to every teacher like it was her life’s goal. She manipulated everyone she could for any little reason, and bragged about how much fun it was to manipulate people and get others to do her bidding.

We’re from an Ontario high school, so there were very few of us actively trying to get into top US colleges. Both of us were among them. For several years, all she could talk about was Columbia University. How perfect of a fit she was for Columbia, how much she couldn’t wait to go, how sure she was she would be accepted. She was talking to all these admissions people to secure her acceptance. She was in the “know.” Columbia was her dream, but, ‘you never know,’ she claimed, ‘I’m going to have a hard time deciding between Columbia and Harvard.’

App season comes around. She’s decided she’s too good for Columbia ED and applies to Princeton SCEA. She wants to keep her options open.

She’s deferred, unsurprisingly. I, too, was deferred from my EA school.

In RD round, I was accepted to Columbia, two other Ivies, and a bunch of comparable universities, most on more than 50% ride (scholarships + aid). The only US college she was accepted to was NYU, with a $1K entrance scholarship.

The little brat was down for awhile, but man. She could not shut up about that $1K scholarship. She was totally smug about it, too, and would mention it every time we ran into each other. I assume she thought I didn’t get into anywhere good, either.

Decision day rolls around and I come into school wearing my Columbia tee shirt.

The look on her face was amazing.

I wore some sort of Columbia gear (whether that tee shirt, my Columbia hat, or my Columbia sweater) every single damn day the rest of the school year.