Page 16 of Due Diligence

“Sounds good,” I responded, telling her what she wanted to hear. “I’ll definitely do that.”

***

After work, I got on the subway, rode back to my neighborhood, walked into my kitchen, and immediately made myself a dark and stormy with double rum. Bethany didn’t ask questions. She simply raised an eyebrow, stole a sip of my drink, and then vacated the living room so I could commandeer the television.

Bethany and I had lived together for a year, ever since I moved back to the city after finishing my MBA. We found each other on Craigslist when she responded to my ad that said:Former trust fund brat going through a tragic breakup and just trying to find a roommate who won’t judge me for not separating my laundry by color and for still not knowing how to cook anything. Recent MBA grad with high earning potential and zero ambitions. Non-smoker (except when drunk) and not-annoying (except when drunk).

Bethany had emailed me and said:You’re hilarious. You also sound like a horrible person to live with, but I’m an aspiring lawyer so I obviously have a high capacity for misery. Want to grab coffee?

The rest was history. I settled in on our rundown IKEA couch and I put onThe Texas Chainsaw Massacre, my go-to for days when I was too pissed off to function. Bethany knew this about me—and I strongly suspected she actually kept a spreadsheet that tracked what movies I watched when I was in a particular mood. One time, she walked in on me watchingI Know What You Did Last Summer, and commented, “Someone’s in a good mood!” And she wasn’t wrong—I had just had a one-night stand with a guy who made me come so hard that my eyes watered.

A couple hours later, Bethany emerged from her bedroom when she heard the end credits playing and took a seat on the couch. “Feeling better?”

“Sort of.” I groaned and slid down on the couch, far enough that the thin cushion dug into my lower back. “Today was a fiasco.”

“What’s up? Mom and dad stuff? Work stuff?”

“Both, but mostly work stuff.” I rotated to face her and pulled one of our old pillows onto my lap. “Have you ever worked with someone who just wants to watch you fall hard on your face? Like someone who really just wants to watch you eat shit?”

Emphatically, she shook her head. “No. But I work at a nonprofit. People there are actually good and not complete psychopaths like the people you work with.”

“Fair point,” I noted. “But whatever. I can handle it.”

“You’re sure? I’m happy to talk.”

To be honest, the only thing worse than having Marcus Fitz sabotage my very existence was the idea of talking about Marcus Fitz sabotaging my very existence. I shook my head. “What’s going on with you? How was your day?”

Bethany gave me an exaggerated grin. “I have a question about the LSAT.”

Of course she did. There were almost no downsides to living with Bethany aside from two things: One, she had really small boobs, so none of her tops fit me. Two, I once let it slip that I briefly attended Columbia Law School, so she always had questions for me about the LSAT (the Law School Admissions Test), which I took when I was a senior in college. I loved her though. And as much as I hated the LSAT, I would forever owe Bethany for taking me in when nobody else wanted anything to do with me. “Go for it,” I said, nodding my head.

“You’re the best,” she declared as she opened her spiral notebook and pulled her pen out of her wavy brown hair. “Did you ever find any good strategies for the logical reasoning section? For some reason I keep running out of time.”

“Just on that section?”

She nodded as she released a sigh. “It’s like I have a mental block. I keep getting hung up on the questions and rereading things.”

“That’s common,” I told her. “A few of the people at school who were also taking the test at the same time as me would always say they just got stuck on those questions.”

“Any tips?”

“Sorry. I didn’t really have that problem. To be honest, I didn’t study very much,” I admitted. As soon as I said that, I saw Bethany’s brow furrow.

“Okay, well how much did you study?” She extended her long legs onto our crooked coffee table. “Because I’ve been at this for six months and I’m still not getting better.”

“Like…a week.”

Her dark eyes widened and they stayed that way. After a moment, her stare made me shift. Immediately, I wished I had lied to her. It had been a while since anyone had given me that look—that look of disbelief, almost like I wasn’t human or something. “Sorry,what?” she demanded. “You’re telling me you got a perfect score on the freaking LSAT after studying for only a week?”

“I’m a good test taker,” I responded, raising a shoulder to appear nonchalant. It failed miserably though. Bethany flicked up an eyebrow and surveyed me up and down.

“I wish I could be you. You’re a prodigy.”

I flinched when I heard that word, almost like it was an expletive. It was something I couldn’t help. For years and years, that title was bestowed upon me carelessly by the adults around me—a designation that ultimately did more harm than good. My chest tightened, making the act of breathing feel suddenly laborious. “Can I asked you something?” I said, trying my best to change the subject.

To my relief, Bethany nodded. “Always.”

“Why do you want to go to law school?”

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