Monkey Business Read Online Free PDF Page B

embarrassing fact?” the leader asks.
    Kimmy blushes. “They were diaper commercials.”
    That is so cute. Do I have anything that adorable? True, calling attention to one’s bare behind probably isn’t the way to curtail the sex-object problem, but still, everyone will remember her, and isn’t that the point?
    She sits down, and the leader continues listing names.
    â€œLayla Roth.”
    I jump from my seat and stand at attention.
    â€œLayla grew up in Manhattan and worked for Rosen Brothers Investments. Her interesting fact is that her mother was one of the first women to graduate from the Leiser Weiss Business School. What’s your embarrassing moment, Layla?”
    Someone in the back row is humming the tune to the Clapton song.
    â€œI was in London when I was nine, and I was at a party that Princess Diana was also attending. When it was my turn to meet her, I was so overwhelmed I couldn’t speak. My parents had to take me home.” I shiver at the memory.
    â€œSo you never met her?” the leader asks.
    â€œOh, I did, but not until four years later at a benefit.”
    I loved Diana. Instead of pictures of Kirk Cameron, I had posters of the princess of hearts up on my wall. Not on my wall proper, obviously—the tape would have ruined the paint. I thumbtacked them to the corkboard inside my closet.
    Ah. That’s what I forgot to buy. A corkboard for my schedules. Dorothy had a terrific one in her office with a gorgeous chrome frame. I must remember to ask her where she got it when I inquire about the job.
    She must have read my application by now.

11:30 a.m.
kimmy contemplates the random acts of the universe
    W hat am I doing here? Jerry, the guy sitting four seats diagonal to me started a multimillion-dollar paper company. Juan, sitting in the corner, is an international student from Colombia and has two degrees in neuroscience. The woman I met in the bathroom at the dorm is an investment banker and hangs out with British royalty in her spare time.
    I was in a diaper commercial.
    I’m not sure why I couldn’t come up with something a smidgen more intellectual than discussing my crap, literally. I am so pathetic. I must have been an admissions mistake. Stapled to a worthier application by accident. That’s the only explanation. I don’t know how I aced the GMATs. I must have gotten an easy version.
    The class is laughing now, while my knuckles are gripping the sides of my desk in panic. They’re laughing at a joke where Arbitrage Pricing Theory is the punch line. What am I doing here? I don’t even know what Arbitrage Pricing Theory is.
    Something pings me in the head. A paper airplane is nestled between my freakishly long foot and the leg of the desk. I look over my shoulder to see my nightmare from last night demonically smiling at me.
    I’ve been successfully avoiding him all morning. When returning from the shower this morning, I spotted him standing by my door, knocking and hollering, “Kimmy? Kimmy, you there?”
    I ducked back into the bathroom.
    When I heard him searching inside the bathroom, I sneaked into a stall.
    How could my potential husband have turned into my personal stalker in just twenty-four hours?
    What does he want from me? I thought all men wanted was action, and then they took off. Why was this one still around?
    I rushed into orientation, claimed a desk with my sweater and pen and then disappeared back outside. I correctly assumed that he wouldn’t be able to sit next to me if he didn’t know which desk I’d taken.
    Unfortunately, I didn’t take the law of random act of chance or whatever it’s called into account. Until he threw an airplane at my head, I’d managed to pretend to concentrate on the lecture with intensity usually reserved for a Details magazine. (I love men’s mags. Women’s are so annoying: “What do I do? My mascara is clumping!” Who friggin’ cares?)