Facts about Feminism | ✓

27

Guy | Girl

"Hey, you coming?"

She looked up, tearing her eyes away reluctantly from her novel. "What?"

"You coming to the college fair?" He nodded towards the crowds, concentrated in the gym and the outer hallways, where students chattered with admission experts from universities all over the world. The school had given the seniors the afternoon off in order to visit all the college booths set up all over the school, in order to prepare them for the impending college applications they would have to submit.

"I thought this was a detention only thing."  She joked, yet the light tone of her voice hit on an actual question. Nevertheless, she still got up from where she was sitting and joined him in the direction of the fair.

"I've been thinking," He started, "about what you said, how we could have been friends if the stuff with Jimmy and Emma didn't happen. Then I realized, so what if it did? It shouldn't affect our friendship."

"But that was weeks ago." She pointed out dubiously. 

"I've always been a little slow," He shrugged. "I'm a jock after all."

She laughed. "Speaking of, you hoping to play in university?" She asked, referring to soccer, where he now played varsity and bagged MVP every year.

"It all comes down to if the scouts want me." He said, his normally confident facade tainted with a hint of nerves. "Which they will once they see me play." A cocky smile decorated his face once again.

"Yeah," She let out a breath, "I've seen you guys practice like five hours a day." She remembered how he used to sprint to the field after detention, the tired bags under his eyes magically vanishing as soon as his foot hit the ball. It was like he absorbed the energy from the game.

"We have one morning practice and one afternoon practice." He stifled a yawn. "It's tiring. With homework and all too. But it's hard for all of us." He nudged her, "You're hoping to go into the sciences right?"

"Yeah, chemistry, I hope." She stopped at Princeton's booth, picking up the orange and black brochure. "I'm trying to hit Princeton, Stanford, Caltech, and MIT today."

"MIT and Caltech have crazy high graduate salaries." He whistled. "You're bagging six figures right out of college." He looked up to the ceiling, a rare moment of weakness shining in his eyes. "While I'm relying on if I get drafted after college."

"Hey," She comforted, "You definitely will."

"How do you know that?"

"You just have to believe it." She said, her eyes shining with conviction.

"Easy for you to say." He grumbled.

 "I don't know what's going to happen to me after college either. Half of chemistry undergrads are women but only 16% of all chemists. The numbers are not really in my favour."

She sighed. "It's really disheartening as a girl going into STEM. To hear that despite women being interested in the sciences, most don't make it."

"There are challenges in different fields. You see?" She said. "In STEM, there are higher resignation and job dissatisfaction rates for women. Many of whom quit the industry all together." 

She caught glance of a familiar face, chatting away happily at the Georgetown booth, "Take Annalise for example. She wants to go into politics. It's a field that's dirty and difficult. There's a huge lack of representation of women in the government but when they do try to run for office, when they do try to prove that there are strong women, they receive threats telling them when and how they are getting raped and murdered. They're called bitches to their faces and on media. They're told that no guy will ever go out with them. They're labelled as rude, tough, mean, when they are simply doing the same thing as a guy is doing."

"Annalise has no idea what might be in store for her. But she'll have to handle it if she wants to go into politics as a woman."

He furrowed his brows. "There are so many female leaders now too. Think of Jacinda Ardern or Angela Merkel. Things are changing."

"It's definitely getting better," She agreed. "Who knows what the future will bring?"

She glanced at the Princeton admissions officer, having finally freed up from his earlier conversation. "My point is though," She said, "none of us are sure what might happen." 

Her hand rested lightly on his arm. "So sometimes you just have to keep pushing. And know that there will be an end soon."

He heaved a sigh. He looked over to UMichigan's booth. They had everything he wanted, a stellar soccer program, a great city, and his major of choice. Turning back around one last to see her talking animatedly with a group of people, he suppressed any remaining nerves and made the first step to life after high school.

A/N -  GUYS, I'm so sorry I keep going back and editing older chapters. I didn't really plan out this book and the more I've written, the more I want to change it. At this point, I think it's shifted into a high school narrative of feminism, and how it ties in every day struggles of teens. 

Also, I screwed up the number of the chapters last time, please forgive me, so I accidentally published 28 before 27. Also, we have two more chapters to go! I know there isn't really a strong plotline, but I'm hoping that chapter will wrap some things up.

Hopefully, y'all don't think I'm putting too much of a focus on college in this book that's about feminism. I'm just sick of reading books all the time where the main characters are seniors, and they never even mention college in the entire book, yet at the end they somehow miraculously get into Yale or Georgetown.

Like how?? Give me some of that magic potion you're obviously taking!

So while my characters are having a great time in detention every day, and I insinuate at their relationships and drama, they're also majorly stressing out about college, battling different anxieties and fears every single day about uni and life after uni.

Sorry for the long ass author's note that's longer than my actual chapter.