Free The Select by F. Paul Wilson

jiffy."
    "That's nice, Marge.
Thanks."
    "It's the truth. Look. You
keep calling, you hear? I can't call you—I have to account for my
outgoing long distances, and they'd kick my butt out of here for
something like that— hell, they might even do that yet if they find
out I told you your spot on the wait list."
    Quinn had been crushed to
hear she was eleventh on the list. Even if she were first or second
her chances of getting in were slim to none. But eleventh ...
    "They won't hear it from me,
Marge."
    "I know that, dear. But
there's no law says you can't call again. So don't you hesitate a
minute."
    "Thanks, Marge. I appreciate that.
Talk to you soon."
    "Any time, Quinn, honey.
Any time."
    Quinn shook her head as she hung up.
Couldn't be too many applicants who got to know the Admissions
Office staff on a first-name basis. She'd called so many times
since spring break she actually felt close to those secretaries.
Couldn't hurt. Just too bad they didn't decide who got
in.
    August was boiling the potato fields
outside and baking her here in the kitchen. She yawned and rubbed
her burning eyes. She was beat—mental fatigue more than anything
else. She was working her usual two waitress jobs plus hustling
after student loans from anyone who had money to lend. She'd even
tracked down a Connecticut Masonic Lodge with a student loan
program. She spent her free hours filling out applications and
financial statements until she was bleary eyed.
    Money was tight. The bankers she spoke
to said student loans had been easier years ago, but with the
economy the way it was and the ongoing trouble some of the
Government programs were having with deadbeats, a lot of the funds
had dried up. And they all told her the same thing: All the purse
strings would loosen considerably once she reached her third year
in med school; she'd have passed through the flames of the first
two years when the shakeout occurred, when those who couldn't cut
it were culled out, and would then be considered an excellent
financial risk. But that didn't do much for her now.
    There was still the Navy. It was
beginning to look as if they were going to approve her for their
program. If so, they'd pay her way through med school, but in
return they'd want her to take a Navy residency in the specialty
she chose plus a year-for-year payback—one year of service for
every year of medical education they funded.
    So that was Quinn's situation on this
steamy summer morning. If she was approved for the Navy plan, she'd
get her degree in exchange for six-to-eight years of her life. A
stiff price, but at least it was a sure thing.
    The other course was riskier: gamble
that she could scrape together the tuition for the U. Conn school
on a year-by-year basis through work, loans, and anything else she
could think of, and come out of medical school seventy-five or
eighty thousand dollars in debt.
    The panic and heartbreak of March were
gone. She'd got her act together and devised a plan. Her dream had
not been snatched from her as she'd thought on that awful day,
merely pulled further away. She'd get there; she simply was going
to have to work a lot harder to reach it.
    But getting into The Ingraham would be
so much better. She'd be able to devote all her efforts to the
massive amount of learning that had to be done and not worry about
chasing after tuition dollars. Or she wouldn't be stuck in a Navy
uniform, doing whatever they told her to do, going wherever they
sent her.
    She sighed. The Ingraham...she still
got low when she thought about what she'd be missing. Here it was
the middle of August and no one who'd been accepted was going
elsewhere.
    Better get used to it, she told
herself.
    *
    "I'm not going to The Ingraham," Matt
said.
    Tim sat up and stared at
him.
    "Bullshit."
    They were stretched out on white and
canary-yellow PVC loungers beside the Olympic-sized pool in Matt's
back lawn. Each had a tall gin and Bitter Lemon on the ground
beside his chair, a pile of fresh-baked