Jessica was used to getting her way. Most college students from overly affluent backgrounds, still at one time or another meet a challenge and realize that they aren’t the smartest, most beautiful, most talented person their parents told them they are since birth. Not Jessica. She was a genius at everything. She was also tall, and had a body that might have been considered “lanky” on anyone else. This could have made her awkward and that awkwardness could have given her the self-awareness she needed to avoid her downfall, but that didn’t happen.
Jessica was selfish, unthinking, and arrogant. But she was also loving to those who broke through her facade and fiercely loyal to her family, especially her little brother. This is just to say that while some parts of her life might make her out to be a caricature or a cliche, taken on the whole she was not.
There was a boy, Paolo. He was a pledge in Phi Kappa Theta, a Catholic fraternity on campus. He was 19. Brown hair. Brown eyes. A chemistry major, like her, but he worked at it harder than she ever had. Jessica was a natural. Paolo squinted at his organic book and moved his lips when he read difficult passages. He had beautiful lips. Jessica was almost sure he was a virgin.