Assignment #6: A Romance

One Friday afternoon in December 1984, Julie and her friend Janet made their way down the dark stairs leading to the Mine Shaft. Even though it was only about 5:00, the bar on High Street was already crowded with young law students anxious to unwind after another week immersed in the study of torts, contracts and other subjects reverentially known as “the law.” The fact that their class in civil procedure, taught by the dreaded Professor Fink, was also held on Fridays made happy hour that much more inviting. Professor Fink was infamous for calling on students who had not volunteered, sometimes making them stand up to answer a whole battery of questions about a case that could last the whole 50 minutes allotted to the subject each week.

Despite the anxieties that came with the experience, Julie really liked law school, and the social life had a lot to do with that. In college, she had become accustomed to the all-female campus at Smith, and even though she had taken an occasional class at Amherst, she was always just a visitor there. The best co-ed parties were always off-campus. There were no sororities or fraternities. And compared to Ohio State, Smith was tiny. Ohio State’s law school was a world unto itself, situated on the edge of the huge university of 50,000 students. Every Friday, it seemed, the whole law school would turn out for its own happy hour at one of the many bars along High Street. The undergrads wouldn’t arrive until much later, so you could be pretty sure anyone you met was a fellow law student.

Music of David Bowie and Tears For Fears pulsated throughout the dark rooms of the Mine Shaft, and lights swirled around the tiny dance floor. At the bottom of the stairs, the girls surveyed the crowd, looking for familiar faces, those of friends and naturally those of the opposite sex with whom they’d like to be friends. They headed toward the bar, at which several second and third year students were already busy quenching their evidently parched throats. Maybe Professor Fink had just released them from Advanced Civil Procedure. Julie chose a strategic spot at the bar where she would be standing right next to a tall young man she knew to be a law student, although she had never actually met him. They had spied each other in the library earlier that week, he offering a snide but unmistakably flirtatious comment on the kilt she had been wearing that day, she responding with a decidedly coy smile, but walking right past him.

“I’m Jon,” he said. “let me see your hand.”

That’s an odd way to start a conversation, Julie thought, but OK.

The young man knitted his brow together as if trying to figure out something important.

“You have turtle skin,” he said. And he proceeded to show her hand to one of his buddies. “Look, you can see right through her skin.”

His friend feigned interest just to humor Jon. Indeed, the blue veins were clearly visible on Julie’s hand and their raised outline looked like some kind of crazy blue tree branching out in all directions. She had her mother’s hands.

Jon continued to hold her hand while he asked her name, where she was from, and what professors she had for various classes. He was tall and had curly black hair. He was easy to talk to. He was cute. Julie asked him his last name but the music was so loud she couldn’t hear him.

“Krassenstein!” he said louder.

“Eisenstein?” she asked.

“Never mind! Let’s dance!”

Looking back, Julie could never remember what song was playing, only that it was a slow one so he had his arm around her waist and they continued holding hands and talking over the music. Soon the music was fast again, and though the dance floor was packed with people dancing to the energetic beat “Walking on Sunshine” or “I’m Turning Japanese,” they kept dancing slow, talking.

Soon Jon’s friends were leaving and he asked Julie to come along. She opted to stay with Janet. She’d see him around. As soon as he left, Julie began asking people if they knew a “Jon Eisenstein”. Nobody had any idea who she was talking about.