“I’m quite jealous of your world, really.”

“I don’t think the same things scare me about it that scare other people. I’m not particularly nervous about the workload, or about meeting people. I’m more scared because I’ve spent the past few years working so hard to build something and now I’m back at square one.

I’m also not worried about not being the smartest. I don’t define my identity by being the smartest. I went to a school where I wasn’t, so instead I developed my personality around being really nerdy.”

He pauses and grins at me.

“But in an awesome way.”

Another pause.

“Or so I’d like to think, at least.”

He suddenly looks at me.

“Do you keep a diary?”

I frown, confused by the non sequitur.

No, I don’t. I’ve tried but I’m too lazy.

Why? Do you?

“Yes, I do. It takes up a lot of my time. But I’m starting to think that when I get to university I
should live my life, not write about it.”

I dismiss this, telling him that writing is a perfectly decent way to spend your time, that by writing you are living your life.

I tell him that I admire his drive – I can never be bothered to write anything if it doesn’t have an
audience.

“Oh no,” he says earnestly. “I have an audience too.”

He looks slightly embarrassed.

“I pretend I’m writing to entertain a robotic toaster.”

I lean forward.

His voice is quiet and I can’t quite hear him over the chatter that is filling the café that we are sitting in.

What was that, sorry?

“I said I’m writing to entertain a robotic toaster.”

Hang on, sorry. I misheard again. I thought you said…

“Oh no. I did.”

He grins cheerfully.

I like him.

“I guess I like writing because I like being alone. I read something recently which said that you can tell an introvert from an extrovert by where they get their energy from. I think I’m definitely an introvert then. All my energy come from being alone.”

I consider this, and tell him that if this is the case, then I am certainly an extrovert.

I don’t actively despise being alone, but it gives me no energy whatsoever. Very little happens when I am alone. I am always seeking out other people’s company.

I tell him that I suppose that the only big thing that I really do alone is write.

He looks carefully at me.

“But you said you write for an audience, right? So you aren’t really alone. You are still talking to people. You just can’t see them yet.”

God. Yeh. You’re right actually. I don’t do anything alone. Wow.

I stare at my coffee.

“Sorry.” He ventures.

No. No. Really, don’t be sorry. It’s just I’ve never looked at it that way. It’s interesting.

Wow.

There is a pause.

“Do you mind if I ask a question?”

I indicate with a jerk of my head that this will be fine.

“Well, it’s not really a question. It’s more… In your blog, a lot of the stories are quite sad. A lot of the people talk about how Cambridge is really stressful, and complain about it.

But then all the way through, there’s this undercurrent of affection that you have, that the people you interview have.

You make it sound so wonderful. I’m quite jealous of your world really. It’s like a fairytale.”

I had come here expecting to do the whole wise second year thing: to give the guy some hard won advice on making it through your first year at university.

Instead, I find that I am the one who being taught.

I consider my first year at Cambridge.

I think of all the time that I spent tired, stressed, drunk or ill over the past year.

I imagine if you added up all the time during term that I was none of those things, you would get a sum total of about two weeks. If that.

And then I consider how I look back at my time in Cambridge.

How all I remember is a vague sense of overwhelming happiness, of being home, of being surrounded by people who make me happier than I have any reasonable right to expect.

How all I remember is the fairytale, I guess.

If you were inclined to put it that way.

He repeats his last words.

“Yeh, I’m quite jealous of your world.”

I grin at him.

It’s not my world.

It’s your world now.

And it’s going to be extraordinary.