America 1982-Chapter 110 - 25: Why Not Give it a Try

"I think Stanford has gone crazy trying to catch up with Harvard, Yale, Duke, NYU, and other prestigious schools. I called a high school classmate who studies at NYU yesterday during my break. He’s having a great time there with their semester system, living a life of relative ease. The workload and pressure there are virtually non-existent compared to the hellish quarter system we have at Stanford. You wanna know the craziest part? Their classes only last from 50 to 70 minutes, whereas ours are twice as long. By the time I graduate, my bladder or prostate will probably have given out entirely, and I’ll have to carry a urine bag in one hand and receive my diploma from the dean with the other."

Jason yawned, sitting in the cafeteria, gulping down coffee to refuel his energy, and complained to Tommy, who was sitting across from him enjoying breakfast, about the intense academic life at Stanford University.

Tommy was quietly enjoying his meal, not in a hurry to respond, but Jason’s rant prompted other students eating breakfast in the cafeteria to chime in with similar complaints, talking about friends of theirs who studied at other semester-based universities; by comparison, their own experiences at Stanford felt like anything but heaven.

No wonder they complained. The old prestigious schools like Harvard and Yale were still using the traditional semester system, which divided the year into two terms, whereas schools like Stanford had adopted the more efficient quarter system, with four quarters in a year. This meant that if you were studying at Harvard and disliked a professor and their class, you’d have to endure it for at least half a year. But at Stanford, you’d be done with that course in just ten weeks and move on to a new one.

Tommy Hawk could actually endure the pressure of rushing through midterms in the first month and finals in the second month at Stanford, this relentless pursuit of learning efficiency. As far as Jason’s complaints, all Tommy could say was that American college students were too blessed and had never endured the mountainous workload that Chinese high school students faced.

"Look on the bright side, it means that in our four undergraduate years at Stanford, we get to experience at least six more courses than those at traditional semester-based schools. You could easily earn a double degree as long as you have enough energy," said Tommy after finishing his sandwich, addressing Jason.

Jason glared at Tommy resentfully, "Double degree? Enough energy? Dude, others might not know about my stamina, but you should, right? Your damn assignments have nearly drained me dry. I can hardly feel its presence when I wake up in the morning these days. You should know, when I first started school, it was full of energy every morning."

"I know, I know, Mr. Lothario. I’m sorry. That’s why I’ll take on some of your workload today, like receiving our first student and customer," Tommy said, finishing his coffee and wiping his lips.

Jason cursed at Tommy with disdain, "F*ck you! Tommy! You don’t actually wanna share the workload. You just wanna check out the hot girls coming for the training with me, don’t you?"

"Scoping out girls doesn’t conflict with sharing the workload," Tommy replied. "Let’s go. Most women choose the quiet Saturday morning for training. Know why? Because the men who pay them prefer to hypocritically return to their families on Saturdays, leaving their ’tools’ free to satisfy their wives, whom they can use without charge."

As they left the cafeteria, Jason drained his coffee and followed Tommy, puzzled. "Didn’t you hire some girls to help with the reception? You don’t need to go so early to check out girls. Wouldn’t it be better to go to the classroom to see them?"

"I only realized how dumb*ss they were after seeing their capabilities yesterday. Now I understand why many company founders like to take matters into their own hands," Tommy grumbled with a rough tone.

Stanford University didn’t have any proper gate, actually. Since most of the nearby land belonged to Stanford, designers were given free rein. So, the high-priced designers who were employed to plan the campus layout didn’t bother with a main gate but instead created a mile-long Palm Drive, lined with huge palm trees reaching 20 to 30 meters height.

At first glance, it made newcomers immediately understand the grandeur it conveyed.

When Tommy Hawk first came to Stanford, he had even intentionally walked down this Palm Drive at sunset, imagining himself as a lone cowboy going to the ancient Stanford mansion for a rampage of vengeance.

The view of the Drive at sunset was even more evocative than the scene in ’Red Dead Redemption 2’ with eight cowboys walking side by side towards vengeance against the setting sun on a sycamore-lined street.

Tommy sat at the reception set up at the entrance of Palm Drive, a mile away from Stanford, smoking a cigarette, ignoring the disgusted looks from the three sorority girls beside him.

Garry Good, who orchestrated the cooperation between the promotion society and Tommy for the training, got chewed out by members, who now all knew he had enlisted a crude, barbaric country rascal to promote female employment, while this rascal showed not an ounce of respect for women, driving two poor girls to tears upon their first meeting.

A bus pulled up at the nearby stop; it was the earliest bus for the day, and only two people, a man and a woman, stepped off. They looked around, and upon spotting the sign at the reception, they tentatively approached Tommy and the others.

Tommy had been watching the bus intently, dropping his legs down as it parked. As the pair approached, he initiated the conversation, "You two, I guess you’re here about the computer training, right?"

The man and woman, clearly unacquainted, both nodded. This caught Jason by surprise, and he whispered to Tommy, "Tommy, have you been advertising outside of ’Seeking Pleasure’? Or are clients also interested in learning computers?"

"Perhaps clients hope to have some common language with the prostitutes during intimacy? Or maybe he’s a gigolo? My God, he’d be perfect for you; you could exchange tips!" Tommy joked, then stood up and turned to the two, "This is the reception. Your names?"

The woman with dark hair and a petite frame spoke first, "I called yesterday, Susan Curtis. You answered; I remember your voice."

"You’re really lucky, Miss Curtis, yes, that’s right, I remember now, the coupon thing, right?" Tommy walked over and shook hands with Susan: "Tommy Hawk, these are my classmates and colleagues."

He then turned to the young man whose eyes seemed to always evade others’, probably about twenty-three or twenty-four years old. When he saw Tommy looking at him, his first reaction was to lower his head and then immediately raise it to look at Tommy.

Tommy asked, "Buddy, what’s your name?"

"Mark, Mark Warren." The young man said to Tommy: "I didn’t make a phone call, I just saw the ad, so I wanted to come and take a look. I’m studying at a community college in San Francisco."

"To be honest, I didn’t expect there to be men in the first group of trainees, since the initiating organization is called Women’s Equality Advancement Society, but that’s fine, we don’t do gender discrimination, gigolos can be trained too." After speaking with him, Tommy turned to Jason:

"For better communication, I’ll take Miss Susan Curtis, you take Mr. Mark Warren."

"Fuck You! Tommy Hawk!" Jason White watched in disbelief as Tommy took off with the woman named Susan in one of the two golf carts they had driven out.

Only the man called Mark Warren was left, cautiously sizing up himself, which made Jason involuntarily shiver: "Shit! Alright, sir, get in the car, but please keep your distance! I remind you, Stanford’s campus police are everywhere around the campus, and they are all armed!"

Only when the golf cart started and entered Palm Drive did Tommy, holding the steering wheel, ask Susan, who was admiring the exceedingly beautiful scenery beside him:

"You’ve never been to Stanford before, have you?"

"I’ve never been to any university, just high school," Susan withdrew her gaze and told Tommy.

Tommy exhaled and nodded with understanding: "A university is just a bigger pile of shit than high school, except the tuition is fucking expensive enough to scare you to death."

"Your tone doesn’t sound much like a student here." Susan looked at Tommy curiously: "More like some of the jerks I run into often."

"The jerks at university are even scarier than the ones you run into. Those jerks at least know shame, while the university jerks have no shame at all, and what’s worse, these shameless jerks will one day rule the country." Tommy glanced at Susan’s somewhat heavy dark circles and, after making sure she hadn’t applied smoky makeup, asked:

"Do you have a drug or the like habit? Just to clarify, if you do, I would not recommend wasting your time."

"I even skimp on alcohol and cigarettes, let alone those more expensive habits, so will you guys recommend jobs?" Susan answered Tommy’s question but quickly asked in return.

"Yes, but the premise is that you have to be certain that you learn and can handle the job skillfully. It may not pay as much as you earn from seeing clients, but you should be able to make two hundred bucks a week. You’ll have your own desk in the company, your colleagues will ask if you’d like to go to the break room for coffee instead of informing you that the cops are searching, they’ll discuss the latest movies with you instead of which clinic treats syphilis cheaply, you won’t have to worry about discount coupons anymore because you’ll be getting a paycheck every week, and they even offer employee insurance." Tommy said, laughing as he looked ahead:

"You can dress in a proper women’s suit, comb your hair neatly, and apply light makeup to sit in front of a computer, instead of painting your nails bright red, wearing cheap fishnet stockings, low-cut tops, and hot pants lying in bed. Overall, this society is striving to transform the old you into a white-collar worker. You know, those respectable women in insurance companies or car dealerships that you pass by, all dressed properly and busy in front of computers."

"Can you do those jobs with just a high school diploma? Nobody ever told me that." Susan said skeptically.

"Nobody ever told me how to date girls, kiss and go to bed with them either, but it didn’t stop me from teaching myself," Tommy laughed, turning to look at Susan Curtis:

"So, lady, the important thing is to seize the free opportunity, teach yourself, and straighten out this fucking fate. After all, it couldn’t be worse than it is now, so why not give it a try, right?"

"Yes, you’re absolutely right, it couldn’t be any fucking worse than it is now, so why not give it a try." Susan nodded in agreement: "So you only make four bucks an hour?"

"No, as the boss of this training business, I’m not even making four bucks an hour right now, still spending money and not making a profit yet." Tommy said to Susan: "I hope to make my first bit of money off you."