Tiger’s Mouth

Four weeks before graduation, an interloper slipped through the side door of Columbia University’s Lerner Hall. In the darkened lobby, a guard winked and nodded him through the swing gate. His steps quieted as his heart gained momentum, and he reminded himself to breathe and to tighten his tie. Though he was a frequent visitor by imagination, it was the first time he’d arrived in this building on foot. No time to linger and take in his surroundings, though he itched to do so. He was carried along by a crowd of students and parents into an auditorium filled with long booths bearing the banners of tech firms, investment firms, and consulting firms, most of which he had never heard of. He scanned the room until he saw the name he was seeking.

“Jack,” he said, when it was his turn at the table. He stuck out his hand. “Jack Chen.”

The company rep at K.O. Systems was taken aback when the boy in front of him laid on the table a briefcase whose leather was peeling at its corners, and pulled from it a résumé printed on ivory card stock. The kid smelled of cigarettes and hair gel, and he had CUNY written all over ­ him—a pierced ear, ill-fitting pants, the briefcase clearly extracted from the depths of a bin at Goodwill. But he wore a smile so confident you’d think he was a Rockefeller.

“You don’t go to Columbia,” the rep said, looking up from the page.

“Well, K.O. Systems doesn’t recruit at City College. I’d like to work for you this summer. As a software engineer.”

The rep raised his eyebrows and scanned the résumé again.

There was nothing of note on it—years-long part-time work at a catering company, one-off gigs painting apartments in Queens. A full two-thirds of the résumé was under the heading “Personal Projects,” a litany of coding languages and descriptions of self-made programs.

“How’d you even get in here?” the rep asked.