shorthand

Today was Janet Thomas's twentieth birthday, and she had no idea what was doing with her life. She had just finished a congratulatory telephone call in which her friend, after many birthday wishes and discussions about presents, had convinced Janet to discuss grade point averages.
"Liz, I don't even know what I even want my GPA to be."
"What is it, exactly? Are you please with it?"
"I don't know if I'm happy. How can I know?"
"Just tell me. Are you happy with it?"
"I guess. I don't know what my standard is yet."
"Janet, I'm sure it's not bad. What it is?"
"Again, I don't know what my standard is."
"Okay, that's fine. But what's the number?"
"I guess it's a 3.3 or something."
"Oh! That's fine, Janet, just fine. Nothing to worry about. Mine is between 3.6 and 3.7"
"That's great, Liz. Fit for the Dean's List."
"Better than the Dean's List, because that's only 3.6, and I have a 3.689."
Their conversation had ended soon after. Janet poked slowly at her birthday cake with a fork, her phone still close at hand. The party had ended half an hour ago, not that there had been much of a party. Two of her friends had brought a cake and some sparkling cider, but the cake was store-bought, and the cider was leftover from a New Years Party two years ago. Janet's birthday was in December, so that made the cider three years old.
GPAs didn't matter all that much in the real world, she told herself. Job opportunities didn't care about such things, and as long as Janet was learning, numbers didn't matter, right? Numbers were an absurd system anyway. They didn't tell stories, and they didn't tell Janet what to do with her life.
Her cake grew lopsided, and Janet took a sip of the cider, forgetting that it was flat.
What a pleasing birthday twenty was turning out to be.