Breakthrough (18 page)

A selfie with Hillary Clinton!

Just when I didn't think it could get any more surreal, in October of my sophomore year, I was invited to appear as a guest on
The Colbert Report with Stephen Colbert
. I loved every second of being on
The Colbert Report
—even though I just sat there laughing through most of it. My favorite moment came when he asked me if I had ever considered
using my powers for evil. I laughed so hard I couldn't talk.

I was struck by how different the real Colbert was when I got to speak to him for a few seconds off camera. He congratulated me on my accomplishments and asked me to keep it up, but he wasn't anything like his television persona. His tone was so serious and sincere.

However, my strangest post-victory moment by far came in November, after I was awarded the Sciacca Award in Research and Development and was invited to have an audience with Pope Francis. By now nothing seemed real, so, in that way, it all kind of made sense. When we arrived at the Vatican, my mom and I were escorted into a large ornate room where his staffers gave us a list of ground rules outlining things we could or could not do around the pope.

“You are not to touch any part of him for any reason,” we were told, more in the tone of an interrogation than instruction. I could tell by the look on their faces that they were not kidding.

When Pope Francis finally emerged, he was dressed in his pope uniform with the big hat. He walked slowly and looked very frail. I kind of held my breath as he walked up to me, reminding myself not to shake his hand or go in for a hug. He stopped two feet away from my face, then, staring directly into my eyes, said words in a language that I couldn't understand. After he finished, he stared at me, waiting for a reaction. I didn't know what to do. I looked at my mom, who just wore this strained look on her face, as though she were trying to see something very far away. Then he did it again, this time in a different
language. I smiled and nodded. Finally, on his fourth try, the words came out in English: “Congratulations on your award.”

“Thank you very much,” I said, holding my hands tightly together across my waist.

Back at home, I was receiving no special treatment. I still had to do the same normal chores, like keeping my room clean, taking the garbage out, and making sure our ferrets, Ginny Weasley and Phaedrus, were fed and bathed.

By now, my sophomore year of high school had morphed into a continuous blur of speaking appearances and interviews. My social life was virtually nonexistent. It seemed like most of my social interactions were with news reporters. I found myself answering the same questions again and again. I began to feel like a machine.

Yes, it feels great to get all this recognition.

No, I wasn't expecting to win the award.

Fortunately, my school had taken a real hands-off approach, basically assuring me that if I continued to do well on my tests, they wouldn't hold my lack of attendance against me. The few times I did show up to school, some of the teachers looked surprised to see me, thinking that I had dropped out.

However, the first few weeks of sophomore year, the talk of my high school wasn't about me, but about my brother, who was a senior at the time.

My mom received a call from the school secretary letting her know that she needed to come right away to deal with Luke. He had built an arc furnace in the school lab and his teachers had grown nervous when he mentioned that the device could heat up to one thousand degrees Fahrenheit. They grew even more nervous after he melted a steel screw to prove it. She raced to school to pick up Luke, along with his furnace. It soon found a spot among the collection of random projects in the Andraka family basement, just to the left of where we thought we had killed Morley Safer.

Most of the attention that I received during my sophomore year was positive. While the vast majority of people were supportive, there were some voices in the scientific community who doubted that my test worked, probably because they didn't think someone my age could make such a discovery. Some of my critics made me flash back to my time in middle school and seemed more focused on trying to tear me down on a personal level. One major publication even dedicated a thousand words to why they were NOT going to celebrate my accomplishments! There were times when I wanted to scream and shout or go online and respond to every single comment.

There were also attacks on my sexuality. I never really set out to become a gay role model, or to discuss my sexuality publicly. I wanted to share my ideas and to become a scientist. But being gay is part of who I am, so when it came up in an interview, I decided to
be honest. I'd tried hiding before and that didn't work out so well for me. Besides, I remember going to fairs and participating in the science community for the first time and thinking,
Where are the people like me?
Maybe my story would make it easier for the next kid who wanted to come out. I tried to think about the messages I got from other gay teens when I got hate mail. And I got a lot of hate mail.

Fags burn in hell, you know that, right?

Most of the time I can tell by the subject line of the email that it's hate mail and I won't allow myself to open it, but sometimes my curiosity becomes my enemy.

If you ever change your sinful ways and decide you want to live a moral life, here is my email. It is never too late, Jack.

However, the hardest emails I get are from people who have lost someone to pancreatic cancer and want to know when they can get my test. Sadly, I have to tell people that it is going to take a while. My test still needs work. I need to refine it and also to publish my findings in a scientific journal where my work can be peer-reviewed. As Dr. Maitra says, the test is still in a preliminary stage. We need to examine patient samples to prove that in human serum, even when there are low levels of mesothelin, the test can still consistently detect cancer.

Then it needs to get approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the government agency responsible for protecting public health by ensuring the safety of most of the things we put into
our bodies, including medicine and medical tests.

I've discovered that there is simply no quick way to push anything through the FDA. Receiving approval of even the simplest projects can take years and years, which can be especially hard if you happen to be one of the millions of people waiting for lifesaving treatments or drugs that are still pending. I've been told it will probably take another five or ten years for my test to hit the market. Knowing there was nothing I could do to speed this process, I tried to focus on giving interviews and speeches, and on what project I might work on next. In a recent interview Dr. Maitra said that he hopes I stay in biomedical science. I'm not sure where my next project will take me, but I feel so fortunate to have started in his lab. I know that he does not regret the day he took a chance on me, and I'm proud of that.

Halfway through my sophomore year, on February 11, 2013, I was at home packing to give a speech in London the next day. My dad was downstairs working out the bills.

I heard the phone ring, followed by the sound of my dad's voice.

“Jack, Jack, you better come down here,” he said.

I ran downstairs.

“I just got off the phone with the White House,” he said.

“The White House?”

Ohhhh! Luke's
really
done it now
, I thought. This time his experiments were well beyond the letter-from-the-FBI stage. Now he had
incurred the wrath of the president!

“You have been invited to the State of the Union address as a guest of the First Lady.”

At first, I was confused—why would Michelle Obama want
me
to be
her
guest? I mean, I didn't even know her.

“Why?”

“Jack,” my dad said in his you're-an-idiot voice. “To celebrate your accomplishments, of course.”

“Oh my God! Oh my God! Oh my God!”

I ran around the kitchen, sliding around in my socks on the wooden floors.

“When do we need to leave?” I asked.

My dad, who had been standing there patiently watching me freak out, smiled.

“Jack, it's tomorrow.”

I'm sure London will understand.

The next afternoon my mom, my dad, and I all piled into the family station wagon and set off on the fifty-mile drive to the nation's capital. Since I was allowed to bring only two guests, Luke had to stay home. That was my parents' call—sorry, Luke!

On the drive up, my dad had to endure me and my mom. First my mom got really excited, then her excitement got me excited, and our energies bounced off each other until words became screams and screams became squeals, until finally my dad, who is a wooden
block of practicality, was on the verge of a mental breakdown.

When we arrived in Washington, we found a parking garage and walked the three blocks to our destination on Pennsylvania Avenue. We were greeted by a bunch of guys in very dark suits at the gate, some holding massive weapons.

My mom, who isn't intimidated by anyone or anything, stepped forward and did the talking for the rest of the family.

“This is Jack Andraka, he is here as a guest of First Lady Michelle Obama,” she said proudly. “And we are Jack's guests.”

The security officials looked down at me. I smiled and tried to look nonthreatening. My parents filled out some forms before another group of people in suits walked us across the lawn and into the White House. I knew that Uncle Ted would have gotten a real kick out of knowing that I was here because of him.

After opening the doors, we were deposited in this big dining room area, where we were allowed to mill around with a group of very important people who had also been invited for the speech.

Striking a pose at the White House

In the room, I got to meet Tim
Cook, the CEO of Apple. I recognized him right away and went up and introduced myself. He was very approachable, and after I told him my story, he shared that he had lost a close friend to pancreatic cancer. It wasn't until later that I realized he was talking about Steve Jobs.

I tried not to touch anything at the White House. From working at the laboratory, I had learned just how quickly one of my sneezes or stumbles could send things crashing to the floor. I spent my time pacing between these three huge, colored rooms: one painted blue, one red, and one white. Adorning the walls were fancy paintings of people I'm sure I should have known, but didn't. My attention was focused on the tuxedoed men walking around the room handing out plates of the most delicious steak skewers. I became addicted to them. I didn't feel comfortable taking two from the same tuxedo guy, so I tried to rotate among the different trays. I managed to eat seven skewers.

It was two hours later when a White House official walked us into a separate room, where we all got into a line to meet Michelle Obama and get pictures taken. The First Lady was so warm and friendly. She was hugging everyone in line and seemed genuinely happy to see all the people. In my head, I kept repeating my line to myself:
Thank you for inviting me
. As I approached, I saw one of her assistants whisper into her ear, telling her who I was.

“It's so great to meet you, Jack,” she said.

“Thank you for inviting me,” I said.

She gave me a big hug. I could feel her shoulder bones. She was incredibly strong.

“No, thank
you
for coming, Jack!”

We all posed for a picture together, along with Jill Biden. The First Lady thanked us again, and we were ushered away. A few minutes later I got to meet the First Dog, Bo. As I began to pet his head, he rolled on his back so I could scratch his tummy. I knew my dog, Casey, would be jealous when he smelled the First Dog on my hand.

My parents and I pose with Michelle Obama and Jill Biden before the State of the Union address.

Afterward we were divided into two groups. In the first group were the guests of the guests, who would see the speech in the White House movie theater. In the other group were the guests of the First Lady, who needed to be transported for the State of the Union address. I was shaking with excitement as I waved good-bye to my parents.