When I walk into my room, Mr. and Mrs. Martin are gone. It’s just me and Madeline and all of our stuff. I don’t know how she’s managed to do it so quickly, but Madeline has switched my sheets to the bottom bunk, claiming the top bunk for herself. Neither of us mentions it, but right away it sets an unsettling tone to the whole roommate relationship.
At first, she doesn’t say anything to me—not even hello. She stands in the center of the room, lips pressed together, her small Asian features delicate and soft, and says, “This is crap.”
Before I can respond at all, she continues. “Do we get laptops? I mean, do they issue them on the first day, or what?”
I shake my head. Woodsdale is what they call a cyber-secure campus. There are computer labs in school, and most kids have laptops of their own in their rooms, but there’s no Internet access anywhere except the main academic building. We also aren’t allowed to have cell phones—each room has its own landline—or PDAs or iPods or anything like that. Breaking any of these rules is supposedly punishable by expulsion, although Lindsey has assured me you’d just get a ton of work details.
When I explain this to Madeline, she looks on the verge of furious tears. I realize she doesn’t even know my name yet. “So,” I say, trying to ignore her obvious anger, “I’m Katie Kitrell, and I’m a sophomore too. And you’re Madeline Moon?”
“Mazzie.”
“Huh?”
“Ma-zz-ie,” she pronounces. “Don’t call me Madeline. And my last name isn’t Moon. It’s Moon-Park.”
Another hyphenated last name. Great.
“Okay. Mazzie.”
She nods. “Look—Katie? Let me just tell you now that I don’t want to be here. This school is a joke. I mean, as far as boarding schools go, it’s at the bottom of the totem pole. What is it, like, seventy percent of graduating students matriculate to top-tier colleges?”
“I think it’s . . . eighty-five? Maybe ninety?”
She snorts. “That’s what they tell you.”
I don’t know what to say. But I don’t have time to come up with any kind of response before she continues with, “The last school I was at, in Connecticut, had a ninety-five percent matriculation rate to top-tier colleges. It cost about twice as much as this place.” She shakes her head at me, like she can’t believe I’m not as disgusted as she is to be someplace so clearly inferior.
“Well if you don’t mind my asking, why did you leave your last school?”
She pauses, glares at me, and says, “I don’t know. It’s not important.”
“Uh . . .”
“Why did you leave your last school?” She puts her tiny fists on her hips and smirks. When she narrows her eyes at me, they almost disappear. “If you don’t mind my asking.”
I don’t hesitate. She deserves to feel bad. “My brother died.”
And then—right there, in that moment, which I know I’ll always remember, right down to the red-and-white-striped tank top Mazzie is wearing, the small beads of sweat on her high forehead, the bronze of her summer tan and her almost-labored breath—I feel a door closing, my brother’s face behind it.
I feel awful. In this moment, I miss him more than ever. But I also feel relief, a kind of deep satisfaction now that I’ve managed to complete the lie I’ve been trying to tell for weeks. I feel, for the first time since I watched Will being driven away in the ambulance, like I can breathe on dry land again.
Just like every other year, there’s a kind of death in the air as the summer is squelched by autumn. It is a lonely feeling. At night, I lie in bed and listen to Mazzie breathing above me, thankful for her warm sound in the dark. Even though she’s still barely willing to speak to me, it feels better than being all by myself. Sometimes I pretend she is Will, and that I know exactly where he is and what’s happening to him, right there above me. Sometimes I try not to think about it, and I don’t pretend anything. Mostly, though, I pretend that everything I’ve told everyone is true: my big brother is dead. In that scenario, at least, we all get some rest.
For the entire first week of classes, aside from our brief exchanges when we come and go from the room, Mazzie and I hardly speak to each other. At breakfast and dinner, it’s mandatory that you eat family-style, seated with your roommate and a few other girls from your dorm, along with a handful of boys and at least one faculty member to head the table. When we’re forced to eat together, Mazzie and I sit across from each other, wordlessly passing food.
In spite of this, we quickly settle into a rhythm as roommates; we learn from each other’s slowing actions when it’s time to turn out the light at night; we shake each other awake in the morning if one of us—usually Mazzie—sleeps through the alarm. The telephone in our room doesn’t ring once all week. It’s typical of the Ghost and my mom; now that they know I’m tucked away, they don’t feel any need to get in touch. It doesn’t bother me so much. It’s not like I want to talk to them, anyway.
The person I do want to talk to is Mazzie. I feel like, if she’d just give me the chance, we’d have a lot to say to each other. It seems like we are both alone in the world, families out there somewhere, for whatever reasons disinterested in making contact, and we both seem determined that it’s okay with us—isn’t it? I can’t help but feel so sorry for her, even though she took my bed without asking, even though she can’t seem to stand being around anyone. As far as I can tell, she hasn’t made any friends so far. Whenever Lindsey and Estella come into our room, she makes herself scarce; it’s almost like she can slip away before they even know she’s around.
There’s something else, too: from the first night she arrived at Woodsdale, and every night afterward, Mazzie has talked in her sleep. It starts with the grinding of her teeth; that’s how I know she’s out. Then, after ten or twenty minutes, she starts murmuring to herself. Her voice is angry and sad at the same time. More than once, I’ve gotten out of bed to watch her. I’ve thought about shaking her awake, or even putting my arms around her and holding on tight so she can’t struggle away. I want her to know that, whatever she’s dreaming, I’ve probably known worse.
But I get the feeling she wouldn’t appreciate it if I woke her, or tried to comfort her in any way. When she talks during her dreams, she speaks Korean, her guard up even in sleep.
The more I get to know Lindsey and Estella, the more I like both of them. Well, not Estella as much. But I at least understand where Lindsey is coming from when she defends her. Right away, it’s obvious there are advantages to being her friend. On the first day of school, I’m standing at the back of the lunch line when Estella, Stetson, and Lindsey walk past me. Without a word—she doesn’t even look at me—Estella takes my arm and yanks me out of line, leading me toward the front with them. None of the people we cut ahead of say anything.
Later that day, in study hall, I’m sitting a few rows away from Estella, looking over the pile of Latin homework that’s already been assigned. She and Stetson are in the back row, deep in hushed conversation. There’s no way I’d have the nerve to join them. As I’m staring at a page of conjugations, I feel something hit the back of my head. It’s a balled-up piece of paper. When I open it, it reads,
Hey Sasquatch—
I’m going to pluck your eyebrows for you tonight. C U in my room after dinner.
XOXO
—E
I don’t know whether to feel embarrassed—I mean, she did just throw paper at my head—or happy. When I look back at her, she gives me a wave, fluttering each of her long, manicured fingers individually. And when I glance around at everyone else in study hall, nobody is laughing at me. If anything, the other girls seem curious to know what the note says.
Estella, I think, knows how obnoxious she is. She’s more clever than people give her credit for. It seems like everyone assumes she’s a spoiled bimbo, when she’s neither. I can see it in the way she looks around sometimes, quietly, her face tight with concentration, just taking everything in. If people weren’t so quick to judge, just based on what she looked like, she might not be able to get away with so much. Then again—her stepdad is on the board of directors.
A few weeks into the year, I’m sitting at lunch with Estella and Lindsey. I’ve started eating with them every day. “You have an accent, you know,” Estella informs me. So far she’s plucked my eyebrows, showed me how to roll the waistband of my skirt up so that it’s at least a few inches shorter than regulation (although none of the teachers say anything), and openly expressed her hopelessness that I’ll ever be able to properly apply eyeliner. I keep waiting for the day when I can relax around her. So far, it isn’t looking good.
“Do I?”
“Yes. Very Pittsburgh. My mother’s first husband is originally from Pittsburgh.” She shakes her head, oblivious to the hint of a West Virginia drawl in her thick, accusing tone. As her hair spills over her broad shoulders, her movement sends a swirl of perfume across the table. It smells so good—so clean and lovely—I can almost see it. “He trained himself to get rid of it. You should do the same thing.” She digs into her cake—Estella eats three huge pieces of cake for lunch every day, and her body is perfect—and chews silently, staring at me.
“You’re so mean,” Lindsey says, staring at her own untouched piece of cake. The minute she takes a bite, Estella will narrow her eyes and kind of cock her head to one side, looking at me, expecting us to share a smirk.
“I am not mean. I’m honest. You know, nobody is ever straightforward. But sometimes people need to hear the truth.”
“Hey, look”—I put my hand on Lindsey’s arm—“there she is.” We’ve been trying to spot Mazzie every day at lunch, without any luck. Now the three of us stare as she takes small steps, balancing her tray in one hand, looking around the room for a place to sit. I catch her gaze and try to wave her over to us.
“You know, she’s super smart,” Lindsey says. “She’s in my advanced abstract mathematics class.”
“She’s in my advanced abstract mathematics class,” Estella mocks. Even though she’s pretty smart, there’s no question Estella isn’t good at math. She’s taking geometry for the second year in a row. “Big deal. Eat your cake already. You know you want to.” Underneath the table, she kicks Lindsey.
“Ow!” Lindsey’s eyes well up with tears. “That really hurt!” Estella is cocaptain of the girls’ field-hockey team, and you can tell who the other team members are by the way their shins are covered in bruises so purple as to be almost black. Each day after school, they cringe as they peel off their knee socks. Only Estella and the other cocaptain—Amanda Hopwood—are almost bruise-free.
“Go get her,” Lindsey urges me.
“Yeah,” Estella echoes, giving me a much lighter kick under the table, “go get her.” She rubs her hands together. “She can’t avoid us forever.”
“I don’t know,” I say, watching as Mazzie—who pretended not to notice my wave—sits by herself and begins to eat at a deliberate, fast pace. “Maybe we should leave her alone for now.”
I feel protective of Mazzie already. I’m not sure why. Maybe because, at first, it also occurred to me to hide out during lunch, as she’s likely been doing up until today, but I managed to force myself to do otherwise. Or maybe because I keep hearing her talking in her sleep, her voice as angry as ever. I’m not sure why I don’t tell Estella and Lindsey about Mazzie’s restless nights—it’s definitely a juicy piece of info. I just don’t. Somehow it feels cruel even for me to know, because I think Mazzie would be mortified if she found out.
Things loosen up after the first couple of months at school. On paper, Woodsdale Academy is a model of academic excellence. Its students’ days are planned down to the minute. We wake up in time to get dressed and hurry to breakfast by 7:15. Homeroom starts at 7:50. Classes begin at 8:00 and last until 3:00. Every student is required to participate in at least one extracurricular event, preferably a sport, and practice is held at a minimum from 3:30 to 5:30 every day. A sit-down, family-style dinner follows from 6:00 to 7:00. Study hall in the dorms—bedroom doors open, no talking or music allowed—lasts from 7:30 to 9:30. Lights out is at 11:00 for underclassmen, midnight for upperclassmen.
But most of their “model of excellence” is a load of crap. It’s just so people like the Ghost can feel great about packing up their kids and sending them away. Once you know what you’re doing, it’s easy to break the rules. Take our uniforms, for example. In the student handbook, there are five whole pages devoted to their care and cleaning. During our first dorm meeting of the new school year, we even have a visit from a member of the housekeeping staff, who explains how we should hang and fold each article of clothing in order to keep our shirts and skirts in pristine condition. As we lounge on the sofas and on the floor, we pretend to pay attention as she demonstrates how to properly fold—never roll—a pair of nylon-and-cotton-blend knee socks to be stored in our drawers.
This is how it really works: after school every day, most of us have loosened our ties and untucked our shirts before we even get back to the dorm. At the end of the hallway, there are two piles: one for neckties, and one for navy blue knee socks. We add our own clothes to the pile, toss our shirts over the back of our desk chairs, and leave our skirts wherever they happen to fall on the floor of our bedroom. Anytime we put on our uniform, we pluck a tie and a pair of socks from the collective pile. At the end of the week, when they come to collect our laundry, the housekeepers know where to find everything. In the student handbook, “improper uniform maintenance” is supposed to be punishable by half a dozen demerits. But nobody ever mentions what a departure we’ve made from Woodsdale procedure—not even Jill, who is usually so rule conscious that, as Estella loves to say, “She would have made a great Nazi.”
It’s the same kind of thing with sports and academics. Officially, academics come first No Matter What. But Woodsdale has a widespread reputation for its fine swimmers. The varsity team practices year-round, and we compete in scrimmages all fall.
In my first scrimmage, I come in first in every one of my heats. Most of the other girls tell me how excited they are to have me on the team this year, but I’d bet anything they glare at me the second I turn my back, especially Grace.
The following Monday, Coach Solinger tracks me down during a boring lesson on sentence diagramming in English class, tapping me gently on the elbow and nodding at the door.
No matter what time of year it is, Solinger looks like he just wandered off a beach in Malibu. His blond hair is sun streaked, and he’s always in swimming trunks, flip-flops, and some kind of T-shirt. I guess he gets away with it because he’s the swimming coach. Today he’s wearing a threadbare Tom Petty T-shirt that you just know he’s had since college.
Solinger is flirty and has a reputation for picking favorites among his varsity swimmers.
“Katie, I have to tell you, you’re my favorite swimmer,” he declares, leaning against the wall in the empty hallway, gazing at me with a combination of hope and adoration. He rubs an open palm against his whiskery chin, shaking his head. “I simply don’t know where they found you.”
He’s probably in his late thirties now, but I heard he spent the early part of his twenties swimming professionally, and even had a mediocre turn in the Olympics, where he walked away without a medal. He has his doctorate in sports medicine, and I can already tell he’s a great coach. He’s so cute, it’s embarrassing to make eye contact, especially when we’re alone in the hallway like this.
My breath catches. “Hillsburg, Pennsylvania,” I supply.
“What?”
“They found me in Hillsburg. It’s about an hour east of Pittsburgh.”
“Oh. Right.” He grins for a split second before growing serious. “Listen,” he continues, “your schoolwork is important. I mean, nothing is more important than your education, right?”
I’m not sure I’m completely sold on the idea. So far, it seems to me that good looks and money are more important than anything. But whatever—Woodsdale’s slogan for the year (they have a new one every fall) is, “Education is the most valuable tool a person can have.” “Right,” I agree. “I mean, it’s the most valuable tool a person can have.”
Solinger continues to rub his chin. “You’re going to be our key swimmer this year on girls’ varsity. I hope that isn’t too much pressure for you.”
I shake my head. Pressure can feel good, especially if you can push through it. Swimming is all about forcing your way through endless resistance.
“What you need to do,” he continues, “is practice, practice, practice.” He pauses, waiting for a reaction from me. When I don’t say anything, he adds, “Practice.” Then he puts his hands on my shoulders and squeezes. “Practice. Practice. Practice.”
I nod. “Three thirty. I’ll be there.”
“That’s not what I mean.” He takes me by the elbow. “Come with me.”
I glance toward the classroom door. “What about—”
“Don’t worry. You’re clear.” And he tugs me down the hallway, in the direction of the pool.
In a few minutes, I’m standing on deck beside Solinger, feeling ridiculous in my full school uniform. At the opposite end of the pool, in a three-lane area sequestered by buoyed ropes, the ninth-grade girls’ phys ed class is running through a synchronized swimming routine to some kind of classical music. They wear identical maroon swimsuits and bathing caps made of thick, fancy latex that covers their ears. They are operating—all of them—on an insane level of concentration. The effect is both eerie and beautiful, all of them wet and cloaked in stinging fluorescent light.
At first I think Solinger and I are the only people in the natatorium besides the girls. But then I notice somebody swimming in the lane closest to me. His body is parallel with the water, almost beneath it, moving quickly and without too much visible effort, exactly the way it should be.
Solinger kneels at the head of the lane, waiting for the swimmer to reach us. Before the body can curl into a flip turn, Solinger grabs hold of an ear, tugging the swimmer to his feet.
I’d recognized him just by the way he moves in the water. But to see his face as he stares upward at us, his faint scowl at being interrupted, his annoyance with the ninth graders at the other end of the pool—all of it combined with the way he looks dripping wet, his hair stuffed beneath a swimming cap so that only a few lone, blond curls escape from a corner behind his ear—only one thought goes through my mind: I love boarding school.
Drew Bailey spits into the water, his breath heavy. “What is it? I’m in the middle of a five hundred.”
Solinger, annoyed, says, “Keep your panties on, Bailey. Get out for a minute.”
Drew pulls his goggles away from his face, perching them on his forehead to reveal big blue eyes. “But I’m in the middle of—”
“Uh-huh.” Solinger snaps his fingers. “Up.”
Drew stands between us, still panting, oblivious to a white thread of booger at the edge of his nostril. “What’s up? I’ve got”—he glances at the clock—“thirty minutes before I have to be in chem lab. I’ve got a B minus, and I can’t be late or I’ll lose points, five points for every minute you’re late. Education is the most valuable . . .” He realizes Solinger is smirking at him. “Oh, forget it.”
Solinger strokes his shadow of a beard. His other hand is on the small of my back. He gives it a reassuring pat, as if to say, I know. What. A. Jerk. “You won’t lose any points. I’ll take care of it.”
Drew shakes his head. “You said that about trig, and I—”
“Later.” He nudges us together. “Katie Kitrell, Drew Bailey. Drew is our number one on the boys’ varsity. Drew, this is the girl I was telling you about.”
Drew nods, looking at Solinger, not me. I’m not sure why Solinger is even explaining any of this to us—I guess he wants to make a formal introduction. Drew and I have been in practice together every day after school, but the girls’ and boys’ scrimmage meets are separate, so we haven’t exactly had a chance to see each other in action. “I know who she is. She hangs around with Estella.” Drew finally looks in my general direction, narrows his eyes, and mouths, “Trouble.” I notice that he’s wearing a thin silver chain with a tiny crucifix around his neck.
Right away I’m curious about what his problem is with Estella, because Drew’s best friend is none other than Stetson McClure. The two of them are always eating lunch together and talking around the pool, when water polo and swim team practices overlap.
Solinger couldn’t be less interested. “Shake hands,” he directs.
When neither of us moves, Solinger reaches out to physically lift our hands and bring them together, pumping our arms in a forced shake. Drew avoids making eye contact for as long as possible. Finally, after we shake hands, he wipes his nose clean and meets my gaze. But he doesn’t smile.
Drew is a junior, like Stetson. He’s fast, I know, and oh my God is he cute. He’s at least six foot four, strong, and kind of effortlessly graceful, which is why he’s such a good swimmer.
Solinger takes a step back. “I want you two to practice together, every day. Before breakfast and now, third period.”
I blink at him. “But I have English.”
“Not anymore, you don’t. You’ll have study hall, which means you come here. English is seventh period for you now.”
Drew scratches the back of his head, working a finger beneath his bathing cap. “I thought I could come and go whenever I felt like it. Good God, you’d think they could turn down the Rachmaninoff just a little, wouldn’t you?”
Finally, I find my voice. “The what?”
He looks at me like I’m stupid. “The music? This is Rachmaninoff’s Ninth Symphony.” His mouth hangs open. “You’ve never heard this before?”
Before I can say anything else, Solinger interrupts with, “Ladies, ladies, ladies. I want you to work together. Run drills, time each other, keep each other in check. I have intramurals with the freshmen. I can’t be here, and I don’t want you two working completely uncoached.”
I’m too embarrassed to look at Drew again. I’m just standing there in my uniform, actually sweating because the air in the natatorium is so warm and muggy, but I feel almost naked. “It’s fine with me.”
Drew is confused and on the verge of furious. “But, Coach.” He lowers his voice. “She’s a girl.”
“Oh, she is? I hadn’t noticed. Forget everything I said then. As you were.” He gives Drew a light slap against the back of his head. “She’s a girl. So what?”
Drew opens his mouth, looks at me, looks at Solinger—and says nothing. He only scowls.
Solinger gives me a wide, satisfied grin, like everything’s just peachy. “Your suit is in your locker, right, Kitrell?”
I nod.
“Well? Whatcha waiting for? Go get changed.”
When I get back from the locker room, Solinger is gone. Drew watches as I slide into my own lane and position my goggles on my face. He nods at the chalkboard to the right of the pool, where a series of drills is written in chicken scratch: 2X100 free, 2X100 back, 2X100 breast. 500 free.
“That’s today,” he says. “He’ll change it for the afternoon and morning.”
“Are you going to—” I’m about to ask him if he wants to time me, if he has a stopwatch I can use, but he holds up a palm, stopping me mid question. “Listen . . . Katie. You should know, those friends of yours have a bad reputation. Especially Estella.” He shakes his head, looks at me with exaggerated pity. “You should be careful. That chick is nuts.”
And before I can say anything in response, he’s gone, his face below water. When I finish my first drill, I stand up in the shallow end of the pool to find myself almost alone, watching a crooked line of tired freshmen as they move single file toward the girls’ locker room, the music playing to the end on low, echoing against every corner of the room, as though addressing me and my ignorance alone.
The next few weeks are a blur of swimming and schoolwork and scrimmages and more schoolwork—I’m so tired and overwhelmed that I don’t even make it off campus on the weekends. Lindsey and Estella are busy too—everyone is—but Estella manages to go out with Stetson every weekend, and Lindsey often goes home to see her parents. The fact that my only friends in the dorm are gone most weekends makes the time I spend with Mazzie all the more excruciating. She still talks in her sleep, and she still ignores me almost all the time. I get frequent updates from Lindsey about Mazzie’s stellar performance in advanced abstract mathematics, but beyond that, I don’t know the first thing about her aside from the fact that she seemed to appear from out of nowhere and wants to disappear more badly than anything.
For our entire first week of practice, Drew doesn’t say much to me. Then, on a Monday, after he’s finished swimming and stretching, he takes a seat on the bench beside the pool and watches as I glide to the end of a 500-meter free.
I stand at the shallow end, catching my breath, tugging off my goggles and swim cap. My whole body feels warm and energized.
“Nice job,” Drew says.
I’m still trying to catch my breath. “Thanks.” I hop out of the water and glance at the clock on the wall. “Wow. We’ve got twenty minutes until next period.”
When I look at him, as I stand there dripping wet, I notice that his gaze is taking in my whole body, like he’s seeing me for the first time. That’s something about swimming that I’ve always found kind of odd—it’s like you’re standing around in your underwear, soaking wet, but nobody acknowledges that everyone around them is half-naked. I mean, Drew’s in a Speedo. I can see every ripple in his body, right down to the V-shape of his hips, which I do my absolute best not to stare at.
Right now, it’s obvious he’s noticing me too. There’s nobody here but the two of us, our breath audible and deep, our cheeks flushed. For a few seconds we stay that way, silent, staring at each other’s bodies.
“So . . . what should we do with the rest of the time?” I ask. “Should we do more drills?”
The moment between us dissolves. Drew tugs off his swim cap. There are those curls again. I love them. “I’m too tired,” he says. But then he stands up, strolls over to the edge of the pool, and sits down, letting his legs dangle into the water. He lies on his back and stares at the ceiling. “Katie.”
“What?”
“Come here.”
I have no idea where his interest is coming from; a week ago he didn’t even want to look at me. But I’m not going to argue. Trying my best to be casual, I take a seat beside him.
He’s still looking at the ceiling. “You’re really good. You know that, right?”
“Yes.” I dip my legs into the water beside his. “Swimming is the only thing I’m good at.”
He sits up. “That’s probably not true. You get good grades, don’t you?”
“Well, yeah. I guess I meant that swimming is the only thing I really love to do.”
His gaze drifts to my shoulders, my chest, my legs, and finally back to my face. “I can tell you love it.” He hesitates. “You look really good—really graceful, I mean—in the water.”
Oh. My. God. I have to struggle to find my voice. “Thanks.”
He nods. “Do you think you’ll keep swimming? I mean, I’m sure you’ll get a scholarship somewhere, but after college?”
“I hope so. Maybe I can coach.”
“You don’t think you’ll try to go pro?”
He and I both know this isn’t a realistic option—if it were, I’d have been at a swimming academy somewhere since like age ten—so I wonder why he’s even mentioning it. Maybe he’s trying to make me feel good. The possibility makes my face grow hot. “Well,” I say, “I can swim in college, and swim in a league after that, but I’m not good enough to go to the Olympics. I mean, maybe a few years ago, if I’d had a good coach and had been really focused . . .” If my parents hadn’t been preoccupied with my brother as he was losing his mind. I shake my head firmly. “I don’t think I’d want that, anyway.”
“Oh, no?” His voice seems genuinely interested. “Why not?”
“Because I love it so much. The fact that I’m fast is just, like, icing. I told you, it’s the only thing I really love to do. And if I had pressure that intense on me—well, what if I stopped loving it? Then what would I have?” I shake my head. “Nothing.”
Drew narrows his eyes. “That’s really interesting,” he murmurs.
“You think?”
He nods. “Did you watch the Olympics this summer?”
“Of course.”
“How about that Margo Duvall?” He’s talking about the girl who took home nine gold medals in swimming.
“I know,” I say, getting excited. “When she finished the two hundred IM, she stood up and looked around, and she knew she’d won, but she—”
“She wasn’t even breathing heavily!” Drew finishes.
“I know, right?” I shake my head. “Just thinking about being that fast gives me goose bumps.”
“But you’d never want to be like her?”
I shrug. “In theory, sure. But . . . no, not really. Swimming is . . .” I struggle for the right words, amazed that Drew and I are talking so intimately. “It’s mine. I love competing in meets and everything, but once you get to that level, it’s not really about swimming anymore, is it?”
Drew shakes his head, looking over at me again. “No, it isn’t. You know, I believe that people need to find what they love to do most in the world, what they’re best at, and then they need to use that ability to make the world better.”
His eyes are so sincere, so hopeful and kind. “That’s amazing,” I say. “I’ve never heard anyone put it that way.”
Drew nods. “Like, the thing I love to do the most is to be outdoors and to be physical. So I spend a lot of time volunteering, especially for Habitat for Humanity. That way, I get to be outside and do a lot of work with my hands, but when the work is over, I get to watch someone who’s had a way rougher life than me get a nice place to live.”
I could cry if I let myself. If I squinted, maybe tilted my head a little bit, I could probably see a halo above Drew’s curls.
“You make it sound so simple,” I say. Our gazes are locked together.
“It is simple.”
I force myself to swallow before I start drooling. “But I’m no Margo Duvall.”
Drew grins. “That’s right. You’re Katie Kitrell.” He hesitates. “I think that’s even better.”
We sit there in silence for a few seconds. I feel so dizzy that I’m almost nauseous. Drew looks like he’s about to say something else, when his eyes flicker to the clock. “Katie.”
“Hmmm?”
“We’re late.” And just as quickly as our conversation started, it ends. He hops out of the pool. “I’ve gotta go.” As he’s heading toward the locker room, he turns around, walking backward, looking at me while I start to towel off. “This was fun,” he says. He stops at the door to the boys’ locker room.
I nod. “Yeah, it was.”
He gives me another smile. “We’ll talk more tomorrow, okay?”
On a Friday afternoon, I’m sitting in art class, putting the finishing touches on my handmade mosaic of what’s supposed to be the Woodsdale Academy Insignia. Our teacher, Mrs. Averly, who is at least in her seventies, pauses over my shoulder. I don’t say anything as I squint at my project, trying to force an already glued maroon square into a better position.
She clears her throat. “Kathryn?”
“Katie.” I push the mosaic away, sighing. “Yes?”
One of the things that’s interesting about Woodsdale is that you can take your electives whenever you want throughout all of high school. So what ends up happening is classes get filled with students from all different grades. There’s some kind of educational philosophy behind it, I’m sure, but I know I’d much rather be with people my own age who aren’t so intimidating. I’m at the same table with Grace Waugh, whose mosaic is flaw-less, and her best friend, Leslie Carter. Leslie’s father is on Woodsdale’s board of directors.
The two of them nudge each other, their grins spreading as Mrs. Averly says, “That is really very poor work. It looks like you haven’t put the slightest bit of effort into—”
“I think she’s been distracted, Mrs. Averly,” Grace says.
“Oh? By what?”
Grace gives me a demure smile. “By Drew.”
Drew is on the opposite end of the room, working on his own, perfect mosaic of a big white cross surrounded by small ceramic depictions of what I assume are robed Christians. Drew is the president of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes and seems genuine about his faith. Before every swim meet, he leads a circle of swimmers in a prayer. Even though I’ve started to do almost anything for a chance to be near him, I never join in; Will and I decided a long time ago that religion just wasn’t for us.
The thing that gets me is, Grace is right; I have been distracted by Drew. He and I have been finishing our drills early most days and talking more and more. We both seem to know, without openly acknowledging it, that there’s something happening between us. And for the past few weeks in art class, we’ve been glancing in each other’s direction, smiling. If we didn’t have assigned seats, I might have the nerve to sit with him.
Mrs. Averly looks at me, then at Drew. Everybody loves Drew, especially the teachers. She beams at his mosaic. “Well . . . you’ll have to redo that, Katie, if you want to pass the assignment.” She pauses, then adds, “It looks like a pentagram.”
Once Mrs. Averly is out of earshot, Grace and Leslie engage in deliberately loud conversation.
“I think she likes him,” Grace says, “because he’s the captain of the boys’ team, and she thinks she’s going to be the next captain of the girls’ team.”
“Really?” Leslie asks, her tone mockingly innocent. “And then I guess she thinks they’ll be boyfriend and girlfriend, like Estella and Stetson?”
“Yes, I’m pretty sure that’s what she thinks.”
I’m humiliated. I’ve never had anything like this happen to me before, and what’s even worse is that Drew can hear every word they’re saying.
“Do you think that might happen?” Leslie asks.
“Oh, no. I mean, first of all, she won’t be captain because nobody else on the team likes her enough to vote for her.”
What she’s saying doesn’t make sense—Solinger is the one who chooses the captains—but I don’t even have the nerve to look up, let alone say anything.
“And if she isn’t captain, then it seems dumb to think that Drew would go out with her, doesn’t it?”
“Well,” Grace says, “even if by some miracle she did make captain, he still wouldn’t go out with her.”
“Oh yeah? Why not?”
“Because,” Grace says, and now she raises her voice a little higher, just to be sure everyone around her can hear. “Where do I even start? First of all, she comes from trash. Her brother was killed in some kind of crazy car accident. I heard he was drunk. And Drew would never date someone like that. Besides, she’s not even pretty enough for him.”
My hand is closed around my sloppy mosaic, ready to hurl it at Grace’s face. But then what would happen? I’d get in trouble—I could even get expelled, maybe. In the meantime, though, I’m sitting there with my head down, and there’s no way I can stop them, the tears are coming, hitting the table and rolling off the edge and landing in droplets that hover unabsorbed on the surface of my wool skirt. I don’t know what else to do. I get up and leave the room. It takes all my willpower not to break into a run before I reach the door.
The bathroom has three stalls, and there’s no lock on the door; all I can do is hope that Grace and Leslie don’t try to follow me in. All of the stalls are empty for now. I lean against the wall beside the sink, catching my breath, before I let myself start crying hard. I slide down the wall and sit on the cold tile floor, my legs folded, trying to breathe. Just breathe.
And while I’m sitting there, all my sniffling and deep breaths echoing off of the walls, I hear something else—the sound of something shifting in the cabinet beneath the sink.
For a second, I forget all about Grace and Leslie and Drew and Will. I become completely silent. I stop breathing, listening.
I hear it again: a slight crunching sound, quick breathing, and as freaked out as I am to look in the cupboard, there’s something familiar in the sounds.
When I try to open the door, there’s a split second where I think it’s locked, until I realize there’s somebody on the other side, holding it shut. I pull harder—the person inside lets go, which sends me falling backward onto my butt, out of breath, a sharp pain going through my lower back.
Right there—under the sink in the first-floor girls’ bathroom, her tiny body curled into an impossibly small ball, legs gathered behind the pipes, hands in their usual tight fists—is Mazzie.
“What are you doing here?” she says.
I almost laugh. “What am I doing here? What are you doing—you’re under the freaking sink!”
She doesn’t smile. “Yeah. I know where I am, Katie.”
We sit there, staring at each other, for a good long minute. Finally, for the first time since I’ve met her, Mazzie’s voice breaks into something besides hostility. “Don’t tell,” she says. “Please?”
“Is this where you are all the time? We look for you at lunch. I always thought you were—”
“Shh!” She looks panicked, and I realize that somebody’s heading toward the bathroom. Without thinking, I push the door to the sink closed, stand up, and pretend to be washing my hands.
It’s another girl from my art class, Mary Ann Bowers. She’s a freshman.
“Katie,” Mary Ann says, “I’m supposed to give you a message.”
Oh, God. I can only imagine what Grace or Leslie—or even Mrs. Averly—has sent her to tell me. Even though Mazzie’s the one hiding under the sink, I’m so embarrassed by what she’s going to overhear.
“Drew is in the hall waiting for you,” she says. “He wants you to come out and talk to him.”
“Uh, okay.” I’m still pretending to wash my hands. “Just give me a minute alone in here. Tell him I’ll be right out.”
As soon as the door closes behind Mary Ann, I crouch down again and open the door. I give Mazzie my hand, offering to help her out from under the sink.
She shakes her head. “That’s okay. I’m going to stay here.” She hesitates. Then she says, “Thanks.”
“Are you okay?”
She nods. “You should go meet Drew, shouldn’t you?”
I shrug. “I don’t have to, not right away. Are you sure you’re all right?”
Mazzie doesn’t say anything for a moment or two. Finally, she gives me the slightest smile. “Sure. I’m okay.” She glances at her watch. “I’ve got five more minutes before Spanish. Please close the door.”
Just as I’m about to, though, she reaches out and grabs me by the wrist—it’s the first time we’ve ever really touched each other, and I feel a spark of surprise at the strength of her grip, those tiny fingers holding on to me so tightly that I couldn’t get free if I tried.
She says, “I have a message for you too, Katie.” Her smile gets a little bigger. “Your brother called.”
Drew is still there in the otherwise deserted hallway, waiting for me. I’m so shook up that I almost walk right past him—he’s right outside the door to the girls’ bathroom—but he catches me by the sleeve of my blazer.
It’s obvious I’ve been crying. “Katie, come here,” he says, and he gives me a hug.
I let myself lean against him, my head against his chest. If any of the faculty see us like this, we’ll both get demerits. He’s so much bigger than me, his arms so strong and warm, that I can’t help but cry into them. I feel so sick with guilt that I can’t hold it in for another second. When did my brother call? Was it this morning, after I’d left early to go eat breakfast with Lindsey? Or last night, when we were in the common room until lights-out, pretending to do English homework when we were really keeping watch for each other while we took turns sneaking outside to smoke cigarettes?
“It’s okay,” Drew says. Then he cups my chin in his hand, tilting my face upward and looking into my eyes, and says, “You don’t have to be embarrassed, okay? I know you like me.”
“What?” The bell rings, and the halls start to fill up with students. At least I won’t have to go back to art class. “You think I’m crying because I’m embarrassed because—because you think I know you know I like you?”
His hands are on my shoulders. His grip feels so good, a part of me wants nothing else but to sink back into his arms.
He looks confused for a minute, thinking about what I’ve just said, distracted by the people around us. I step back from him. Finally, he says, “Yes. That’s why you’re crying—isn’t it? And,” he adds, lowering his voice, leaning in slightly, “because of everything else Grace said. About, you know, all those other things.”
“Uh . . .” What else am I supposed to tell him? “Yes.” I nod my head. “I guess so.” And really, when I think about it, it’s all kind of the truth—in a way.
The two-minute warning bell rings. The halls start to empty again as everyone makes their way back into class. Drew glances at the clock on the wall behind me. “Katie, I have to go to trig, okay? But listen . . . we’ll talk more. Soon.” He puts his hands back on my shoulders, then lets them slide down my arms, his fingertips lingering against mine for just an instant before he backs away. “Okay?”
The door to the girls’ bathroom opens, and Mazzie strolls out. I turn to watch her, but she doesn’t even give us a glance as she passes. By the time I turn back, Drew is also gone.
Not long after he’s left my sight, it occurs to me that I’m so sick about Will, I don’t even remember what Drew and I just talked about. I’m left standing there all by myself, confused and horrified by what Mazzie knows and who she might tell, and there’s a part of me aware of the fact that I’ve got a vocab quiz in Latin class in about thirty seconds, and I’m going to be late, and there’s nothing I can do about any of it.