Cass needed more than a quick break. Halfway out of her safari clothes up in her room she got a text from Leo that made her wish she could take the rest of the night off.
Sheets & Bezold are back! McWalter & the Wonder Twins get in tonite. Pow-wow at the fountain, 7:00 sharp
Cass whimpered as she read. All of their music and theater friends were returning, and from the looks of things, Leo was arranging one of his legendary meet-ups. They’d hang out at the music school fountain for a couple of hours, talking about their summers, then head downtown for a late dinner, finally ending up at Delaney’s, where it wasn’t unusual for people to still be partying at dawn. Cass had done her fair share of 6:00 a.m. Krispy Kreme runs with a stop at the Quickie Mart for tomato juice and Red Bull to help ward off hangovers.
It was almost physically painful to text Leo her decline.
More voting tonight. So sorry! I really want to be there!
His response came back immediately.
Sorority more important than friends? Color me surprised.
Cass bristled. If Leo knew how much she longed to ditch all of this and spend time with him, he wouldn’t be acting so awful.
Don’t start with this again, she wrote back.
Another rapid-fire reply: So should I expect to be stood up again on Friday? Headless Denvers. Remember? Are you coming to help?
Cass resisted the urge to tell him where he could shove the Headless Denvers. Because she knew she wouldn’t miss Friday for anything. She loved the Denvers, first of all. Plus, the chance to perform before the concert was like a light at the end of the dark tunnel of rush. And she missed Leo fiercely.
Except Leo was being an ass—so much more than usual, which both confused and hurt her still-tender heart. She decided not to dignify his guilt trip and texted back a terse I’ll be there.
She looked up from her phone, into the mirror over her dresser, and snarled at the dark circles under her eyes. If the next couple of days were as painful as the past two, then she’d have to go to Delaney’s on Friday looking like something out of the Walking Dead.
“Why so dramatic?” Ruby said. “It wasn’t that bad a day.”
Cass opened her mouth to unload about Leo’s party; then she remembered that Ruby had real problems to deal with.
“Did you hear anything from your dad yet?” she asked.
Now it was Ruby’s turn to frown. “He e-mailed.”
“What about house payments?”
“He’s going to transfer some cash so I can make the first one. But the rest is due next week. I’m starting to think maybe I should talk to somebody.”
Cass stopped with her head half in her Hamilton T-shirt. “Don’t.”
“What?”
“Seriously. Don’t.”
Ruby gave a little laugh. “Why?”
Cass slipped her arms through the sleeves and went to sit on her bed. Usually Ruby’s idealism was endearing, but this bordered on stupid.
“Do you have any idea what they could do if you told anybody? They’ll eat you alive.”
“C’mon, Cass. Remember the Sigma oath? Sisters for eternity?”
Cass rolled her eyes. She could picture it now—the whispering disguised as concern, the way the other girls would devour the details of Ruby’s predicament like a Thanksgiving turkey until nothing remained but a picked-over carcass. And that was if she got lucky. Cass didn’t want to think about what sick treat the Killer Bees might come up with to “strengthen” Ruby’s resolve to fix her financial problems. She could just imagine how quickly they would jump at the chance to get rid of another “subpar.”
“This place is all about sisterhood until they find out you aren’t perfect,” Cass said. “Remember all the drama last year? They’ll make your life hell.”
“You need to have more faith in people,” said Ruby.
“And you need to get over this whole sisterhood illusion.”
“You used to believe it, too. Remember?”
Cass’s eye fell on a photograph she’d pinned to her bulletin board—a picture of their pledge class on their first retreat just a few weeks after Bid Day. They were all tumbled over one another in a canoe by the lake, laughing into the camera with giddy, nothing-to-lose grins. Somehow Ruby had managed to maintain that spirit, despite all of the abuse that came after. Most of the other girls hadn’t smiled like that in ages.
“I did believe it,” she told Ruby. “Once. But things are different now.” She went to the door, holding it open for her friend. She bumped her hip against Ruby’s. “You know I love you, right?”
“Ditto, my dear.” Ruby squeezed Cass’s cheek with her free hand. “Now quit it with the sad face. Cheer up!”
But Cass couldn’t cheer up because there was the dining room, packed with girls settling in for a second long night of voting. Some of them had even brought down comforters and pillows; everyone wore pajamas. And there, presiding over all of it, was Sophia Kensington, looking just as pinched as ever. By all accounts, tonight was when the voting got serious.
And nasty.
Marina kicked things off by handing out the lists of girls who had gotten unanimous yesses and nos after each party that day. The nos were cut without debate, and the yesses were just an FYI. As always, it was the borderline girls everybody was interested in. Delia would read their names one by one, and then each would be debated and voted upon.
Delia took her place at the head table, then signaled Cass to start the Sigma anthem and pledge. When the sisters were finished singing, Delia cleared her throat and started to read down the names. Cass rubbed her temples. Each name represented at least twenty minutes of debate. They were going to be at it all night.
“Brittany Elliott,” Delia read, nearing the end of the list. “Madeleine Christopher, and . . . Rachel Morgan.”
Everybody gasped. Rachel Morgan was a must-have. They’d been looking at her photograph for the past week and a half, busting their asses to impress her. How had Rachel Morgan made it onto the borderline list?
“I’ll open the floor for discussion,” Delia said.
“Starting with Rachel Morgan,” Sophia jumped in. “What are the objections?”
Silence for a moment. Then Courtney stood up.
“Rachel Morgan is unsustainable,” she announced.
More gasps—a mixture of horror and delight. Sisters were forbidden to say anything blatantly negative about rushees, but they had developed a code. “Unsustainable” was one of the worst things you could say. It could mean anything from “this girl is a backstabber who posted all my secrets online” to “she’s a felon who might actually have killed someone.” People could let their imaginations fill in the details, but “unsustainable” meant that a rushee wasn’t what she seemed; once she joined the sisterhood her true colors would come out and then everyone would be sorry they’d let her in.
Cass had met Rachel the day before. Just briefly, but it was enough. She’d been doing her best to stay out of Courtney’s way, but something inside of her snapped. Maybe it was Ruby’s reminder of the way things used to be, or maybe she just didn’t care anymore what the older sisters thought—Leo’s disdain for the sorority had gotten into her brain, and now she told herself that if she could just make it through rush, then she could let Sigma go. Maybe she’d even quit.
But not without making things a little harder for Courtney Mann.
Cass stood. “Rachel Morgan is not unsustainable.”
Courtney turned with a withering glare. “Excuse me? I think I would know. We were in Future Leaders Intensive together.”
“Then why didn’t you bring this up when we were talking about her as a must-have for the past two weeks?”
“I honestly had hoped she’d changed. But let’s just say I no longer feel she’s Sigma material.”
Courtney looked pained, but anyone with half a brain could see why she’d really waited to drop this bombshell. She’d held off for maximum effect—and maximum pain to poor Rachel.
Delia cut in. “But Rachel Morgan was identified as a top prospect. We would have to have a very good reason to cut her.”
“I do have good reasons,” Courtney answered. “I want to stay positive here, so I won’t discuss the details in public. But I have a reliable indication that she’s been discussing a very private matter with other rushees, and I just don’t see a place for gossips here at Sigma.”
Courtney’s friends were all nodding. Delia looked apprehensive and Sophia looked furious, but there was nothing either of them could do. Rachel was on the borderline list, so the sisters had to vote.
“Alright,” said Delia. “Voting is now open for Rachel Morgan. What say you sisters?”
Cass watched as the black paddles went up. “Oh, come on,” she muttered to the table next to hers, which was full of Killer Bees. “You didn’t even meet her.”
“No talking during voting,” Delia snapped.
Cass raised her red paddle, then counted. Most of the other yes votes came from her pledge class.
“We have a tie,” Delia announced, and groans filled the room. When a tie happened, another round of debate was required, and then another vote to see if anyone could be persuaded to change her mind. If not, then another round of debate ensued, and on and on until somebody cried uncle and switched sides.
Cass watched Courtney smirk, remembering how she’d tried to sabotage Madeleine Christopher that afternoon. Cass hadn’t formally met Maddy yet, but Violet’s attachment to her was so strong that Cass had started to feel a fierce protectiveness toward the girl.
Courtney thought she could fix rush for the girls she and her friends liked by rigging the system. Well if Courtney could do it, then maybe Cass could, too, and buy at least one deserving rushee another chance.
“Wait a minute,” she spoke up. Her idea was ballsy, but she figured why not try? If nothing else, it would let her see just how flexible Miss Play by the Rules Delia could be. “Madeleine Christopher is on the borderline list, too. Right?”
“Right,” said Delia.
“Okay, then I want a trade. Invite Madeleine Christopher back tomorrow, and I’ll change my vote for Rachel Morgan. I’ll vote her down right now.”
Whispers sizzled up as the sisters registered this new development.
“I don’t think you can do that,” said Sophia. She turned to Marina at the computer. “Can she do that?”
“That’s not how things are usually done,” said Delia.
“You know we’re going to have a fight over Madeleine Christopher when her name comes up,” Cass said with a pointed look at Courtney. “That’s on top of however many more rounds we’re going to go over Rachel Morgan. I’m offering to cut at least an hour out of the evening.”
“Courtney?” said Delia. “Is that acceptable to you?”
“Absolutely not,” said Courtney. “Every rushee should get her own vote.”
“Fine,” said Cass. “Then we’ll spend all night debating two girls.”
“Somebody else will change their vote,” Courtney insisted. Her gaze darted from table to table, staring down every subpar in its path. “They will if they know what’s good for them.”
Cass could see her pledge sisters shrinking under Courtney’s gaze. Memories of last year hung heavy in the air. But then something amazing happened. Delia brought down her gavel.
“Threats aren’t allowed, either,” she told Courtney, and an almost palpable release flooded the room. The spell had been broken. “In fact,” Delia went on, “I think we should stop the discussion right here and take another vote.”
Again, the paddles went up, and Cass silently begged the girls in her pledge class to keep their responses the same as before. They still looked beaten down, but nobody changed her vote.
“Fine,” Courtney snapped when Delia announced another tie. “If people don’t care about character and quality, then that’s their problem. I’ve done all I can do.”
Delia turned to Marina Lucci. “Rachel Morgan will not be invited back, but Madeleine Christopher will be.”
Cass sat back, astonished. She couldn’t believe her plan had worked! And up at the head table, Sophia Kensington looked like she couldn’t believe it, either. She sat with her mouth open, her face paler than pale. Ruby reached over and squeezed Cass’s hand under the table.
“That was awesome,” she whispered. “Go, you!”
Four hours and thirty rushees later, the sisters dragged themselves back upstairs. It was past midnight, but the decorating committee was already outside preparing the house for the next day’s party. Cass peered out the window to see them laying a red carpet up the front walk with klieg lights on either side.
“I can barely walk,” she moaned as she and Ruby rounded the landing on the second floor. They almost bumped into Courtney and Aimee, who stood in the middle of the hall with their heads bent over Aimee’s phone.
“Excuse you,” said Aimee, shielding the phone from Cass’s view.
“Wow, Cass. That was pretty amazing down there,” Courtney said. “I guess I should have known you’d fall for the hopeless ones. Are there any other charity cases we should be aware of?”
Cass studied Courtney—perfect face, perfect hair, perfect body—she was so beautiful, yet so hard. Cass looked for a hint of compassion in those wide eyes and saw only steel.
“No,” Cass said. She was done fighting for the night. “Come on, Ruby, it’s late.”
“I’m going to try and call my dad first,” Ruby said. She ducked into the privacy booth with her phone. Cass, meanwhile, headed up to the third floor to print out the next day’s songs in the study lounge. It was quieter up here; most of the other girls had already tucked themselves into bed. Cass could hear her own footsteps creaking on the rug-covered hardwood. And there, just across the landing, was the door nobody ever entered.
This was the room where Marianne McCourt had lived, and inside was the window from which she’d fallen. Cass paused just a moment, then pushed the door open, surprised that it gave so easily. She’d figured a door closed for so long must have been locked, or at least become stuck a little. But suddenly she stood on the threshold, looking into a place that hadn’t been entered in almost three years.
Moonlight came in through the window. Cass ventured forward and peered around. The room looked like any other room in the house before the sisters moved in each year: two iron-framed beds stripped to the mattresses, two chests of drawers with mirrors, and two desks flanked by bulletin boards and empty shelves. The bulletin boards in this room were empty, except for a small picture still pinned to one. It was an old drawing of Snoopy and Woodstock from the Peanuts comic strips. They were hugging, and the caption read, “Happiness is having a friend like you.”
Cass looked around again, disappointed. She wasn’t sure what she’d expected to find inside Marianne’s room, but after all of the mystery, the actuality was surprisingly anticlimactic.
She turned away from the desk, and as she did she spotted something between the bed and the wall. It looked like a couple sheets of poster board had folded in on each other. Drawing closer, Cass could see what looked like pieces of paper and photos taped to the boards. Gingerly, she pulled it up a few inches and saw that it was a sort of trifold photo collage. It was big and heavy—the kind of thing that might have been used as a visual aid for a class project. This made Cass bolder; if it were just somebody’s novel study homework, why not take a look?
But when she lay the boards out on the bed and opened them up, what they revealed made her gasp. “To Our Beloved Sister, Marianne—We Will Never Forget” was handwritten across the top. Photos, notes, and other items had been arranged across the boards to form a memorial collage. It was the kind of thing that sat on altars at funerals or in front of makeshift shrines where someone had died. Clearly, this had been made for Marianne, and perhaps it had been shut in this room as a way of honoring her. Cass felt like she was looking at a time capsule. Here was Marianne, healthy and vibrant. She had strawberry-blond hair that fell in waves to her shoulders and an almost zany smile. It was hard to imagine someone with a smile like that being unhappy enough to take her own life.
Cass studied the other photos. There were pictures from various fraternity parties, charity functions and formals, plus shots of girls just hanging out around the sorority house. Delia smiled out from many of them. She had long hair in those photos—quite different from the sophisticated crop she now wore. She looked happy and carefree, laughing with her arms around Marianne. Under one image of the girls in Halloween costumes was a handwritten note. “Sisters for eternity,” it read. “I will always carry a part of you with me. Delia”
Cass looked around, hungry for more. When people moved out of houses and rooms, it was impossible to get rid of every trace. Surely there was a hairpin or a scrap of handwriting or even an old book hidden in a corner, a drawer, or under the bed. Using her phone as a flashlight, Cass started pulling open the dressers, feeling along the tops of shelves, checking every crack and crevice. All she found were some dead stinkbugs and a whole lot of dust. She’d almost given up when something told her to look in the beds.
She slid her hand between the box spring and mattress of one bed, running it back and forth. Nothing. She turned and did the same to the other bed. Just when she’d resigned herself to the idea that she’d been wrong, her fingers hit something hard. Something glass. Cass closed her fingers around the object and pulled it free. It was a whiskey bottle: Flat, square, and empty.
A sound from outside, like lots of little pebbles on the roof, made Cass look up. She pushed the bottle back where she’d found it, went to the window and opened the square panes using the old brass handles on each one. The slope was frighteningly steep here. If you didn’t know just where to put your feet, you could easily slip.
But that wasn’t what made her catch her breath. What stunned Cass was the view. Overhead, the stars were free of the campus rooftops. And down below she could see over the trees to places that were usually hidden at street level.
She stood there, enjoying the giddy feeling of being able to glimpse things from a new and beautiful vantage point, until she became aware of voices coming from the open window of the room next door—the president’s suite.
“Rachel Morgan was a must-have. How could you let that happen?” demanded a familiar voice. It was Sophia, and she sounded pissed.
“I had no control over it,” Delia protested. “The sisters voted according to the rules . . .”
“Forget the rules!” Sophia hissed. “It’s your job to ensure Sigma gets the best possible pledge class.”
Cass could hear footsteps going back and forth across the floor, as if one or both of them were pacing.
“I couldn’t have overridden the vote,” Delia was saying. “The rules clearly prohibit a chapter president from going above the will of the sisters.”
“And what do they say about sisters like Cassandra Ryland bartering votes in order to save other rushees from getting cut?”
Cass’s cheeks burned at hearing her own name. She leaned closer to the window, both wanting and afraid to hear what Sophia might say next.
“That girl has a lot of nerve making bargains when she’s lucky to be here in the first place.”
“If it strengthens the sisterhood, I don’t think it’s necessarily a bad thing to let Rachel Morgan go,” Delia said. “If what Courtney said is true, then it doesn’t sound like she’s the kind of person we’d want anyway.”
Sophia spoke in a new, darker voice.
“The Morgans own the most successful network of law firms in this region. They could have kept this house in food and electricity for the next four years.”
“Food and what . . . ?” Cass pulled back, confused. It wasn’t a surprise that Sophia was concerned about money, but Cass had thought she wanted a library wing named after her sister. Why, all of a sudden, were Sophia and Delia talking about everyday expenses like electricity?
The pacing got faster, and when Delia spoke again she sounded scared. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I thought I was doing the right thing.”
Sophia was silent. Then Cass thought she heard a sigh.
“Oh, Delia. Of course you did the right thing. You always do. I’m simply urging you to think more creatively when things like this happen. I’m almost afraid to ask this, but . . . I heard some talk about Imogen Ash not coming to any parties today. She didn’t cut us, did she?”
“No.” Delia sounded relieved to be able to deliver some good news. “She had to miss us due to a school conflict, but we’ve automatically asked her back. She’s still our prime prospect.”
“Good,” said Sophia. “Compared to the Ashes, the Morgans are poor law students. But make no mistake about it: Imogen Ash is now critical. Concentrate on her and everything else will fall into place.”
“This couch is ugly, but it sure is comfortable.”
Maddy shifted on the orange sofa while Rachel channel surfed the old commons TV. They’d been lounging there since getting home from parties at 8:00, and they hadn’t even bothered to change clothes. Maddy’s Bermudas were wrinkled and sweaty but she didn’t care; it just felt so good to rest.
“The only thing I can move is this one finger,” Rachel said. She stopped at an America’s Next Top Model rerun and let the remote fall from her hand. “I am so freaking exhausted.”
“I’m not moving at all,” said Maddy. “Not any more than I have to.”
Just then, the elevator door opened and Imogen dashed out. She skidded across the tile floor in her stockinged feet, almost dropping two steaming boxes of pizza. She got her balance back, shook her hair out of her eyes, and announced, “Food’s here!”
“Okay, I am moving for this.” Maddy sat up so Imogen could sit between her and Rachel. She reached into one of the boxes and took out a gloriously greasy slice of pepperoni with extra cheese. “Oh, wow,” she said as the flavors spread through her mouth. “I’m so used to not eating I didn’t even know how hungry I was.”
“What time is it?” Rachel peered at the TV, fiddling with the remote again. “This thing doesn’t have a clock on it.”
“My phone says ten fifteen.”
“We better eat fast,” said Maddy. “Everybody else’ll be here soon to get their invites.”
Imogen groaned through a mouthful of pizza. “I’m bracing for the apocalypse. Nobody’s going to want me back after I skipped all those parties today.”
Maddy felt horrible for feeling happy about this. Imogen was her friend, and even if she didn’t care as much about rush as the other girls, getting cut was still going to sting. Maddy also knew that if she wanted to be worthy of becoming a Sigma, then she needed to be more positive. Beacons of excellence didn’t root for failure, they helped others see the bright side of potentially negative situations.
“Don’t worry if they cut you,” she told Imogen. “You’re more into the Beacon anyway, so maybe it’s a good thing. Going Greek’s not for everybody.”
Imogen dipped her pizza crust into a mini-cup of ranch dressing. “That’s what Ben said, too.”
“Ben?” Rachel’s eyes widened. “I was going to ask how orientation went, but from the sound of things it was pretty . . .”
“Incredible. But I had to put my fetus of a crush on ice. Turns out he’s already taken.” Imogen sat back with the pizza box in her lap looking dreamily frustrated, which reminded Maddy that Logan hadn’t called or texted her back after she’d thanked him for the flowers. She’d been checking her phone obsessively between rush parties, and she’d even broken her no social media rule to look at his Instagram for a hint about what he might be up to. But he hadn’t posted since before the bon voyage party, and every hour that went by without hearing from him just brought back all of her confusion. If they were over, then why was he sending her roses? Was he sorry for what had happened or just sorry that he’d hurt her?
And when, exactly, were they going to talk about it?
Other girls were coming into the commons, looking droopy and tired. Eye cream couldn’t hide all the dark circles, and zits were starting to pop out on even the most perfect complexions. Maddy offered the leftover pizza around, but nobody took a piece. And now that invites were on their way, she was starting to regret that she hadn’t passed, too; her stomach did a backflip, threatening to give everyone a second look at pepperoni with extra cheese.
At 10:35, Alex got off the elevator. Her hands were empty.
“Some of the houses were late turning in their next round of invitations,” she explained. “It could be awhile longer, so why don’t you treat yourselves to an early night? I’ll come to everybody’s door and wake you up the second they arrive.”
“That’s just great.” Maddy hoisted herself off the couch. “How are we supposed to sleep with this hanging over our heads?”
She shuffled back to their room with Imogen behind her. Imogen flopped onto her bed in her clothes and closed her eyes.
“Do you mind if I make a few phone calls?” Maddy asked.
“Go ahead,” Imogen said. “I’m so beat I won’t even hear you.”
Even though she was exhausted, too, Maddy knew she’d never be able to lie still. She got out her phone and called home. She figured she should at least let her parents know she was still alive, and she knew they’d be up watching the news.
“It’s good to hear your voice,” her mother said. “But it’s so late. Are you taking care of yourself?”
“I’m fine,” Maddy replied. “I’m going to bed in just a minute.”
“Did you get the flowers from Miranda?”
Maddy glanced at the daisies wilting in her garbage can. “I got them. Tell her thanks.”
“Maybe you could tell her yourself. Give her a call one of these evenings. I think she’d like to hear from you.”
Maddy sighed. As usual, the conversation had stalled on her sister. And Maddy had to admit she wanted to hear from her sister, too. She needed someone to talk to about how hard rush was and how conflicted she felt now that she was actually going through it. She yearned to unload to someone who wasn’t going to the same houses every day. Someone with whom she didn’t have to worry about competing.
Except Miranda had chosen to compete for one of the dearest things to Maddy’s heart. Because of that, the person she’d always turned to was the one person with whom she couldn’t let down her guard.
“I don’t know . . .” She picked at a piece of wood that had started to chip off her headboard. “Rush is really busy.”
“Of course,” said her mom. “I’m sure it is. It’s just I worry about you girls. I know you’ve been arguing, but your sister is supposed to be your best friend . . .”
As her mother was talking, another call beeped in. Maddy checked her caller ID and almost dropped the phone.
“Mom, it’s Logan. I’ve got to go. I’ll call again soon, okay?”
She clicked over but didn’t answer right away. Instead, she held her hand over her chest, trying to calm down. “Breathe,” she whispered. “Just relax.”
Finally, she cleared her throat. “Hello?” She hoped it sounded light and confident.
“Hey,” said Logan.
It was the first time she’d heard his voice since that night at the country club. Just a few days ago, that voice made her feel like she could accomplish anything. How weird to be hearing it now and not know what he was thinking. Her mind raced, trying to read anything she could into the way he’d said that one word—anything that might give her a hint where they stood. But all she could get was that he sounded sort of tired.
She put her feet under her comforter; she was suddenly very cold. “Did you get my message? The flowers are gorgeous. Thank you so much.”
“I’m glad you like them. I couldn’t call back earlier ’cause it’s Grunt Week, and the pledges spent the whole day cleaning the chapter-house bathrooms. With our toothbrushes—just like in the movies.”
“You couldn’t even text?” Immediately she wished she hadn’t said it, but she couldn’t help herself. Not knowing what he was up to drove her crazy.
“The actives give you hell if you even stop to pee, which means no phone time. And technically, I’m not supposed to be telling you any of this. What happens at Pi Kapp stays at Pi Kapp.”
“Hazing is illegal,” Maddy reminded him.
“It’s not hazing; it’s building the brotherhood.” He laughed. “How are things there?”
Maddy snuggled into her bed, starting to feel more cozy. He sounded like the Logan she’d always known.
“Good! Invitations are late, so we’re going to bed while we wai—”
She didn’t finish because a girl’s laughter had bubbled up in the background. Maddy rose onto her elbow.
“Who’s that?”
“Peyton,” Logan answered, as if it was no big deal to have a girl in his room at 10:30 at night. “My big sister.”
“You don’t have a sister.”
“My Pi Kapp sister. All the pledges got paired up with sisters from Zeta Omega. They bake us cookies and stuff. Tonight they’re taking us out for pizza. Hey! Stop that!” The line got muffled as Logan laughed along with the girl. Maddy strained to hear what was going on.
“Sorry,” he said when he came back. “She spilled her Diet Coke in my lap.”
“Great,” said Maddy. Any hope she’d had of things being normal again had pretty much gone down the toilet.
“So after pizza we’re supposed to come right back to the house,” Logan said. “Word is it’s going to get hairy in the brotherhood-building department. I wanted to call now in case I don’t get to talk to you again for a while. I wanted to say I’m sorry.”
“But . . . What are you sorry for exactly? I don’t even understand what happened.”
“I don’t think I do, either.”
“Are you with her now? I mean, you and Miranda. Are you together?
“No,” he said. “I still love you, Maddy.”
“You do?”
“Of course. When rush is over and I’m done with Grunt Week things will be better. We can figure it out then. Right now you focus on getting into a great house, and I’ll try to keep the actives from kicking my ass. I’ll call you again soon, when they let me get away. How does that sound?”
“Okay . . .” Maddy didn’t want to let him go, but she had no desire to look desperate—especially not while he had another girl in his room. “Have fun getting pizza.”
“You, too!” Just before he hung up, she could hear the girl laughing again.
Maddy lay back on her pillow. He still loved her. That meant there was hope. And once she became a Sigma he’d see that she was better than Miranda and Peyton and all the other girls who’d stayed in Chesterfield because they were too scared to be away from their high school friends.
Maddy shut her eyes. And maybe she was more tired than she’d thought, because she ended up in the middle of a dream. She and Logan were at his initiation formal. She wore a gorgeous purple dress, and people stood back as the two of them walked through the crowd, Logan leading her to the dance floor.
Instead of putting his arms around her, though, he dropped her hand. “Wait here,” he said. She watched him get swallowed up in the crush of bodies. Then she waited, because that’s what he’d told her to do.
When she finally went looking for him she found him on the other side of the room, slow dancing with a girl who had long, wavy brown hair. She rushed over and grabbed the girl by the shoulder. The girl turned, and Maddy gasped.
It was Imogen.
Maddy opened her eyes to someone knocking on their door. She looked at her alarm clock; it was 1:00 a.m. and the lights were still on in their room. Imogen got out of bed and answered the door. Maddy listened while Alex gave her the invite sheets for the next day’s parties.
“I’ll come around for your acceptances when I’m done handing the rest of these out,” Alex said. “I don’t want to hurry you or anything, but if you could make your decisions quickly, that’d be great.”
Maddy sat up, took her paper, and scanned it. Sigma was there, fourth down. Then, just like the night before, she counted.
Eight.
Maddy squinted at the paper, not believing it. Two more houses had cut her! One of them she’d really liked—enough to think maybe she’d take it all the way to Pref Day. Maddy shook her head, baffled. It was one thing to get cut by a couple of houses on the first day. At that point, they were all going on first impressions. But getting cut in the second round meant that the sisters had gotten to know her better and had decided they didn’t want her.
Across the room, Imogen sat on her bed, looking at her sheet. Maddy couldn’t help asking: “So . . . How’d you do?”
“They all asked me back again.”
Even though it wasn’t cold in the room, Maddy started to shiver. That couldn’t be right; not after Imogen had missed all those parties. “Congratulations,” she said, pulling her comforter up to her chin.
“Thanks.” Imogen stared at her paper. “I thought they would cut me. But they all want me back.”
Maddy wanted to scream. She wanted to rip the paper out of Imogen’s hands and hit her with it. A knock on the door kept her from actually following through.
“That can’t be Alex already,” Imogen moaned. “I need more than five minutes to figure out which of these little boxes to fill in.”
But it wasn’t Alex, it was Rachel. She came into their room and sat cross-legged on Imogen’s bed.
“Look at this.” She held out her invite sheet.
Imogen took the sheet and Maddy came over to look, too. The paper held just three names.
“You got cut by seven houses?” gasped Imogen.
“That can’t be right,” Maddy said. Right away she could see that Rachel had been cut from Sigma. And not just Sigma, but six other sororities as well. Their names were all missing from her invitation sheet.
“I don’t get it.” Rachel’s voice shook as she spoke. “I thought today went great. I sure didn’t think I sucked bad enough to get cut from basically every house on campus.”
“Maybe there’s a mistake,” said Imogen. “Did you talk to Alex about it?”
“Alex actually brought my sheet before everybody else’s so she could break the news. She said this happens sometimes. She said a lot of the time it’s just bad luck.” Rachel turned to Maddy. “You know how this works. Is it possible to get cut from everywhere?”
Maddy thought about it. She had definitely read about things like this—people who ended recruitment week without receiving a bid. The vlogs all tried to be upbeat and frame it like it was all just everything working out for the best, but Maddy couldn’t imagine how a person could have something like that happen and not be devastated.
“It does happen,” she ventured, trying to be respectful of Rachel’s feelings. “But you shouldn’t take it personally. Sometimes the numbers just don’t add up, or —”
“—or whatever. It totally and completely sucks!” Imogen cried. She threw her arms around Rachel’s shoulders. “I hate this! I absolutely hate this. It’s their loss, Rachel. Not yours.”
Maddy scowled. Easy for Imogen to say. Even after skipping an entire afternoon’s worth of parties, she still hadn’t been cut from a single house. Didn’t she know that nobody wanted to hear how much she “hated” rush? Especially not people who would kill to be in her position?
Maddy fished a packet of tissues out of her purse and handed it to Rachel. “What are you going to do?”
“I feel like I should drop out,” Rachel sniffled. “Pretty much none of the houses I liked want me back. Maybe there’s something wrong with me.”
And that? That terrified Maddy, because there was nothing wrong with Rachel at all. Maddy’s stomach churned as she thought about the four houses that had already cut her. What if more cut her tomorrow? What if the same thing that had happened to Rachel happened to her? How could she show her face back in Chesterfield? What would she tell Logan?
And how could she make it through the whole rest of the year with Imogen for a roommate if Imogen somehow got into Sigma and she didn’t?
A tear slid down Rachel’s cheek. She lay down, curling into a ball with her head on Imogen’s lap. Maddy sat at the foot of the bed and held her hand, trying to think of something that could help her friend look on the bright side—whatever bright side there might be.
They were going to be up a really long time.