In My Dreams I Hold a Knife(69)

What was I doing here?

I pressed my hands against the floor to push myself up and froze. My hands. They were covered with something dry, something sticking ever so slightly to the wood. I held them in front of my face and choked on a scream.

They were covered in blood, like I’d dipped them in paint, the red drying as it snaked down to my elbows, leaving track marks. My palms and fingers stung with pain.

I looked down at my dress—pink, for Sweetheart. Blood everywhere. I looked at my thighs, my knees. Covered in thick, dried blood. Wherever I looked, the pain started—burning, stinging pain.

What the hell had I done last night?

I sat up, clutching my head, vision swimming. All of a sudden, the sunlight through the windows wasn’t peaceful but oppressive. It came back like a punch to the gut: Heather had won the fellowship. She’d gotten a letter from Dr. Garvey. I would never go to Harvard.

Oh god. I remembered taking the Adderall, and the diet pills, chasing both with whiskey. What was I thinking? I felt a flash of panic—I’d cut up those photographs. I had to go back, clean up the pieces, before Heather opened her drawer and found what I’d done.

But what exactly had I done? I’d blacked out after leaving the dorm, no doubt because of the pill-and-whiskey cocktail. I couldn’t remember anything. I looked down at myself. Why did I look like I’d survived a serial killer? And why was I in the art studio—had I been too angry at Heather to sleep in the same room? Had I even made it to the Sweetheart Ball? My stomach clenched thinking about what I could have said, while blacked out, to Mint and Frankie, to Heather and Jack. I was holding on to too many secrets to get this drunk. It was like playing Russian roulette with everyone’s lives.

Something caught my eye—a manila folder on the ground, covered in red fingerprints. A terrible suspicion dawned. I reached for it, ripping it open.

Inside was my application to the Duquette Post-Grad Fellowship. Alongside it, the committee’s ranking of candidates, on official Duquette letterhead. In case the winner declined, or something happened to her, god forbid, they’d chosen students for second and third place. I stared at the three names. I could see where I’d traced my fingers over the letters, brushing them with blood.

First place: Ms. Heather Shelby. Second place: Mr. George Simmons. Third place: Ms. Katelyn Cornwall.

Like déjà vu, the jolt of discovery.

I wasn’t even on the list. Heather hadn’t edged me out. I’d never been close, not even with Dr. Garvey’s letter and my impeccable grades, not with all the years of working so hard. No matter what I did, it never changed. I wasn’t good enough.

I sat numbly while time passed, letting my powerlessness wash through me—the smallness of my life, all the times I’d tried in vain. For some reason, the rage I’d felt toward Heather—the anger that had driven me to stab and cut her pictures—had mysteriously vanished. Maybe it was because now I knew she hadn’t stolen my dream right out of my hands. In reality, it had never been within reach.

This was what it felt like to fail utterly.

My spine straightened, survival instincts flooding back. I was covered in blood in the middle of the art studio. Holding my fellowship application and the committee’s confidential papers, which I clearly wasn’t supposed to have, and I couldn’t remember how I’d gotten them. If anyone walked in—if anyone caught me—I would be in a world of trouble.

I’d done something wrong last night. I knew it, felt the conviction simmering inside. I had to get out of here, had to get rid of these bloodstained clothes.

I tore the papers and manila folder into the smallest pieces I could manage, then opened the kiln and placed the scraps in the far corner, where no one would notice before firing. I snuck, heart hammering, out of the art studio and into the sunlight.

It was far too warm for February. The weather felt like a mockery of everything that had happened to me, a reminder that the world would keep turning, no matter how ruined my life was. I snuck quickly, arms covering my dress, jumping every time I heard a noise, desperate to avoid running into anyone. What could I do? It was a sunny Sunday, which meant everyone would be outside. I was all the way on the other side of campus from my dorm.

It came to me in a flash of inspiration: the gym. It was right next door.

I walked inside as quickly as I could, eyes locked on the floor, beelining for the girls’ locker room. Just one person, changing in the corner. I darted to the showers and peeled the blood-splattered dress off, turning the water to scalding. Red water spiraled down the drain. The water burned everywhere it touched.

Ripping open the plastic shell around one of those flimsy bars of complimentary soap, I scrubbed my hands, my face, my knees and thighs. Red bubbles slid across the tiles. With the blood gone, I could see the cuts across my palms and thighs.

What in the world?

It didn’t matter. I just had to fix this, and then I would never think about last night again. I’d never do anything wrong for as long as I lived, to make up for all the things I couldn’t remember.

When I was done, I grabbed a towel and wrapped it around my body, took another and scrubbed my hair, trying to squeeze out all the water. I opened the towel. The faintest red stains marked the white.

In a flash, a vision: torn blond hair, sticky and red, matted against white sheets.

No—where had that come from? It was painful—terrifying—and I shoved it away.