They Wish They Were Us(43)

I gasped. “No!”

“You know what that makes us?” she continued, not waiting for me to answer. “Strong. Powerful. Murderers.” She crossed her eyes and stuck out her tongue and together we fell back on her bed laughing even harder.

Now whenever this happens with Henry, I always think of Shaila. Of the little death.

“Hey, come back to me,” he says, pulling me to him. He places his hands on my cheeks and I look at him like I haven’t in weeks. His eyes are wide, searching, and his hair, normally perfectly in place, is just a little bit smushed, damp where it meets his forehead. His eyelashes are thick and long, like a cartoon’s. He trusts me completely, I think. He’s at his most vulnerable. All I want to do is run.

“You okay?” he asks.

“Yes,” I say.

That’s good enough for him because he wraps me in a deep hug so my chin rests on his shoulder, molded into muscle.

“You did, too, right?” he whispers into my hair.

“Mm-hm,” I lie, trying to imagine my own little death. “Of course.”





TWELVE





AS FAR AS Gold Coast parents are concerned, college planning starts as soon as you walk through the brass gates in your navy Prep blazer. During sports practices, students wear sweatshirts printed with the names of schools they consider. Yale, Harvard, Princeton. Penn if you wanted to have fun or make bank. Wesleyan if you were artsy. Stanford if you hated your parents and wanted to flee.

And by the beginning of senior year, if you hadn’t figured out where you were applying, you were the loser whose future was uncertain. The admissions board wouldn’t let you in based on how badly you wanted to go there or how soon after you exited the womb you realized it was your destiny to be a fighting bulldog or a roaring tiger, or whatever. But in our minds, whoever decided where they wanted to go first was the chosen student, the one who deserved to get in. And if you were accepted over them, prepare for war.

I saw it go down freshman year when Jake Horowitz got into Princeton early decision and Tina Fowler got deferred even though Tina’s parents were alumni and she always wore that horrible neon orange sweatshirt during volleyball practice. Her fury nearly split the Players apart when she screamed at him during lunch one Friday. Everyone was relieved she got accepted in the spring.

So it was a no-brainer that my friends entered senior year with polished applications and so much hope. Even Robert, who bombed his SATs despite getting so much extra time, believed he was destined to be back at school in Manhattan, studying music management at NYU. Rumor has it his parents made a casual million-dollar donation to the school.

All of that makes today, December 1, the day we are due to hear back from our first round of applications, torture.

I wake up in a sweat, panting, cotton sheets balled in my fists. I can barely catch my breath. But I didn’t dream about Brown, about getting in or not. I dreamed of Shaila, her eyes wide and full of fear, bulging out of her beautiful head. Her mouth open, screaming for help. I inhale deeply and try to shake her from my mind. Just another nightmare. Just stress. That’s all. I reassure myself of this over and over, but my heart continues to race at a speed too rapid to calm.

I lean my head back, so it kisses the wooden headboard, and rub my temples, willing Shaila to disappear. I fumble for my phone on the nightstand with shaking fingers, hoping an endless scroll will calm me down. But before I can open Instagram or YouTube, I see a text from Rachel. Of course.

You change your number or something? she writes. Don’t give up on us.

I throw my phone down into my blankets so hard it bounces onto the floor. My fear is gone and I’m left with anger. Why does Rachel have to stalk me? Why not Nikki or Quentin or even Henry? Why can’t she just leave me alone, especially today? And why the hell am I actually considering helping her?

Mom pops her head into my room. “You okay, Jill?” she asks, her brows forming a deep V. “Thought I heard something.”

“Yep,” I say without looking at her.

“Big day, sweetie.” Her face softens into a warm smile. “Whatever happens, it’s all going to work out.”

I grunt and throw the covers off, pushing past her to the bathroom. “Whatever.”

For the next few hours, I do my best to not think of Shaila or Rachel or Graham. Instead, I focus on the unbearable agony of waiting for our fates to arrive.

Everyone can feel it. An eerie, electric spear pierces through the caf, and even at the Players’ Table, we’re barely holding it together.

If Shaila were here, she wouldn’t have been worried about getting into Harvard. She would have been sitting next to me, rolling her eyes at how freaked out we all were. She would have assured us that we’d all be fine, guys. I imagine her in the Gold Coast Prep uniform, chewing on a piece of cookie dough with one foot propped up on my chair so her bare knee was visible above the table. That was the real Shaila, not the creepy ghost who haunts my dreams.

“So, uh, what’s up?” Quentin tries.

Nikki offers a half laugh but rubs her thumb against the rose quartz around her neck. She’s waiting to hear from Parsons, though she’s a shoo-in for their design merchandising program. Her portfolio featured dresses I’d die to buy.

“Robert, you okay?” she asks.

But he stays silent, probably for the first time in his life, and chugs his soda, crushing the plastic bottle in a swift, crunching motion. Guess he’s not so confident after all.