The St. Ambrose School for Girls(55)



And I know, without a doubt, that I will never, ever refer to her in my mind or anywhere else as Tera Taylor, undiscovered movie star.

“Bye, Mom,” I say.

“Bye, Sarah.”

And just like that, she is gone.





chapter SIXTEEN




For all my time at Ambrose, I’ve never been up to the third floor of Tellmer. I hear the girls moving around above my room occasionally, but it’s rare, so either they are very quiet, which is unlikely, or the dorm was built very well seventy-five years ago, something that’s quite likely given the standards here. As I mount the apex series of landings, I feel like a trespasser, especially as I emerge in front of the residential advisors’ door. Fortunately, they don’t have a check-in roster or something you’ve got to put ID into to walk down the hall. On the contrary, the RAs up here have accessorized the entryway to their suite with a welcome mat and a seasonal wreath in autumnal golds and red. This strikes me as something married people do. They tend to have the stability and dual incomes to support things like mats and wreaths, plus they live in homes no matter if they are in an apartment or a house because they’re a family.

Nick and Sandra are too cool for that, though. They’re intellectuals busy analyzing great literature and saving the world. I want to be like them.

Which is probably my mom’s point.

I glance left and right. I have no idea what room I’m looking for so I’m forced to wait for someone to stroll by—which turns out to be a girl on her way to take a shower, given the towel on her shoulder and her flip-flops. I know I’ve seen her on campus and in dorm meetings, but I don’t know her name. I’m certain she feels the same about me.

“Do you know where Keisha’s room is?” I ask as she gives me the once-over.

“Down there. Three seventeen.”

“Thank you.”

I proceed in the direction she came from, and I can feel her staring at my back. I want to tell her if she thinks only my clothes are out of whack, she’s got no clue about the real weirdness, given the way I have spent my morning and afternoon.

As I go along, I am nervous, my palms sweaty. I’m heading for a bad number, according to my OCD, and I have no idea whether Strots is in there. It’s just before seven p.m., so she’s usually back in the dorm after dinner, having a cigarette before she starts her homework. In the beginning of the semester, she performed this ritual in our room. Lately, she’s transitioned up here. Now, because of what happened last night, I gather she will move heaven and earth to avoid our room for any reason whatsoever.

317.

I stand in front of Strots’s best friend’s door. As I rap with my knuckles, my suicidal depression knocks on my consciousness, a squatter who’s been evicted but believes it can wheedle its way back in with protestations of homelessness and perhaps the promise to do light housework.

Keisha opens the door. Her face is set and her eyes angry, and she blocks the entry with her strong, athletic body.

Before I can ask about Strots, and before Keisha can tell me to get the hell off the third floor, my roommate says from inside, “It’s all right, let her in.”

Strots’s voice is tired, and as her teammate steps aside, I’m unsure exactly how much has been shared between the two. Did Strots tell her what happened by the river? Or is Keisha just guessing something bad went down by the contours under the blanket of Strots’s change of affect, change of location, change of pattern?

Strots is sitting on a bed, underneath a black-and-white poster of Muhammad Ali in the ring, the great boxer standing over his opponent, the other man sprawled at his feet, knocked out cold. My roommate’s—former roommate’s?—hair is wet, and she’s wearing an Ambrose field hockey sweatshirt and sweat pants. She will not meet my eyes. She’s flicking the strike wheel on her red Bic lighter, and my instinct is to tell her not to waste the flint. Except Strots doesn’t have to worry about money like I do, and besides, it’s her lighter. She can do what she wants with it.

Keisha shuts the door and leans back against it, crossing her arms. But I can’t do this in front of her. I just can’t. The girl’s well known to Strots, but she’s a stranger to me—and besides, I feel like she wants to throw me out the window for doing something to her best friend.

Even though it was the other way around. Or started that way.

“Can we go talk downstairs?” I ask.

Keisha shakes her head, but Strots puts her hand up. “No, it’s okay. Yeah. Let’s get this over with—”

“You went to Mr. Hollis,” Keisha says. “You went to the fucking RA—”

“It’s fine, K,” Strots cuts in. “Let me deal with this.”

I start shaking my head. “No, I didn’t go to Mr. Hollis—”

“Shut the fuck up—”

“Okay, okay.” Strots talks over Keisha. “I’ll handle this.”

Strots shifts off the bed, and even though this is dire stuff, she takes the time to smooth the blanket and arrange the pillow properly.

I look at Keisha and figure the gossip tree has reported all that was witnessed by the stairwell on the floor below. “I didn’t talk to Mr. Hollis or the administration about Strots. That wasn’t what was happening.”

Jessica Ward's Books