The St. Ambrose School for Girls(93)

“Nah. There’s a bus service down in town. I have some money. Cash, I mean. Enough to last me a month on the road.”

“No.” I shake my head, though she isn’t looking at me. “You’re not leaving. You’re just not.”

Strots laughs in a short huff. “So you can see into the future, huh. You know everything I’m going to do.”

“I know you don’t quit. And if you leave, you’re quitting.”

Strots stares at the end of her cigarette and the subdued nature of her face, her body, her affect, is just all wrong. This is not my roommate sitting before me.

“Things have a way of changing a person,” she says remotely.

“Not you.”

She smokes for a minute in silence. “Why the hell do you think so highly of me, Taylor.”

“Because you’re my friend and friends believe the best in each other.” I lean so far forward in my chair, I’m in danger of slipping off the seat; I am begging her with everything I have, all the way down to my posture. “And that’s how I know you’re not going to go.”

“I wouldn’t put so much faith into me if I were you. You’re bound to be let down.”

I glance through the open door of her closet. She never did unpack her stuff from when her father came and negotiated a way for her to stay. With the exception of remaking her bed so she had somewhere to sleep, she left the rest of her clothes and things in the backpack and the duffel, using them as a bureau.

“Do you need help unpacking your stuff?” I ask as I eye the loose mess of half-folded sweatshirts and pants and shirts.

“Nope, I’m going,” she says listlessly.

“No, you’re not. Let’s get you unpacked.”

Except, typical me, I’m too timid to start without an okay from her. So we both stay where we are as she smokes the white part of her cigarette down to the orange quick of the filter.

“You’re not leaving,” I tell her again. Like my opinion matters. Like I can affect anything—

Now, wait a minute, I remind myself. I did manage to get a teacher fired. That counts. Of course, I’ve also ruined Strots’s life, it feels like. And if I’d been assigned to another dorm, or even another floor in Tellmer, none of this would be happening at all.

“Don’t make a permanent decision based on a temporary emotion,” I tell her. Which I realize is a bon mot from Phil the Pharmacist. “At least give it a little time. Think things over.”

“A day,” she finally says. “I’ll give it a day.”

This is as much progress as I’m going to make on the subject, but I tell myself that my roommate will rally. That’s who she is. And I’m not bringing up the Greta stuff. Not right now. I’m not going to give her another reason to go Greyhound on me.

I get up and dress inside my closet, just as she always does, although unlike her, I am embarrassed about how my body looks. Pulling on my black clothes, I note that my thoughts are consumed with both Strots’s breakup and Greta’s lies about the year before, and though I am sad for my roommate and worried about my having to track down our common foe, there is a measure of relief at the subject matter of my focus.

I’m plugged into a commonly agreed-upon version of reality.

It’s better to be connected with the planet, even if everything feels seesaw shifty and very raw. At least we’re all in this together, and by “all,” I mean Strots and me.

I tell myself she’s going to come to her senses. She just has to.





chapter TWENTY-EIGHT




There is yet another mandatory dorm meeting that night. The announcement for it is in my mailbox when I get back from lunch, the single sheet of paper lolling lonely in the slot with my name on it. I am not at all interested in attending if it’s going to be another seminar on how to behave. After my roommate has now lost her girlfriend thanks to St. Ambrose’s sanctimonious bullshit, I’ve had more than enough of the handbook’s conduct expectations.

But what I am curious about is why there are four cop cars parked in front of my dorm. They’ve been there since I went to breakfast.

As a rippling anxiety turns my body into a tuning fork for all the worry in the universe, the idea of going upstairs to do some homework seems like a life sentence in solitary confinement. It’s one o’clock on Saturday. Strots, I imagine, is getting ready to play a field hockey game, and I wonder how that’s going to work with Keisha. Mr. Strotsberry’s negotiations included keeping his daughter on the varsity team and Keisha is the captain.

It’s going to be so tough on both of them. Yet it’s impossible to fault Keisha for protecting her scholarship, and I hope the distancing is not too late. Greta wasn’t at lunch just now and I’m terrified about what that absence means. I picture her in Mr. Pasture’s office, sitting under the protection of the handbook and that oil painting, condemning a girl to an expulsion that is grossly unfair just to fuck with my roommate.

Measuring the stairs to the second floor, I know I need to go up there and wait for Greta’s return so I can cop to my actions, but I’m suddenly having trouble breathing in the foyer. I wheel around and charge back out of the heavy door. The change in air temperature helps, and I start walking, resolving to clear my head a little before I face Greta.