It was the last exam on the last day before winter break. We were in the library, which had been cordoned off for senior tests. Over the course of ninety minutes, the other students had sighed, packed their pencils, and turned in their tests. Madison and I were the only two left, using every last minute. Finally, she stood up, shuffled her pages, and gave me a smile—not a full smirk, but a knowing look, like a smirk in church clothes.
In her cloud of self-satisfaction, she didn’t notice the test page that slipped out of her pile and onto the floor, sliding under the proctor’s desk. Instead of stooping to collect it, she handed her test to the proctor and flounced out the door.
I bubbled my last circle and gathered my papers carefully, rising and walking to the proctor, who reached out to accept my test. I hesitated. She raised an eyebrow.
I glanced down at the corner of Madison’s missing test page, the small triangle of white sticking out from under the desk like a flag of surrender.
Then I smiled and handed the proctor my test.
She wished me a good winter break, settled my papers in her bag, and hummed on her way out. I tracked her silently down the hall until she disappeared.
I became salutatorian.
It was so easy—that’s what I thought when I looked back. It couldn’t have been simpler: spot the paper. Give the proctor that wide, ingratiating smile, like everything was normal. And then do nothing. Stay quiet. So little effort, such maximum effect. Doing nothing was comfortable, like slipping into an old, warm robe.
The other thing I thought when I looked back: how pathetic that I had to fight for second place.
But the competition with Chi O wasn’t for second. It was for first. Best. And, if I was being honest, it was for revenge.
Caro teased me about how intensely I rushed sophomore year. I suspected she was jealous of the time I spent with other girls, the ones who cared as much as I did. Caro was like that—always trying to stay glued at the hip, resenting any time we spent with people outside the East House Seven. I’d noticed she’d do anything—really, anything, even go watch Frankie’s football practice—to keep from being alone. Sometimes, when I stopped to think about it, I felt bad for dating Mint and leaving Caro behind, just like Heather did with Jack.
But other times I needed space. Sophomore rush was one of them.
The holy grail of freshman girls was Amber Van Swann. She was rich, beautiful, perfectly dressed, and dating a senior Phi Delt. The number one recruit on campus. I wanted her so bad I could taste it, and I knew—because I was friends with Heather—that the Chi Os were hungry for her, too. Heather had instituted a no-talking-about-rush rule to keep things friendly, but still. I knew.
Then the night before Bid Day came—the night we got our list of pledges. And despite how hard we’d tried, Amber Van Swann wasn’t on it. She’d chosen Chi O. Standing in Kappa’s front lawn on Bid Day, my friends and I watched her run to the Chi O porch and get swallowed up by screaming, hugging girls. In the center of the mayhem were Courtney and Heather, wearing matching gold foil crowns and pink boas.
Stop punching down.
I stood there and imagined ripping the crowns from their heads, my hand arcing through the air, seizing the pointed tips, jerking their blond hair out, collateral damage. I shivered and blinked the picture away, turning to my friend Kristin, who hated second place as much as I did.
She looked at me and said, in a voice with zero inflection, “Amber Van Swann made a sex tape.”
I stared, but only for a beat. “Show me.”
That night, three of us sat in Kristin’s dorm room, gathered around her desktop computer—me, Kristin, and Caro, who’d insisted on following me. Kristin pulled up a video, grainy at first, then very, very clear. Amber Van Swann and her Phi Delt boyfriend, going at it. Loudly.
“How did you get this?” Caro asked, once the video ended and she’d uncovered her eyes.
Kristin shrugged. “Amber sent it to her boyfriend, and he sent it to a Phi Delt I hooked up with last weekend. He showed me as a joke, and I asked for it. Simple.”
“That’s terrible,” Caro said.
“It really is,” I agreed. “You have to be so careful what you film nowadays. What are you thinking, Kristin?”
“It’s pretty obvious,” Kristin said. “We send it anonymously to JuicyCampus.”
“What?” Caro sputtered. “Isn’t that illegal?”
“Good question.” I squinted at Kristin. “She’s eighteen, so it’s not child porn, but are there any other laws?”