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“I’m sure,” I say, and Seth nods once.
“Good,” he says. “I’ll be on the pull-out bed in your office.”Chapter Forty-SevenThaliaI lean toward the mirror, checking my teeth for lipstick. It’s a dusky rose color, not the bright red I tend to favor, but this isn’t a girls’ night out, or a frat party, or even the psych major mixer.
This is my ethics hearing, and the last thing I need to look like is some trashy slut who wears red lipstick and has affairs with her calculus professor.
Yesterday, Victoria drove me to the mall on the other side of town and I blew nearly my entire paycheck at Sephora. I bought primer, concealer, foundation. I bought eyeliner and mascara and blush and eyebrow gel and lipstick and I nearly bought false eyelashes, though I changed my mind at the last minute.
I already own most of those things, but I bought new ones because I needed something, anything, to hide behind. If I put on new eyeliner and new mascara, if I paint my nails I’m-so-innocent light pink, if I have on the suit I bought for graduate school interviews, maybe I can get through this.
It’s armor, and I know it. If I thought chain mail would help, I’d wear that, too, but the best armor I’ve got is looking like the kind of girl who’d never, ever do what they’re accusing me of.
Even though I did, and I think they know it.
I don’t know what I’m going to do. The only advice I’ve gotten has been to say Caleb coerced me, and frankly, fuck that.
I’m not above tears, mostly because I’m pretty positive I won’t be able to help it. I’m not above begging for forgiveness and swearing not to do it again. But I’m above throwing Caleb under the bus to save myself.
I take a deep breath. I fix a tiny smudge on my lipstick. I straighten the jacket of my suit, run my fingers through my hair, hope I look good enough to be believed.
Then I turn and leave the bathroom.* * *Smythe Hall feels like a labyrinth. It was one of the first buildings on campus, so it’s from before things like fire codes really existed. The corridors are smaller than other buildings, the ceilings lower, the floor oddly discontinuous because it was added onto and added onto again, which means you can only access parts of the second floor from the third floor, not the rest of the second floor.
When I find Room 233A, I’m three minutes late and I’m so nervous I’m shaking. I couldn’t eat this morning, and already I’m making a bad impression.
It’s a big, old, wooden door, the doorknob cold. I hold my breath and pray once and then push it open.
The room’s empty. It’s a meeting room, unexpected light pouring in from two big windows, with a big wooden oval table in the middle of the room surrounded by office chairs. Nice office chairs, the kind that cost hundreds of dollars each, maybe thousands.
I’m starting to feel like I’m in a Kafka book, but then something moves in the corner and I realize that Dr. Castellano has been there all along, a laptop open in front of her.
‘Thalia,” she says, taking off her reading glasses and holding them in one hand.
“I thought I had a hearing,” I say. “Am I early? Did I get the time wrong? I know it’s four past three already —”
“The honor case against you is pending dismissal,” she says, matter-of-factly.
I stand there, in the doorway, and stare at her. And stare.
“What?” I finally ask. “What does that even mean?”
She leans forward slightly, her elbows on the table, twirling her reading glasses by one stem.
“It means that, as of a few hours ago, the university is no longer interested in pursuing a case against you,” she says. “I apologize for not letting you know sooner, but I still wanted to speak with you.”
“So they dropped it,” I say, stepping into the room, letting the door slam shut behind me. “All that and they just dropped it?”
There’s a dangerous, bubbly feeling deep inside me, like I’m about to burst into laughter at any moment, like my insides are shaking and I’m so rattled and sleep-deprived that I might just start cackling with relief.
“They dropped your case,” she says. “Professor Loveless resigned this morning in a letter to the administration, effective immediately.”
I close my eyes, replay her words quickly in my head, just to make sure she said what I think she said.
When I open them, I’m smiling. I’m still trying not to laugh because that completely insane urge is still there, in the face of the unexpected, to just laugh like a maniac and maybe all this will go away.
“He did?” I ask.
He didn’t tell me. We haven’t even spoken since Monday, when he hung up on me. Even though I called. Even though I texted.
