“Cool, guys. It’ll be fun.” He ambles toward the backyard, summer swag in full effect. Likely on his way to talk Grey into some mischief.
My crazy brothers. What a relief that they’re dudes. If they were girls, I’d constantly worry?—
A slam of the car door reverberates, shaking me, pulling me down a mental black hole. Every muscle tenses. My arms curl around me. My eyes squeeze shut against the memory. It’scoming. Black clouds of fear pour in and cover everything with a vivid false reality. I smell rain. I hear the crunch of pavement. I feel the slosh under my feet. I’m living it again, running again.
The car door. Scrambling up. Forcing my legs faster. Lungs aching. Gas station lights.
I angrily paw at the tears falling and the wisps of fear that remain. Every time it’s so real. Three long months ago, and it still isn’t in the past. I crumple against the car and slide to the driveway, hugging my knees to my chest, as if making myself smaller could protect me.
Please make it stop. Please.
I’m always here,I feel God whisper.
“Oh, sweetie. I’m so sorry.” Mom drops to her knees on the hot cement and cradles me. “The door. Was it the door again?”
I squeeze her arm. I hate that I’m like this now.
“Can we talk about it?” Quiet tears in her voice. “Are you okay?”
Under no circumstances will I talk about it. I know she loves me, but she can’t understand this. She just can’t. I shake my head and bury my face into her shoulder.
I want to pray, but I don’t know what to say.
I’m always here.
This move couldn’t come at a better time. Get me out of this town—to a place where memories are less likely, where my mind can start fresh. I need to be anywhere but here.
CHAPTER ONE
After the summerof doom and gloom I had, this campus might just be the distraction I need. I enrolled before everything went down, so it’s not a Jonah orForrest Gumpsituation. More likeAlice in Wonderland—I’ve tumbled into Mayberry University and its world of nicknames, traditions, and stories. Let’s be real, change isn’t my strong suit, but I’m so desperate for different that I’m not even mad about it.
“Do they really expect me to sit at the same table all year?” Sophie assesses the table of guys behind me. “What’s with the cardboard sword fight outside? Are we supposed to know why the cafeteria is called Saga?”
“Frankly, I’m too scared to ask about the frog,” I say. Oops—I’m not with my old friends. I have no reason to expect they’ll recognize myTangledquote.
Sophie claps with excitement. “Chameleon!”
“Nuance,” Mia finishes.
I mirror Sophie’s clapping. She’s contagious that way.
Maybe these girls will be different. Last year, my old friends dropped me as fast as my new friends embraced me—and for all the wrong reasons. After only a week and a half on campus, it’s hard to guess whether my suitemates will fall into one of those categories.
“I love inside jokes,” Ayumi says deadpan. “I’d love to be a part of one someday,”
“Yes! Ayumi!” Sophie says. “You would be anOfficefan.”
“I heard the food service company was called Saga like decades ago.” Mia is brand new too—a junior transfer student rather than a freshman like us—but she already knows all the things and all the people. “Administration’s been trying to make the students call it the Corner Cafe ever since they built this fancy building. Clearly tradition trumps all around here.”
“Clearly,” I say, and pan the room.
It isn’t quite the Great Hall at Hogwarts, but it’s actually nice in here, carpet and stone columns and hundreds of gleaming wood chairs. No plastic seating or linoleum like the fluorescent cafeteria of high school. I can’t blame Ayumi as she picks at the food on her plastic tray. Fancy vibes aside, nothing tastes quite like it did at home. The whiffs of antiseptic and fried food don’t help.
“The sword fighters were wearing purple, no?” Mia asks. “That’s Club, another dude floor.”
I try to stay focused, but my attention drifts again to the students pushing through the doors, friends hugging and chattering, guys high fiving across a table. Students in red shirts leave the cafeteria line and head to the other red shirts. Purple with purple. Yellow with yellow. Every color marks a dorm floor, and while not everyone is wearing their floor shirt, enough do that it’s easy to tell where each group sits. I’m at the G1 table—Griffin Hall, first floor—with black shirts. Floormates band together like schools of fish, often choosing to stay on the same floor all four years. The whole floor pride thing is weirdly cultish, but also fun. Like a never-ending summer camp.
I thought college was supposed to fill my mind with knowledge about the world. Maybe it will, but so far it’s been more about learning the rules of this alternate universe—what each floor is known for, why guys spray paint their friend’s stomach and throw him into a pond, when to use someone’s floor name versus their real one. Still, it’s comforting to be wrapped up in this foreign reality. I can choose who I am, have a fresh start, because not a soul on this campus knew me before. I can be the Kit I want to be and not the Kit from last year.
