“Are you feeling better yet?” she demands, her voice muffled.
“I can’t fucking breathe!” I screech.
“Oh, sorry.” She eases the pressure on the cushion, and I heave in a grateful breath. My laugh is buried in the stiff fabric.
The article about Alex’s family going live may have sent so much of my life into chaos, but it’s tied what few friendships I do have closer. Divya and I whittle away our evenings studying in the library in companionable silence, and Colette’s best friend, Magda, has become one of my best friends, too.
After the bomb exploded between me and Alex and fractured the delicate thing we were building, I did what I’ve only ever been able to do. Withdraw. Isolate myself. Deprive myself of human connection because how could loneliness ever be worse than the pain of losing someone you thought was here to stay?
I’m never one to miss a good opportunity to wallow, and man, did I wallow. Like, crying into my dry bowl of cereal and listening to sad music just to make myself cry harder. Scurrying across the floor like a greasy orange sewer rat to collect the snacks that Divya left outside my door but refusing to let her in.Thatsort of wallowing.
But my new friends are not so easily dissuaded, and when Colette’s thousand-dollar ankle boot snuck in the door before I could close it on the fourth day, I knew I was done for.
A nutritionally balanced meal and a tipsy pep talk later, I told my new friends everything. I told them about my parents, aboutBancroft, about Cain Green. I told them why I could never get on a plane, why the sound of the helicopter terrifies me, and why thunder crashing in the valley makes me think of my parents’ death.
I told them I felt like Alex leaving was one thing too many, that it hurt me so much I didn’t think I could survive it.
By the end, all three of them were sobbing with me. And since then, by the time the first flash of lighting illuminates Sorrowsong’s crumbling walls and well-buried secrets, they’re already at my bedroom door, armed with snacks and blankets. Which, when you’re as well-acquainted with the Highlands’ storm warnings and howling winds as we are, is serious dedication. Every frantic run from the castle’s walls to the mansion feels like a deadly trial.
And yet, they think I’m worth it.
For the first time, I find myself with fledgling friendships, delicate roots finding their place in my broken heart and filling up the smallest cracks.
I’mdesperatenot to damage them.
Alex’s absence gnaws a gaping hole in my chest every day, but there are people looking out for me. I’m getting to know the reflection in the mirror. I’m learning what she likes, what she’s passionate about. I’m learning her insecurities and her dreams and all the other things she put on pause for five years.
I see the next flash of lightning through the pillow, and when Colette finally removes it from my face, the power is out. The lush amber curtains and art deco wallpaper of the Cortinar halls are cloaked in dim candlelight.
“Fuck this weather,” I mumble, letting out a heavy exhale that has me sinking farther into the soft velvet of the sofa.
“Fuck this weather,” the three of them echo, in perfect unison.
“And fuck this group chat,” I add, phone open on one of the many group chats I was advised to join “because they’re a great way to network,” like having an oil tycoon’s son on speed dial is something that’ll come in handy for me.
With his good looks, online speculation of how badly his father treated him, various paparazzi images of him dropping his sisters off at school in his rugby shorts, and Green’s rallying economic performance, Alex has become somewhat of a national treasure. And people love to talk about it, which unfortunately means everyonehatesme. More messages ping through in the Sorrowsong first years group.
Annabelle Young
Apparently a guy in second year is missing
Lawrence Carlisle
Someone check Ophelia Winters’s hard drive.
Rose Hanover
Lol. Or under her bed.
Lawrence Carlisle
He’s probably in the trunk of her car with Sofia Ivanov.
The inside of my cheek bleeds from how hard I have it clamped between my teeth. I want to march into lecture halls and scream at them, but that won’t help my case.
Tabby Jones
You think she can afford a car?
