Page 26 of Bombshell

Second from the top is a notice from the Valmont registrar’s office, its cellophane window cutout displaying a garish pink packet of paper inside. I rip open the top of the envelope, getting a paper cut for my trouble. It reads:

Pursuant to the administrative action rescinding your scholarship for violations of Valmont University’s Code of Student Conduct, your account balance is now ($29,872). If the balance is not paid in full within one week of the date indicated on this notice, your student status will be put on probation pending payment.. This change in status may endanger your housing and educational privileges…

I don’t bother reading the rest. I check the date at the top of the letter, realizing it was marked two days ago. So I have 5 days before they kick me out of school. Less time than I thought.

“Nothing printed on that color of paper is good news. You ok?” Cyrus looks nervous, which just pisses me off more. I don’t want his pity or sympathy. Even his nice gestures—letting Francie and I have the suite for Thanksgiving—ended up being shitty for me. I already feel lighter, just from unloading the burden of having to play at being friends.

“Nothing you need to worry about,” I say, picking up the nearly empty bottles of whiskey and vodka scattered around my bed. I won’t be needing them anymore.

“Whatever. Have a nice day.” He’s done with me, too. Cyrus turns to go, his eyes landing on the stack of mail on my desk. For a moment I’m sure he’s going to say something stupid like: It’s not very much money for me. Let me give you $30k so my third Valmont residence is less depressing for me. But he gives up trying, probably because, thick as he is, he knows I don’t want to hear it.

I pull a couple of legal pads out of my desk and toss them in my bag. I need to head to the library to do research. The U.S. has 4 major armed forces, and I need to figure out which one offers the best terms for tuition payment, and which will give me the chance to gain the kind of skills that will be useful later. I ignore the tiny voice warning me this will break Francie’s heart. I refuse to acknowledge the smug satisfaction this will give Angus MacLaine. But when I imagine Adair, sitting alone, full of regret, wondering how she got stuck here, I almost smile.

9

Adair

I get ready for class three days in a row.

On the first, I never make it out the front door of Windfall. On the second, I drive all the way to campus and circle the building for ten minutes straight, trying to see if Sterling is waiting for me to show up. But I get cold feet and go home where I find a small, wrapped package wedged between the seats of the car. Opening it, I discover a small clover charm. It takes me a moment to process how it got there. Sterling’s birthday present, forgotten in the drama of that night. It’s just been sitting there, waiting for me to find it. A ticking bomb. I cry for three hours straight. I consider throwing it away, but shove it in a drawer instead. For some reason, finding it makes me more determined to take back my life.

So finally, on the third day, I make myself park and go to class.

Branford Hall is four stories of red brick, tucked between a few massive oak trees and a small, one-way street that gets choked with students whenever classes let out. It takes me a few minutes to find a parking spot, and by the time I step through the doors of the building a cold lump has settled in my throat. People glance at me as I pass by, and I can’t help wondering, each time, if it’s a normal look—or if they know. The door to psychology is already closed, meaning class has started.

I have to fight the urge to turn around and run home. How can I survive every set of eyes in that room turning to look at me? How many times will I have to tell myself I’m okay?

I may not have been physically present in class for two weeks, but I had emailed my professor and kept up with the work. Which is probably why, when Professor Jones sees me sneak in, she smiles and hardly slows down her introduction to today’s lecture.

Probably.

But what if she’s trying to put me at ease? Does she somehow know?

The rational part of my brain is completely certain she doesn’t. But the part of me that was afraid of what might come out of the crack in my closet door at night—gone since I was ten years old—is screaming with alarm.

It takes me a second to fight back my panic and focus on the lecture.

“Though Milgram’s methods are still controversial today,” Professor Jones says, her perfectly coiffed blonde bob acting like a frame for her sharp, aquiline features, “his work on obedience is nonetheless seminal.”

A guy a few seats down shifts in his seat, and I flinch.

“Milgram believed there was a fundamental shift in social psychology starting at the industrial revolution and culminating in the twentieth century. He said, ‘Often, it’s not so much the kind of person a man is, as the kind of situation in which he finds himself that determines how he will act.’”

A wave of nausea rolls over me, and I do my best to keep hold of breakfast. One thing I’m learning about psych: it’s hard not to apply every lesson to what’s going on in your life. They actually warn you about it the first day of class. But what if your life reads like situations in a therapy manual?

Have I been stupid? Am I being unfair? If Sterling tried to blackmail my father, isn’t he just trying to protect himself? Isn’t that what humans do? Isn’t that what he probably tried to come tell me?

I force myself to pay attention to the lecture, but every time I do, the first sentence seems relevant to my current situation. I try telling myself it won’t always be this way, that eventually things will get back to normal—that what I need is time. But the minute hand of the watch on the wall keeps moving slower and slower, and I’m almost hyperventilating by the time there are five minutes left in class.

What if Sterling’s been going to my classes and waiting until I show up? It sounds like something he would do. I need to leave. I shove my notebook and pens in my bag, and slide out the door, closing my eyes in a sort of prayer that when I open them, he won’t be there.

He isn’t.

I actually get the chromed handle of the Jag in my hand before my escape is ruined.

“Adair, where are you going?”

Ava is making a beeline for me, waving furiously as she dashes from Branford’s main entrance. I see her other hand furiously texting on her phone as she makes her way to me, and for a second I wonder if Sterling has paid her to tell him where I am.