Frost

 When I emerged from my closet reverie, I took a moment to rehang Celeste’s photo. I wasn’t quite sure why it had fallen to begin with—there was actually nothing wrong with the way David had installed the nail. To be safe, I took the nail out and hammered it in again, at a bit of a steeper angle. After resting the frame on it, I studied the image for a moment. Even though it was disturbing, there was something compelling about it. Still, I didn’t understand how Celeste could want to look at a picture of herself in which she appeared dead. I hoped—for both of their sakes— that David was just a worrier. That he didn’t need to protect his sister from anything.

Later, after dinner, I was in the bedroom going over my notes for my first, short English paper when Celeste appeared in the doorway. “I’ve never been so over-caffeinated in my life,” she announced, then hopped in and collapsed next to me on my bed, letting her crutches fall on the floor.

 “Where’ve you been?” I asked.

“The Mean Bean. The guy there is madly in love with me.” She handed me a crumpled, white paper bag. “He gave me two free iced latte refills and three of those dark chocolate biscotti. Now I’m supposed to meet people at open mic at Graham House and I’m all juiced up. And I’m going to have to pee every five minutes. You want to come? I might sing. If they’re lucky.”

 “You sing?” I opened the bag and broke off a piece of cookie.

“No. But I pretend I can.”

“Tempting,” I said, smiling. “I think I’ll stay here, though.” I was about to turn back to my notes when I remembered. “Hey. Don’t you notice anything?”

 It took her a moment. “The shades, you mean?”

“Yeah. What do you think?”

“They look okay,” she said. “But can’t people see right through them? They’re just paper.”

“No,” I said. “Maybe at most someone could see fuzzy silhouettes.”

I went back to studying as Celeste got up and began putting together an outfit to wear to the open-mic thing. When she’d finally settled on a dark red dress with black net tights, I noticed her looking around at the windows. I thought I saw her shiver slightly, before she grabbed her crutches and her clothes and headed to change in the bathroom.

 That night was only one week into the semester. I don’t think I ever saw her undress in the bedroom again.

Chapter 10

THE SHADES DIDN’T DO A VERY GOOD job of helping Celeste sleep, either. With the windows open, they flapped and crackled in the wind. Or so she said. With the windows closed, the air in the room was stagnant and stifling. Also, moonlight filtered in through the rice paper. So, despite my best efforts, after three or so weeks at school, Celeste hadn’t gotten a good night of sleep yet, and I heard about it. Often.

Every time someone came to me for peer counseling and had complaints about their roommate—which was a lot of what us counselors dealt with at the beginning of the year—I wished I could offer my own stories, so we could commiserate.

During one of my sessions, a redheaded freshman was especially upset. She sat in the chair across from mine, crying,trying to explain to me all of the ways in which she was unhappy.

“Is the roommate situation what’s bothering you the most?” I asked when she seemed to have finished her initial, somewhat rambling explanation.

“Uh-huh.” She blew her nose into the tissue I’d given her. “Are people ever allowed to switch?”

“Only in extraordinary circumstances,” I said. “Having a roommate is like living with your sister. She might not be your best friend, but you have to make it work.”

“But I liked living with my sister,” the girl said in a tone verging on a whine. “I wish I still were.”

“Why did you come to Barcroft?” I asked. Maybe this wasn’t so much about her actual roommate.

“My dad wanted me to. He went here. I . . . I guess I didn’t really not want to come. But I would’ve rather stayed with them. I want to be home.” She crossed her arms and stared out the window. Beyond our reflections in the glass, the new addition to the library glowed in the night, like an enormous, geometric ice sculpture. I could see two people inside gazing back in our direction. For a moment, I thought one was David.

Since spending that morning together installing the shades, he and I had started hanging out a bit—walking to classes, sitting on the steps before the bell, sometimes having a meal at Commons. He’d left a series of notes in my mailbox: The Principles of Spoon Theory. I smiled, thinking of them, forgetting for a moment the girl was waiting for me to say something.

“Well, look at it this way,” I said. “You have to change your frame of mind so that from now on, Barcroft is home. When you go visit your parents, you need to think of it that way—as visiting. Otherwise when you’re here, you’ll always feel like you’re away, which is kind of an ungrounded way to feel. Right?”

She nodded and sniffled. I offered her the tissue box again.