Frost

“No,” she said, “I’ve missed you!” I squeezed even tighter, trying to make up for months of only virtual communication. Boarding school had spoiled me—I was used to having my friends around me all the time.

As Viv and I broke away from our hug, Abby materialized next to us. She bounced up and down. “Can we show now, since we’re all together? We don’t have to wait till we’re back at the dorm, do we?”

“I almost forgot,” I said. “Here, though?” A couple of sophomore boys stood right next to us. One of them grinned when our eyes met, as if he knew I was considering unbuttoning my cutoffs.

“No chance,” Viv said. “Mine’s not for public viewing.”

“Come on.” Abby grabbed our hands. She pulled us through the registration room, into a black granite hallway, and down a set of polished concrete stairs, chattering about her horrible class schedule and the “Green Beret disaster.”

“It’s not a disaster,” I said, wishing she hadn’t mentioned it. I’d go see the dean in a bit. Now, I just wanted to enjoy this moment, wanted to see if my guesses were right—an Aries symbol for Viv, and a butterfly for Abby. At the end of last semester, we’d made a pact to get tattoos over the summer and had forbidden further discussion about it until the moment of revelation.

Abby pushed open the door to the girls’ bathroom.

“Who goes first?” Viv asked.

“Me,” Abby said.

Doing a mock striptease move, she lowered the right strap of her tank top. Two hollow-eyed faces stared up from her shoulder blade. A comedy/tragedy drama-mask thing. One face smiling, one frowning, the expressions exaggerated almost to the point of dementia.

“Ooh, I love it,” I said. “Really well drawn.”

“Exdese,” Viv agreed, using the dorky word for excellent we’d made up freshman year. “And very appropriate, of course.”

“It’ll be even more appropriate if you become bipolar,” I pointed out.

“Ha, ha.” Abby flicked me on the arm. “Who’s next?”

Viv turned around and lifted up her skirt. Smack in the middle of the left cheek of her thong-clad butt was a heraldic crest: black and red, with fleur-de-lis designs around a knight’s helmet and a stag’s head.

“Wow,” I said. “That’s . . . amazing. It’s so elaborate.”

“Oh my God,” Abby said. “It’s the Parker family crest! Isn’t it? The one you showed me online?”

Viv turned back around. “Yup. Isn’t it funky? It’s thanks to. Orin.”

“Your astrologer—sorry, your advisor,” I corrected myself, “told you to get your family crest tattooed on your butt?”

“No, of course not,” Viv said. “He told me I should incorporate my family history into my identity.”

Abby covered her mouth; a snort escaped her nose.

“It’s an important part of my being,” Viv added.

I made the mistake of looking into Abby’s glimmering brown eyes, and we lost it.

I shook with laughter until my cheek muscles ached. It was perfect. The Parker-Whites are a bizarre hybrid of old money aristocracy (Parker) and new-age bohemianism (White). Their psychic “advisor” is practically a full-time employee.

Eventually, the bathroom filled with wheezes and deep breaths as Abby and I struggled to compose ourselves. Viv waited, arms crossed.

She leaned back against a sink. “Laugh all you want. But Orin said something else, too. Something not so good.”

“What?” I said, bracing myself for another absurdity.

Before she could continue, the bathroom door swished open and three of our dorm-mates from junior year bustled in.

“I heard about your new roommate, Leena,” Jessica Liu said as the other two went into stalls. “That should be entertaining.”

“You heard? How?” I didn’t like that. Other people knowing made it seem more like a done deal.

“My brother went to school with her brother. They were on the phone yesterday and her brother asked to talk to me. He wanted to make sure she wasn’t rooming with some psycho.”

“Hah!” Abby said. “That’s rich.”

“What did you tell him?” I asked Jess.

“The truth. That Celeste was in serious danger.”

“Thanks.” I gave her a sarcastic smile. “Anyway, I’m not sure if it’s going to work out for her to live with us. Dean Shepherd wants to meet. Speaking of which . . .” I checked my watch. “She won’t be in her office much longer. I should get going.”

“Leen, we’re not done!” Abby said.

“We’ll finish later, okay?” I gripped the chilly metal door handle. “I need to deal with this.”

Chapter 3

ALTHOUGH THE RAIN HAD STOPPED, the humid air still clung to me like a full-body sweater as I hurried past the stately brick buildings of the main quad on my way to Irving Hall. Barcroft is one of the oldest boarding schools in the country, and while the newer buildings are flashy and modern, the central campus is quintessential New England prep school.

Marcia, the dean’s assistant, said I’d have to wait a few minutes. I sat on a leather chair and rearranged the legs of my cutoffs to separate my clammy skin from the slick surface, then took out my packet and thumbed through my registration materials. Black type floated into abstract designs as I silently rehearsed my conversation with the dean.