“Get your clothes on!” Alice shouts.

  For the first time in a month, shame washes over me. My back curves and I begin to shelter myself away from not just Nicki and Alice, but Henry too. I no longer want to be seen—by anyone.

  “I’ll meet you downstairs. Grab your things. You’re leaving this school—now!”

  Alice turns her back to me and marches back to the service door without even giving me enough time to loop my sweater over my head. My hands are flustered and shaking with nerves, and Henry is trying to get to his feet while helping me get dressed and get to my own.

  “Lily, what’s going on?” he asks.

  “I don’t know.” I’m trembling, and my first attempt at my sweater is backward, so I switch my arms without taking it off. My gaze flashes up to meet Henry’s when his hand wraps around my wrist. “I don’t know why she’s here, Henry. I don’t know…I…”

  My lip quivers, and I feel a panicked cry trying to break in. My eyes move to Nicki, who is still apologizing, and I start to question her angrily.

  “Why is she here?”

  “Lily, I swear. I don’t know. She just now showed up, and she was waking everyone up. She made the guardian let her in. She dumped her whole purse out trying to show them ID, and before the guardian could even verify her security she was knocking on doors asking which room was yours. I heard her down our hallway, so when she knocked, I opened.”

  “She saw…” My breath hitches and I cup my mouth.

  More shame.

  “No, Lily. Don’t do that,” Henry says, his fingers fighting to get a grip on more of my arm. I’m stiff, and fighting him, but he forces me to face him eventually. “Our time up here is just for us. It’s not for her. Or Elena. Or Nicki…sorry Nicki.”

  His mouth bends with a short smile, but I’m not in the mood. He quickly shifts and dips his body so he can meet my gaze and force my head back up even though I want to hide.

  “Don’t you dare think any of that was wrong, Lily. That meant too much. And you are too good of a person for her to let you think you’re anything otherwise. Do you hear me?” His hands move to both sides of my face and his eyes drill into mine, waiting.

  I nod, but barely.

  “No, Lily. You are good. And she’s…fuck, she’s just crazy.” His eyes glance to the doorway Alice left through, then back to me. He stares at me again, waiting for me to agree. I nod a little bigger this time.

  “That’s right,” he says, leaning forward and pressing his lips to mine in a chaste, but long and sweet kiss. He gathers me into a hug and does it again before holding my head to his chest and rocking me.

  “That’s right,” he says.

  CHAPTER 15

  I did not pack my things.

  Alice was in a car parked out front by the time I got downstairs. I walked up to her window and motioned for her to roll it down. When she did, I told her I was not going. Then I walked back to Nicki and Henry, and we all went inside and stared at her through the security door window.

  Nicki Roman School of Resilience 101.

  There was yelling. And she also bothered to get out of the car and order me to leave with her, but I knew she wouldn’t physically drag me out of the building. I’m sixteen in four days, and I’m an inch taller than she is.

  Collin would have handled this differently. He would have called and just asked me about it. But he was at work when Alice sorted through the mail and opened up a tuition bill for fourteen thousand dollars. Alice doesn’t pause in the face of a challenge; she barrels right through with zero information and leaves tornado-like destruction in her wake.

  Maybe I would have ended up here in Ms. Manning’s office on a Saturday anyhow.

  “Did you do something to make Elena angry?”

  This is the twentieth time Alice has asked me this question. I quit responding at number ten or eleven.

  “Ugh!” Alice growls, standing from the spot between Collin and me on the bench outside the counseling hall. Ms. Manning is dealing with a discipline case this morning, too. One of the seniors was caught selling essays. I can overhear the conversation between her and his parents through the thin doorway beside us. He’s being expelled.

  I’m surprised Alice hasn’t asked if I can be expelled for a refund. Maybe she will?

  “It’s probably just a mix-up, Alice. Elena wouldn’t just refuse to pay or take away her support.” Collin is trying to be reassuring, but it’s like throwing Pepto-Bismol at a plague.

  “You’ve met Elena once, Collin. This is exactly the kind of thing she would do if Lily did something to make her angry.” Alice’s gaze jerks to me in a beat. “What did you do?”

  I simply stare at her. Answering is futile.

  The doorway opens and an angry-faced couple doesn’t bother to respond to any of the offerings Ms. Manning is shouting to them as they hurriedly drag their son down the marble hallway. My counselor mentions something about giving a recommendation to another school, but that only results in a mumble from the man. The woman’s heels click at a rapid pace, and the student—or I guess now former student—drags his undone tie along the floor as he walks behind his parents.

  “At least he doesn’t have to wear that ugly suit anymore,” Collin whispers at my side. I smile at him, but put on a straight face when I catch Alice’s eyes on me. She’s not in the mood to joke.

  The doorway at the end of the hall slams behind the family, and Ms. Manning flinches a little where she stands. Her eyes then shift from that scene to mine.

  “Lily,” she smiles. “Come on in.”

  She stands to the side to let Alice and Collin enter before me, and I’m tempted to mouth, “I’m sorry,” as I pass by. Like Collin, though, I’m sure all of this is a misunderstanding, so I doubt we’ll be in here long.

  Alice takes the seat closest to the desk, so Collin and I sit off to the side of her, against the window.

  “You mentioned something in your call about billing? What’s the issue?”

  Before Ms. Manning can finish her questions, or even sit in her chair behind her desk, Alice pulls a thick envelope from her purse and flops it down. She’s taken it in and out several times and has written on most of the pages with red pen, circling numbers she doesn’t like. She doesn’t like all of them, really—especially the bottom line.

  “Ah, yes…I see…” Ms. Manning pulls the forms apart and chuckles to herself while she looks through everything, her expression amused, as if she’s seen this happen before.

  “We can’t pay that,” Alice says, leaning forward and tapping her finger vigorously on the statement.

  “And you don’t have to,” Ms. Manning explains. Her words inject instant ease into the room.

  We all lean forward as she spins the pages around and points to a line of text—fine print.

  “This is a thing the school sends out strictly for their taxes and to show off, for a lack of a better way to put it,” she explains.

  “Oh,” Alice says, clipped. None of us really understand, but the important part is that we don’t have to pay money. That’s the part Alice cares about. The only part.

  “We have to show what your scholarship is worth so we can write it off and show we’re giving a certain amount of aid to our more modest families.” She’s practiced that line, the use of the word modest. It’s a really nice way to say poor.

  “So Elena didn’t request to have Lily’s scholarship revoked or whatever?”

  Collin’s question languishes in the open for several long seconds. A deep crevice forms in Ms. Manning’s brow, and eventually she leans back in her chair and lets her hands fall to her lap, palms along her thighs.

  “Why would that ever be the case?” she says.

  I glance to Alice, her face puzzled with thought before she tries to answer.

  “I don’t know. I just figured since she was her sponsor or whatever, that she was sort of in control of how that money was spent. It…it doesn’t work that way then?”

  Ms. Manning’s brow draws in tight as she holds back what looks like laughter.

  “Lily, I’m sorry you weren’t aware, but I was the one who put you in for our scholarship program. That’s how it works, though usually we have an application period. You had missed it, but I recognized your name and checked to see if it was you when I saw your phone number on your submission to the school. I was so excited that the kind girl from the street was applying here!”

  I’m baffled by this new information, and I can feel the questions piling up to my side and in front of me, where Collin and Alice fake polite laughter when they really have no clue what any of this is about.

  “You got me into Satis House?” It hits my chest suddenly—her kindness, and the gratitude I’ve been misplacing at Elena’s feet.

  “Well,” Ms. Manning leans forward again with a chuckle as she pulls the financial documents back together and hands them to Alice. “I would say that you got yourself into Satis. I only nudged it along with a little know-how on how the financial loopholes work around this place.”

  I’m stunned flat to my seat, and I lean back to let my head clunk against the window pane.

  “Then Elena…”

  “Is a very fine piano teacher,” Ms. Manning finishes. She would never openly insult her sister, especially since she isn’t sure where Alice and Collin fall on the Elena scale.

  I nod in agreement with her, though, picking up on the undertone of her response. Elena is a great piano instructor, or at least she’s the only one I would have ever had access to. She’s the one I got, and maybe somehow that gives her a role in my self-discovery. Or maybe I get all of that credit. I’ll certainly take more of it than I did before I walked into this office this morning.

  “So, it’s settled,” Collin says, his special brand of nerd slipping out as he stands and claps his hands together in an attempt to get out of this office and move on with his day.

  “Yes, you have no payment due. And I am sorry that this wasn’t explained to you,” Ms. Manning says, taking Collin’s cue.

  “It was very lovely to meet you both,” she adds, glancing to me with a brief wink of understanding. I linger behind Alice and Collin, and before I exit the office I grab Collin’s arm.

  “I’d like to just stay this weekend, and I have a few schedule things to work out with Ms. Manning, so…” I say. Collin’s forehead furrows, and I think maybe he’s disappointed I don’t want to spend a weekend at home. It was his plan, though, not Alice’s.

  “Oh,” he says, looking to his wife who has already started shaking her head and fluttering her eyes in a gesture that says “whatever.”

  “I’ll be home for Thanksgiving this year. Our home.” I dip my head to stress that word. I don’t want to spend this day with Elena again, and if Alice is there for work, she’ll just have to endure it alone. Henry already plans to visit me.

  “All right then,” Collin says, holding an arm out for me in a position I assume means…hug? I step into him, surprised—pleasantly surprised. His hands pat at my back awkwardly, but not without their share of affection. Alice has already started to walk away.

  “She’s just wound differently than us is all. She’ll be glad to see you though,” Collin says, head leaning toward Alice’s path.

  I nod my okay, decidedly all right if she’s never glad to see me. I became Alice’s responsibility in a blink, and for her, that falls on the side of burden. And the more time she spends in that house with Elena, the colder her heart becomes.

  Collin leaves me with an apologetic smile before rushing off to catch up. When I turn my attention back to Ms. Manning, she’s leaning against her desk with one hand and holding a fist against her mouth with the other. Her color is…off.

  “Are you all right?” I rush to her, my hand on her bare arm which feels instantly clammy.

  She nods, feverishly.

  “It’ll pass,” she says, her eyes blinking closed as the red returns to her cheeks. I stand next to her, ready to take her weight if she faints.

  “Were you ill that whole time? I’m so sorry they insisted on this meeting right now,” I yammer, looking around her office for a trash basket. I find one peeking out from under her desk, so I bend down and grab it. That’s when I see the enormous bottle of prenatal vitamins sitting in her open drawer.

  “Oh…” I react, even though it isn’t my business and I’m not sure why it matters to me. She catches the direction of my gaze then takes the basket from my hands, moving to the chair Alice was in a minute ago. She slumps down with the basket in her lap, hands gripping either side while she holds her breath and looks at the crumpled papers inside.

  “There’re holes in this,” she says with a short, manic laugh.

  I flash my gaze to her and the bin and realize she’s right—it’s woven straw with gaps every inch. I twist around and look for anything else that might work, grabbing a canvas bag hanging on a hook in the corner of her office. I hand it to her and take the basket, but the color has already fully returned to her cheeks.

  “Thanks,” she says, her head falling to the side with exhaustion. I see it in her face now. Her cheeks aren’t as full as they normally are, and her eyes are heavy.

  “I thought the sleeplessness was supposed to come with the baby.”

  She whimpers out a pathetic laugh at my joke.

  “It’s early still. I’ve been so sick, though. Poor Mischa has to wake up at three with me every morning so I can vomit. I don’t know why it comes then, but it does. Well, and now…at…” She leans to her right to glance at the clock on her wall. “Nine forty-seven.”

  I nod sympathetically and sit on the edge of her desk. Her eyes slip from mine and look off to the side. I bring my hands to my front and pick at the remaining flecks of silver polish left on my nails from when Nicki painted them a week ago. The silence is thick.

  “Don’t tell Elena,” she finally says.

  “Oh no…I wouldn’t,” I answer fast. I lift my head to meet her gaze. Her expression is instant relief.

  “Good, good,” she mutters, her eyes moving around again nervously. Elena will find out, eventually, unless she plans to disappear before she begins to show.

  “Why have you never moved away?” The question just sort of falls out.

  Ms. Manning laughs silently, leaning back a little and looking at the ceiling.

  “God, I would love to. But Mischa loves it here. His parents were immigrants. They owned a meat shop.”

  “They’re…passed?” I ask.

  She nods.

  “We did not carry on the meat shop,” she laughs. “But we do still have their apartment. It’s beautiful, and it’s near the university. If I ever made a change, I’d do what I do here…there.”

  I smile, but also study her. I thought Mischa was older. His hair is grayed, and I guessed he was maybe in his fifties, like Elena, when I met him briefly. I don’t think Ms. Manning is much younger. They have two daughters already.

  “Is it easier this time around?” My questions are naïve. I’m an only child, and my guardians seem to have zero plans to have a real child of their own. I don’t know that I’ve ever actually been around someone who’s pregnant.

  “What you mean is aren’t I too old,” she says. I blush and give a small shrug.

  “It wasn’t planned. Hell…it wasn’t supposed to be possible!” I laugh with her.

  “Is it…dangerous?” I ask.

  Her head wobbles side to side as her eyes squint.

  “I’m forty-six…and I know that this might end badly. But we both decided I had to try. We had to try.”

  She takes in a long breath and shifts to sit up taller as her eyes flit to her lap, her palms slapping down lightly to signal that she’s done sharing. She stands, so I move from her desk, closer to the door. So many thoughts and facts in my head.

  “Thank you!” I rush out the words, suddenly remembering the real reason I wanted to stay behind and talk with her. I’d almost forgot. “For helping me to get in at Satis House. This place is everything to me.”

  Her smile is fast and genuine, glossed lips curved into a satisfied line.

  “You got in on your own merit, Lily. I only made sure things like money weren’t in the way,” she says.

  My chest fills with a fast and heavy breath. I didn’t realize how worried I’d been over the bill and the thought of not being able to stay here.

  “Elena and I both went here. I could leave…like you said. But I don’t think it’s fair that I have to just because she wants to have it all, you know? This place is mine, too. She can have her fancy boards and fundraisers. I’m happy helping young people think about their futures.”

  The future. Ms. Manning is really the first person who made me see a future. It’s probably not appropriate for me to do, but neither is asking probing questions of my high school counselor’s pregnancy, so I give in to my urge and embrace her. Her arms slowly collapse around me in return, and while our hug is brief, it’s meaningful.

  I miss my mom and dad. I feel like maybe they sent her.

  Henry is waiting in my room with Nicki when I return. He’s lying on my bed, his body taking up the entire length, and his arm folded over his eyes so he can sleep.

  “When did he show up?” I whisper to my roommate.

  Nicki is sitting on the edge of her bed, legs folded and her hands holding the pleats of her plaid skirt around her thighs. She’s the only one of us who wears that thing on non-uniform days, probably because on her it looks so completely non-uniform.

  “You hate me,” she says. She hasn’t even bothered to draw the thick, black line under her eyes yet this morning. It’s strange seeing her like this—like her alter-ego, or something.

  “I don’t hate you, Nicki.”