LITMIR.BIZ

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were silent for a moment. “Was he … really that in love with her?”

      “I don’t know what it was. It was something … different.”

      My heart sank. “Okay.”

      “He just couldn’t tear himself away from her. I don’t know why. But I mean, he wasn’t the only one.”

      “What do you mean?”

      “I just mean that … everyone was fascinated by her. She looked like a movie star, but partied like a rock star. I don’t know. She was just endearing in that way.”

      I bit my lip and stared down at the floor. I’d never felt more drab in my life. I was like the gray, rainy skies outside, only less threatening and full of no mystery at all. Before coming to Manderley, I’d always thought I was worth knowing—certainly not worth admiring or obsessing over like Becca clearly was—but now I just felt like a mess. I bet Becca never had a hole in her socks, or a bad face day. I bet she never had puffy eyes in the morning or got hungover. She probably looked good in glasses—not that she’d have to wear them because she’d surely have perfect vision—and still look gorgeous without makeup. Probably had sexy, messy, bed hair instead of just ratty, messy hair.

      She was the kind of beautiful we’ve all been comforted into thinking was just airbrushing in magazines. I was the “real” girl they always show before the airbrushing with a caption like, “But here’s what the average real girl looks like! Can you even believe it? She was walking around like that!”

      “I can’t compete with that.” My face was getting hot. “Everyone looks at me like they think that I think that I’m as good as her, and I’m not even saying that I am. And yet, why should it be just so obvious that I’m not?”

      I couldn’t figure out what exactly was driving my jealousy. I didn’t want to be fawned over and obsessed over. But I envied that she was.

      “Look. Look at me.” He waited for me to look at him. “Call Becca the most beautiful and charming girl in the world, and it has nothing to do with who you are. You hardly pale in comparison. Everyone here, they’re just shallow. Becca wasn’t a bad person on the inside, but no one here got to know her, either. They all liked her because she was unique. She was a new toy they never really got to play with. And now that she’s gone, they just want her more than ever.”

      I looked up at him, not noticing my eyes were filled with tears until some fell from my eyelashes. It was nice of him trying to console me. But I knew what he was saying was just that. Consoling.

      Johnny smiled a little, furrowing his eyebrows. “Don’t. You have no reason to cry. You’re bigger than this whole school and everything anyone might think about you inside of it.”

      “I never worry about this kind of thing. I’ve never been this person.”

      “You’re still not, you’re just being massacred by a popular girl’s posse. It makes sense.”

      I took a deep breath and laughed. “Thank you.”

      Johnny looked over my shoulder and I turned to see Max.

      “Are you fucking joking?” Max asked, looking at Johnny.

      “Max, stop before your imagination goes crazy. I wasn’t—” Johnny began.

      Max clenched his jaw, and stared straight at Johnny. “I’m not going through this whole thing again, especially not with her.” He threw a finger at me.

      Johnny shook his head. “Max you gotta—”

      “Fuck it, do what you want.” He walked through the dorm door, and was gone.

      Johnny and I both sat silently for a moment in the now very still air.

      I didn’t know what had just happened. I wanted to cry all over again.

      He put a hand on my shoulder when he saw the expression on my face. “It’s okay, you haven’t done anything.”

      “I have to go to sleep. Thank you so much, Johnny.”

      I stood and went back to my room. I got under my covers and tried to sleep. Before I knew it, hours had passed and I was still not asleep. Finally my desire to talk to Max outweighed my desire to try sleeping.

      I ran to the boys’ dorm and then through it. I knew his room number. It had been a small, embarrassing fantasy of mine to sneak into his room for months.

      He opened it after a few seconds. He was in shorts and no shirt. I collected myself and then said, “What’s wrong with you? Why were you so mad earlier?”

      “I’m sorry about that. I shouldn’t have acted like that.”

      “But why did you? I was just talking to him.”

      He nodded. “Yeah. So was Becca.”

      “What do you—what?”

      He opened the door he stood in front of. “Come with me.

      “Becca and Johnny were hooking up for … I guess most of my relationship with her.”

      I practically did a double take. “What? Johnny?”

      “Yeah. So that’s why he and I aren’t friends anymore.”

      “Weren’t you two friends for a long time? I can’t believe he would just do that to you.”

      “He wouldn’t usually. It was just Becca. Just how she was.”

      I nodded. I was barely even aware of how cold it was outside.

      “So when I saw you two,” he went on, “it just felt like déjà vu.”

      “Well, I’m not … I don’t have any interest in Johnny at all. I hardly even know him.”

      “You don’t have to say that. We’re not together.”

      He may as well have slapped me. “I know.” My words were hard and restrained.

      He took a deep breath. “I’m sorry about that. I really am.”

      “I never said—”

      “No, I know you didn’t. I’m sorry. I’m just …” He looked at me. “I like you. And I want to be with you. But I just can’t.”

      “Max, I never said I wanted that. What makes you think you’re the one deciding you and I aren’t more than we are?”

      He looked surprised, and that only made me madder.

      “Seriously,” I went on, my voice rising a little. “When do you imagine I said anything about feelings for you?”

      His face fell a little but I had to ignore it. I opened the door and said, “I’m going.”

      A couple of guys were coming down the hallway. I felt my cheeks go red, and I closed the door behind me. They stayed silent, but I heard them start to laugh once I was past them. I flew out of the boys’ dorm door, and heard a lot of noise coming from the hall below. I leaned over the balcony.

      “Miss Tobias!”

      Professor Crawley, in khakis and a Harvard sweatshirt, was standing and breathing hard at the bottom of the stairs. Susan turned around when he called her name. “Stop running, I’ve already seen you—all of you—so just stop running.”

      Susan Tobias was trembling and white as a sheet. “P-please, Mr. Crawley, I—I … My p-parents will kill me!”

      “Come with me, and we might be able to work something out.” He ushered her with his hand. “There are only, what, five hundred students at this school? I know who you all are.”

      He looked up and caught eyes with me. He crooked his finger to beckon me downstairs.

      “We might have been

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