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  Neither of them had brought a couch. Or a TV. Or any cute Target lamps.

  Reagan didn’t seem to have brought anything personal, besides her clothes and a completely illegal toaster—and besides Levi, who was lying on her bed with his eyes closed, listening to music while Reagan banged at her computer. (A crappy PC, just like Cath’s.)

  Cath was used to sharing a room; she’d always shared a room with Wren. But their room at home was almost three times as big as this one. And Wren didn’t take up nearly as much space as Reagan did. Figurative space. Head space. Wren didn’t feel like company.

  Cath still wasn’t sure what to make of Reagan.…

  On the one hand, Reagan didn’t seem interested in staying up all night, braiding each other’s hair, and becoming best friends forever. That was a relief.

  On the other hand, Reagan didn’t seem interested in Cath at all.

  Actually, that was a bit of a relief, too—Reagan was scary.

  She did everything so forcefully. She swung their door open; she slammed it shut. She was bigger than Cath, a little taller and a lot more buxom (seriously, buxom). She just seemed bigger. On the inside, too.

  When Reagan was in the room, Cath tried to stay out of her way; she tried not to make eye contact. Reagan pretended Cath wasn’t there, so Cath pretended that, too. Normally this seemed to work out for both of them.

  But right at the moment, pretending not to exist was making it really hard for Cath to write.

  She was working on a tricky scene—Simon and Baz arguing about whether vampires could ever truly be considered good and also whether the two of them should go to the graduation ball together. It was all supposed to be very funny and romantic and thoughtful, which were usually Cath’s specialties. (She was pretty good with treachery, too. And talking dragons.)

  But she couldn’t get past, “Simon swept his honey brown hair out of his eyes and sighed.” She couldn’t even get Baz to move. She couldn’t stop thinking about Reagan and Levi sitting behind her. Her brain was stuck on INTRUDER ALERT!

  Plus she was starving. As soon as Reagan and Levi left the room for dinner, Cath was going to eat an entire jar of peanut butter. If they ever left for dinner—Reagan kept banging on like she was going to type right through the desk, and Levi kept not leaving, and Cath’s stomach was starting to growl.

  She grabbed a protein bar and walked out of the room, thinking she’d just take a quick walk down the hall to clear her head.

  But the hallway was practically a meet-and-greet. Every door was propped open but theirs. Girls were milling around, talking and laughing. The whole floor smelled like burnt microwave popcorn. Cath slipped into the bathroom and sat in one of the stalls, unwrapping her protein bar and letting nervous tears dribble down her cheeks.

  God, she thought. God. Okay. This isn’t that bad. There’s actually nothing wrong, actually. What’s wrong, Cath? Nothing.

  She felt tight everywhere. Snapping. And her stomach was on fire.

  She took out her phone and wondered what Wren was doing. Probably choreographing dance sequences to Lady Gaga songs. Probably trying on her roommate’s sweaters. Probably not sitting on a toilet, eating an almond-flaxseed bar.

  Cath could call Abel … but she knew he was leaving for Missouri Tech tomorrow morning. His family was throwing him a huge party tonight with homemade tamales and his grandmother’s coconut yoyos—which were so special, they didn’t even sell them in the family bakery. Abel worked in the panadería, and his family lived above it. His hair always smelled like cinnamon and yeast.… Jesus, Cath was hungry.

  She pushed her protein-bar wrapper into the feminine-hygiene box and rinsed off her face before she went back to her room.

  Reagan and Levi were walking out, thank God. And finally.

  “See ya,” Reagan said.

  “Rock on.” Levi smiled.

  Cath felt like collapsing when the door closed behind them.

  She grabbed another protein bar, flopped onto the old wooden captain’s chair—she was starting to like this chair—and opened a drawer to prop up her foot.

  Simon swept his honey brown hair out of his eyes and sighed. “Just because I can’t think of any heroic vampires doesn’t mean they don’t exist.”

  Baz stopped trying to levitate his steamer trunk and gave Simon a flash of gleaming fang. “Good guys wear white,” Baz said. “Have you ever tried to get blood out of a white cape?”

  * * *

  Selleck Hall was a dormitory right in the middle of campus. You could eat there even if you didn’t live there. Cath usually waited in the lobby for Wren and Courtney, so she wouldn’t have to walk into the cafeteria alone.

  “So what’s your roommate like?” Courtney asked as they moved through the salad bar line. She asked it like she and Cath were old friends—like Cath had any idea what Courtney was like, outside of her taste for cottage cheese with peaches.

  The salad bar at Selleck was completely wack. Cottage cheese with peaches, canned pears with shredded cheddar. “What is up with this?” Cath asked, lifting a scoop of cold kidney and green bean salad.

  “Maybe it’s another Western Nebraska thing,” Wren said. “There are guys in our dorm who wear cowboy hats, like, all the time, even when they’re just walking down the hall.”

  “I’m gonna get a table,” Courtney said.

  “Hey”—Cath watched Wren pile vegetables on her plate—“did we ever write any fic with Simon and Baz dancing?”

  “I don’t remember,” Wren said. “Why? Are you writing a dance scene?”

  “Waltzing. Up on the ramparts.”

  “Romantic.” Wren looked around the room for Courtney.

  “I’m worried that I’m making Simon too fluffy.”

  “Simon is fluffy.”

  “I wish you were reading it,” Cath said, following her to the table.

  “Isn’t every ninth-grader in North America already reading it?” Wren sat down next to Courtney.

  “And Japan,” Cath said, sitting. “I’m weirdly huge in Japan.”

  Courtney leaned toward Cath, swooping in, like she was in on some big secret. “Cath, Wren told me that you write Simon Snow stories. That’s so cool. I’m a huge Simon Snow fan. I read all the books when I was a kid.”

  Cath unwrapped her sandwich skeptically. “They’re not over,” she said.

  Courtney took a bite of her cottage cheese, not catching the correction.

  “I mean,” Cath said, “the books aren’t over. Book eight doesn’t come out until next year.…”

  “Tell us about your roommate,” Wren said, smiling flatly at Cath.

  “There’s nothing to tell.”

  “Then make something up.”

  Wren was irritated. Which irritated Cath. But then Cath thought about how glad she was to be eating food that required silverware and talking to someone who wasn’t a stranger—and decided to make an effort with Wren’s shiny new roommate.

  “Her name is Reagan. And she has reddish brown hair.… And she smokes.”

  Courtney wrinkled her nose. “In your room?”

  “She hasn’t really been in the room much.”

  Wren looked suspicious. “You haven’t talked?”

  “We’ve said hello,” Cath said. “I’ve talked to her boyfriend a little.”

  “What’s her boyfriend like?” Wren asked.

  “I don’t know. Tall?”

  “Well, it’s only been a few days. I’m sure you’ll get to know her.” Then Wren changed the subject to something that happened at some party she and Courtney had gone to. They’d only been living together two weeks, and already they had a slew of inside jokes that went right over Cath’s head.

  Cath ate her turkey sandwich and two servings of french fries, and shoved a second sandwich into her bag when Wren wasn’t paying attention.

  * * *

  Reagan finally stayed in their room that night. (Levi did not, thank God.) She went to bed while Cath was still typing.

  “Is the
light bothering you?” Cath asked, pointing at the lamp built into her desk. “I could turn it off.”

  “It’s fine,” Reagan said.

  Cath put in earbuds so that she wouldn’t hear Reagan’s falling-asleep noises. Breathing. Sheets brushing. Bed creaking.

  How can she just fall asleep like that with a stranger in the room? Cath wondered. Cath left the earbuds in when she finally crawled into her own bed and pulled the comforter up high over her head.

  * * *

  “You still haven’t talked to her?” Wren asked at lunch the next week.

  “We talk,” Cath said. “She says, ‘Would you mind closing the window?’ And I say, ‘That’s fine.’ Also, ‘Hey.’ We exchange ‘heys’ daily. Sometimes twice daily.”

  “It’s getting weird,” Wren said.

  Cath poked at her mashed potatoes. “I’m getting used to it.”

  “It’s still weird.”

  “Really?” Cath asked. “You’re really going to start talking about how I got stuck with a weird roommate?”

  Wren sighed. “What about her boyfriend?”

  “Haven’t seen him for a few days.”

  “What are you doing this weekend?”

  “Homework, I guess. Writing Simon.”

  “Courtney and I are going to a party tonight.”

  “Where?”

  “The Triangle House!” Courtney said. She said it the same way you’d say “the Playboy Mansion!” if you were a total D-bag.

  “What’s a Triangle House?” Cath asked.

  “It’s an engineering fraternity,” Wren said.

  “So they, like, get drunk and build bridges?”

  “They get drunk and design bridges. Want to come?”

  “Nah.” Cath took a bite of roast beef and potatoes; it was always Sunday-night dinner in the Selleck dining room. “Drunk nerds. Not my thing.”

  “You like nerds.”

  “Not nerds who join fraternities,” Cath said. “That’s a whole subclass of nerds that I’m not interested in.”

  “Did you make Abel sign a sobriety pledge before he left for Missouri?”

  “Is Abel your boyfriend?” Courtney asked. “Is he cute?”

  Cath ignored her. “Abel isn’t going to turn into a drunk. He can’t even tolerate caffeine.”

  “That right there is some faulty logic.”

  “You know I don’t like parties, Wren.”

  “And you know what Dad says—you have to try something before you can say you don’t like it.”

  “Seriously? You’re using Dad to get me to a frat party? I have tried parties. There was that one at Jesse’s, with the tequila—”

  “Did you try the tequila?”

  “No, but you did, and I helped clean it up when you puked.”

  Wren smiled wistfully and smoothed her long bangs across her forehead. “Drinking tequila is more about the journey than the destination.…”

  “You’ll call me,” Cath said, “right?”

  “If I puke?”

  “If you need help.”

  “I won’t need help.”

  “But you’ll call me?”

  “God, Cath. Yes. Relax, okay?”

  “But, sir,” Simon pushed, “do I have to be his roommate every year, every year until we leave Watford?”

  The Mage smiled indulgently and ruffled Simon’s caramel brown hair. “Being matched with your roommate is a sacred tradition at Watford.” His voice was gentle but firm. “The Crucible cast you together. You’re to watch out for each other, to know each other as well as brothers.”

  “Yeah, but, sir…” Simon shuffled in his chair. “The Crucible must have made a mistake. My roommate’s a complete git. He might even be evil. Last week, someone spelled my laptop closed, and I know it was him. He practically cackled.”

  The Mage gave his beard a few solemn strokes. It was short and pointed and just covered his chin.

  “The Crucible cast you together, Simon. You’re meant to watch out for him.”

  —from chapter 3, Simon Snow and the Second Serpent, copyright © 2003 by Gemma T. Leslie

  FOUR

  The squirrels on campus were beyond domestic; they were practically domestically abusive. If you were eating anything at all, they’d come right up to you and chit-chit-chit in your space.

  “Take it,” Cath said, tossing a chunk of strawberry-soy bar to the fat red squirrel at her feet. She took a photo of it with her phone and sent it to Abel. “bully squirrel,” she typed.

  Abel had sent her photos of his room—his suite—at MoTech, and of him standing with all five of his nerdy Big Bang Theory roommates. Cath tried to imagine asking Reagan to pose for a photo and laughed a little out loud. The squirrel froze but didn’t run away.

  On Wednesdays and Fridays, Cath had forty-five minutes between Biology and Fiction-Writing, and lately she’d been killing it right here, sitting in a shadowy patch of grass on the slow side of the English building. Nobody to deal with here. Nobody but the squirrels.

  She checked her text messages, even though her phone hadn’t chimed.

  She and Abel hadn’t actually talked since Cath left for school three weeks ago, but he did text her. And he e-mailed every once in a while. He said he was fine and that the competition at Missouri was already intense. “Everybody here was the smartest kid in their graduating class.”

  Cath had resisted the urge to reply, “Except for you, right?”

  Just because Abel got a perfect score on the math section of the SATs didn’t mean he was the smartest kid in their class. He was crap in American History, and he’d limped through Spanish. Through Spanish, for Christ’s sake.

  He’d already told Cath that he wasn’t coming back to Omaha until Thanksgiving, and she hadn’t tried to convince him to come home any sooner.

  She didn’t really miss him yet.

  Wren would say that was because Abel wasn’t really Cath’s boyfriend. It was one of their recurring conversations:

  “He’s a perfectly good boyfriend,” Cath would say.

  “He’s an end table,” Wren would answer.

  “He’s always there for me.”

  “… to set magazines on.”

  “Would you rather I dated someone like Jesse? So we can both stay up crying every weekend?”

  “I would rather you dated someone you’d actually like to kiss.”

  “I’ve kissed Abel.”

  “Oh, Cath, stop. You’re making my brain throw up.”

  “We’ve been dating for three years. He’s my boyfriend.”

  “You have stronger feelings for Baz and Simon.”

  “Duh, they’re Baz and Simon, like that’s even fair—I like Abel. He’s steady.”

  “You just keep describing an end table.…”

  Wren had started going out with boys in the eighth grade (two years before Cath was even thinking about it). And until Jesse Sandoz, Wren hadn’t stayed with the same guy for more than a few months. She kept Jesse around so long because she was never really sure that he liked her—at least that was Cath’s theory.

  Wren usually lost interest in a guy as soon as she’d won him over. The conversion was her favorite part. “That moment,” she told Cath, “when you realize that a guy’s looking at you differently—that you’re taking up more space in his field of vision. That moment when you know he can’t see past you anymore.”

  Cath had liked that last line so much, she gave it to Baz a few weeks later. Wren was annoyed when she read it.

  Anyway, Jesse never really converted. He never had eyes only for Wren, not even after they had sex last fall. It threw off Wren’s game.

  Cath was relieved when Jesse got a football scholarship to Iowa State. He didn’t have the attention span for a long-distance relationship, and there were at least ten thousand fresh guys at the University of Nebraska for Wren to convert.

  Cath tossed another hunk of protein bar to the squirrel, but someone in a pair of periwinkle wingtips took a step too close to them, and
the squirrel startled and lumbered away. Fat campus squirrels, Cath thought. They lumber.

  The wingtips took another step toward her, then stopped. Cath looked up. There was a guy standing in front of her. From where she was sitting—and where he was standing, with the sun behind his head—he seemed eight feet tall. She squinted up but didn’t recognize him.

  “Cath,” he said, “right?”

  She recognized his voice; it was the boy with the dark hair who sat in front of her in Fiction-Writing—Nick.

  “Right,” she said.

  “Did you finish your writing exercise?”

  Professor Piper had asked them to write a hundred words from the perspective of an inanimate object. Cath nodded, still squinting up at him.

  “Oh, sorry,” Nick said, stepping out of the sun and sitting on the grass next to her. He dropped his bag between his knees. “So what’d you write about?”

  “A lock,” she said. “You?”

  “Ballpoint pen.” He grimaced. “I’m worried that everyone is going to do a pen.”

  “Don’t be,” she said. “A pen is a terrible idea.”

  Nick laughed, and Cath looked down at the grass.

  “So,” he asked, “do you think she’ll make us read them out loud?”

  Cath’s head snapped up. “No. Why would she do that?”

  “They always do that,” he said, like it was something Cath should already know. She wasn’t used to seeing Nick from the front; he had a boyish face with hooded blue eyes and blocky, black eyebrows that almost met in the middle. He looked like someone with a steerage ticket on the Titanic. Somebody who’d be standing in line at Ellis Island. Undiluted and old-blooded. Also, cute.

  “But there wouldn’t be time in class for all of us to read,” she said.

  “We’ll probably break up into groups first,” he said, again like she should know this.

  “Oh … I’m kind of new around here.”

  “Are you a freshman?”

  She nodded and rolled her eyes.