Their gentle glow is comforting. Every few feet, I step out into the next pool of blue light. I count my steps in the blackness between them—one, two, three, four. I reach the mid-thirties before I start over again. It calms me down. On the way, I text Sierra.
Aves and Em had huge fight, and I ended up doused in someone’s drink. Heading back early to shower & sleep. See you at practice, tho!
And I do precisely that. By the time I’m under my covers, I’m exhausted and also more than a little drunk. I should be ecstatic. I got into Harvard. Harvard. But Emma and Avery’s fight has shaken me. I feel nothing. I glance at my phone before drifting off; it’s just shy of 11:00 p.m.
* * *
—
I wake to my bed shaking, swaying beneath me like a mattress riding a wave. Earthquake? My sleep-deprived brain panics. I take a second, two, to orient myself. Logic tells me, no, it’s not an earthquake; my mind is playing tricks on me. This happens sometimes when I go to sleep drunk. Unpleasant middle-of-the-night wake-ups.
My heart thunders in my chest, so hard I can feel it in my fingertips. My eyes seem glued shut. I force an eye open, then the other. It’s dark, but the shadows playing on the ceiling and wall are familiar. I’m in my room. I must have had a nightmare.
The wisps of the leftover dream don’t leave quickly, though. I was somewhere cold and inky black. An amorphous place, but a strong feeling: someone was with me, and I was afraid. They were trying to kill me. A classic anxiety dream. At least it wasn’t the one where a psycho chases me through a hedge maze.
But I’m fine now; I’m safe. I tell myself that. My brain knows it, but my heart thinks I’m a liar. Too spooked to go back to sleep, I fumble on the side table for my phone, depressing my thumb into the power button. I squint against the brightness to catch the time. It’s a little past 2:00 a.m.
I roll over as my eyes adjust, more dynamic grays slowly edging into view, and that’s when I finally notice: the bed across from me is empty. Emma’s not here. Is the party still going on? No way, curfew is 11:30. Not that there aren’t ways around that.
Now I throw back my duvet, allowing a flash of cold to wash over me, wake me more fully as I swing both feet out over the edge of the bed and sit up. I scan the room. My heart leaps into my throat. The door is open, just a crack. I grasp the fluffy down cover tight to my chest, like it could protect me from an intruder. I look for hulking shadows crouched by the desks, hiding in the closet. Nothing. Everything is normal. No one is in here with me. I release a breath, and the tension rolls off my shoulders. But then why is the door open? I definitely closed it before I went to sleep, right? I try to remember pressing hard against the metal until I heard that satisfying click of the bolt.
Suddenly I’m parched and in desperate need of Advil. I go to the mini fridge to grab a bottle of water. The fridge light illuminates a slice down the middle of the room. It falls on Emma’s desk chair. Her cherry-red sweater hangs over the back of it.
The sweater Emma was wearing at the party. Which means she came back to the room. I heave a sigh of relief. She’s probably in the bathroom and didn’t want to take her key. It’s definitely late for her to be getting back, and she’ll regret it in the morning, but that’s her problem.
I gulp down the water like a dying man in the desert and then check my phone to see what I must have missed. Instagram first; I tap through Stories, looking at the time signatures to figure out if there’s an after-party somewhere in Bay. But the last images from the party are hours old, and there are no after-party snaps. I open my text app and go into the Ivies’ group text. Radio silence. Avery’s clearly on strike, given everything that happened with Emma, and the rest of us are too cowardly to take a side.
Emma’s not back yet. Weird. I cap the half-drunk bottle and place it on my bedside table. Slink toward the door, open it carefully, and poke my head into the hallway. Listen for running water or the sloppy shuffle of my drunk roommate moving around. There’s nothing but an eerie drip of a loose faucet.
A chill creeps up my spine. I rush back into the room, swipe my key card from atop my dresser, and pad down the hall to the communal bathroom.
“Emma?” I whisper, leaning through the doorway. Her name echoes. The faucet drips. No answer.
I go back to our room, shut the door behind me out of habit. Click. Locked and safe. I check my phone again, but there are no new notifications.
I think. Emma must be staying over with Tyler. Yes, that’s it. She came back here to change and then snuck out, forgetting to close the door in her haste. Risky to hold an overnight—there’s a reason the 5:00 a.m. hookup is popular—but maybe the administration would let it slip for ED day. I bet a lot of people are illegally staying over in their significant others’ rooms tonight. Normally Emma texts me if she’s staying over, but she was drunk and upset last night. Probably forgot. Right.
I move to Emma’s closet and tap my phone’s flashlight on. Her blue dress isn’t there—I swing the light over to Emma’s pop-up hamper—or there. She didn’t change her clothes. Why come all the way back just to drop off a sweater?
Something is wrong. I feel it in my bones, like when you enter a room and know people were just talking about you. Or like a ghost walking over your grave. My mom always says that, though it doesn’t really make sense. And yet…that feeling.
I sit on my bed and text her.
Emma, are you okay?
I wait a minute, then two, sucking down water and coming more awake with every second.
I get up and cross to the window, cupping my hands against the cold glass and peering out. Our room faces the gravel path; half the security lights are out now. I squint to the left, searching the pool of light a hundred yards away for…I don’t know what. I repeat the sequence to the right.
Then I’m pulling on wool socks and shoving my feet into my boots before I can change my mind. I don’t bother to get dressed or even put on a bra. I zip up my heavy down coat, stuff my ID card and phone into my pockets, and slip out into the hall. I tiptoe past the dozen doors on the way to the elevator bank and stairs. Stairs will be quieter, and as I make my way down the three flights, I keep my hand on my phone, willing it to vibrate with an incoming text. It remains motionless in my palm.
The whole building is alarmed from midnight until 5:00 a.m. The front door, back exit, and all the windows. Except one. The story is that some intrepid soccer player and the Girls Who Code club founder took advantage of a snowstorm blackout four years ago to disconnect the system from the large bay window in the ground-floor study room. Now the study room window is the only way in or out of Bay Hall after hours without risk of detection by the administration, making it popular with troublemakers and romantic partners.