Gina’s brothers were both athletes; the sophomore was a tennis player, and the junior, Howie, was good at lacrosse. Gina got the story from Howie. There actually had been a party the night that Alice had sex with Scott, but not on Kennewick Beach. It had been down at the Harbor Beach. Scott had skipped out to be with Alice, but when he returned he got drunk and bragged to all his friends how he’d just fucked a freshman girl. His on-off girlfriend, Stacy Homstead, the girl with the crimped hair, heard about it, and she was the one who spread it around school the following day, the story of the slutty freshman from Biddeford who’d steal your boyfriend. The Bitcheford.

“Did you really have sex with him?” Gina asked. They were walking together to Alice’s house, along the sidewalk that bordered the beach.

“Sort of, I guess. It didn’t last very long.”

Gina covered her mouth and laughed, more of a snort.

“What was it like?”

“It was like nothing,” Alice said, and meant it.

“Geez,” Gina said. Alice knew that despite being fascinated, Gina had judged her as well. She also knew that Gina, gawky now, with her giraffe legs and wobbly head, was going to be beautiful by senior year, and that their friendship would not last. She didn’t really care. She’d already resolved to just get through high school on her own. She’d gotten through her whole childhood on her own, after all, without a father or brothers or sisters. She had her mother, who barely counted. Alice felt that she’d been counting down the days to being on her own as an adult for longer than she remembered. She didn’t really need friends, even though Gina and she remained somewhat close throughout all of high school. But Alice’s first prediction did come true. Between junior and senior year, Gina lost her awkwardness and turned into a runway model. It didn’t make her as popular as Alice thought it would, though. The girls seemed to resent her, and the boys were frightened away.