Her arm went back over her eyes and she growled in the back of her throat. “We’re going to be there for four years, at least, Amelia. Don’t you want to make sure we’ll be happy there?”

I laughed. “You can’t be serious. You don’t honestly think this spreadsheet is going to guarantee us happiness, do you?”

But she did. A week later—after a lot more frustrated grumblings on her part—Jenna ordered informational pamphlets from the top three contenders on what I had come to call her College Deathmatch Spreadsheet. When they came in, we pored over them at her dining room table. Glossy photos of campuses in ideal lighting, bookmarks with the numbers of admissions advisors, and detachable sheets of majors littered the table.

“I don’t even know,” Jenna said, what felt like hours later. “What do you think?”

“There’s something about the campus of this one,” I said, pushing the University of Montana packet in front of her. “The snow and the hill behind the admin building, and did you see the photo of this professor? Her professional head shot is a photo of her dogsledding.”

Jenna stared at the flyer, her lip curling upward. “You like it because the trees remind you of Orman, don’t you?”

This hadn’t even popped into my mind, but when I looked back to the photo, I nodded.

“Me, too,” she whispered.

“So let’s go.” I smiled. “Where did this one rank in the deathmatch?”

“Second,” she said. “But only by three-tenths of a point.”

“Let’s apply,” I said. “No harm in trying. And maybe this will be the only place we both get into our programs.”

It was. I called it a sign, and Jenna called it a statistical probability, based on her research, but I took it to mean that we were on the right track. Jenna and I were supposed to be with each other, always.

But she’s not here. What am I supposed to do with a sign meant for two?