‘Lucky?’ I spluttered, my infuriated breath freezing in the cold air. ‘What a creep! How pathetic is a guy who has to, like, corner a freshman girl and lure her back to his room? He’s the lucky one! He should, like, light a fucking gratitude candle that you were even willing to set foot in his gross sweatsock-smelling room. Seriously!’

Wait, was I defending Katie Casey? Was I saying someone was lucky to have her in their room, when a few weeks ago I would have refused to let her into mine even if she brought amazing and super-fattening baked goods? What was happening here?

‘So I left,’ Katie continued, huddling into herself. ‘But, as I was going down the hallway, I overheard the senior talking to another guy. They were talking about me. And he said, “Three words: waste of time.”’

I shook my head in silent, indignant sympathy.

‘And that’s when I decided,’ she said, her clear, strong breath cutting through the smoke, ‘that my body was mine.’

‘Hell, yeah!’ I stood up.

‘And that I got to decide what I did with it!’ She stood up.

‘Right on, sister!’ The fire was climbing higher and higher, crackling and hissing now, and my face was hot.

‘And that I was going to save myself for marriage!’

Hold up. That just took a turn I wasn’t cool with.

‘Um,’ I interjected. Pricks of pain were bringing the feeling back to my legs, and I was stomping my feet. ‘You do realize it’s possible to have a totally consensual hook-up where you’re in control and there’s lots of sexy fun and laughter and possibly dulce de leche sauce involved, right?’ Then I waved that little life lesson away. ‘You know what? Forget that for now.’

Katie Casey was staring greedily at the fire, and I could see the flames leaping in her wet eyes. Turning to me, she confessed in a low, excited voice: ‘I kinda want to burn something.’

‘Oh hell, yeah!’ I said again.

The bras I’d brought were still lying in the frosty grass because Katie had built the fire out of my physics quizzes. I picked up two and held them out to her.

‘Balconette or racerback?’

‘Actually …’ Katie pursed her lips mischievously. She unzipped her ski parka, reached inside and pulled out …

A bra. A baby-blue, lace-trimmed bra.

‘You brought your own bra to burn?’ I squawked in disbelief. ‘Yes! Let’s do this!’

I went first. I stepped up, yelled ‘FUCK THE PATRIARCHY!’ into the cold, smoky wind, then hurled the mystery balconette bra from the laundry room on the fire, and thrust my arm above my head in triumph as the flames devoured it.

Next it was Katie Casey’s turn. And she hesitated at first, dangling her bra by the strap, coughing a little at the smoke in her face, her voice wavering in the wind: ‘F … F … F …’