“Are you headed home?” she asks, coat on and books in hand. “Want to walk out together?”

I think of home. Of our tiny apartment, my tinier bedroom—and Dad with all his hopes and dreams for me in the next room. Suddenly the prospect of going through the Binder of Colleges That Are Not Columbia feels slightly nauseating. Security keeps the school open until nine for students anyway.

“I think I’ll give this a read here,” I say. “Better lighting and I don’t feel like going home just yet.”

She nods. “Just remember, you have plenty of options if Columbia doesn’t pan out. Although I’m very serious about the state of that binder. I can’t even imagine how people just go around lending out their books. Troglodytes.”

I laugh. No one makes me laugh like Corinne.

“Hey, Corinne?”

I can’t believe I’m about to ask this. “You and Marvyn? Is that . . . that a thing?”

Corinne raises an eyebrow. She’s frowning at me, specifically my forehead. Is she actually watching me sweat? “Nah,” she finally concedes. “I’m kind of into someone else.”

She smiles. Or maybe it’s a smirk. Since when does Corinne smirk like that?

“Lights on or off?” she asks by the door, beanie on.

I silently raise the binder with a raised eyebrow, which seems to rattle her confidence.

“Right. Reading. Um, good night, then! Happy reading.”

I chuckle. “Good night,” I call after her, then open my binder and slide into a seat. I shake myself awake and dive into an objective assessment of pristine institutions.

The lights suddenly turn off as Corinne disappears into the hallway.

“Hey!” I say.

“Things don’t always work out the way you want, Haltiwanger!” she shouts. “Get off your butt, and do something about it.”

I let myself sit in the dark for a moment and think that, if nothing else, at least this clusterfuck of a senior year has had one good surprise—even if she’s been upstairs all this time.

Sixteen

Today’s debate semifinals are to be at St. Celeste. Intrastate New York debates tend to rotate schools depending on availability and to keep some sense of fairness to the proceedings. Every one of the competing schools (Trinity, Regis, FATE, St. Celeste, Brearley, Horace Mann, Collegiate) is therefore theoretically available to host a meet at the drop of a hat.

If two teams are competing against each other, one of the two will host the other in a display of decorum and sportsmanship that looks great in school pamphlets and websites. It’s a weird bit of logistics, but I imagine that Slytherin and Gryffindor kids still often have to pose together and smile extra bright in Hogwarts brochures to show that the pesky Potter-era animosity is indeed ancient history.