“Jared is in his Comparative Lit class,” I said. “He gets out in twenty minutes.”

“So what do we do in the meantime?”

I noticed two security guards standing in a booth. One of the guards stared at us. I realized how out of place Ema must look to him.

“We should probably get out of sight,” I said. “It’s an all-boys school, and, well, you probably stand out.”

I meant her gender, of course, but it was more than that. This campus seemed pretty straitlaced and old-school. Ema looked anything but.

“Excuse me.”

I had spoken a few seconds too late. The words had come from yet another campus security guard. He was a small man with a mustache so thick, it looked like someone had glued a guinea pig under his nose.

“Hi,” I said.

“Are you a student here?” he asked me.

I was going to lie and say yes, but that wouldn’t work. The guard would ask me for my student ID or look up my name or something like that. I was debating how to handle it when Ema enthusiastically stuck out her hand.

“Hi!” she said in this fake golly-gee voice that was nearly the polar opposite of her normal affect. “My name is Emma.”

The guard hesitantly took her hand. “Uh, nice to meet you.”

“And your name?” Ema asked, still holding the handshake.

“Bruce Bohuny.”

“Well, nice to meet you too, Officer Bohuny! Oh, and this is my brother Mickey.”

She gestured toward me. I nodded because I’m fast on the uptake.

“Say hi to Officer Bohuny, Mickey.”

“Uh, hi.”

Officer Bohuny and I shook hands.

Ema gave us both her biggest-wattage smile. Who was this girl? “Officer Bohuny, my brother is visiting the campus as a prospective student, and I thought I’d walk around with him. Is that a problem?”

“Well, see, you need visitor passes,” he said.

“We do?” She frowned at me. “Mickey, did you know that?”

Me: “No. I didn’t know.”

“So you two don’t have visitor passes?” Bohuny asked.

“I’m so, so sorry,” Ema replied—and she looked more than sorry, almost crushed by this indiscretion. “What should we do, Officer Bohuny?”

“The admissions office is that building on the left.” He pointed with both his finger and, it seemed, that bushy mustache. “The entrance is on the other side of the circle. You can get a pass there. I can walk you over there, if you’d like.”

“Please don’t bother,” Ema said, shaking his hand again. “We’ve taken up enough of your time. Thank you so much, Officer Bohuny.”

“Sure thing.”

We started toward the admissions office. Officer Bohuny kept watch. Under my breath, I muttered to her, “Who are you?”

She gave a small laugh.

“Now what?” I asked.

“Keep walking.”

“Do you have a plan?”

“I do,” Ema said. “You’re going to have to talk to Jared on your own.”

“How?”