Suddenly it seems obvious—sickeningly, horrifyingly obvious—that he was much sketchier than I ever admitted to myself. I explain just a few of these memories to Lex, and she goes positively incandescent with rage. “He what?” she barks, fury contorting her features. “You never mentioned anything like that to me. Why were you okay with that?”

“I didn’t have a choice,” I say. “I need the scholarship.”

“You did have a choice!” Lex practically shouts. “This is exactly what I was talking about earlier. Shay, you’re so obsessed with this, like, really specific idea of success. It kind of bothered me before, but this is ridiculous.”

“What?” I say, staring at her. “How is this related to what we talked about earlier?”

“It’s like you think that if you don’t get the scholarship and get into Willington and get rich from working in a magilab, you’re a failure. Yeah, okay, I get that it would be expensive for your family if you didn’t get into college right away. But still. It’s a fucking scholarship, Shay. You almost got molested.”

There’s silence. Lex pushes a hand back through her hair, scowling. When she puts it like that, I feel like I’ve been acting like a whole fool. I’ve been killing myself for this one thing for so long that I can’t imagine any other path. Maybe I wouldn’t have been in this situation if I’d been just a little bit less obsessed.

“Sorry,” Lex mumbles, rubbing her face tiredly. “I just—I’m so mad.”

“At me?” I say in a small voice.

“Oh my god, no! I’m mad at Mr. B for being a manipulative creep.” She taps her orange nails on the steering wheel and shakes her head slightly. “You have to report him to the school.”

I’m hit with a wave of panic just hearing those words. “Nobody would believe me, Lex. Everybody loves him. Like, they really love him.”

“Yeah, but—”

“This is not going to work out for me!” I snap. This kind of thing happens. You see it on the news: Powerful, rich wizard makes his problems go away with his influence. But the second part of that is that the witch always gets fucked over. Always. “If I report him, there’s no way I’m getting the scholarship.”

She groans with frustration. “Forget the scholarship!”

“I can’t!” My voice breaks a little as I say that. “I get that I’m obsessed with it, but I can’t give it up because Mr. B did something wrong.”

My words linger in the air between us.

“Okay,” she says, her tone softening. “I’m sorry.”

“What if I don’t tell anyone?” I say. “I guess it’s not really illegal. She’s eighteen already. And age-gap magic sharing is fine in Florida.”