But I can’t stop. The anger has a mind of its own, and it feels so wonderfully cathartic, I give myself over to it. “You’re done. You won’t sit with us, you won’t look at us, you won’t have the audacity to speak to us. Any of us. You can find new friends to harass and sexually assault, and whoever has the misfortune to inherit you is not going to hear a word from you about what you did to her. If anyone asks why you’re suddenly alone, I want you to tell them we grew tired of your endless inane questions, and your humiliating lack of boundaries, and your insistence upon over-explaining concepts everyone understood the first time.”

I watch with vicious satisfaction as Harriet transitions from wounded, to devastated, to furious. I want to goad her further, to find the insult that lands just right. To tip her over the edge, so she snaps at me, and gives me a good reason to properly snap back. I want to rip her apart for touching Danni. I want to destroy her.

“Rose,” she says, very slowly. “Calm down. Your girlfriend didn’t kiss me back.”

Several things happen at once. I spring forward, finally losing control of myself altogether, at the same moment Eleanor leaps to hold me in place with all her body weight. Theodore places himself swiftly between me and Harriet, while Molly whirls on Harriet and shoves her, firmly, out of the room, whispering something unintelligible but jagged-sounding as she does. And behind me, Danni calls out urgently. “Rose.”

At the sound of Danni’s voice, I fall limp in Eleanor’s grip.

Molly is staring at me with something akin to horror. Or perhaps it could better be described as unrecognizing. She’s closed the door behind her and is standing pressed against it, almost as though she’s trying to put as much space between us as she can. When Eleanor releases me, I discover she’s looking at me in much the same way.

“Where did that come from?” Molly asks me, and I don’t have an answer.

I’ve never lost control before. I’ve never even allowed myself to feel enough of anything to come close.

Not anger, not sadness, and certainly not fear. Not like that.

Wordlessly, I wrench my eyes away from them and go to Danni.

She’s squeezing her eyes closed, and breathing heavily. “Rose,” she whispers. “I just want to go home. Can you take me home, please?”

“To school?” I ask.

“Yeah.”

“Of course.” Grunting, I help her sit up, and she takes a second to catch her breath, looking up at me pitifully.

“We have to go past people at the party,” she says.

“Yes.”

“Don’t leave me, though. Please?”

My stomach sinks. I place a hand on the side of her face, wishing I could take back leaving her in the first place. “Never again.”