“No wonder they raised more this year,” Ethan said, followed again by laughter.

Timid and soft-spoken, Jane mostly endured it quietly. Elise would occasionally shoot them dark looks or tell them to shut up, but one day they crossed the line and she silenced them for good.

“When was the last time you saw your mom, Jane?” Ethan asked, feigning concern. When she ignored him, he poked her in the shoulder with his pen. She continued to ignore him, which pissed him off. “It doesn’t matter. I heard she got a ten-year sentence. Oh no, what if she dies in prison? Then you’ll never see her again.” Jane teared up almost immediately.

“Oh shit,” George said, shaking his head appreciatively. “Harsh.”

Elise swung around. “Hey, assholes, say another word and I’ll fucking end you.”

They were stunned into silence. It wasn’t just the words. It was the way she delivered them, like she had power and they were nothing.

Maybe they heard she orchestrated the revenge prank against Jae’s ex-girlfriend, Dana. Rumor was that her family had to hire exterminators to get rid of the mice and that she was too scared to sleep in the basement anymore.

Or maybe they could sense Elise Ferro was someone you didn’t fuck with. Either way, they stopped torturing Jane, at least whenever she was around.

• • •

Then there was the Friday we had a substitute in World History, the only other class I had with Elise. When doing roll call, Mrs. Jones stumbled through all the names and then got to mine. “Katherine Te-say?” I always dreaded moments like this.

“It’s just ‘sigh,’ or ‘zai,’ like the word ‘tsar,’ ” I said. “And I go by my middle name, Remy.”

“Sah-ay,” she said, drawing it out, clearly annoyed at being corrected. “And Remy. What an odd name. Katherine is what your parents picked for you and it’s a perfectly good name, so that’s what I’ll call you.”

Sliding down in my chair to avoid drawing any more attention to myself, I caught Elise staring at me, anger flashing in her eyes. I shook my head slightly: Please don’t make it worse. To my relief, she said nothing, but I could see that rage simmering right beneath the surface. She remained quiet the rest of class, but as soon as the bell rang, she strode up to Mrs. Jones. I thought Elise was about to say something that’d land her in detention when she turned the wattage up on her smile and began chatting with her, laughing even. Confused, I waited for her outside.

“Come on,” she said, looping an arm around mine and steering us away from the crowd heading to the cafeteria for lunch.

“Where are we going?” I asked once we were outside.

Grinning, Elise pulled out a set of car keys from her pocket.

“Wait, is that—”

“—the rude woman’s keys?” she finished. “Yep.” So that’s what she’d been doing. “They were just sitting on the desk.” We wandered the teacher’s parking lot using the key fob to locate her car.