“What invitation?” I say. Shit, shit, shit. He is literally, actually literally, the last person I would want knowing about this. Okay, besides Christopher. But still, I’m frozen, eyes wide, staring at him with no idea what to say and my heart whapping faster than it should be.

“When did you start doing burlesque?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I’m so bad at playing clueless, and he doesn’t even pretend to take me seriously.

“I wish I had gotten an invite,” he says.

“There’s no invite,” I say, pulling out my phone.

“But I would very much prefer a very private, just-Addie show anyway. What do you say?”

“I say it’s a real pity you dumped me, I guess,” I say, and leave him in the stairwell.

In the quad I call Nevaeh to ask if we should panic, and she tells me she’s panicking at that question.

“I’m sorry! I should have killed him immediately and left his body for the janitor!” I only one-eighteenth joke. We know this is a small school and that we are not collectively James Bond and that our invitation plan isn’t flawlessly cryptic and secretive, and we’ve been keeping an ear out for rumors. But we hadn’t looked right in the face of what it would mean to be so directly confronted, even in such a ham-handed way by someone who isn’t a threat.

“No, no,” she says. “Murder would just add to our worries.”

“So what should we do?” I ask. “Should we cancel it?” I know we’re not going to, but feel like I need to hear her say it.

“Of course not,” she scoffs.

“Okay,” I say. “Okay.” And I try to breathe past it, but can’t help feeling like I’m not going to relax again until this whole thing is successfully behind us.

When Jack pulls out a chair at our dinner table, the evening of our second-to-last dress rehearsal, he seems very pleased with himself. His socks are purple and have kittens playing with yarn balls, and his haircut is too short.

“No, why did you do that?” I say, reaching out. He’s startled, touches his head. I shake mine. “No, I’m sorry, I like it. I liked your curls, is all.”

“Did you?” he says, and he’s really smiling at that. “I didn’t know that.”

“Uh, yeah,” I say, awkwardly. Usual reminder to myself that I don’t like someone who likes my friend.

“Anyway, I wanted to tell you all I was really excited about tonight,” he says earnestly, and my heart is squeezing so hard. “Where should I meet you? When should I be there?”