Eventually it rang ten thirty, the time he had set for himself as okay to head back to Hawley before check-in at eleven. As he passed the other dorms he saw kids getting out of cabs with the airy melancholy of coming back to school. He avoided making eye contact in case it was that group of guys.

Ben walked into Hawley and came into the common room. Leon and Hideo were sitting in front of the TV watching Fletch; Chevy Chase was playing tennis. Mr. Tan, the school’s Chinese teacher, was on duty, and Ben waved to let him know he was in. Mr. Tan made a mark next to Ben’s name and nodded and smiled to him as though Ben had supplied a word in a stubborn crossword puzzle. According to the microwave, which had by now spread its smell through the common room, it was 10:37. If Ben stayed here until eleven, everyone coming in would know that he had checked in this early. As he climbed the stairs, Ben strangely envied Mr. Tan; how nice and simple it must be to be an older dignified Chinese man, how clear the ways you’re supposed to act.

He looked at his Great Auk as he opened the door. The room was exactly as they had left it, the comforter twisted up on his bunk, smoothed out on Ahmed’s. Ben wondered whether Ahmed had servants at home, and if so, how he had learned to be so fastidious. It smelled like Ahmed: Polo cologne, that tangy body odor. Ben opened the window to the air.

The older guys, Ennis and his roommate, Fitzy, had already started bringing newbs up to their room to drink. The two of them lived in the Chute, a third-floor room so named for its long, narrow shape and slanted eave ceilings. It was the most desirable room in the dorm because it was the farthest away from the faculty apartments, and Ben couldn’t figure out whether Ennis and Fitzy had gotten the Chute because they were cool, or whether they had become cool because they had drawn the Chute in the housing lottery.