On the way home, Priti soothes me like only a sister and best friend can.

“You’re too good for her anyway,” she says. “She’s like … I don’t know.” She crinkles up her nose, presumably thinking of Flávia. “She seems kind of cold, doesn’t she? And she’s Chyna’s cousin.”

“You’re still going to Chyna’s birthday party,” I point out.

“That’s different. I’m barely even going to see her there. It’s a big party, there’ll be a lot of people.”

“So all of that stuff you said about Chyna extending a hand and you meeting her halfway was bullshit.”

Priti looks at me with narrowed eyes but doesn’t deny what I’ve said. “Maybe it’s not the most accurate portrayal of my feelings … I know what Chyna’s like.”

Everybody in our school knows what Chyna is like. She single-handedly runs the rumor mill. It started with the lies she spread about me, but it grew into something larger than life. Or, at least, larger than all the people in our year.

What I can never understand is why people stand by her despite the rumors she spreads. She’s not exactly a credible journalist; half the things she says are outright lies, but people still accept them like decrees from the Pope himself. To the people at St. Catherine’s Secondary School, Chyna Quinn basically is the Pope, and you don’t go up against her.

At home that evening, I spend hours poring over blank pages, trying to perfect more original henna designs.

“You need to actually practice, you know,” Priti says when she slinks into my room with her math book.

“Are you offering your hand as a canvas?”

She examines her hand with careful eyes, like it’s about to reveal the answer to my question. Like it’s a sentient being instead of part of her body.

“I suppose I must make this sacrifice to aid my sister.” She sticks her hand out in front of her. “I offer up this hand to—”

“Oh, shut up.” I can’t help but smile. If there’s one person who can take my mind off of miserable things, it’s my little sister.

We plop down on the bed together, her with the math book propped up in front of her, and me with a stick of henna in my hand once more. It feels like we’re in the summer days again, when Priti and I did this so often. Lazing about. Spending all of our days together, cooped up in this room with nobody to bother us.

I wish it could last forever.

“Do you think helping you with this competition, a.k.a. sacrificing my hand to this worthy cause, is an excuse to not have my math homework done tomorrow morning?” Priti asks.

“Definitely not.”

She frowns and brings her math book closer, muttering, “I hate math.”

10