In the morning, I ate my cereal between Harriet and Nisha, but I didn’t hear anything they said. I was looking over at Laurel, whose makeup was not quite hiding the dark circles under her eyes. Where had she been, if Janet had been with Luke? Where was she ever? Twice, her spoon clattered against her bowl. I was about to approach her, to touch her arm, even struggle through some kind of argument if it would keep her from being alone, when Janet finally appeared, her hair wet. I thought her usual scowl seemed hung inexpertly in place, like a surgical mask about to slip from an ear. More likely the face was the same, and I was seeing it differently now. To be honest, I had never even considered Janet as a sexual creature. Not like Laurel, not like Serena, not even like me. Not for a moment. Can I be blamed? She rolled her eyes at every allusion. She wasn’t interested in tanning her stomach, or the tops of her small breasts. She had no stories. She had no questions. It seemed she had no desires. But all that meant nothing. All that meant was that she didn’t need to talk about sex with us, she didn’t need to make jokes, to assert herself in that way. She knew she had something we didn’t.

We had Kyūdō again that day, and I watched Janet carefully, taking in her strong arms and the concentration on her face. She looked the same as ever: as calm and hard as a machine. I was lying before, you know. She was beautiful, in her own way. We all were. I couldn’t see it then. I was too cocooned in my own relative judgments, too disappointed at my own dull bone structure, too enamored of long limb and bouncy hair and cookie-cutter exactitude, but now I see us clearly: we were young, smooth, clean. Or at least younger and smoother and cleaner than we are now. Those of us who are left, I mean. Janet hit the target again and again, her shots increasing in power as the lesson wore on, while I fumbled, still, with the steps, and Laurel gave up and sat down in the grass. She hadn’t even put on her glove.

“Sarah’s going to yell,” I said.

She looked at me like I was a tree that had opened its mouth to speak. Maybe I was.

“It doesn’t matter,” she said.

And it didn’t. Sarah didn’t even reprimand her. She must have been tired, that far into the summer. Like all of us, she must have been so tired.

I skipped my rota that afternoon. The reasons for this should be obvious to anyone.