All done for the day. A group of us is getting together for dinner at seven. Meet you back at the room at six?

I squeeze my eyes shut against the desire to hurl my phone into the nearest body of water. There are a lot of bodies of water around to choose from, but I resist the urge. It wouldn’t be fair to take my anger out on my innocent, well-meaning cell phone.

My fingers are cold, and for some reason the phone won’t register my touch. I rub my hands together, open and close my fists, take a deep breath, and try again.

Actually, I’m not feeling well, I type shakily. I think I’m sick.

I’m a coward. I hate myself for it. But I know I can’t do it, not tonight. I can’t have dinner with Mom and Afton and Abby and everyone in our group and pretend like I don’t know.

I send the text.

What kind of sick? my mother texts back immediately.

Of course she wants to know the exact symptoms I’m experiencing.

Stomach, I reply.

Did you vomit?

I bite my lip. She won’t let me stay in tonight if I only have an upset stomach. She’ll make me take a Pepto or a Tums and go with them anyway. She has this thing about participating.

Yes, I text back. A lie. The first of many, I think, about this thing I am not supposed to know. The first in a lifetime. But what choice do I have?

Are you at the room?

I cringe at the phone. Shit. Yes.

I’ll come check your vitals.

I tuck the phone back into my pocket, my heart drumming in my ears again, and start walking fast, calling myself a moron the entire way back, because I was so incredibly brainless to tell her I’m sick, and she’s a doctor and she’ll know I’m not really sick, won’t she, and even if she doesn’t know I’ve made it up, she’ll be actually examining me and how am I going to be that close to her, look into her eyes, and hide what I know? She’ll figure out that something’s up in two seconds flat. She’ll demand to know what it is. She and Afton are so alike that way.

But I can’t think of what else to do. I’m on an island two thousand miles from home. I don’t have a car or money or a good excuse.

I have to go back to the room.

I quicken my pace, and within a few minutes I’m standing at the base of the Ocean Tower. I stare up at it for a minute, wondering which window is ours. They all look the same, but some of them have the curtains drawn and some don’t.