by Melissa Grey
There is peace in dungeons, but is that enough to make dungeons desirable?
—Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Social Contract
Title Page
Dedication
Epigraph
Prologue
Chapter 1: Bex Johnson
Chapter 2: Noah Rainier
Chapter 3: Tamsin Moore
Chapter 4: Hana Sakamoto
Chapter 5: Chase Donovan
Chapter 6: Javi Lucero
Chapter 7: Bex Johnson
Chapter 8: Noah Rainier
Chapter 9: Tamsin Moore
Chapter 10: Hana Sakamoto
Chapter 11: Chase Donovan
Chapter 12: Javi Lucero
Chapter 13: Chase Donovan
Chapter 14: Bex Johnson
Chapter 15: Javi Lucero
Chapter 16: Tamsin Moore
Chapter 17: Noah Rainier
Chapter 18: Hana Sakamoto
Chapter 19: Hana Sakamoto
Chapter 20: Bex Johnson
Chapter 21: Tamsin Moore
Chapter 22: Chase Donovan
Chapter 23: Noah Rainier
Chapter 24: Javi Lucero
Chapter 25: Chase Donovan
Chapter 26: Noah Rainier
Chapter 27: Hana Sakamoto
Chapter 28: Bex Johnson
Chapter 29: Javi Lucero
Chapter 30: Tamsin Moore
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Copyright
THE RATINGS ARE NOT REAL.
The words were written across the front doors of Maplethorpe Academy when students arrived on the first day of school. The spray paint was a lurid red against the dark wood, dripping to the white marble steps like freshly spilled blood. Graffiti was a rare sighting in that part of town, but not one that was unheard of altogether. The perpetrators were usually apprehended in short order thanks to the cameras mounted around the property, recording each and every moment that transpired within and directly outside those hallowed halls. The culprits typically belonged to one of a few categories: bored kids with more privilege than sense wanting to rattle their parents’—and their own—sterling ratings, a renegade Unrated who somehow made it past the security guards, a delinquent student on the cusp of losing their own rating and wanting to go out with a bang and not a whimper.
It was almost impossible to escape the notice of those blinking red eyes that never tired, never faltered. The cameras were pointing directly at the spot where the graffiti artist must have stood while he—or she—vandalized the towering mahogany doors. Their lenses should have received a crystal clear portrait of the person who’d defaced the school. If not those cameras, then the others, positioned at regular intervals along the wrought-iron gates circling the school’s verdant lawns, should have committed the crime to their digital memories. The case should have been closed within hours, maybe less. Just as long as it took for the headmaster to alert campus security and for them to track down whoever did it. Except for one minor detail.
The stickers.
They were plastered on the lenses of the cameras, obscuring their view. The faces of jesters in garish red-and-white masks, grinning down on the scene as if it were all part of one big joke. And maybe it was. Because if there was one thing everyone at Maplethorpe Academy knew, it was that the ratings were very, very real. And the ratings were everything.
It was the first day of school, the glorious start of a new semester, that time of year when the humidity of summer faded to a fond memory and the air held the promise of a brisk autumn chill. For Bex Johnson, it was the beginning of her senior year. She fidgeted in her seat on the bleachers, the energy of a shiny new semester buzzing in her veins, awash in possibility. She watched as students filed through the row of doors on the left side of the gymnasium, each wearing a navy-blue blazer, the rich color accented by the maroon-and-gold crest of Maplethorpe Academy on their chests. They didn’t have a uniform so much as a loosely enforced dress code, but the blazer was a tradition. It was a symbol of the school’s prestige and long history. Bex loved the feel of hers, the rough texture of the dark wool, the crispness of the lapels, the raised embroidery of the stitched crest. It reminded her of her place in the world, of her ranking at school. She took pride in it, in what it symbolized. Her parents wore the same blazer during their days as students at Maplethorpe, and all she wanted—all she’d ever wanted—was to make them proud.
Pride was sparingly dispensed in the Johnson household. It was treated as a finite resource, something to be distributed only in extraordinary circumstances. Bex had to fight for every scrap of it. Sometimes, doubt niggled at her mind. That she would never live up to her parents’ lofty expectations, or that nothing she did would be enough to satisfy them. But it was simply the way things were done in their family. Bex’s wildly accomplished parents held themselves to a high standard and expected nothing less from their own flesh and blood. Bex would simply need to work harder this year than she ever had before.
As her father liked to say, A Johnson can always work more, do more, and be more.
And so Bex was going to dominate this semester and the next. She would not be stopped or slowed down or distracted.
Her best friend had other ideas.
Melody leaned against Bex’s shoulder, her breath warm against Bex’s ear as she stage-whispered, “I wonder who did it.”
The words were all but lost in the cacophony of morning assembly as students filed into Maplethorpe’s gym and tramped up the bleachers to their seats. Freshmen were against the far wall, then sophomores, juniors, and finally seniors closest to the entrance. Bex remembered the giddy feeling of advancement every time she moved along the bleacher seats at the start of each year. Freshman students were ensconced in the deepest part of the gym, while each year saw the classes get closer and closer to the door until they were gone, off to bigger and better things after graduation.
Students flowed around Bex and Melody where they sat, seeking their own seats and shouting to the friends they hadn’t seen since the end of spring semester, separated by the long reprieve of summer and whatever activities had dominated those warm, sunny months. Part-time jobs, volunteering gigs, math camp, drama camp, band camp. There was a camp for everything. In Bex’s case: space camp. The kind meant to entertain not starry-eyed little kids but the more sophisticated sort that was actually concerned with teaching gifted participants what it took to become scientists exploring the far reaches of space.
Headmaster Wood climbed the steps to the dais upon which he led morning assembly. He cut a striking figure in his tailored cream suit, his bald head gleaming mahogany under the gym’s fluorescent lights, his goatee freshly trimmed. He didn’t look like a teacher, or at least none that Bex had ever encountered. She wondered if the shaved head and artful facial hair were an attempt to maintain an image of coolness, of approachability. He was young, younger than the school’s last headmaster. Bex once caught him sipping coffee from a mug that boasted You Put the Pal in Principal, even though he was technically not a principal. He was a headmaster. It was the sort of linguistic detail Bex couldn’t not notice.
The headmaster waited a moment for the students to settle themselves, but when the soft buzz of conversation failed to die down completely, he held up his hands in the universal gesture for silence. He leaned toward the microphone mounted on the podium and fixed each grouping of students with a hard glare.
“I’m sure that by now you’ve all either seen or heard of the recent incident of vandalism on campus.”
A burst of frenzied whispers erupted from the assembled students, but it faded when Headmaster Wood very pointedly cleared his throat.
“As if anyone could have not seen it,” Melody whispered into Bex’s e
ar once everyone else had fallen silent. Bex hushed her, but it was too late. Wood’s eyes cut to them, picking the source of the sound out of the crowd with uncanny precision. Without missing a beat, he tapped on the face of the device on his wrist, once, twice, then swiped down on the screen. A subtle vibration against her wrist alerted Bex to a shift in her rating. She looked down at her own smartwatch.
The display lit up. The number had changed. A glowing 91 stared back at her, and her stomach seized at the sight of it. One minute into the semester and she’d already been docked a point because her best friend couldn’t keep her mouth shut.
“Oops,” Melody murmured, her gaze angled down at her own rating, which Bex assumed reflected a single point loss as well. It wasn’t a big deal, not really. Minor disciplinary infractions usually expired by the end of the day. With luck, she would be back at 92 by eighth period, but it still stung. Bex huffed and looked back up to find Headmaster Wood lifting a single eyebrow in her direction. She shifted in her seat. Wood continued with his speech, unperturbed by her discomfort.
“I don’t think I need to remind you that the punishment for defacing school property will be harsh and swift. Not only would such a student face immediate expulsion, but a disciplinary infraction of that magnitude would leave a permanent stain on one’s rating.”
The threat was enough to send a palpable, collective shiver across the student body.
The ratings were not taken lightly, no matter how many stupid stickers were deployed in an effort to make fun of them. Most people hovered in the mid-range for most of their lives—40s, 50s, 60s—but the expectations for students at Maplethorpe were higher, especially by graduation. The school had boasted a graduation average of 72 for the past couple of years, and Headmaster Wood had seemed determined to raise it even higher since his tenure began when Bex was a freshman.
“And that’s all I have to say about that.” Wood straightened his already-straight tie. “I see no reason why this one act should cast a pall on the rest of our year.” He spread his arms wide and smiled benevolently, but his gaze was still sharp as it raked across the gymnasium. “With that unpleasantness out of the way, we can move on to happier topics, like the upcoming Founder’s Day Festival. The planning committee is looking for volunteers for the dance, so all interested students should speak to the committee chair, Summer Rawlins.”
A redheaded girl waved from her seat on the dais. A few heads of school clubs sat there during assembly if they had announcements to make. Bex would soon, once it came time to recruit new members for the Lantern, the school newspaper.
Founder’s Day was the most sacred day on the Maplethorpe calendar. It commemorated the birth of John Maplethorpe, the founding father of both the academy that bore his name and the Rating System that governed seemingly every aspect of life. He’d been a genius, an innovator, and a philanthropist. His brilliance was marked with both an annual festival and a marble bust of his likeness in the school’s foyer. It was the first thing every student saw when they entered and the last thing they saw when they left.
“This semester may have had a rocky start,” Wood continued, “but I’m sure we can get it back on track in no time. Consider this a very warm welcome back to Maplethorpe Academy. I look forward to seeing each of you shine brightly over the course of the coming year.”
Polite applause shepherded the headmaster away from the podium as he stepped aside. Then the president of the student council skipped forward to make the more mundane announcements.
Bex let the president’s voice drone on in the background as she peered down at her smartwatch. It was set to School Mode, which meant all incoming calls would immediately be sent to voicemail and her email notifications would go off only at the end of eighth period, so as not to distract her. The home screen on her device displayed the same thing as everyone else’s: her rating. But unlike every other junior in her school last year, Bex had cracked the 90s at the end of last summer. She stared at the number, letting the reality of the 91 sink in. It wouldn’t be easy to maintain it over the course of the year, but achieving a number so high in the first place hadn’t been easy either. If Bex could keep up the good work, not get distracted, and maybe even add a few points to her score, her future was bound to be the brightest of any student at Maplethorpe Academy.
* * *
“You never answered my question.”
The words cut through Bex’s focus, threatening to interrupt the mantra she liked to repeat in her head every morning before first period.
Good grades mean good ratings. Good ratings mean a good college. A good college means a good life.
Bex’s locker door rattled with the force of Melody’s shoulder smacking into the one beside hers. Her best friend never did anything quietly. Her arrivals were always marked with forceful nudges, or books jovially slammed onto tables, or her own body falling dramatically against a wall of lockers.
Today, Melody drummed the fingers not holding a half-eaten lollipop against the burgundy metal of Bex’s locker door, punctuating her impatience.
“What question?” Bex asked, not lifting her eyes from her tablet’s screen. Her schedule—color-coded for easy reading—was filled from end to end with different shades of pastel. Blue for her classes, pink for extracurriculars, yellow for volunteering, green for tutoring at the middle school, and lilac for independent study. In theory, white rectangles meant a free period, but she didn’t have one of those this week. Or next week. Or any week in the foreseeable future. The hours stretched out on the screen like a cheerful rainbow of activity. No one hit the 90s halfway through high school by taking a nap between chemistry and comparative literature.
“Are you serious?” Melody pulled the lollipop out of her mouth with an audible pop. Bex met her friend’s incredulous stare. Melody’s watermelon-pink nail polish perfectly matched the spit-slick lollipop. Bex didn’t eat sugar the way Melody did. It rotted the teeth, and Bex hadn’t had a cavity since kindergarten. Tooth decay, her father liked to say, was a personal failing.
“The graffiti on the front doors, Re-bec-ca. Who do you think did it?”
Melody stretched out the syllables of Bex’s name. She did that whenever she thought Bex was being particularly obtuse. As if Bex had time to keep abreast of every exciting scandal.
“Oh,” Bex said, turning her attention back to the tablet. “That.” There was a ten-minute gap between morning assembly and first period to give students time to get their books from their lockers and organize themselves for the day ahead. Bex’s mind had already course corrected to focus on her next period, though now the headmaster’s words came back to her. Wood had made sure to emphasize the seriousness with which violations of the school’s honor code were handled. The warning had settled deep in Bex’s gut, chilling her to her core. She shuddered at the thought of what getting kicked out of school would do to a person’s rating. Wood was right. It was the sort of stain that would never wash clean. “It was probably just someone messing around.”
Melody heaved a dramatic sigh and tossed her long black hair into the open door of Bex’s locker. She liked flipping her hair; it made a show of how perfectly long and thick and straight it was, like a waterfall of black ink. Bex’s own hair never flipped like that. Her curls answered to no master, not even the person to whose head they were attached. Melody stuck the lollipop back in her mouth, obviously disappointed in Bex. Speculation had gripped the rest of the student body, but she just honestly didn’t have time.
Bex had more pressing things to think about. Like the fetal pig they were going to dissect in Advanced Placement Biology this semester. The notion made something churn unpleasantly in Bex’s stomach, but she did her best to push her unease far, far down. The same way she had last night during dinner. She hadn’t been able to touch the pork chop on her plate, knowing that in a few weeks her scalpel would be slicing open a soft pig belly.
When she’d tentatively raised the issue with her mother—a neurosurgeon—Bex had been met with a gen
tle, condescending pat on her shoulder. If she couldn’t handle a fetal pig, then she wouldn’t be able to handle an actual human cadaver in medical school. Her parents never chided or berated or yelled. They simply reminded Bex that everything she did was in the service of her future. She could deal with a little discomfort for a good grade.
Good grades mean good ratings. Good ratings mean a good college. A good college means a good life.
“But why write that?” Melody wondered aloud. “ ‘The ratings are not real’?”
She tapped her finger against the screen strapped to her wrist by a rainbow-striped band. It was so vibrant compared to the plain black of Bex’s wristband. Melody herself always seemed so vibrant compared to Bex. Her grades might not be better, but her social scores were considerably higher. Bex hoped that some of Melody’s affability would rub off on her over the course of the year. Positivity was nearly as important as an impressive academic performance, after all. “The ratings are super real, whether they like it or not. See?”
The small screen came alive under Melody’s finger. A number blinked into existence as Bex watched. 76. Not bad.
“You’re up two points from last semester,” Bex remarked. “Nice work.”
Melody rolled her eyes; once again Bex had focused on exactly the wrong thing. Considering how wildly their priorities differed, it was an expression Bex had come to know well. “Thanks. Drama camp was quite the success. The counselors loved me.”
As if there had ever been any doubt they would. Bex smiled, glad her friend was doing so well. “They’d be idiots not to. Everyone loves you.”
Melody waved away the compliment, but Bex noticed a pleased flush rise in her cheeks. Melody wanted to be liked the same way Bex wanted to excel. It was a primal need. A craving that had come to define her personality. “Yeah, yeah. I’m more interested in our resident street artist. You still haven’t told me who you think did it.”
Bex slipped her tablet into her backpack, along with the books she would need for the first two periods. Literature and history. Nice, easy subjects to start the day. She shrugged. “Who knows? Probably just some dumb kid looking for attention.”