“Oh.” I rolled my eyes. “Great.”
“You’ll like this too. I happen to know there are some people you’d prefer to not have around here anymore. If I was to guess, I would say your life might be improved if perhaps the young lady and the young man sitting outside that door no longer attended this school.”
“Yeah, those guys. They’re the worst. The absolute worst.”
“I’m glad to hear you’re thinking that way. So, let’s say you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours.”
“Oh, I hope you don’t mean that literally. I imagine yours is all sweaty and hairy.”
“Enough.”
“It’s probably got red blotches.”
“My back is fine.”
“It’s not a fair trade-off. My back is great. It’s soft and slender—”
“You know what I mean. You know it’s a figure of speech. Let’s just get this conversation over with, okay?”
“So what do you want, exactly?”
“Just tell me what you know. I know you know who started the fire. Just tell me.”
“I’m not a rat.”
“Who’s calling you a rat? Think of yourself as a businesswoman. This is just a negotiation.” He opened a drawer and took out a key. It wasn’t just any key, of course. I knew it very well. It was the master key to the school. My master key. And it was beautiful. “It was in the chapel door. The firemen found it. I’m positive you know which of those two used it to get in there and set the fire.”
I didn’t say anything. Not yet.
“Come on,” he said. “Just tell me. Who was it?”
The truth was, I had no idea who set the chapel on fire. Pierre had been angry after he walked away from Noah and me. Talia Pasteur was in love with Pierre, and she just heard him tell the whole school once and for all that he loved me. I’m not sure what the purpose of the fire was, but then, I had never been one for destruction for destruction’s sake. I’d always needed things to have a purpose, and the chapel fire, well, it just had no style. It was a tacky move, and I hated tacky.
But the more important question was, what did I actually want from Dean Rein? What did I want at all anymore? What was I fighting for? I tried to evaluate my life for the next six months of my senior year at Bristol and I didn’t like how it looked. It wasn’t me. Not anymore. That world was for the Pierres and the Talia Pasteurs. Those two deserved each other. They deserved to be miserable, and they were destined for a special misery that I didn’t need to control. They had the rest of their ordinary lives right ahead of them.
And whatever my life was, I didn’t want any more of it to be at Bristol. I knew that there was only one way to answer Dean Rein. And when I made the decision in my mind, it felt right. I felt a wave of positive emotions coursing around in my head. I started grinning uncontrollably. I was happy.
“It was me,” I said.
“What?”
“That’s my key. I used it to open the chapel. I walked inside, and I lit a match, and I burned it down. That’s what I did. If there is a fire to start, I will always start it. That’s what I do.”
Dean Rein didn’t look mad or anything. He was truly confused. He really thought that I was no longer a person who would do anything like that. I guess that was one point in his favor—which made our score nine hundred ninety-nine to one.
“You know I have to expel you, Astrid. Again.”
“I figured.” I was almost laughing at that point, which confused him even more. I couldn’t control being happy. It was all out there, and it was hilarious.
“But this isn’t just about Bristol,” he said. “You may very well be in serious trouble. I have to call the police, of course. You may have to go to jail for this.”
“I’ve been to jail,” I said. “It’s surprisingly not that bad at all.”
Dean Rein leaned back in his chair and looked out the window. It was dark outside, so he was looking at absolutely nothing. “Why?” he asked. “Why did you do it?”
I leaned in close to him as if to impart a secret. “The world turned and flung me,” I said. And then I winked.
Dean Rein’s mouth made what could only be described as a smile in return. “I’ve heard a lot of excuses. That’s an interesting one.” I may have made his life miserable, but I was certainly entertaining. “Do you have anything else to say, Astrid?”
“I like how your toupee looks,” I said. “It’s very believable.”
“I don’t wear a toupee,” he said.
“I know. It’s very believable.”
>>>>>>>>>>>>>
I walked out of his office, and a crowd of people were waiting. Some I knew. Some were the kids who had come that day to help me. They were my friends.
I found Noah and told him, “I think I understand why people do good things.”
“Okay. I’ll bite. Why?”
“I think it’s something about people,” I said. “You know, the more that people surround you, the more good you want to do.”
“Are you talking about yourself?” he said.
“Do you think I’m a good person?”
“You’re a great person,” he said.
I happened to always think I was a great person. I never doubted that part for a second. A good person? Well, I’d never been sure. But that was only because it was hard to do good things, and it wasn’t always fun. In fact, it sometimes sucked—but when you did it enough, it was in your DNA. It became who you were.
When you get to your last year of high school, everyone you’ve ever met in your entire life asks you, What are you going to do next? Noah and I had an understanding that he would never ask that question again. We talked about things. We talked about jobs and cities and directions, but I had no plan. I had no idea what was going to happen next. I was actually okay with that.
We both knew that the moment we were in was temporary. (At least I hoped so. Wouldn’t it be horrible to spend eternity next to a smoldering building at your school?) The year would eventually end, and we would both go on to other places. Maybe for me, it would be an airport or a train station or a college dorm. Maybe I would step out of Noah’s terrible car, and he would let go of my hand.
“Take care of yourself, Astrid,” he would say.
And then I would say, “I always do.”
Acknowledgments
Writing a book is hard! I could not have done it without a lot of help.
My brilliant wife, Allis, reads every single thing I write, gives great notes, supports like a steel beam, and is almost positive I based this character on her even though the timelines don’t quite line up. Those are her legs and torso on the cover, so she has evidence. I am very lucky to be able to borrow her brain, transcribe the things that come out of her mouth, and take credit for it. Thank you so, so much. You’re the best ever.
Thanks to the good people at 3Arts: My manager, David Miner, who has known this story almost as long as I have and made the suggestion that I write a book. He led me to Richard Abate, my book manager, who read some odd things of mine and suggested I write this book, amazingly made it a reality, and was right about everything except when he said, “You’ll get this done very fast.”
Thank you to everyone present and bygone at Razorbill, particularly the smart and patient Ben Schrank, Parisian competitive yo-yo champion Anne Heltzel, Brianne Mulligan, and Caroline Donofrio.
Thanks to my supportive family: my parents, Larry and Dale, my brother and ex-roommate Greg, and my sister Lori. Also, thanks to my grandmother, Evelyn Silvert, who will be thrilled to see her name in print.
And in no particular order, the people whose ideas, thoughts, guidance, friendship, and various support were vital: Emily Brochin, Wendy Molyneux, Jeff Drake, Jon Hartmere, Matt Velick, Adam Markovics, Miha Matei, Marc Zeltzer, Peter Friedman, Thomasin Franken, Ben Patterson, Ben Dickerson, Brooke Cadorette, Sarah Kozinn, David “Da
ve” Anderson, Dr. Bacon (my dog), Buck’s Rock, Ssips Lemon Iced Tea, the writing staffs and office space at New Girl and United States of Tara, Kendall Jackson, Victoria Forester, Keya Khayatian, Elise Henderson, Reynold Forman, my wife’s amazingly named step-grandfather Marvin Wonder, and Kurt Vonnegut, J.D. Salinger, and Judy Blume.
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