Copyright © 2013 by Margaux Froley
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States in 2013 by Soho Teen an imprint of
Soho Press, Inc.
853 Broadway
New York, NY 10003
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Froley, Margaux.
Escape theory / Margaux Froley.
p cm
eISBN: 978-1-61695-128-3
1. Boarding schools—Fiction. 2. Schools—Fiction. 3. Counseling—Fiction.
4. Death—Fiction. 5. Love—Fiction.] I. Title.
PZ7.F9199Es 2013
[Fic]—dc23
2012033456
Interior design by Janine Agro, Soho Press, Inc.
v3.1
This book is dedicated to the Not-Supposed-Tos
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Acknowledgments
About the Author
ESCAPE THEORY: A psychological term used to explain why people may engage in self-destructive actions*
* Handbook of Consumer Psychology by Curtis P. Haugtvedt, Paul Herr, Frank R. Kardes
Jason Reed Hutchins
1996–2012
———————————————————
Jason Reed Hutchins, 16, of Marin County, died Wednesday, September 5th, 2012, of an apparent suicide at The Keaton School in Santa Cruz, California.
Jason was born March 13, 1996 in San Francisco, California, the son of William Hutchins and Mitzi Barbara Hutchins. Mr. Hutchins is the founder of TerraTech, a Fortune 500 company and innovator in the field of molecular biology.
Jason is survived by his mother and father, older brother Eric, a pre-med student at Stanford University, and grandfather Reed Hutchins of Santa Cruz, California, famed biologist and owner of the Athena Estates Vineyard and Winery. Jason was predeceased by his grandmother, Athena Hutchins.
At the start of his junior year, Jason was on staff at the student newspaper, The Keaton Hawk, a varsity soccer player, and an avid surfer at the nearby Monte Vista Beach Cove. He will be remembered as a loving son, loyal brother, and cherished friend to many.
Services will be held Sunday, September 16th at 10 A.M. at the The Keaton School chapel. In lieu of flowers the family requests donations be sent to TerraTech Children’s Hospital in Palo Alto, California. A memorial scholarship will be set up in Jason’s name at The Keaton School.
PROLOGUE
September 10, 2010
Freshman Year
Those Nutter Butters are going to need milk.
Devon glared at the package of peanut butter cookies at the foot of her bed. The bright red plastic caught the light from her desk lamp, taunting her, daring her to break into the package. Of course she wanted to devour them, but there was the problem of living in a dorm room. Milk—the milk required to have on standby when eating Nutter Butters—wasn’t just out the door, down the hallway, past the living room. No: here the milk was across a grassy courtyard, past a library, two boys’ dorms, and the teachers’ lounge, tucked away, in the oak-paneled dining hall.
They can wait. Devon swiveled on her stiff twin bed, twisting her toes into her crisp new Ikea bedspread. It felt hotel phony, not like something that was hers, in her new room. She put her focus back on the smiling pair of girls she’d tacked up to her wall. In the picture her best friend, Ariel, was holding two fingers up to the camera, all-cool peace sign/Hollywood starlet, while Devon smiled but kept her eyes toward her feet. The photos always followed a pattern: Ariel confronting the camera, leading the way, Devon a willing passenger. But that was just an Instagram memory now.
Devon’s eyes drifted back to the package of Nutter Butters. Her mom had snuck them into her suitcase before she left for boarding school four days ago. Devon re-read the purple Post-it: Share with your new friends, but save one for Derek!
The peanut butter cookies were a nice gesture. They were Devon’s favorite after all and only because her mom had turned her on to them. The two had a ritual of demolishing a package over an episode of Grey’s Anatomy and saving just one in case the handsome “Dr. Derek Shepherd” miraculously appeared at their door. Mom subscribed to the “ya never know who you’re going to run into” philosophy. Always on the prowl for a classic Leading Man (she wore lipstick for even the quickest errands) and always leaving a cookie for a charming stranger who might appear at her doorstep.
That was before boarding school. Before Devon got a scholarship to Keaton, and before her mother told her it was an opportunity she couldn’t afford to turn down. “The doors Keaton will open for you.…” Devon’s mom had begun on more than one occasion without ever actually finishing the thought. Devon wasn’t sure where those doors led, but she knew she was supposed to walk through them for one reason alone: her mom had never had the same opportunity.
That wasn’t Devon’s fault or problem, of course. Just because her mom’s family couldn’t afford some ritzy boarding school when she was a kid didn’t mean Devon had to go to one now. The scholarship was nice and all, but Devon didn’t ask for it. Her mom had applied and set up an interview before Devon had even heard of Keaton. To her, boarding school was full of those people; and nothing she’d seen so far had changed that perception. Devon still didn’t want to be one of those people who used seasons as a verb, like “My family summers in the Hamptons” or “We winter in Aspen.”
Once again, Devon felt herself getting angry. She had spent her summer break listing many cogent psychological reasons about why she shouldn’t attend Keaton, which of course her mom chalked up to being “just an ungrateful teenager,” which only infuriated Devon more. Really? Couldn’t Mom come up with a more creative phrase to describe her only daughter? Sure, Devon was thirteen, and sure she was annoyed that her “mature” body hadn’t quite come in yet, but mentally she felt old enough to be in control of her own life: as in perfectly justified in not wanting to live in some upscale mountain penitentiary for the absurdly rich.
Next week Ariel would be headed to public school in Piedmont. Ariel: who made Devon feel like she belonged anywhere they went simply because Ariel acted like they belonged everywhere they went. No awkwardness about cliques or cafeteria seating. No first day jitters. New friends, new crushes on boys, new after-school hangouts; none of that fazed her.
And here was Devon, stuck at the top of a mountain at The Keaton School.
Ariel’s ease could never spill out of the photo and into her, no matter how hard Devon stared at it. She turned to the Target digital alarm clock (“Because you won’t have the Mom Alarm anymore,” her mom chided on a dorm room shopping trip), blinking 10:18 P.M. Twelve minutes until the bell rang and everyone had to be inside their dorms for the night. Twelve minutes until she could stop feeling bad about not socializing and reasonably crawl into bed, crossing off another day of her sentence at Keaton. Twelve minutes until roll call and Devon’s dorm head would peek in.…
Devon Mackintosh: check.
Where else would she be? Or more importantly, as Ariel would ask, whom would she be
with? Keaton was perched above the small beach town of Monte Vista. It’s not like Devon could wander over to the nearest shopping mall and catch a late movie with some locals. No, Devon was physically trapped on the mountain. There was only one way up and one way down, as far as she knew. It was almost funny.
When they built these dorms Devon suspected that “durability” was the prime objective. The thin gray carpet could absorb any dirt, footprint, or stain. (And probably had. Yuck.) The cinderblock walls were painted a slick and glossy white, which made it virtually impossible to stick, pin, nail, or tape anything to the wall. But there was a single framed corkboard. Someone must have taken pity on the students and allowed them at least an iota of space to post mementos of their pre-Keaton lives. But apart from that teeny area of suggested self-expression, Devon’s twin bed, lean closet, and rickety desk was definitely more white-collar prison than the golden door of opportunity her mom described.
“Knock, knock. Devon?” came a sing-songy voice.
The Senior RA, June Chan, poked her head inside.
Devon sighed, but mustered a smile for June. Who actually says “knock, knock” out loud? June was from Taiwan and spoke Taiwanese, Mandarin Chinese, and English fluently. To Devon she seemed like an over-eager cheerleader who’d been at Keaton since birth. When Devon first arrived, June was there to greet all the girls in the dorm with a neon-bright smile and a bouncy ponytail. “Hi, I’m June. Like the month!” She spoke in exclamation points. Since that first day Devon had only seen June wearing dark green The Keaton School sweatshirts and sweats, like an athlete in training. But Devon could never figure out which sport. Maybe being at Keaton was the training itself.
Behind June, doors slammed. There was a burst of high-pitched giggling, the kind she and Ariel once reserved for slumber parties. A cry echoed down the hall—“Hey, that’s my bra, bee-yotch!”—followed by another round of laughter and footsteps. June smiled at the mayhem. She caught Devon’s gaze and turned back. Her mouth tightened into a thin, sympathetic smile.
Even June, the month, would rather hang out with them.
“Just checking in on you,” June said, sounding concerned yet upbeat all at once.
Yes, Devon was already the charity case. The girls in her dorm all seemed to have gone to volleyball camp or ski school together. Insta-Friends by the end of the first day. But somehow Devon missed her chance. Her Insta-Friend sponge pellet—the one that would turn her into a perfect friend if you just added water—turned out to be a dud.
“Clueless just finished,” June added. “We’re starting up Bring It On if you want to come and join us? It’s the Spring House Pajama Formal. Kind of an annual tradition.”
Devon reached for another photo. “Thanks, but I’m cool. Just want to get this done,” she said.
“Okay, but you’re welcome any time, all right, chica?” June flashed Devon another encouraging cheerleader smile.
The harder people tried, the less Devon wanted to hang out with them. Ariel never tried. Maybe that’s why this whole orientation week sucked so much; everyone was desperate to be everyone else’s friend. But, it was all too soon and would never last; couldn’t they see that? She saw the way the seniors sat in the dining hall in tightly formed cliques. Surely they were all fake smiles freshman year too.
June left the door open.
Closed doors were frowned upon at Keaton. Devon had read in the rule book—in typical form, it was called The Keaton School Companion (as in: another fake friend)—that if a member of the opposite sex visited your room, doors had to remain open at least twelve inches. Also, “four feet” needed to be on the ground. That was Rule #4c if she remembered correctly, only to be surpassed by #5a, where having sex was an offense punishable by suspension. Basically it was against the rules to do anything with a boy in her room except stare at their dueling feet.
Maybe they were going to have to reword that rule in the future. Say if a boy might want to make out with a boy? There was apparently no rule against members of the same sex making out. The Companion could catch up eventually (judging from its tone, it hadn’t been updated in thirty years), but for now, the gay students had a loophole they could exploit. Lucky for them. Yes, Devon did want to make out with a guy sooner than later. One fumbling, wet kiss last summer in the back booth at Peet’s Coffee didn’t exactly count. If Devon had one goal, it was to actually hook up in high school. Ariel agreed. Besides, Devon figured there had to be one benefit to coed living.
She looked at the next photo. Another one of her and Ariel: tanned, short shorts, flip-flops, and fake mustaches. Over the summer she and Ariel liked to put on fake mustaches and take pictures around town, trying to get shots of people giving them weird looks. She wished she could show Ariel The Keaton School Companion—now that would make her laugh.
The bag of Nutter Butters caught Devon’s attention again.
They still needed milk.
Waiting until tomorrow seemed impossible. “So, go get some milk, loser,” is what Ariel would have commanded. Devon looked at her clock. 10:21 P.M. Nine minutes. If she left right now, she could dash up to the dining hall and be back in time for curfew. She could burst into the Spring House common room with a cold pitcher of milk and cookies to share just as Bring it On was starting. “Look, I brought it!” she could shout. And the girls would giggle back. Boom: Insta-Friends. June would probably say something like, “Welcome to the party, chica!”
It’d be as easy as that. Right?
Or she could stay in her room eating the cookies alone without milk. But Ariel’s voice would call her a loser all night long. Steeling herself, Devon stuffed the cookies into her sweatshirt pocket. She figured if a teacher asked what she was up to, it would be good to have the cookies on hand to back up her story. She shoved her feet into her sneakers and ducked out her door without even bothering to consult the mirror first. Best just to move. Best not to think.
Outside the wind had picked up. Devon pulled her sweatshirt hood over her head to keep her hair from flying everywhere. She squinted, her eyes adjusting to the moonlight. We’re really far out here, she thought. The night had a sharp chill to it, as if a storm was coming in off the ocean. At the bottom of the black Keaton hillside, Devon could see the straight line of faint yellow lights: Monte Vista’s main drag. Beyond that the velvety black of the Pacific Ocean merged into the dark sky on the horizon. The wind whipped a strand of hair across her eyes. Get the milk and get back to the dorm before curfew. That’s all she had to do in nine … no, eight minutes.
The Dining Hall stood at the peak of the hill—its façade largely floor-to-ceiling windows. A ring of classrooms encircled it, and below that, the ring of dorms. The layout meant there was a view of the valley below from every dorm room, but it also meant every meal involved walking up to the dining hall. While Devon’s mom might find it “invigorating,” Devon found it an annoying metaphor for Keaton. Everything was an uphill battle, even a pitcher of milk.
Devon hurried up and across the wet grass of Raiter Lawn and passed the cobblestone path below the senior boys’ dorm, Sherman. Senior boys sat on their balconies, shirtless, comfortably nestled into crappy wicker chairs and surrounded by surfboards, stinky lacrosse gear, and passed-down hammocks. The sound of someone playing guitar drifted from behind a tapestry-covered window.
Devon kept her head down. She was short—five feet three inches and a thin frame—and she hoped she could pass by undetected. Someone whistled from the balcony above, but she didn’t look up. The freshmen were warned that seniors could initiate a water balloon fight anytime during the first week. She ran quicker just in case that whistle was a precursor to getting soaked—up, up, up, her breath coming fast.
The Dining Hall doors were open. She pushed through, her heart thumping, and made her way around the polished wooden tables and benches—perfectly aligned and glistening in the moonlight—toward the drink machines. Soda, ice, lemonade, iced tea, water, and milk; they all buzzed and hummed in the silent hall. Devon
found a plastic pitcher next to the water jug and pulled the lever under the low-fat milk.
Nothing.
She tried the non-fat. Nothing again.
That’s when she noticed a plastic latch above. The machine was on lockdown for the night. Water was her only option. Great. So much for listening to Ariel’s voice. Her Nutter Butter plan was already going awry.
“Don’t you know they control our diet?” a voice asked.
Devon jumped. June had warned the freshman girls about avoiding popular make-out spots around campus at night. It was considered a major faux pas to stumble upon a couple behind a bush or in an empty classroom. But this was just one voice. Sitting alone in the back of the Dining Hall. She squinted, trying to turn the outlines and shadow on a bench into someone she recognized. Long, gawky legs with knobby kneecaps. A spiky head of hair. A narrow neck that threatened to topple from the weight of a bulging Adam’s apple.
Jason Hutchins.
Another freshman. Devon remembered him from orientation. He kept bumping the back of Devon’s chair. After she had shot him an annoyed glare, he whispered an apology while the headmaster talked about their class schedules.
He stood up. Devon guessed he was easily six feet two inches, and only thirteen or fourteen. No wonder he could barely fit in his seat. He tucked something in his pocket as he walked toward her. She caught herself thinking that once he got over being gangly, he could be kind of hot. His face didn’t need any help. Then again, she had to grow out of this flat-chested stage before she might be considered cute, so who was she to judge.
“Just wanted some milk. Didn’t think that would be against the rules,” Devon said. She tucked her hands into her jeans pockets. She had a bad habit of letting them flip and flail when she was nervous. And being alone in the dark dining hall with this boy was definitely making her nervous.
Jason leaned against the wall by the milk machine. Devon noticed he wore cargo shorts (as he would for the next three years, because he always needed pockets), and a simple belt where new holes had to be punched to account for his bony hips.
Keaton School 01: Escape Theory Page 1