Chapter 8
When I was younger, I had a doll with yarn for hair.
Blues and greens mixed with lavenders and pinks. It had two sapphire buttons for eyes and a pink plastic heart gem for a mouth.
My mother and I had made it in one of her more creative moments, and we laughed at how silly it looked. Like it was perpetually stuck blowing a kiss.
At bedtime, Grandee told tales of the doll traveling to amazing places and solving mysteries. She weaved grand adventures all about how the pyramids were built and about women who disguised themselves as men to fight in wars.
But instead of people doing those things, it was always the doll. Grandee had told me that the doll was supposed to be me, and anywhere I could see it, I could see myself.
I hated it.
The idea that anyone could do anything always felt ridiculous, because even as a little girl, I knew there were impossible things.
And somehow the very toy that caused me so much frustration as a child has made it to my college dorm room bed. I stare at it and wonder if Grandee ever thought that the doll could end up reliving time.
After all, she can do anything.
“I can’t believe you brought that thing with you,” Linden says next to me. “Didn’t you hate it?”
“Yeah,” I tell her without taking my eyes off the monstrosity. “That’s a great question.”
Some version of me brought it here. To taunt me.
She flops down on the bed and picks up the doll, then looks at me. “Are you good now?”
Am I good now? I roll the words around in my head, over and over again, like rocks being polished in a tumbler. I am absolutely not all right. I’ve already had a first day of college, but I don’t know how to tell anyone that.
“I’m good.”
Linden runs her fingers through the doll’s hair, and I fight the urge to rip it out of her hands. I don’t even like the stupid thing. Why do I care if she’s touching it or not?
“I was…” She clears her throat like she’s having a difficult time telling me how she feels, and for a second, I feel horrible.
Linden is my best friend, my cousin, my confidante. I tell her everything. And yet this thing, this break in my brain—it’s something I feel like I can’t give words to.
Like if I say them out loud, then maybe I really am crazy.
“Don’t say crazy,” Grandee has told me. “People aren’t that word. We don’t all see the world through the same kaleidoscope.”
Except my kaleidoscope is broken.
“Linny. I’m sorry,” I tell her. “I just got … overwhelmed or … something.”
Linden’s face breaks into sympathy, and I can’t tell which one of my emotions I feel the strongest.
Guilt that she believed my lie or anger that she didn’t realize I was lying.
I decide to feel nothing.
“Good.” She sets down the doll and takes my hand in hers.
“I was worried about you. You’ve been talking about school for so long.
But I guess it’s normal. Benji said he had a friend from church who wanted to be a doctor her whole life and dropped out a month into college.
” She releases me and stands, moving to the mirror and combing her fingers through her hair.
“You’ll love Benji. He’s gonna meet us for dinner tonight. ”
Benji’s friend from church is a gay kid who figured out a month in that she didn’t have to live inside her parents’ narrative anymore. I know this because I know Benji, and I know this story. And it’s nothing like the one I’m living in.
“Dinner?”
“Yeah, we meet at the Cattle Club every Thursday after the Inheritance Committee meets.”
“Since when?”
Linden gives me a funny look. “Since always? We started, like, freshman year.”
Right. I shouldn’t think this is odd or different. “Oh, cool. I just don’t remember you talking about it.”
A tiny ripple. There’s no way to know what decision I made that led to this change, but it feels like I will never be able to keep up.
Linden gives me a cautious look. “Okay. So. You’ll meet us there?”
I don’t know how to ask if Carter’s going to be there without looking suspicious, but I’m sure he will. These are his friends, after all.
Sitting across from Carter at dinner sounds like my nightmare. “I might need to stay late for class. I have to catch up on what I’ve missed.”
“Oh, Max is in that workshop! He’s the TA.” She smiles at me as if she’s solved all my problems.
“Max?” Another person I want to avoid, but for very different reasons.
“You met him on the first day in the student services building. He said you…” She looks at me before continuing. “He’s great. I’m glad he was there.”
I don’t speak, because I’m not sure what to say to that. Am I glad he was there?
“He said…” She shifts her shoulders. “He said you were looking for Carter?”
This is where I should come clean and just tell Linden about what’s happening in my head. She would be kind and understanding like she always is, but I can’t seem to line the words up in my head. “I don’t remember that.”
Without waiting for her to respond, I take my bag and sling it over my shoulder.
“’Kay, make sure if you need anything, you text me. Right?” She means it genuinely. Because she’s worried.
“Okay.”
I’m out the door before she can say anything else. Before she can attack me with more concern where I’m forced to lie to her.
It’s a beautiful walk from Founder’s Tower to the art building. The redbrick facades are covered in ivy, ready to take back the land and anything on it. In a few weeks, those vines will turn to red and gold, making everything look magical.
Art History is long, and I feel lost. Then there’s Math and Poetry, where I barely focus. But next is Art Studio, the one thing I’ve been looking forward to.
The warehouse-style building sits surrounded by a giant glass solarium at the back of campus. Greenery creeps up the windowpanes, almost blocking the giant double doors that lead inside. The promise of creativity and inspiration has my feet moving without thought, until I see them.
Carter leans against the entryway, hands in his pockets and one leg propped up to hold the metal door wide.
He’s talking with Max, who smiles like Carter just told the funniest joke.
Max’s arms are crossed in front of himself as he kicks at something on the ground.
When Carter’s head falls back and he lets out an infectious laugh, all I can do is stare.
He looks so real. So alive. So … Carter.
My heart beats and breaks and breathes all in a moment.
It’s so strange. I’ve spent so many days thinking about what I would do if I could just see Carter one more time. I swore I would run to him and pull him into my arms. Say his name over and over just to hear mine repeated back to me in his voice. I would never stop holding him.
But I do none of those things, because I’m no good for Carter Delaney. Knowing me—loving me—killed him. And if this really is a second chance, I should stay as far away from him as possible.
Max smacks him on the shoulder and shoves him off the door. Carter stumbles a bit with a giant smile on his face, but it’s mostly for show.
And then.
Carter is walking toward me.
Carter.
He pulls his phone from his pocket and unlocks it with a swipe.
I count each of his steps toward me. They sound in my ears and I want to scream because this is the moment I’ve been dreading. Carter is going to see me, and I can’t make myself leave. He’s going to look up, and he’ll know. He will just know.
Maybe I can tell him. Maybe we can be together if we just fix this.
He’s so close that I can see the light stubble on his chin because he probably woke up too late to shave, and his shirt has a line in it from where he folded it to fit in a drawer.
I take a deep breath as Carter makes it to the doorway of the solarium I stand in, frozen.
He glances up, and my chest feels like it’s caving in as I wait for him to speak.
And …
Carter Delaney walks past me.
He glanced at me as he passed without a word.
Carter just walked by. Like we’re strangers.
Because we are.
I’m moving toward the bathroom, because in seconds, I’m going to collapse and fall onto the ground.
Pushing open the door, I stumble to the sink and brace my hands on either side of the cool porcelain.
In the mirror, everything looks the same, but everything is different.
Tears fall down my face and tangle in my dark hair.
Stranger. Stranger. Stranger.
That’s who I am, and I knew it, but I didn’t realize how bad it would hurt.
Like a wound that I keep ripping open with each breath.
Carter is alive. And if Carter never knows me, Carter stays alive.
If he never knows me, he never jumps into the water after me.
So why can’t I stop crying? Why does it feel like Carter has died all over again?
Eventually, I decide I’ve felt sorry for myself long enough and splash cold water on my face before I head out to the workshop.
The door to the studio is open, and I hear the thrum of students. They chat and laugh as pencils scratch against paper and clay is moved into kilns and paint is mixed and textiles are ripped.
I’ve always loved this room, and I let the soothing feeling of familiarity and home wash over me as I walk inside.
“You must be Nieve.”
Dr. Montgomery Adams stands next to a giant easel.
In his uniform of oversize jeans covered in paint and a T-shirt that looks like he took it from a lost-and-found bin, he pulls his shoulder-length brown hair back into a ponytail at the nape of his neck and ties it with a rubber band.
I don’t wince at the thought of him taking it out, because this is who he is.
A little scattered but never silly. He could care about his clothes or he could focus on art.
My face softens as I look at him. Dr. Adams was like a father to me here.
He was the first person to really see my art for what it was, and he was the first person to tell me how to improve it.
He never cared what my last name was or who I was related to.
“Doc,” I say in greeting, and he gives me a funny look.