Chapter Twelve
214 days until graduation
“Have you studied?” Winnie asks as we walk toward our AP Calc class.
She’s carrying a light pink duffle bag with her that I recognize as her dance bag, along with her regular school bag.
Winnie’s life is split in two. There is ballet Winnie, and then there is everywhere else Winnie. She takes on two different lives as if they are the bags she carries, and somehow, it only makes her all the more authentic.
We walk toward AP Calc, which is where we will have one of our biggest exams of the year. It’s not a final, but it’s a test that’s weighted enough to do considerable damage to our grade if we don’t do well.
“Who do you think you’re talking to?” I joke. I don’t know why Winnie still asks if I’ve studied. The answer is always “yes, obviously.” “I studied until dinner last night, and then when I was almost asleep, I had the overwhelming urge to study everything over again. So, I did more practice problems.”
“Of course, you did,” Winnie laughs.
We make our way into the classroom, where most of the people in our class are either looking over the study guide or standing and talking with their friends.
“There’s nothing wrong with wanting to be prepared,” I defend as I set my bag down next to my desk. “I need an A in this class.”
“Of course, you do.” I hear from behind me; the voice of the only person I have been trying to avoid for the last week and a half. “If you don’t get an A, I will win.”
I turn to face Jameson. “Over my dead body will you get a better grade than me in anything.”
“You better start looking over that study guide then,” he snides before walking back over to his seat.
“Okay, what was that?” Winnie asks.
“What?”
“You know what.” She narrows her eyes at me. “Did he do something?”
“Winnie, he didn’t have to do anything, I’ve always hated him,”
Homecoming, while it may have been enlightening, changed nothing between us.
“Okay.” She doesn’t believe what I’m saying, but she also isn’t willing to push the subject further.
The bell rings, and everyone takes their seats. Mrs. Kisler passes out the exam and continues to drone on about testing procedure. Meanwhile, the only thing running through my mind is the repeating phrase: You have to do better than Jameson.
“How do you feel?” Winnie asks in a whisper as we turn in our tests. I look at her with wide eyes. “Sorry.” She winces quietly in response.
She knows my fear of a teacher overhearing us talking during a test. We’ve already heard the speech enough to know she will not hesitate to put us both on academic probation.
I cannot afford to give Jameson that advantage.
Once we’re back to our seats, I grab my phone from my backpack and send her a text.
I don’t want to talk about
the test until the scores are
announced.
Why? Do you think you
did bad?
I don’t want to jinx myself
Let’s just not talk about it
for the time being.
Is this about Jameson?
When I don’t respond, Winnie kicks my ankle from where she sits behind me.
I turn around, glaring at her. “This is about me,” I whisper.
Boys don’t dictate what I do, whether I’m dating them or I hate them. My merits are sound and I don’t need anybody else clogging my conscience, especially a boy.
All Winnie does is shrug, a small smile gracing her face.
When the bell rings to signal the end of calculus, I decide not to stand from my seat until Winnie and Genevieve are passing by me.
By the time we’re in the hallway, I’m walking in line with both of them. “So, how did you feel about that test, Genova?” If I’m being honest, I know I’m being cruel by asking.
She immediately turns to glare at me, because she knows exactly what I’m getting at.
I’d been stealing glances at Genevieve the entire time she was taking the test. I could tell by the way she was continually retyping things into her calculator or chewing on the end of her pencil that she did not feel great about it.
“Why do you care?” She snips, making me sidestep away from her.
“I was wondering if you still think you have me beat, that’s all.”
I can see the way her jaw moves as she grits her teeth together. “I do.”
“Good to know.”
“How do you think you did?” Winnie asks.
“I’d say I got a perfect score,” I say, more toward Genevieve.
That may have been her last straw. “Do you have any reason to continue walking next to me?”
“Woah,” I almost laugh, holding my hands up in mock surrender. “Did I hit a nerve?”
“No, but I will hit something if you continue talking to me that way.”
“Was that a threat?” I smirk right as we reach the staircase.
“Goodbye, Jameson,” she deadpans, beginning her tread down the steps.
“Bye.” Winnie waves with a nervous smile before continuing after Genevieve.
I give her a short wave in return before turning away from the stairs and toward my next class.
“Oh, and Jameson?” I look back, seeing Genevieve stopped a few steps down and is leaning against the railing.
“Yes?”
“I saw your test when I turned mine in, and I think you may have forgotten to write out your mean value theorem justifications on the front page.” Except, her tone doesn’t suggest that she merely thinks this; she knows. And as soon as she says it, I do too.
I feel the sinking realization as I stare at Genevieve”s wide smile, and I’m angry.
This anger doesn’t fade. It only grows after I hear Genevieve’s sinister laugh as I walk away from her, and it damn well doesn’t fade when I see my exam mark later that day.
Suddenly, everything feels so unbelievably unfair, and maybe that’s because I am finally in Genevieve’s position.
Anger toward oneself often boils down to the want of perfection.Anger toward others, on the other hand, can be attributed to the irritation when someone does not reach the same level of perfection.
We all want what we can’t have, but why is that?
I know exactly why.
I want it now so she can’t have it.
My biggest enemy, my biggest rival. She is the person who encompasses all the resentment I have toward myself as soon as I stumble.
Whenever I get a question wrong, or any time I start to believe that I finally have her beat, she comes out of the gate swinging. Like a lion in a den, fighting for her life. And the worst part is I can’t blame her because I have become the exact same way.
Maybe if I had studied harder than her or made more of an effort to propagate my worth in my mind—make myself believe I could defeat her—then maybe, I would be unstoppable.
But I guess we’ll never know because, at this moment, Genevieve has made it blatantly obvious that I am losing.