CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
JORI
My mother took my phone Sunday night and put it in the trunk of her car.
“You doing too much,” I told her.
“You checked that gossip page six times during one dosage problem.”
“I was making sure nothing new got posted.”
“And did checking stop it?”
I looked at the closed front door. “Give me my phone.”
“After your exam.”
“What if somebody needs me?”
“They can call the house like it’s 2004.”
“What if Kye—”
“Kye has her mother, cameras, police, and an order. You have an eighty to earn. Sit down.”
My mother had never sounded more like me.
I hated it. Then, I sat down.
She made tea. I worked through calculations until the numbers stopped moving when I blinked. At eleven, she left a plate near my elbow without speaking. At midnight, she turned off the television and went to bed.
I studied another hour.
Nobody asked me for advice.
Nobody needed a ride.
Nobody’s crisis became mine.
Without those excuses, I had to admit how often I used being needed to avoid things that might prove I was not perfect.
Monday morning, Professor Hargrove placed the exam face down on my desk.
“You have ninety minutes,” she said.
My hands were damp. I wiped them on my scrub pants and turned the paper over.
The first page was medication conversions.
The second was adverse effects.
The third gave a scenario about a patient with renal impairment and asked which order required clarification.
I knew it.
I had gone to remediation, asked questions, and let somebody see what I did not understand.
Halfway through, panic rose anyway.
My mind offered every possible failure at once.
Repeat the course.
Lose the cohort.
Disappoint my mother.
Become the girl from the voice note instead of the nurse everybody expected.
I placed my pencil down and counted five slow breaths. Then, I answered the next question.
When time was called, I turned in the exam without changing six correct answers into wrong ones from fear.
Professor Hargrove graded them during lab.
At two fifteen, she handed mine back.
86.
The number was written in blue ink.
I stared at it until she tapped the paper.
“You still need an eighty-five on the final.”
“I remember.”
“Good work.”
Two words.
No speech.
They nearly broke me.
I folded the exam carefully and put it in my bag.
My mother answered on the first ring when I got my phone back.
“Well?”
“Eighty-six.”
She screamed so loud, I pulled the phone away.
“I knew it!”
“You did not. You hid my phone in a trunk.”
“Because I knew you could do it if you stopped watching strangers talk about you.”
I smiled walking across campus. Then, I opened the group chat.
My thumb hovered.
Part of me wanted them to know.
Another part said sending good news after hurting everybody would look like asking for applause before the apology settled.
I typed anyway.
JORI: I got an 86 on the exam. Still need an 85 on the final. Not asking anybody to respond. Just trying not to hide things anymore.
Nae reacted with a heart five minutes later.
Kye sent a clapping emoji.
Ari read it.
Nothing else.
The small responses warmed me and hurt at the same time.
After class, I met Nae outside the family courthouse. She had asked me to sit with Amir while she turned in one final document. He wore a blue coat and held the dinosaur Ari had returned.
“You pass?” Nae asked.
“Eighty-six.”
“That’s good.”
“Thank you.”
She handed me Amir’s snack cup. “He already ate most of it. Don’t let him trick you.”
“Got it.”
She started toward the building, then stopped. “Your apology wasn’t bad,” she said.
I looked at her.
“Don’t smile. I didn’t say we good.”
“I wasn’t going to.”
“You was thinking it loud.”
Kye’s line sounded strange in Nae’s mouth.
Nae glanced at Amir, then back at me. “I do make choices alone and hand y’all the consequence sometimes. That don’t mean you get to talk about me like being his mother made me less of a friend.”
“You’re right.”
“And when you tired, say you tired. Don’t help me and save the resentment for a voice note.”
The truth of that sat heavy.
“I will.”
“We’ll see.”
She went inside.
Amir held up the dinosaur. “He bite.”
“I’ve been warned.”
He pushed it against my arm anyway.
I pretended to scream.
His laugh echoed against the courthouse walls.
At four, Kye texted me a picture of a black Charger outside her salon from the night she got the order.
KYE: Police added it to report. Trell says it wasn’t him driving. Car registered to him though.
ME: Do not respond to him directly.
I stared at my own message. Deleted it before sending.
ME: You want me to come sit at the salon tonight?
KYE: My mom here. Thank you for asking instead of assigning yourself.
That one stung because I deserved it.
ME: Learning slow.
KYE: Very.
That night, I pinned the exam above my desk. It proved asking for help had not made me less capable.
Before bed, I opened DAY ONES OR DIES.
Four names still sat at the top.
No one had left.