Page 6 of Nobody in Particular

“Right, butwho isshe?” Alfie presses.

And Molly thought my surname advice was mere snobbery. I have half a mind to reach out to Molly later and tell her what Alfie just said, to prove my point. Only, she wouldn’t reply to my message, would she?

Danni glances over and catches the three of us staring at her. She tears her eyes away while her long piano fingers fiddle with the cuff of her sleeve.

“Nobody in particular, apparently,” I say to Alfie.

As though she somehow hears me across the din, Danni looks back. This time, her eyes land on mine.

I hold her gaze until she tears it away only a heartbeat later.

Poor little blossom. Our world is going to break her.

THREEDANNI

When Mom and Dennis finally drop me off at Bramppath, I’m surprised at the lump that keeps forming in my throat. I’ve been so busy thinking about what life at Bramppath will hold in store for me, I forgot one of the things that’ll be missing from it. Family.

There aren’t going to be family mealtimes, or family movie nights, or family walks anymore. Now, I’m gonna be doing all that stuff with a group of strangers. Are they strangers who’ll end up feeling like family soon? Will I wish I didn’t have to leave by the time term’s over? Or am I going to be counting down the days until I can escape this place, and the people in it?

I try to remind myself that I already have a good reason to believe it’ll be okay. I know Molly now. And a bunch of my classmates’ last names, to boot.

I’m going to be fine.

Just breathe.

As we walk, Dennis makes a huge deal out of the size of the school. He goes on and on about the turrets and arches on the main building, and the ivy snaking over the windows of the residential halls, and the gray-brick masonry he explains was only used during a certain time period. I ask if he’s sure he doesn’t want to move into my dorm room with Mom, and they laugh, but it’s only sort of a joke.

The wheels of my suitcase scrape over the uneven cobblestone path as we wind through the grounds toward my hall. Dozens of girls and their parents are darting all around us like squirrels setting up for winter, lugging suitcases and decorations, blankets and bags. You wouldn’t think I’d even get noticed in all the chaos, but, oh, they notice me. Over and over again a student or parent will catch sight of me, scan my clothes and my hair and my face and decide that I haven’t made the cut. Then their noses wrinkle, and they raise their eyebrows, and move on with what they were doing without even nodding at me.

Okay,thisis what I’d worried Bramppath would be like. If this was my first time seeing any of the students, I probably would’ve made a beeline back to the car and shut myself in the back seat until Mom and Dennis agreed to take me back home.

The fifth-year girls all live in the same building: Dewitt, named after some teacher. Hellene told us in the tour but it was right around the time I was entering full panic mode, so I don’t remember all the details. It’s one of the most centrally located buildings, smack in front of a sprawling marble fountain. The more senior you are, the closer you live to the main entrance, which leaves us with the second-best real estate.

I’m on the ground floor, in room eleven. Bramppath sent me a key card in the mail a couple of weeks ago, and we slot it into the door a few times until the chip’s accepted and the lock flashes green. Dennis whistles again as we head inside. The rooms at Bramppath are all private, and they’ve even managed to squeeze a full bed in here—just. That, a wardrobe and desk—both made of a dark cherrywood—and a leather desk chair, and that’s it for furnishings. The walls are a plain, washed-out cream, and the carpet’s a dark gray color, perfect for hiding stains. I try not to think about what might be camouflaged under my feet right now.

It’s plain, and it’s cramped, and it smells like disinfectant.

I love it.

After a couple of hours we manage to get my room looking less like a fancy prison cell and more like an Ikea display room. After a stern lecture from Mom to keep on top of my piano lessons, followedby a long goodbye that we have to repeat several times because Mom keeps chickening out from leaving the room, suddenly, they’re gone. And I’m alone.

I’m totally alone.

I wander around my room for a bit, folding my arms across my chest. There’s basically nothing familiar here. When Mom offered to take me on a Target shopping spree so I’d have all new things at Bramppath, I jumped at the chance. I figured the more new, glossy stuff I have the better, so I’ll stand out less. But now I’m regretting it. I’d take my old, striped, faded, cat-hair-covered sheets over new and glossy any day.

Besides. Target stuff won’t impress the students here. I was kidding myself.

Before the homesickness has a chance to really get started, I message Molly to tell her I’ve arrived.

It turns out her room is on the next level up, on B-floor, so she’s down in less than a minute. She spends a while politely admiring all the Target stuff, then she plonks on my bed and spreads her body into a starfish position while she bounces. “It’s so good to be in the senior cycle, you have no idea,” she says, patting the bed. “The small doubles we had last year were not okay.”

I straddle the desk chair and lean my chin on its back. “Is that like a twin XL? Because honestly even that would’ve been an upgrade for me from home.”

She props herself up and gives me a pitying look. The kind of look I would probably have taken offense to if I didn’t know Molly meant well. “How did you survive?”

“People survive sleeping on twins every day, Molly.”

I think that’s when she notices how she sounds, because she ducks her head. “Sorry. That was very ‘Rose’ of me.”

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