Chapter 27

OUR MUTUAL FRIEND

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 16

“Family emergency?” Ms. Lyney repeats behind the office counter. Her fuzzy sweater shouts VALENTINE NAM AMOR TRADITIONALIS EDUCATIONIS at the top of its lungs.

“Yes.” My voice comes out half robot, half butler. I can’t control it when the number of lies I’ve told since coming to Valentine has stacked up like Tetris blocks.

“How could you have possibly heard about a family emergency without first hearing from your said family emergency contact?”

Fair question.

“Um.” My gaze shifts toward a few gnomes staring back with their beady, foreboding eyes. “I’d rather not talk about something so personal.”

She picks up the phone. “Shall I call your mother and ask?”

I reach forward so quickly that Ms. Lyney jumps, and I internally smack myself for being so obvious. This might be my only chance to convince Delilah to help STRIP. As my eyes land on the gnomes again, an impressively poor strategy hits me, but it’s all I’ve got. “M-my mom got cast on Gnome in Love over summer vacation.”

Ms. Lyney gasps. Like she believes me.

Will this work? “This season, the final three gnomes meet her family for the last episode. I only just realized that my family friend and I never communicated our winter break schedule with the production team. I need to ask for hers.” I pause. “And then call the production team, too, to let them know. It’s a whole disaster. I want to say more, but the NDA—”

Ms. Lyney holds up a finger. “Promise an autograph.”

Mom was right. Breaking the rules spirals. It spirals. “Sure!”

I go sit in the lobby and wait for Delilah to be called down to the sister academy’s office. After thirty minutes of brainstorming how to dig myself out of this lie after break—season got canceled? Mom got fired?—Ms. Lyney hands me the phone. I rush into the copy room and explain everything.

“So,” Delilah says over the line, “the first real conversation I get to have with you after nearly two months is about STRIP? After all your letters were also about STRIP?”

“You did get my letters?”

An awkward pause passes over the line. “Sort of.”

There must be a reason why she ignored me—maybe it’s about the brief irritation she showed at orientation—but an illogical betrayal creeps up my chest regardless. “You didn’t send any back? Wait, why didn’t you show up to the equestrian center when I was there with STRIP?”

“There’s STRIP again.”

“What?”

“Nothing. STRIP is just all you talk about lately.”

Is it? I hadn’t even noticed. “What else do you want to know, then?” The moment the question comes out, I bite my lip. Answering any other questions about my time here may end in Delilah setting more things on fire with sparklers. “Because I promise, I’m doing fine.”

“Good.” That’s all she says.

Another pause, just as painfully awkward.

“Is something wrong?” I finally ask her.

She sighs and then everything tumbles out. “Well, I’m awesomely twenty-two in the ranks. If this keeps up, I can’t run for the student council board and fight for actual change here because you have to rank in the top fifteen to even be eligible.”

“Oh,” I say. “That really sucks. You’re still helping student council with the mixer, right? I saw you carrying boxes.”

“Only because it’s part of my duties as a basic member. Look, I am sorry for ignoring London’s ask to come talk to you that night. It’s not that I don’t want to hear about you either, but I just really don’t like STRIP.”

My brow pinches. Delilah should support anyone who breaks the guidelines. Not hate them. “Did they do something to you?”

She huffs so loudly that the line blows out. “One of them.”

“Who?”

“Xavier. My ex.”

Xavier once mentioned that he supported STRIP to keep in contact with a girlfriend he had. But there’s was no way that person was—

“He was so needy,” Delilah drones. “Followed me like a puppy. And he always carried around some spoon.”

Never mind. “You really dated Xavier? That’s, like, huge. You don’t like people.”

“I know. Something dark happened within me.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?” I ask, the betrayal within me only twisting deeper. “We talked all throughout winter break. Summer too.”

“Well, you were going through a lot over the last year.”

Unease settles in my chest over what Delilah is implying. “That’s nice of you. Really. But I don’t want you to sacrifice sharing news about yourself because of that. Can’t we both tell each other about our problems?”

“To be fair, I would’ve told you if you asked.”

The accusation throws me until I filter through my memory bank for times I’ve asked how she’s doing lately and draw a blank. This insulated campus really has become my whole world. So much so that I’ve forgotten who my world was before.

But she was clearly upset at orientation too. Maybe this has been going on even longer. I’ve been focused on monitoring Delilah’s feelings over my own well-being since the summer I told her I was a boy. Have I simultaneously failed to realize she’s monitoring her own since then too? “I’m so sorry,” I say. “I should’ve asked. I really should’ve.”

Delilah sighs into the speaker. “It’s whatever. I almost said something but decided not to since I assumed it’d be temporary. Once we were both living at Valentine, I thought I could start being real with you again since you’d be done with all of that.”

“Done with all of what?”

“Boy stuff.”

“Boy stuff,” I repeat, confused.

“Figuring it all out, I mean. You’re staying on the campus you always wanted to be as a boy, right? Your life should be easier now. But all your letters just list more problems.”

I nod patiently, even if offense digs its way into my chest. “Dealing with all these problems is still a million times better than dealing with how I felt before the world saw me as a boy, for what it’s worth. I am way happier now. But also, I didn’t necessarily go through with this to make my life easier. Maybe that’s a misconception people have.”

“Yeah. I don’t think I got that.”

“I still want to hear about your problems regardless. We’re best friends. I’m so sorry for making you feel like that wasn’t the case.”

Delilah fakes a gag. “You’re getting too real.”

“Just this once. Promise we won’t hold ourselves back from one another?”

“Fine,” she grumbles under her breath. From anyone else, it would be rude, but it’s exactly what I want to hear when she’s usually too fired up to admit to real emotions. “Cross my heart and hope to kill. Or whatever.”

“Hope to die.”

“Close enough.”

I’m still not sure if this fixes us. All I want to do is hug her and hash this out in person. Maybe we can’t fully be fixed until then.

“If we’re really doing this, then I have a question for you,” Delilah asks. “Why do you care about STRIP so much? You sound like you care about their love letters. A lot.”

“About the letters?” I almost laugh. “No. But—They might get in trouble, Delilah, and I think it’s my fault. I can’t bail now. Xavier’s been helping me train for PE too.”

“You two are actual friends?”

Are we? “I don’t know. Maybe.”

Ms. Lyney pops her head through the door. She holds up a finger. One minute.

“Just this once,” Delilah says.

“You’ll help?”

“For you.” She pauses. “And to break some rules.”