Page 2

Two

Now

No Caller ID calls nine more times on the drive home, each call ratcheting up my blood pressure and pushing me closer and closer to the stroke I’m apparently destined to have. I pull into the driveway a little too fast and jerk the Subaru to a stop just shy of the garage door, rattling the contents of my incredibly messy backseat. I lunge over the center console to reach the phone.

The second it’s in my hands, I toggle it back to airplane mode, and the home screen mocks me with the daily tally of harassment.

3:34 p.m.

No Caller ID

38 Missed Calls

I swear again, grab my bag, and race up the front steps to get inside as fast as humanly possible. Only after I’ve locked the knob and the deadbolt do I sag against the back of the door and take a breath. Slowly the feeling of eyes on the back of my head recedes as the silence of the house settles around me.

I hope whoever’s doing this gets super herpes.

Or someone steals their identity.

Or burns down their house. Literally anything to force their attention off me and onto something else, because I can’t for the life of me figure out how to make them stop. I changed my number, and they found the new one right away. I spent hours researching how to track a blocked caller, and it’s impossible. I called my cell phone company and tried to get it blocked from the carrier’s end, but they said they can’t prevent a blocked call because the number is hidden from the carrier too. And so, they persist.

It was foolish of me to let my guard down today. I should have been alert. Focused. This is a big day for me, and No Caller ID loves to ruin my good days. And my bad days. All my days, really.

If I had been thinking, I wouldn’t have taken my phone off airplane mode at all. I would have buried it in the bottom of my bag and not set eyes on it again until after the admissions results came in. Instead, I left the door open for this asshole to add stress to an already overwhelming day.

The newspaper headline flashes in my mind again, and I grit my teeth.

All of this started when the investigation finished. The city, the police, the media, the kids at school—everyone’s accepted that what happened in September was an awful accident. But No Caller ID doesn’t agree. I got my first call the day the special investigation report was made public, and they haven’t left me alone for one single day since.

It has to be someone at school because that’s where the majority of the harassment happens. They’ve never done anything at my house—though that may have more to do with my father than anything else. Nobody wants to piss off the next Polk County circuit judge, or give him a reason to ask favors of his law enforcement connections after his house is vandalized.

Most annoying of all, I can’t seem to keep my number private. There are too many people on the dance team and student government who need it for one reason or another, and despite my best efforts, it keeps getting out.

I don’t know how to make the calls stop, except to cut all ties with this whole fucking town—apart from my parents. Nobody can pass my number around Waldorf if I never see any of them again.

Yale is my way out.

Oh shit. Yale.

I check the time on my phone.

3:38 p.m.

The decision drops in twenty-two minutes. A fresh wave of anxiety hits and I start down the hall just as someone rings the bell and pounds on the door. A half-strangled shriek escapes my throat and I almost trip backward.

“Brooke?” Jena yells through the door. “Are you okay?”

Thank god. Also, shit .

“Yeah, gimme a second!” I scramble down the hallway to my room. I drop my bag onto my office chair, hang up my coat behind the door, and quickly erase all the blocked calls from my phone before I stuff it under my pillow. I kick off my heels and run back to the front door.

I pause, my hand on the lock, and take a breath. Goodwins are always composed. Everything is going great. My life is great. No Caller ID is a temporary problem that I’m twenty-two minutes from escaping.

Hopefully.

I open the door and Jena’s standing on the front steps, swiping on her phone. She looks up at me with long perfect lashes, and smiles.

Jena Howton is annoyingly pretty. Even in her Waldorf uniform—black heels, gray tennis skirt, white long-sleeved polo with the royal blue Waldorf logo on the upper right—she looks glamorous. And she knows it. She’s a few inches taller than me, with flawless Black skin and fresh ombre burgundy braids that reach her elbows. A gold septum piercing, which she’s absolutely not allowed to wear at Waldorf, hangs from her nose. She usually keeps the ring in a pouch in her car and puts it back in the second she frees herself from Waldorf and their annoyingly oppressive views on piercings . She did a persuasive paper on it for English 11 last year, and it was well graded, but not well listened to. The rules remain.

She hip bumps me as she comes into the house, and I lock the door behind her—as quietly as possible so she doesn’t ask any questions.

Jena sits atop the list of people I don’t want to know about No Caller ID. If she finds out, she’ll drag me to the police station, and that can’t happen. My parents would flip their shit, and any more legal attention on our family would cause so many problems, especially for my father.

She toes off her heels in the entryway and walks down the hall, but instead of veering to the right, into my room, she goes straight to the great room. The ceilings rise above us as we step into the huge space, and she throws her bag on the cream-colored velvet sectional.

“Why are you ignoring my calls?” she asks, folding her arms.

I walk around her and into the kitchen. The black-and-white vintage tiles are cool on my bare feet as I pour her a glass of water. “I wouldn’t say ignoring. More like…passively avoiding.”

She sits at the island and drops her mess of keys on the countertop. Everything, from the key fob cover, to the pepper spray key chain, to the giant glitter pom-pom is gold. “You mean hiding. We have to go to this party.”

I set the water in front of her and get a glass for myself. “You may have to go, but the only thing I have to do is survive whatever happens in”—I check the decorative clock on the wall—“eighteen minutes.”

Jena excitedly slaps the counter. “You don’t have to survive anything. You’ve got Yale in the bag. I mean, your life is going to become even more perfect in eighteen minutes. How amazing is that?”

It’s increasingly hard to hold on to my Goodwin smile. “Amazing. Totally.”

She sees right through me. “You’re going to get in. You’re the perfect candidate for Yale, and your mom has been setting you up with all the best volunteer opportunities. Your application is gold star worthy. There’s literally no way you’re getting a no.”

Unless I don’t measure up. Unless they took one look at my overachiever application and decided I wasn’t interesting or dynamic enough for this year’s class. The Ivies aren’t only about grades and volunteer opportunities. You have to stand out among the best of the best. What if I didn’t?

Jena waves her hand in front of my face. “Hello? Calm the panic spiral. Everything’s going to be okay.”

I take a sip of water and try to breathe. “Easy for you to say. Your dreams don’t require you to sell your soul for admission.”

She laughs, but the corner of her mouth twitches like it always does when she’s irritated. “Culinary school isn’t exactly a walk in the park, you know.”

I backpedal immediately. “That’s not what I meant. I think what you want to do is amazing—”

“But it’s not like cracking the Ivy Leagues and completing a family legacy. I know what you meant. And you’re right. I couldn’t do what you’re doing—mostly because I don’t want to. Which is why we should totally go to the coast after you get into Yale in sixteen minutes.”

I’m torn between the panic of time passing too quickly and the annoyance that she’s turned the conversation back to the beach party in the span of ten syllables.

“Hear me out,” she says. “If I just wanted someone to go with, I’d wait for Felix and Dylan to finish their game and catch a ride with them. I want to go for you . You’ve been living like a hermit since the last party, and I understand why. But at some point, you have to start living your life again. What better time to reemerge onto the social scene than a party celebrating one of the most amazing achievements of your entire life? Besides, Beau is only throwing it to stay on your good side anyway, and you can’t miss your own party!”

Called it. I grab my water with a groan and flee to my room.

I nudge my bag off my office chair and sit down. The white fur tickles the back of my knees, and Jena flings herself onto the foot of my bed.

“First of all,” I begin, “the party isn’t for me. It’s for Beau’s ego. Ever since my parents sold the lake house, he’s been basking in the elevated social status that comes with having the ‘party’ house. And second, I’m not going to that party, no matter what Yale says. My mom would kill me if she found out. My instructions have been very clear since September. I’m to do absolutely nothing that could get me in trouble, or talked about, ever again. If there’s even a chance my behavior might shine a negative spotlight on the family, it’s a flat no—”

She nods, folding her legs beneath her on the white comforter. “Especially with your dad being considered for a judge appointment. I know. Everyone knows. Your parents are nuts about their Goodwin perfection—but your image is spotless now. Going to one party won’t pitch the Goodwin name into the mud. We’ll drive out together. No drinking. We’ll dance and bonfire and celebrate. The first whisper of drama or anything that could get you in trouble, we get the hell out of there.”

I give her a look. “You’re telling me that if we walk into that party and a fight breaks out in front of us, you’d be cool driving all the way home right then? A ninety-minute drive each way, for thirty seconds of party?”

“Yup. That’s what I’m saying.”

“You’re a liar.”

She laughs. “For you, I’d leave after thirty seconds. But it’s not going to be like that. It’ll be so chill and calm. Nobody’s going to fight, or Beau will have them thrown out.”

3:51 p.m.

I shake my head. “We’re going to have to resume this argument after four p.m., or my brain is going to melt.”

Jena launches herself from my bed and heads for my closet. “Fair enough. I’ll be in here, looking for your beach party outfit, while you panic refresh.”

Ugh. She’s relentless.

I open my laptop and log into the Admissions Status Portal. The Yale logo at the top of the page brings another wave of nausea. My eyes skim the application home page, checking and double-checking that everything is in order.

Application: Received .

Teacher Recommendation: Received .

Teacher Recommendation: Received .

Counselor Recommendation: Received .

School Report (High School Transcript): Received .

Official Standardized Test Results (SAT, SAT-R with Essay, or ACT with Writing): Received .

Common Application: Received .

Three minutes left.

“What if I don’t get in?” I whisper, my bone-deep fear finally vocalized.

Jena bounces out of my closet, having rid herself of her Waldorf uniform in favor of my brand-new, three-hundred-dollar velvet halter jumpsuit—looking better in it than I did in the dressing room. The fabric is the same color as her braids. She’s so beautiful I want to punch her in the face.

She comes to a stop at my back, a sentinel behind my chair, and puts her hands on my shoulders. “Impossible.”

“But what if I don’t?”

“But what if you do ?”

Then everything gets better. My parents start looking me in the eye again. I escape No Caller ID. I start fresh in a place where not a single person within a thousand miles knows anything about me. I can reinvent my whole self. I can stop working so hard to overcompensate for my mistakes.

The thought is almost euphoric.

One minute.

I take a deep breath and down half my water before I prepare to refresh.

“Just breathe,” Jena says. “And remember, you deserve this.”

The “Pending” on the screen mocks me. I watch the clock hover at 3:59 for approximately ten thousand years. It finally flashes to four p.m. and I refresh the hell out of my browser, not daring to take a single breath until…

A status update appears at the top of the page.

New updates to your application were posted on March 28th at 7 p.m. EST

View Update

I move the mouse to the link, and my entire arm is shaking.

“Oh my god,” Jena whispers.

I click the link. Still not breathing.

A video screen pops up with a blue background and multiple dancing bulldogs under…

CONGRATULATIONS

“Oh my god!” Jena screams in my ear.

The video ends, and behind it appears the official letter.

Dear Brooke,

Welcome to Yale College! It is with the greatest enthusiasm that I write to congratulate you on your admission to the class of—

I jump from my chair. “I got in!”

“You got into Yale!”

I turn to her, she grabs my hands, and we’re jumping up and down and screaming in each other’s faces until we’re both out of breath and sink to the floor in a fit of exhausted gasps. The Yale logo fills my screen, the bulldogs and the congratulations replaying on loop with the letter telling me to be proud of my accomplishment and how delighted they are to accept such an extraordinary student to their community.

This is how my mom finds us, laugh-crying on the floor. She hovers in the doorway, looking severe in her pencil skirt and high pony—her hair the same chestnut brown as mine.

She looks confused for a beat, staring down at us like we’ve lost our minds, but then the light bulb clicks on. “You got into Yale?”

I climb to my feet, smooth my uniform, and nod. For the first time in six months, my mom smiles at me. Her eyes are alight with happiness that I created, and she wraps me in what’s possibly the tightest hug of my life.

I finally fixed it. Yale fixed it.

Her tears dampen my face, but I don’t care. She holds me for a long time, long enough to make the chasm I’ve felt between us these last few months feel so much smaller.

“I knew you could do it,” she says, her voice full of emotion. She abruptly pulls back. “Oh my god, I have to call your father. He’s going to be so proud of you!”

She kisses my forehead and backs away.

I grip her hand to stop her. “Wait, can I be the one to tell him?”

As much disappointment as I’ve weathered from my mother, it’s nothing compared to his. The only thing I want in this world is to see his face, tell him the news, and watch that look of constant disdain melt away. To see his pride.

“Of course! It’s your news.” She cups my face. “He should be home soon—we have that charity event, so he won’t be working late for once.”

Oh shit, that’s for the food drive. I collected all the donations from the school this morning, and they’re taking up most of the backseat and the entire trunk of my Subaru. I forgot to drop them off after school.

She doesn’t need to know that though. I’m absolutely not following up the joy and congratulations by telling her I dropped yet another ball.

As my mom disappears down the hallway, Jena takes me by the shoulders and spins me to face her. “Now we have to go to that party. Everyone’s going to want to celebrate with you!”

Maybe it’s the achievement high, or maybe it’s because I feel freed from everything that’s held me back for the last six months, but I’m considering it.

Jena winks at me and turns, motioning to the button on the back of the jumpsuit. I fasten it for her, my wordless permission for her to steal my clothes, as per usual.

“Plus,” she continues, “Felix texted me on the way over here to say that Dylan asked about you while they were warming up for the game. Specifically, whether you’d be at tonight’s party. I think he’d really love to see you, but if you’d rather stay home alone and not make out with the guy you’ve been obsessed with for years, I guess I understand…”

Decision made. “Fine. I’ll go to the Ivy party.”

She squeals and runs out of my room to ask my mom, spinning some story about meeting up with Felix for a celebratory dinner. She implies we’ll be here in town, not an hour and a half away at the coast, and my mom agrees, only tacking on a quick “Be home by midnight.”

That sense of freedom grows. She didn’t ask any questions. Or verify where I’ll be. Or go over the Goodwin rules of decorum. Or impress how important it is to avoid another family scandal. She simply agreed.

In record time, Jena’s ushered me out of my uniform and into a more PNW beach-party appropriate outfit: a black turtleneck sweater tucked into a gold sequin skirt, with fleece-lined tights underneath to combat the cool coastal air. Standing beside her in my full-length mirror, I know I look amazing, but Jena looks runway ready.

“You hate me, don’t you?” she says, with a wink.

“Always.”

She laughs. “Says the rich bitch that just got into Yale.”

I got into Yale.

Holy shit.

We throw on some flats—because, sand—and kill time by touching up our makeup and refreshing our hair until around five when we hear the sound of my father’s tires on the driveway. I snatch my keys and my favorite Chanel bag off the vanity and sprint out the front door.

I catch him halfway up the walkway, clicking the lock to his Mercedes over his shoulder, and I skid to a halt on the top step. When he sees me, he comes to a full stop at the base of the stairs. There’s only three, so he’s almost eye level with me.

His navy blue suit is worth thousands, carefully tailored to make him look more imposing, more professional, more terrifying. His light brown hair is perfectly styled, even after a full day in court. He looks like Lawyer Ken.

“Brooke?” He examines me like I’m evidence in one of his trials.

“I got into Yale.”

My entire body braces for the smile, for the praise, for the acceptance.

“I assumed as much when I saw you standing out here on decision day.”

I blink at him. That’s it? No smile? No hug? No…nothing? “Right, of course. Sorry to ruin the surprise.”

“It’s not a surprise. You worked hard for Yale. This is what happens when you focus on a goal and don’t get wrapped up in drama or scandal. Keep it up. Yale isn’t the end of the race, it’s simply another stop along the way.”

I nod furiously and step out of his way to find Jena in the doorway behind me. She slips to my side to allow my dad to go in, but he pauses and looks us both over. “Where are you going?”

“To dinner,” Jena says. “To celebrate Brooke’s massive achievement .”

The thinly veiled jab doesn’t go unnoticed. He narrows his eyes at her. “Well, in that case, I hope you both behave yourselves this evening. I’d hate to see you get into any more trouble. I might not be able to get you out of it this time.”

And with that, he sweeps inside and shuts the door.

My mouth suddenly feels dry. I keep clenching and unclenching my fingers around my keys. He’s probably stressed. I may have hit my goal, but his is still looming. His final interview with the governor for the judge position is on Monday morning. When it’s confirmed, then I’m sure we’ll celebrate together.

“Dude, your dad is a dick,” Jena mumbles, pulling me toward the Subaru.

I unlock the car. “He’s not a dick. He’s driven.”

“Yeah, a driven bag of dicks.”

Despite the massive letdown of his reaction, I laugh.

The enormity of where we’re going hits only when we’re both in the car and my hand hovers over the ignition. This is my first party since what happened at the lake house, since everything in my life became precarious and the entire weight of the Goodwin name got lumped onto my shoulders.

Everything went so wrong at that party. What if tonight is more of the same? What if I did this great thing that solidified my future, only to ruin it with this one decision?

Flashes of the lake at night flip through my mind.

Inky black water. Laughter. Screaming.

I can’t go through that again.

“Hey, are you okay?” Jena asks, leaning over the console. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

I try to smile but my face just won’t make it happen. I’m already failing. Goodwins always smile—at least when there are eyes on us.

“Hey, everything will be fine,” she says, rubbing my shoulder. “It’ll be a bunch of Waldorf friends at Beau’s house. Like old times, before the drama. And I meant what I said: the first sign of trouble and we’re out of there. Okay? Your dad and his precious Goodwin reputation have nothing to worry about. Besides, what happened at the lake was an accident.”

I start the car and back out of the driveway, letting her words sink in. “No, you’re right. I’m sure everything will be fine.”