Marianna Baer - Frost

Celeste.

“Actually,” he said, “I have to meet someone later at senior

tea. So . . .”

“Oh. Okay.” I didn’t know why, but this surprised me. Maybe

because I hadn’t noticed him making any particular friends since

he’d been here.

We entered the lower level of the student center and went

into the mailroom—a total scene, as it usually was between

classes. My box held a coupon packet from local businesses, a

flyer for Buried Child—the play Abby was in, an Urban Outfitters

catalogue, a glossy brochure from my mother’s office, and a note

to call Dean Shepherd’s office. Probably about babysitting.

David came up behind me as I was sorting through things to

keep and recycle. He rested a hand on my shoulder.

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“Need a condo in LA?” I asked, waving the real-estate

brochure, conscious of the warmth that spread through my body

from where he touched me in a way I wouldn’t have been if

Celeste hadn’t made an issue out of it.

“Why are you on a real-estate mailing list?” he asked.

“It’s my mother,” I said. I glanced at the brochure again.

She’d drawn a speech bubble coming out of one of the windows:

Can’t wait until you’re here!

I held it out to him and pointed at the building. “That’s

where she lives.”

“Really?” he said. “Wow. Pretty slick.”

“Pretty awful,” I said, throwing it in the recycling bin.

He gave me a funny look. Sort of . . . pitying.

“That wasn’t a statement or anything,” I said as we made our

way back outside. Ever since I told him about the divorce mess, I’d

gotten the impression he thought my relationship with my

parents was totally dysfunctional.

“Didn’t say it was.”

“I know.” I fastened a higher button on my jacket to keep the

wind out. “I just feel like you might think we’re not close

anymore. I mean, we’re not close the way we used to be, but it’s

better. I was way too attached to my parents before. The

separation had to happen sooner or later.”

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“I guess,” he said, kicking at a couple of acorns on the path.

“Seems like they didn’t have to make it so traumatic for you,

though.”

“Maybe.” I was kind of annoyed at what he was implying

about my parents. “But it all worked out for the best.”

We walked up the steps and into Grove Hall, to the same

sprawling room where registration had taken place. There was a

setup of baked goods, coffee, and tea here for seniors three

mornings a week. I waited for an opening in the crowd around the

food table—the way we all ate so much, it was as if we hadn’t

eaten breakfast a couple of hours ago and weren’t going to lunch

soon—got a pumpkin muffin and a coffee, and met David on a

small couch in a corner of the room. He moved his bag off the

spot he’d saved for me.

I sat down, shrugged off my jacket, and checked to make

sure no one nearby was listening to our conversation. “So, you

know about the vase,” I said.

“Yup. Am I still a suspect?”

“Don’t be silly.” I wished Celeste hadn’t told him that part of

it. “I think it just blew over. Our room has such strong cross

breezes, and it was pretty blustery.”

“What about Abby?” he asked.

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“No,” I said, shaking my head. “But that’s why I wanted to

talk to you. I’m worried that— Well, wait. Did Celeste mention

the other thing?”

“What other thing?”

Lowering my voice a notch further, I told him about the

knocking noise she’d heard. As I did, the expression on David’s

face grew more and more concerned.

“Why didn’t she tell me this?” he said, pulling his phone out

of his bag. At first, I thought he was calling her, but then I realized

he was online, searching for something, following links. “You

know that guy she was with over the summer?” he said, still

typing.

It took me a second to remember. “The guy in the band?”

“Yeah. I’m just . . . Oh. Here. Hold on.” He didn’t say anything

for a moment, then, “Okay. Good.” He turned his phone off and

tossed it in his bag. “There’s video from a show last night in

Amsterdam. He’s there.”

So David had thought the guy might have followed Celeste

here? “Could you really have imagined him doing those things?” I

asked, trying to picture a typical rocker guy hiding in Celeste’s

closet and knocking on the wall.

“It would’ve been weird,” David conceded. “But he was

weird. Maybe not technically a stalker, but close.”

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I took a sip of coffee. “I guess dealing with him over the

summer explains why she’d be paranoid now.” It made me feel a

bit better to know that there was something behind her

irrationality. “Because I’m sure it was just a noise that the house

made, not a person.”

“Yeah,” David said. “I’m sure you’re right.”

“Anyway,” I said. “I’m worried that from now on, if anything

slightly out of the ordinary happens, she’s going to blow it out of

proportion. Look for someone to blame. Probably Abby. Do you

have any suggestions for what I should do to . . . I don’t know,

make her feel more comfortable in the dorm? And to help

convince her that these things really were just random?”

“I can talk to her,” he said. “But I bet you don’t have to

worry. Something else will distract her. Another ill-fated love

affair, probably.” He smiled a little ruefully.

“And you believe me that Abby didn’t break it, right?” I said.

“Sure,” he said. “If you say so. I don’t even know her.”

“You’ll get to know her better at the dorm dinner.”

“The what?”

It turned out that Celeste hadn’t invited him. I’d assumed she

had, when she referred to her guest as a “he” a couple days ago.

“You should definitely come,” I said, trying to cover my surprise

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and to smooth over the awkwardness. “I’m sorry we didn’t invite

you sooner.”

“That’s cool.” He was looking at me strangely. “You know,”

he said, “as long as we’re getting stuff out in the open, there’s

something I need to talk to you about, too.”

“There is?” I felt a little surge of nerves at his serious tone of

voice.

“Uh-huh. You seem to have a problem, and I’m not sure you

realize.” He reached forward and softly brushed the side of my

head, then grinned as muffin crumbs sprinkled my chest. “Every

time you eat, you get food in your hair.”

I quickly wiped the crumbs off. “Yeah. That’s been pointed

out to me before.” Shit. My nervous system had had a mini-

conniption, wondering what he was going to say and then feeling

his hand touching my head and—

“Hey, Leena, David.” Simone Dzama, a doe-eyed,

environmentally friendly hippie chick, stood by the couch. It was

only after she squatted next to David and began talking excitedly

about a trip to a green rally in Boston that I realized she was

whom he had been meeting. I picked at my muffin as they talked,

trying not to listen to them making plans. I studied the shifting sky

out the plate-glass windows, then read and responded to a

couple of messages that had arrived while I was in class.

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Simone finally stood. Before walking away she said, “We

should find a time for that other thing, too, David. This weekend

or something.”

My pulse sped up again, and I knew it wasn’t from caffeine.

“Hey.” David nudged me.

“I didn’t know you were into that stuff,” I said. “I mean,

enough to go to a rally.” I didn’t know you were hanging out with

Simone.

He shrugged. “I’ll go if I don’t have too much work. Simone’s

nice. We have English together.”

I nodded and took another sip of my now tepid coffee.

Obviously, it wasn’t just Celeste’s involvement that made this

friendship with David complicated. I might not want him, but I

didn’t want anyone else to have him either.

With everything that was on my mind, I forgot to call Dean

Shepherd until I was on my way to lunch. When I did, Marcia said

that the dean wanted to talk to me in person and asked if I could

come in at four this afternoon. I told her it wasn’t great—I had

field hockey at three and wouldn’t be done. She said the dean

would wait. I briefly wondered why we couldn’t just talk on the

phone, and why she was wil ing to stay in the office late for me,

but didn’t think much of it. I was always happy to see Dean

Shepherd.

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Some days, I barely got any exercise during field hockey,

since I was assistant coaching JVII instead of playing. I wasn’t

good enough for varsity, and coaching younger kids sounded

more fun than a noncompetitive “sport” like “Freedom

Movement” or “Boot Camp.” Today, though, the team had

needed extra players for a scrimmage, and I didn’t have time to

go home and change before my meeting. I arrived at Irving Hall a

mess, in cleats and sweatpants and sweatshirt, bringing along my

field hockey stick and the smell of grass, mud, and sweat.

“Sorry I’m so gross,” I told Dean Shepherd as I sat across

from her. “And you look so nice. I love your blouse.”

She glanced down distractedly. “Thanks. Michael gave it to

me.”

“We’re having a dorm dinner soon and if you and Mich—”

“Leena,” she interrupted, “I have to pick up Anya in a little

bit and didn’t call you in here to socialize.”

“Oh. Okay, sorry,” I said, a bit taken aback.

“A couple of days ago, did you tell Nicole Kellogg that . . .”

She looked down at a piece of notepaper in front of her. The

yellow sheet was covered with her loopy handwriting, illegible

from where I sat. “. . . that she doesn’t have a home anymore?”

“Nicole Kellogg?” It took a minute for me to remember that

she was the crying redheaded freshman I’d counseled. “What?

No. Of course not.”

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“You know how much I trust you,” Dean Shepherd said, “but

you’ve got to help me understand what this is about. This girl,

Nicole, she’s very upset. She’s considering leaving school.”

“Are you serious? Because of me?” I must not have

understood correctly. There was no way.

“What did you say to her?”

I picked up a shiny, leopard-spotted shell from the desk and

started running my fingers over it, trying to remember the

meeting. “Um, well . . . She was having trouble with her

roommate, not respecting her boundaries, being loud,

inconsiderate, you know, normal stuff.”

“Mm-hm.”

“And I just, I told her that she had to think of her like a sister,

who she might not choose to live with, but has to find a way. And

that the best way to do that is by trying to communicate right up

front about what she needs.”

“But did you say something about her home?”

“Just that to be happy at boarding school, it helps to think of

school as your home. And your parents’ house as just that—your

parents’ house. Somewhere you visit. Because you don’t live

there anymore, and probably never will. I mean, right?”

Dean Shepherd’s nostrils indented as she drew a deep

breath. “Leena, can’t you see how upsetting that might be for

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someone? It’s hard enough for her to be away from her family for

the first time, but then to tell her that it’s not her home anymore?

These things have to happen slowly. You don’t just break away

like that because you’ve spent a few weeks at boarding school.”

I put the shell down, lining it up with a piece of smoky quartz

that I’d given to the dean when her husband died. A sick feeling

filled my chest. “I guess I see what you mean. But that wasn’t my

intention. I meant to make her feel better.”

“Well, of course. But you said something that came from

your personal experience, that didn’t help this girl in her

situation.”

“I . . . I’m sorry. What can I do? Should I talk to her? Tell her

she misunderstood me?”

“It doesn’t sound like she did misunderstand you. Rather

that you used bad judgment in your advice.”

I stared down at the grain of the wooden desktop, willing my

eyes to stay dry. “So what do you want me to do?”

“I don’t think there’s anything you can do for Nicole,” she

said. “I’m dealing with it now. Hopefully, it will blow over, and

she’ll stay at school. I just want to make sure you understand

what you did wrong.”

I looked up. “I do. And . . .” I was sure she could see my lips

trembling. “ . . . I’m sorry.”

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“All right,” Dean Shepherd said with a half smile. “I’m sure it

won’t happen again.”

She began shuffling the papers in front of her. Was there

another topic I could bring up? Something to bring us back to the

way we usually were?

Before I thought of anything, she said, “Oh—by the way,

how’s everything in the dorm? One of Celeste’s teachers is

worried she’s seemed kind of tired and distracted this semester.

Everything okay?”

“Fine,” I said. “She’s got a bit of insomnia, but it’s better than

it was at first.” I certainly wasn’t going to tell the dean about the

problems we were having. That would just give her more proof

that I wasn’t as good with people as she’d thought. That I wasn’t

living up to her expectations.

“Okay. Good.” She nodded and went back to her papers.

I sat there a moment longer, still feeling like I needed to say

something, like I needed to make this better.

“Leena,” she said. “You can go now.”

I pushed back the chair and stood up. On my way out I

noticed I’d tracked clumps of mud all over her rug.

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Chapter 12

I CONCENTRATED ON THE SOUND of my cleats hitting the