The Ivy: Secrets (14 page)

The empty lecture hall—but for how much longer, she couldn’t say. There on the table in front of the blackboard were the sign-in slips, extra blue books, and a few leftover exams. The rest, Callie noted looking at the desks, had already been passed out. “You stay here and watch the hall,” she said. Vanessa nodded: she looked horrified, but she propped the door open nevertheless. Callie darted inside.

Whipping out one of the pens she had taken from Vanessa’s desk, she filled in two blank sign-in slips—one for each of them—and then slid the written records that they had, in fact, arrived for the exam on time, into the middle of the pile. Then she tucked two tests and two blue books under her arm. Barely breathing, she started walking toward Vanessa.

“Someone’s coming,” Vanessa hissed. “I can hear footsteps—”

F@%#^$@. Callie turned around and looked up. The doors at the top of the stairs were swinging open. We are so dead, she thought. Her eyes met Vanessa’s.

“Come on,” Vanessa said suddenly, grabbing Callie by the wrist and slamming the Faculty Only door shut behind her. Several students were trickling through the front entrance, but nobody seemed to have noticed the two girls standing at the bottom of the room. Without hesitating, Vanessa pulled Callie up the far left-hand aisle and pushed her into one of two empty desk chairs in a row somewhere in the middle of the auditorium.

“
Don’t
turn around,” Vanessa spat. Callie sat completely still, listening to the chatter of other students who had begun making their way to their seats. She slipped an exam and a blue book over to Vanessa, who smoothed it out across her desk like this was exactly where she had left it before the fire alarm sounded. Together they watched the old dragon lady of a proctor hobble through the Faculty Entrace Only door and take her seat in front of the table without pausing to check if any of the papers had been disturbed.

Callie’s pulse thundered in her ears, nearly masking the clamor of the hundreds of students who had now returned to claim their desks. The dragon lady adjusted her microphone. “We will resume the exam once everyone has returned to their seats. Quickly and quietly please.”

“LADIES!” a severe-sounding voice suddenly barked. The color drained from Callie’s face. Turning, she found herself staring at a female teaching fellow. Vanessa released an almost inaudible whimper. Busted.

“There needs to be at least one empty seat between the two of you,” the TF said. Callie stared. You mean, we’re not—

“You, just move over one to your left,” she instructed, pointing at Callie. Quickly Callie obliged her. Satisfied, the TF continued to make her way down the aisle.

“Ohmygod,”
Vanessa breathed through her lips. “I can’t believe you just did that,” she muttered, keeping her eyes facing forward.

“Yeah, well, I busted my ass studying for this test,” Callie whispered. “Plus, there’s no way I’m going to remember any of it by next week.”

“No, I mean what you did for m—”

“Quiet please, ladies,” the TF admonished, frowning at them as she made her way back up the aisle.

“Well, hopefully that’s everyone,” said the dragon lady proctor as she surveyed the room, half to her microphone, half to herself. She cleared her throat. “Due to the interruption, we are adding an extra fifteen minutes to the clock.”

“Good luck,” Vanessa whispered. “And thank you.”

“Pencils up—
begin
!”

“I
’m doooone,” Callie called, opening the door to C 24. She had meant it to sound enthusiastic, but it had manifested as more of a groan.

“Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!” Mimi screamed, running over from where she had been sitting on the floor with OK and wrapping Callie in an enormous hug. “
Merci Dieu, maintenant on se saoule!
”

“Whoa,” said Callie, catching a whiff of her breath. Apparently sober Mimi was a thing of the pre-finals past, and pre-pre-finals Mimi a thing of the pre-afternoon present. “What’re you guys up to?”

“Quarters,” OK muttered, attempting, and failing, to flip a coin into a shot glass on their coffee table. “She’s killing me.”

“
Je vais te tuer
!” Mimi echoed happily, jabbing at him with an imaginary sword.

“Care to join, Blondie?” asked OK after he had downed the contents of his shot glass. “I’ve got a whole sock full of these things,” he added, holding up a yellow-toed sock filled with coins. Someone—probably Matt’s mom—had sewn a little label printed with
M ROBINSON
along the top. Oops.

“Callie!” someone cried, pushing open the front door. Turning, she saw Matt looking panicked.

“What the hell happened to you?” he asked. “One minute you’re running out of the exam and then I didn’t see you—and the fire alarm—I mean, did you come back? Did you take the test?”

“I did.” She sighed happily. “I looked for you afterward, but I was just so”—she yawned—“exhausted that when I couldn’t find you, I came home.”

“What about Vanessa?” asked Matt.

“
What
about a fire alarm?” OK added.

“Vanessa overslept. I woke her up and we ran over as fast as we could, but we were late and they weren’t going to let us in until—uh—luckily the fire alarm went off for some reason, so we were able to sneak in, you know, in the confusion.”

“Luckily . . . the fire alarm went off . . . for
some
reason . . . and you were able to sneak in?” Mimi repeated slowly, her eyes dancing.

“What?” said Callie sharply.

Mimi shrugged. “
Bravo! C’est une bonne décision.
Saving Vanessa, I mean.
Où est-elle maintenant?
”

“She has another exam at two fifteen, so she went back to the library,” said Callie, making her way over to the couch. “I feel so bad for her—I seriously don’t think I could survive another one.”

“You feel bad for her—this is good, no?” Mimi commented, expertly flicking a quarter into a shot glass. OK moaned, picking it up. “Things are good—better?” Mimi ventured.

“They are . . . or I think they will be,” said Callie. Then, for the first time quite possibly in three days, she smiled.

“Getting her was really cool of you,” Matt said, collapsing next to Callie on the couch. “Man, but wasn’t that fire alarm thing so crazy! I wonder how it happened. My guess is maybe a Bunsen burner in one of the— Hey, is that my sock?”

“Er, no?” said OK. His eyes fell on
M ROBINSON
. “I mean, yes, found it!” he amended, holding it up.

“Relax. I’m too tired to care.” Matt moaned, rubbing his face with his hands.

“Here,” said Mimi, pouring him a shot.

To Callie’s surprise, he accepted it. “Oh, what the hell,” he muttered. “I can take a few hours off before final edits.” He downed the liquor and made a face, trying not to choke.

“Callie?” asked Mimi.

“Bed,” she answered, standing. “Bed, shower, dinner, Clint, edit, edit, edit.”

“Quite a to-do list,” OK said. “Ha-ha, to
do
get it? Clint? Get it?”

“Oh, do this!” Callie cried, flipping him off. Then she walked into her room and dove headfirst onto her bed.

When she came to several hours later, it was dark outside and difficult to tell whether the clock meant 6:30
A.M.
or
P.M.. P.M.
—
duh
—she realized, lifting up her cell. She wished she hadn’t checked, because there was a new text message from Lexi waiting for her.

Callie groaned. Can’t Lexi once—just this once—ask another COMPer to do the b-i-t-c-h work? I’m already pressed for time as it is, she thought, glancing at her laptop and trying not to think about all the pieces that still needed editing. She hadn’t the faintest clue at this point whether or not she’d make
FM,
and moreover, she was finding it difficult to muster the strength to
care
. She’d done everything Lexi had asked. (Well, minus staying away from Clint, but she needed to worry about keeping that secret for only the next forty-eight hours—then she’d be home safe for winter break). She’d also done everything she could with the topics she’d been assigned. Nothing left to do but a final read-through, print, and pray. Oh yeah, and buy coffee filters.

But that would all have to wait. Right now she had just enough time to hop in the shower, run to dinner, and then head off to her Super Top Secret Done with Exams Date with Clint. Or as most normal, non-subject-to-blackmail-by-psychotic-ex-girlfriend people probably called it, “going to the movies.” The Brattle Theatre was having a Nora Ephron marathon, so Clint was taking her to see her very first screening of the classic
When Harry Met Sally
. Should she stay in and work on her COMP portfolio instead? Maybe. But was Mimi right when she said that sometimes you ought to work on maintaining your sanity? Definitely.

Twenty minutes later Callie was emerging from the service area of Annenberg with a tray full of food, scouting for a place to sit. At a table near the back she spotted OK, Matt, and—even though he was facing away, she could still recognize him—Gregory. She hesitated. Eh, whatever, she decided, making her way over.

“Hey, guys,” she said, setting down her tray.

“Hey.”

“Yo.”

“’Sup?”

Matt giggled. Wait. Matt giggled? Why in the heck . . .
Oh.

“You guys forgot the crucial step between day drinking and night drinking, didn’t you?” Callie asked.

“Cuddling?” Matt volunteered.

“Peeing!” cried OK.

“Napping,” said Gregory.

“Oh, you read Lexi’s article last week then, too?” Callie asked.

“Yup,” said Gregory.

Callie frowned, nibbling on the edge of her sandwich.

“So,” said OK, “what are you going
to do
—ha, get it?—on your
date
later?”

Callie dropped her sandwich and whacked OK on the arm. “Shhh . . .” she hissed. “That is
supposed
to be a
secret
.”

“Then
why
did you broadcast it to all of us earlier this afternoon?” Matt asked, munching on a green bean.

“I didn’t— Oh.” Damn. So much for top secret.

“I must have missed the announcement,” Gregory said, sounding bored. “Who do you have a date with later?”

“Well, I really shouldn’t sa—”

“It’s with that Perpetual Sweater Vest character,” OK offered helpfully. “Though really, Blondie, we don’t know
what
you see in him.”

“Nuh-uh,” said Matt, taking a swig of his drink and shaking his head. Callie peered into the cup, beginning to suspect that they were “pulling a Mimi,” i.e. had smuggled alcohol into the dining hall.

“I mean, he’s always—wearing—a sweater vest!” said OK. “Yes, we get it. Cute, stylish, appropriate for the major seasons. But all the time? That’s a big fashion no-no.”

Matt cocked his hand to his mouth and whispered, “Mimi’s been reading him her ladies’ magazines.”

Gregory started laughing loudly. “Perpetual Sweater Vest is Clint?” he roared as if it were the most amusing thing he’d ever heard. “Don’t get me wrong, I like the guy, but it’s kind of true.”

Callie glared at the three of them.

“Plus,” Gregory added, “he’s too old for you.” His face had a similar expression to the one he’d worn right after he’d delivered his limerick. “You should stick with someone closer to your own age.” Matt nodded in agreement.

Callie, electing to ignore them, took a big bite of her sandwich and chewed. “Doesn’t that go both ways?” she blurted suddenly.

“What d’ya mean?” asked Gregory.

“I mean, what about Lexi: isn’t
she
too old for
you
?”

“Well, no, because I’m not dating her,” Gregory said slowly, staring at Callie like she had just asked him how to spell
stupid
.

“But—yes you are!” Callie cried. She couldn’t believe that even he would sink into such a low level of sketchdom as to deny the relationship outright.

Gregory lifted one incredulous eyebrow. “Now, where’d you go getting a crazy idea like that?”

“Blondie,” OK added sternly, “we’ve been over this before: Gregory does not date!”

Gregory grinned, offering his hand to OK for a high-five. Callie tried to keep herself from rolling her eyes as their palms smacked together.

“Well, I don’t care
what
you call it,” Callie interrupted their bro-fest: “Dating, hooking up, seeing each other, smushing—together is together no matter how hard you try to deny it for the sake of getting into other girls’ pants.”