FIVE
As I sipped my tea, I realized it wasn’t escaping the faculty neighborhood that especially worried me. While boarders had strict nightly curfews and had to stay in their houses until morning, I had more leeway. People might call me a fac brat, buttechnicallymy file said I was a day student. If I wanted to claim insomnia and go on a late-night run, no one could question me. Campo didn’t drive around town to make sure the other Ames day students were tucked into their beds now, did they? Staying away from main campus was a given, but I wouldn’t get in trouble if I was caught jogging past Headmaster Bickford’s or Dean DeLuca’s house.
Around 11:15, I started getting ready.By the stroke of midnight, the email had said, but I didn’t know how long it would take me to sneak over to campus under these circumstances. I quietly changed into dark clothing—black gym shorts, black T-shirt, and a lightweight black Dri-FIT. The pullover had pockets, so I shoved my mom’s keys in one and my phone in the other. I pulled my hair into a low ponytail and then dugthrough my closet until I found a black baseball cap. It wasn’t ideal thatCHICAGO MARATHONwas stitched across the front, but it was the best I had. Tag and I had trained all summer for that race, and we’d run it together when I’d gone home with him for fall break junior year. The rest of the day had been spent soaking in a hot bath and napping in his heavenly bed.
His parents had no idea because they weren’t home. According to Tag, they were almostneverhome. The Swells lived right outside Chicago, but his parents commuted into the city for work. “We own a condo near their law firm,” he’d explained, “so they spend a lot of time there.”
Tag had an older sister, but she was already moved out and married, so the thought of him alone in his big house bummed me out all over again as I slowly crept down the stairs in only my socks. No wonder he spent half the summer in New York with Alex.
I would’ve liked to say I snuck out through my bedroom window and shimmied down a tree, but that was a fairy tale. The tree near my window was tall with a tire swing that my mom had hung when I was seven, but it wasn’t quite close enough to safely catch hold of a branch. Jump, then fall? Far from ideal.
The back door it was.
After slipping outside, I silently begged its hinges not to squeak when I closed the door behind me. My mom wasn’t a heavy sleeper. There was also a chance she was still awake, possibly playingWordscapeson her phone. “I’m on level 2,700!” she’d bragged the other day.
The ocean waves crashed hard tonight, and it was chilly enough that I thought about backtracking to grab a sweatshirt, but it was too dicey. My thin pullover would have to work. “You’ll warm up,” I whispered to myself, rubbing the goose bumps from my legs before taking off into the night. Even though lights were still on in my neighbors’ houses, sprinting through the streets seemed like the smartest thing to do. In the distance, I heard the yips and yaps of a French teacher’s toy poodles—they preferred walks after dark—but I didn’t slow my pace. Madame Hoffman always wore noise-canceling headphones to listen to her podcasts. She wouldn’t hear me.
Only when I reached the covered bridge did I stop, press myself against the side, and take several deep breaths.In through the nose, out through the mouth.
Here was where it would get tricky. Eyes were everywhere on campus. Students might be confined to their dormitories, but only the freshmen were required to be in bed by 11:00. I had a feeling the other houses would be lit up like Christmas trees. Ames’s avenues and alleys were lined with streetlamps and of course two or three Campo sentinels would be roving around in their Priuses. I thought of veteran Mr. Harvey and Gabe, the new kid on the block. He would be hungry to catch someone.
And to top it off, there was a full moon tonight. Shining bright like a police spotlight. “We couldn’t have consulted the moon’s cycle?” I muttered, feeling sweat slide down my back.It had been warm from my run at first but had quickly turned cold.
I shivered.
One would think the “King’s Court” the Jester had summoned us to would be the Circle or student center, Ames’s top social hotspots…but it was neither. King’s Court was right outside the school chapel, where a bronze statue of Ames’s founder had been erected. Kingsley John Ames had founded our school in 1803, and the tall bust was quite regal. The pretentiously named Kingsley sat with perfect posture in a throne and held a scepter-like cane. His left foot had been worn down and rubbed shiny; it was a school tradition to give it a brush if you needed some luck. King’s Court was the closest thing campus had to holy ground.
On a normal day at a normal clip, it would’ve taken me ten minutes to reach the chapel. It was the halfway point between the two senior dorms, which were tucked away from Ames’s academic village. I had to admit that it wasn’t a bad rendezvous point.
But instead of ten minutes, it took me double that to get there. I had to stick to the shadows, avoiding the streetlights’ beams and stopping under trees to reassess my surroundings. Overhead lights and bedside lampswerestill on in dorms, and I had to hide from one Campo car on patrol. If anyone could hear my hammering heartbeat, I would’ve been burnt toast.
Only one streetlamp sat outside the small, ivy-coveredchapel. Fortunately, it was another memorial to our centuries-old school: an old-fashioned gas lantern that the Buildings and Grounds crew never thought to light. The moon shone faintly through the trees, so I navigated my way across the deserted cobblestone courtyard. It was 11:49; I’d managed to arrive early.
Punctuality, my friends affectionately teased, was one of my core values.
Good evening, your royal highness, I thought as I began circling dear Kingsley’s statue, staring up at his slightly scowling facial expression.Are you ready to have that frown turned upside—
I stumbled over something. Suddenly stumbled and nearly tumbled…over the Jester’s long legs. He was down on the ground, leaning back against the statue’s marble base and rocking a green-yellow-and-purple jester's hat. Bells and all, despite his email. “Christ,” I breathed. “Thanks for the warning.”
Tag scrambled up from the ground, and once the moonlight found him, a lump formed in my throat. He was just soTag. I saw him in class and around campus in his blue blazer and chinos, but I’d always thought him more handsome out of dress code. Tonight, he was wearing a pair of scuffed Blundstone boots, dark jeans, and a black sweatshirt with a Scotch-plaid flannel over top. My lips quirked. Who did that? Wore a shirt over a sweatshirt?
He was so tall too. When we’d met at freshmen orientation, we were the same height, but after two growth spurts, he wasnow six foot three to my five foot six. He was this magnetic force who kept dropping times in the pool and adding muscle in the weight room. First Josh and the athletic department noticed, and then Ames’s administration, colleges, and finally the entire swimming world. “Virginia just won the lottery,” I’d told him last year, after he’d signed his letter of intent to swim for them. “I’m so proud of you, Smoosh.”
Smoosh.
We’d had such silly nicknames for each other. Tag had been “Smoosh” because he gave the best hugs, wrapping me in a warm, cozy cocoon. They lasted for what felt like a wonderful forever.
Meanwhile, more girls than ever started showing up to swim meets and saying things like, “Tag Swell is a gold medal.”
That had been a tamer one.
“Sorry,” Tag said now, turning on his iPhone flashlight. “I was—”
“I mean, what a stupid place to sit,” I blurted.
“But what a pretty place to fall,” he quipped before coughing, remembering himself.
We were off to a roaring start. One of the reasons Tag and I couldn’t be friends was because we were always in sync with each other. Here we were, already bantering. It should’ve been awkward because I’d buried our relationship, but instead I felt white-hot inside. I feltalive.
