The Rivals (8 page)

Maia straightens up a bit higher as he says that. Nothing could please her more than the chance to sharpen her skills, especially with the Elite on her radar screen.

Mr. Baumann chuckles slightly. “Well, I shouldn’t presume you’ll enjoy them. You might be bored stiff, but I suspect not, because I have selected a series of books for the next few months that I believe should speak to all of you. Because you all will have something in common with these books.
Jane Eyre
,
Nicholas Nickelby
,
Tom Brown’s School Days
,” he rattles off. “We’ll also read
The Chocolate War
by Robert Cormier and
A Separate Peace
by John Knowles. What you have in common with them is they, either in part or in whole, are set at private prep schools, usually boarding schools,” he adds.

Oh. Well, that
is
a bit more interesting.

“And I want you to look for yourselves in these school stories. Boarding school in particular is an unusual experience. You live away from home in dorms with your friends. You’re given all sorts of freedom but even more responsibility. What do you do with that freedom? What do you do with your responsibility? What did your fictional counterparts do, and what does that say about truth in fiction? That will be the overarching theme of this semester—truth in fiction. And perhaps then we will better understand what John Knowles meant in
A Separate Peace
when he wrote, ‘When you are sixteen, adults are slightly impressed and almost intimidated by you.’”

He holds up the paperback, then adds, “In this context, it was about war. Which is why you should never take things at face value. Because Knowles wasn’t just talking about the experience of being a teenager. He was talking about teenagers getting ready to fight a war. A war the adults would only watch. ‘When you are sixteen, adults are slightly impressed and almost intimidated by you. This is a puzzle, finally solved by the realization that they foresee your military future, fighting for them. You do not foresee it,’” he reads. “As you can see, context is everything and nothing at the same time. Words both stand alone and with each other.”

When class ends, I notice Theo leaves with Anjali. They fall quickly into what looks like a deep conversation. Maia and I leave together.

“That was a headfake if I ever saw one,” Maia says, and it’s clear she approves.

I look at her out of the corner of my eye. “A headfake? You mean because he set us up to think he was talking about teenagers, and then it turned out he was talking about war? And then it was as if he was talking about the first thing again?”

“It was bloody brilliant. I am totally going to use that strategy in my next debate. It’s like your opponent thinks you’re going one way with the football,” she says, then demonstrates by turning her head to the right, “then, boom! You’re off and running the other way.” She finishes by turning her head to the left.

“Did you actually just refer to football, as in
American football
? I thought you had a long-standing practice of spitting on American football.”

“I still spit on American football. The headfake is an English football strategy too, my oh-so-American roommate. And besides, it’s properly known as
footy
in the homeland,” she says as we walk across the quad to our next classes. “Speaking of the homeland, did I tell you Ms. Merritt wrote to me this summer about the Elite? Several times actually, asking if I was prepping for it yet, if I was going to be ready, if the other debaters would be ready,” Maia says.

“Creepy. Did you delete her messages?”

“Yes,” Maia says proudly. “Though I finally relented two weeks ago and answered
one
of them. But get this! I made it seem as if I hadn’t received the ten other e-mails because I live in London, hence the
homeland
connection. Like the Internet doesn’t work there or something. I told her I had
spotty
Internet access at our country home, and I was so dreadfully sorry I hadn’t replied to her notes.”

I laugh. “You don’t even have a country home!”

“I know. That’s the irony of it.”

“But you know, she
loves
thinking you do.”

“Oh, she ate it up. I’m pretty sure the next e-mail she sent was to my parents asking for a donation. She probably figures they’re
lords.
”

“Shall I call you Lady Maia, then, in front of her?”

“Oh, please do. In fact, I command you to as my royal subject.”

“It’s all because of that stupid J. Sullivan James Award. She made it pretty clear she’s pretty much dying for me to get into Juilliard,” I say.

“There are three criteria to judging the winner of the J. Sullivan James Award. Academic excellence, athletic excellence, and artistic excellence. So debate, theater, music, dance—they are all part of the artistic portion of judging for the award. I looked it up,” Maia says.

“You research everything.”

“You have to know the enemy,” Maia says.

When I arrive at orchestra later in the morning, my friend Jones is waiting outside for me, lounging against the railing, sunglasses on. But the strange part is he’s actually holding his violin in public. Even stranger is when he lifts the instrument to his chin, then gently, like a painter, an artist, Monet himself laying a brush to canvas, massages the strings with the bow.

I recognize the first notes immediately, Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture, and I’m about to shout it victoriously, but then he shifts into something else, something more Jones’s speed, opting for a little Vampire Weekend.

“For a second I thought you might actually play Tchaikovsky. More than a few notes, that is,” I say, and give Jones a reunion hug, then a quick once-over. With his brown hair now reaching his shoulders, he’s totally got the whole rock-star look going on. He’s the most amazing classical violinist, but he’d rather be jamming on his electric guitar. I have no doubt he’ll make his way back to New York City for college when we graduate, and start some awesome band. I can picture him in cool little indie clubs, the kind where beer has sloshed onto the wood floor so many times, the place smells permanently of hops. The lights’ll dim, he’ll come onstage with his bandmates, and then he’ll jam out an epic opening chord sequence on a sleek silver Fender Stratocaster.

The crowd will go wild. The girls will swoon.

“I heard Delaney Zirinski is in need of your services,” Jones says, then gives me a wink.

I’m shocked, but then I’m not shocked. Nothing gets by Jones. He notices things, sees things, then sees what lies beneath. Like he found out some shady stuff his dad’s company was up to this summer and now they’re engaged in some kind of standoff. It’s a shame Jones isn’t a Mockingbird. He’d make a terrific investigator, an unbeatable secret weapon.

Still, it’s my job to protect Delaney. God knows, I wouldn’t have wanted Amy giving up my name, rank, and serial number before I was ready last year. So I will myself to keep all the muscles in my face still, to not grin, to not frown, to not give a thing away.

“Not sure what you mean,” I say.

A full-blown grin fills his face, like a kid whose dad just handed him the keys to the car. “That is really adorable. How you do that whole stony-faced denial thing.”

I press my lips together, fighting harder to remain a blank. “How was your summer?”

Now he laughs and points a finger at me. “This is good. It’s like a show. I want to see more.”

I look away but can feel a smirk starting to bloom on my face.

“Ah, there. I knew I could break you down.”

“I’m saying nothing,” I say, but I can hear the laughter breaking through my voice.

“It’s okay, Alex. Don’t feel bad,” he says, and wiggles an eyebrow. “My ability to put two and two together knows no bounds.”

“You are the worst,” I say, teasing him.

“But don’t you want to know how I knew she was in need of your services?”

I hold up my hands as if to say yes.

He taps his forehead. “You leave D-Day. Two seconds later, she leaves D-Day. Ergo.” Then he adds, “Besides, I hear the same things she hears. It’s so Themis, isn’t it? Anderin is like the drug of choice for overachievers.”

Which is pretty much an apt description for anyone who goes to this school. I can only imagine what’ll happen at Themis if this gets out of hand. A whole student body amped up on speed. It’s like giving a cheetah a triple espresso when it’s chasing down a gazelle. The cheetah doesn’t need another advantage, but the cheetah will take it.

Predators, all of us.

Jones returns to Vampire Weekend, tucking his violin back under his chin. He sings quietly, plays quietly in the final moments before the bell rings, but I still recognize the words and the music. I also recognize an opportunity when I hear one.

“Hey, Jones. Would you come to the Faculty Club with me? Ms. Merritt wants the Mockingbirds—the a cappella version of the Mockingbirds—to come sing.”

He straightens his head but keeps the violin on his shoulder. “You’re crazy. I only make Faculty Club appearances if I have to.”

I give him a light punch. “Do it for me?”

He plays a few more notes. “We’ll see,” he says.

“You’d do it if I told you about the morning I had,” I say, rolling my eyes to make light of things. But the fact is, that run-in with Carter still lingers, like the scent of sliced onions left in the garbage can for too long. So I tell Jones what happened, the way Carter spewed those words out—
whore
.

“God, I hate that guy,” Jones says. “Why can’t he leave you alone?”

I shrug, then sigh. “I don’t know.”

“If I ever see him or hear him say anything like that to you or anyone, well, it’ll be the last time any words come out of his mouth for a long time.”

I give Jones a faint smile. I love the protector in him, though I don’t mention Theo played that role earlier today.

“But what were you doing in Richardson Hall?” Jones asks.

I look away. I don’t want him to see me as I lie to him. “Nothing,” I say.

“Nothing? Why do I have a hard time believing that?”

“Jones, it was nothing, okay?”

“I’m sure this
nothing
had everything to do with your case.”

“Yes, it did, and that’s all I can say because I shouldn’t be talking about it,” I say. Because I have to do my best to protect people’s privacy. No one’s been charged with anything.

“Playing by the rules,” he remarks.

“It’s the least I can do,” I say.

“You won’t even bend for your old friend Jones? Maybe I can convince you with a little of this,” he says, then returns to the violin, to the 1812 Overture, a musical gesture just for me. Then he stops playing and lays a hand on my shoulder and it’s as if Tchaikovsky radiates from it, like notes are seeping out of his fingertips, and my skin beneath the fabric of my T-shirt absorbs the music, shoots it through my body and turns me into a human tuning fork. This must be what they say about great guitarists, extraordinary violinists. They are “hands men,” and there is something simply electric in the way his hand feels after he’s just played.

“Did it work?” he asks, taking his hand off me. My shoulder goes silent, and I don’t like it. I want it bursting with sound again.

“Nope. I’m a vault,” I say, making a motion to zip my mouth closed.

“Damn. I’ll have to try harder next time,” he says, and holds the door open for me for our music class.

But before I go in, I say, “Of course, it should be noted that I would gladly tell you
almost
everything if you’d just join the Mockingbirds.”

“Ha,” he laughs. “Like that’ll happen.”

I give an exaggerated sigh. “I know, I know. You operate alone.”

He shrugs. “I am a loner, as they say. But, you know, not in the creepy, dark-raincoat way.”

“Right. More like the leather-jacket-and-motorcycle way,” I say, picturing Jones rumbling down a long stretch of deserted highway, perfectly content with himself and the road in front of him.

“Something like that.”

“Well, if you ever change your mind, you have an open invitation to join. I wouldn’t even make you go through all the hoops.”

“You’d bend the rules for me,” he says, then winks.

“Only for you,” I say.

As the door closes, I find myself touching my shoulder ever so briefly as if I can feel a lingering vibration. Then it occurs to me that when Jones touched me, I didn’t think about Carter at all. When he touched me, it was as if his hand had silenced all those memories and the only thing I felt or saw or heard was music.

I keep my eye on Theo. So do Martin and Parker.

We can report that he and Delaney are very hot and heavy. Everywhere I turn, I see the two of them. But not where you’d expect—never in the caf, or on the quad. Martin will run into them at the library, pressed up against each other, down in the stacks. Or I’ll spot them way down by the side of one of the buildings in between classes, when they think no one is looking, and he’ll be running a hand down her leg. One night after I leave the music hall, I see them slipping off campus, and she’s touching his hair as they walk off into the night.

She’s hooked on him, that much is clear. She may hate cheating, she may want to have nothing to do with even the mere suggestion of it, but she can’t seem to resist the boy she’s saying is doing it.

I can also tell you that Theo spends his afternoons in the dance studio. I know this because it’s right next to the music hall, where I spend my afternoons. That first week of school I see him slip in with the rest of the dancers every day, wearing dance clothes like the rest of them.

But then one afternoon I hear the door slam and the sound of feet in the hallway. I take a chance it might be him, so I pop out of the music hall to get a drink from the water fountain. My hunch was right. Theo’s practically marching toward the door now, fire in his eyes. I take a quick drink, then say hello.

“Hey, Theo,” I say.

He looks taken aback. “Hey, Alex.”

“Thanks again for that morning.” I still feel kind of weird knowing he helped me out of a jam and yet now I’m
keeping an eye
on him.