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“Fine, the one who was standing. Light brown hair. Holding the water bottle. He’s a fucking dick.”

Kenzie and Paige look at each other.

“Oh, him,” says Paige, and doesn’t say anything else, and I don’t like her face at all.

I say good night on the landing, and they go on up to four while I take the door to three. Tessa is in bed with a book when I get in, and she doesn’t look up. She’s in her pajamas with her hair up and her lamp on, exactly where she was when I left two hours ago, with her one mug on her desk. Her side of the room is tidy.

I kick my shoes off and sit on the edge of my bed. “There’s a party Saturday. Off campus. Paige got us invited. You should come.”

She turns a page. “No, thanks.”

“You didn’t even think about it.”

“Don’t need to. It’s not my scene.”

“It’s Saturday, Tessa. You don’t have anything on Saturday. You sit in here all day, and it’s kind of weird.”

“I have a book.”

“You have a book,” I deadpan.

She nods. “It’s a long book.”

She looks at her page, and I look at her, and apparently that’s the end of the conversation. Tessa Canten hasn’t left this building for anything except class, the dining hall, and the laundry room since the day we moved in. I’m going to get her out of this room whether she likes it or not.

“Fine,” I say. “Stay here and read your book.”

“Thank you.”

Evan texts me the next morning.

Evan: Hey. Hope your week’s going okay.

I read it at the mirror with a toothbrush in my mouth, and something in my stomach drops, because it’s a normal text and it’s the fourth one like it since Monday. He’s giving me space without announcing it and texting me things like this in the middle of it. I spit, and rinse, and stare at my own face for a second.

Evan: Also I was thinking we could do something on Saturday?

Evan: No pressure. I just miss you.

I put the phone down on the edge of the sink and finish getting ready with it lying there like a dead bird. I don’t answer it all day.

I go to class. I take notes. In sociology, the professor says social capital too many times, and at the end, I look down and I’ve written social capital multiple times and nothing else. I go to the dining hall with Kenzie at one, and she tells me about her homework trouble and then her sister’s drama, and I’m grateful for five minutes of somebody else’s mess. It makes me feel less alone, like maybe we’re all doomed no matter what we do, and we just call it life.

At two, I draft a message.

Me: I don’t think we should keep doing this.

I read it four times and delete it. At four, I try again.

Me: I think we both know this isn’t––

I delete that one before I finish the sentence.

At six, I get as far as pressing the call button, and my thumb hovers over the red circle for one ring before I hang up, and then I sit on my bed with my hands over my face, because I am absolutely the kind of person who does that.

Evan: Did you just call me?

Of course he texts instead of calling back.