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Turned out Kiran was not as flawless as she would have the world believe. From her cool demeanor and the casual way she chose her food at meals, I never would have known. As badly as I felt for her, I can't say it wasn't good to know. Comforting, in a way, to know someone that perfect didn't actually exist. But, of course, this had nothing to do with Leanne.
Reluctantly, I shoved the food diary back where I'd found it and replaced all Kiran's things. The closet search had turned up nothing to help Natasha's case.
Was this a good thing or a bad thing?
I had a few more minutes, so I decided to check under Taylor's bed. I yanked out a few under-?the-?bed boxes full of notebooks and texts. When I pulled one of them out, a sheaf of printer paper exploded all over the room, white sheets flying everywhere.
“Oh, crap,” I said under my breath, gathering them up. They must have been piled loosely atop one of the boxes. There was no way I was ever going to get them back in the right order.
Please let them be numbered. Please, please, please.
But as I stacked the pages back up, I realized it didn't matter if they were numbered. Each and every page was filled with exactly the same thing--the same phrase typed over and over and over again:
I am good enough. I am good enough. I am good enough. I am good enough.
I snorted a surprised laugh. I couldn't help it. But then I instantly felt guilty. Taylor was losing it, clearly. Of course, I supposed all geniuses were a little off. But this was ridiculous.
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Fifty pages, at least, of this? She was the smartest girl ever to walk the halls of Easton. I couldn't believe she needed all this affirmation. When did she have time to sit down and do this?
Hidden snack cakes and obsessive affirmations. No wonder these two were roommates. Did each know what the other was hiding? Maybe if they did they could help each other.
“Taylor! Hurry up!” someone shouted from downstairs.
There were footsteps on the stairs.
“I just have to get my planner!” Taylor called back. She was right down the hall.
Shaking violently, I shoved the papers back on top of the box and pushed it under the bed. Then the second, then the third. The third got caught on the leg of the bed and I was just jimmying it back into place when the door flew open. I stood up, straightened my sweater and looked right into Taylor's surprised eyes.
“Reed! God! You scared me,” she said, then glanced at her bed.
“Sorry. I was just finishing up in here,” I said.
“Oh. Okay,” she said, stepping uncertainly toward me. It was almost as if she knew what I had found. She grabbed her PDA off the nightstand and smiled. “Come on. Let's ... go to breakfast.”
“Okay,” I said. “Let me just grab my book bag.”
“Oh, hey. Reed?” she said, pausing as she stepped into the hall. She fumbled with her bag and pulled out a neatly typed paper in a l
ight blue cover. 'You're good with the classic writers, right?"
I closed the door behind me. “Yeah.”
“Well, I was wondering if you could read this paper over for me,” she said, handing it to me. "I know I'm a year ahead and
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everything, but it needs another eye before I hand it in. I just want to be sure it's . . . you know . . . good enough."
Good enough. Good enough, good enough, good enough.
Oh, my God.
“I'm sure it's great,” I told her firmly. “Everyone's always saying you're the smartest person ever to even go here.”