For B.V., who decided his due date should be the same day as the due date for this novel
NOT AGAIN
The dread was like smoldering black embers right in the pit of my stomach. I knew the sensation
well. Used to feel it every day after school as I approached my house in Croton, Pennsylvania, not
knowing what might be going on inside. Never knowing in what condition I might find my mother.
Passed out with a bottle of pills spilled on the floor? Manically cleaning the kitchen in her
pajamas? Angrily waiting to scold me for something I hadn't done? Yes, I knew dread all too well. I
had just never felt dread like this upon my return to Easton Academy.It was the Sunday of
Thanksgiving weekend, and, thanks to my Billings House fund money, it was the first time I'd flown
back to Easton. When I had said good-bye to my parents that morning at the airport I had actually
felt a pull to stay. It was so ironic. Now that my mother was better, leaving home was the hard
part, and it was coming back to school that was giving me the dry heaves. But who could blame
me, considering the pariah I had become at Easton?
2
The cab driver pulled up in front of Bradwell, the freshman and sophomore girls' dorm. I paid him
and struggled out of the car with my backpack, duffel bag, and laptop. It was frigid outside, and a
cold wind whipped through the trees along the drive. I had expected the campus to feel more alive
since all the students were supposed to be returning from break. But though there were a few lit
windows dotting the brick facades of the three girls' dorms on the circle, there wasn't a soul in
sight. I took a deep breath and started along the cobblestone walk between Bradwell and
Pemberly, my heart pounding with each heavy step as I drew closer to the quad.
I didn't want to go back to Billings House. I so wasn't ready.
When I reached the far side of Bradwell, I paused and gazed across the quad at Billings, the tallest
dorm on campus. Instantly, the embers of dread burned brighter. It had been just over a week
since the Billings fund-raiser in New York City--the event that should have been the most amazing
night of my life. Instead it had been the most humiliating. It had been the night when a video of
me and Dash McCafferty getting all gropey at the Legacy had been sent out to every cell phone
and BlackBerry at school. Everyone had seen me and Dash--my best friend Noelle Lange's