The minute Sequoia and I walk into the student union, I have to choke back the sob that rises in my throat and the tears of joy that well up in my eyes. It’s just like I always imagined. No, better than I imagined. The floor-to-ceiling windows, the massive round pendant lights hanging from the rafters, the chic blue and silver decor (to match the school colors). There’s even a rec room with a Ping-Pong table, and a store selling Windsor Academy–monogrammed everything!
Sequoia heads straight for the café along the back wall. It’s cafeteria style and she grabs a tray and slides it along the metal poles. I watch her closely, figuring my best bet is to follow her every move so I don’t mess anything up.
“Egg white and spinach frittata,” she tells the woman behind the counter.
“The same,” I say quickly, while inside my head, I’m screaming, They serve egg-white frittatas here?!
The Southwest High cafeteria only sells prepackaged muffins and stale bagels for breakfast. This is too cool.
As the woman prepares our meal, I glance around the rest of the café. They have a hot and cold cereal station with every oatmeal topping you could imagine, a toast station with like a hundred different kinds of bread and jam, a waffle station with real maple syrup and fresh berries, and even a juice station with a push-button juicing machine.
This is like eating breakfast in a five-star hotel!
The woman hands us our plates of food and Sequoia pushes her tray down to the beverage station and orders us two double cappuccinos with extra foam.
“Actually,” I tell the barista behind the counter, “I’ll have a chai tea.”
For a moment, I think Sequoia’s eyes might bug right out of her head. “You’re having tea?”
I can tell instantly that I said the wrong thing. “Uh, yeah.”
“But you always have a double cappuccino in the morning.”
I try to control my gag reflexes. Coffee? Gross! There’s no way I’m drinking that. I’ll throw up all over my beautiful uniform.
“I thought I’d try something new today,” I say, attempting to sound nonchalant.
Sequoia continues to gape at me like I’ve suddenly grown a third arm. “B-b-but,” she stammers, “how will you make it through AP chem without a cappuccino?”
Jeez, by the sound of her voice, you would think I told her I was skipping oxygen.
“I think I’ll manage,” I say confidently.
The barista delivers our drinks and I scan the café for a place to pay, but Sequoia prances off with her tray, heading into the main seating area of the student union.
Is this included with our tuition?
I follow Sequoia and watch her plop down at a table and pull her laptop out of her bag. She turns it on and begins typing furiously, taking short breaks only to shovel forkfuls of frittata into her mouth and guzzle sips of her cappuccino.
She really wastes no time getting started with the studying, does she?
“What are you doing?” Sequoia asks, glancing up at me. It’s only now I realize I’m just standing here staring at her, with my tray still in my hands.
I quickly take a seat. I guess I should get started on the studying, too. I kind of hoped I could explore the student union a little more but that would probably be weird, given that I’m supposed to have been coming here for more than three years.
With eagerness bubbling inside me, I open my bag. It’s honestly the first time I’ve even looked in here. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised when my eyes land on my very own navy blue Windsor Academy laptop, but I am.
I gasp as I pull it out and run my fingertips across the smooth surface. The school logo is stamped right into the top left corner and my name is engraved in the center. This is the coolest thing ever! I can’t stop touching it.
But I freeze when I realize Sequoia is gaping at me again. I flash a hurried smile and pretend to be wiping off a smudge. “Got it,” I say brightly.
I open the laptop and power it on, feeling my heart race faster with each passing second that it takes to boot up. I drum my fingers anxiously on the table until the desktop finally appears. Then, before I can even get a good look at the screen, I’m suddenly bombarded by a stream of notifications.
Ding!
Ding!
Ding!
Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding!
The sound is so loud, students from neighboring tables turn to stare at me. I search frantically for a mute button, but the pop-ups are coming so fast and furious, I can’t seem to do anything but sit paralyzed and watch them fill up my screen.
Read chapters 4–6 for AP history
Write paper on technology in the Civil War (20+ pages … single spaced!)
Read 50 pages of Treasure Island
Study for AP chem quiz
Are these homework assignments?
Sequoia glances at my screen and her eyes widen in panic. Her reaction instantly makes me feel better. At least I’m not the only person alarmed by this attack. It’s probably some kind of computer glitch.
But then she says, “Jeez, Crusher. What did you do last night? Watch TV?”
“Uh,” I stammer, trying my best to close the pop-up windows. But it’s like trying to play a game of Whack-a-Mole. For every notification that I close, another three pop up in its place.
“Did you not study at all?” Sequoia asks.
“Uh,” I repeat, trying to come up with a believable excuse. “I wasn’t feeling well. You know, after the whole stair-falling thing.”
Actually, now that I mention it, my head is starting to hurt again. I rub the back of my scalp. The bump is still there, although thankfully it’s getting smaller.
Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding!
Sequoia, finally losing her patience, reaches over and presses a combination of keys, silencing the beeping machine.
But the notifications keep coming. It takes me a while, but I finally manage to track them all to a program called the Windsor Achiever.
That’s right! I think with sudden realization. That’s the app I read about on the school’s website. It’s supposed to store everything I need for school.
I open the program and click through the various tabs, marveling at how impressive it is. It’s like the most robust organizational app ever.
There’s a Task tab with all of my homework assignments (twenty-two are currently marked in red as “overdue”), a Textbook tab with access to my digital textbooks, a Schedule tab that lists my classes, times, and room numbers (that will come in handy today), and even a Clubs & Activities tab that lists every extracurricular I’m currently enrolled in. And there’s a lot. Investment Club, French Club, Young Entrepreneurs Club, Model U.N., National Honor Society, National Economics Challenge (what on earth is that?), Astronomy Club, and Robotics Club?
As in like robots?
Seriously?
Other Me has been quite a busy bee.
And finally, there’s a tab at the end labeled Rankings. I curiously click on it and have to cover my mouth to block another involuntary gasp. It’s our class ranking! The entire senior class arranged in order of highest to lowest GPA.
And at the very top, with a significant lead, is my name.
A huge grin spreads across my face.
It’s almost too good to be true! Other Me did all the work and now I’m going to reap the rewards. No wonder they call her Crusher. With all of those clubs and that GPA, there’s really no other way to describe it.
I’m crushing it in this life.
“What?” Sequoia asks, obviously having noticed my ridiculous grin. She leans over to get a glimpse at my screen and lets out a harrumph. “Please don’t remind me. Stupid French midterm. Stupid Steven Lamar.”
I see her lip start to quiver again and I quickly angle the screen away.
“Don’t ask me how he pulled that 98 percent out of nowhere,” Sequoia goes on, seemingly holding herself together. “I have theories but I won’t sink that low.”
I skim the list, seeing Sequoia Farris ranked at number 6. I scroll to the bottom but stop when I notice that there are only ninety-nine names listed.
I could have sworn each class at Windsor had one hundred students. Didn’t Dean Lewis tell me just yesterday that there are one hundred spots in the senior class and they were all taken? That’s why I couldn’t enroll. Because no one ever drops out. There’s rarely ever an open spot at Windsor.
So why are there only ninety-nine names here?
I’m about to ask Sequoia this very question when she leans over again and points to the little red 22 hovering over my Task tab. “You better get cracking on that if you want to keep that number-one spot.”
I blink out of what feels like a trance. She’s right. I really should stop futzing around with this awesome app and get to work. I click on the Task view and scroll through the long list of overdue assignments. It seems to go on forever.
There’s no way I can do all of these things before first period starts in—I click the Schedule tab—an hour! It’s virtually impossible. Hermione Granger with her Time Turner couldn’t even finish this in time.
Relax. Deep breaths. In. Out. In. Out.
I just have to take it one thing at a time. I quickly scan the list of tasks. A few reading assignments, a few papers to write, a calculus problem set to finish, a chemistry quiz to study for. And what are these weird tasks?
EN-1118-DQ
CH-1121-MD
FR-1122-AK
What do they even mean? They’re obviously written in some kind of shorthand that Other Me uses to save time, but to me, it’s like an alien language. How can I do the assignment if I don’t know what the assignment is? And it’s not like I can ask Sequoia. She already thinks I left my mind on the steps of Royce Hall.
Well, I’m sure I’ll figure it out as soon as I get to one of my classes and the teacher is like, “Okay, everyone turn in your EN-1118-DQs!” For now, I’m going to have to skip it.
I continue scanning the list, looking for something to tackle that seems relatively simple, but I’m interrupted by a shrill voice coming from behind me. “Oh my gosh! Crusher! Are you okay? I heard what happened yesterday. I was so worried!”
I turn around to see a short girl with a cute blond bob and a headband. She’s holding a paper coffee cup and staring at me wide-eyed like I’m a newly unveiled exhibit at the museum.
“She’s fine,” Sequoia answers for me, sounding a little protective. “Just a small bump to the head. Nothing to concern yourself with.”
The girl exhales dramatically. I don’t even know her but I can tell it’s fake. “Thank goodness. I thought maybe you had brain damage or something.”
Is it just my imagination or did she sound a bit hopeful when she said that?
I glance out of the corner of my eye just in time to see Sequoia roll her eyes. “Her brain is fine. And she’s still number one in the class so…”
She lets this hang in the air, along with a thick awkwardness that makes me squirm.
“Okay, good,” the girl says with another overly theatrical sigh. “After what happened to Lucinda, I couldn’t bear to think…” But then she looks at Sequoia and her voice trails off.
I follow her gaze, noticing the tears brimming in Sequoia’s eyes. And her lips are pressed so tightly together they seem to disappear completely.
“Well,” the girl chirps, sounding anxious. “I gotta go. See you in chem!”
She scurries away and I glance back at Sequoia, wondering if I should scoot my chair over and comfort her. But then, a moment later, she sniffles and goes back to work, that switch flicking just as suddenly as it did in the parking lot.
“God,” she says, typing into her laptop. “She is such a vulture. One mention of you falling down the stairs and she’s already planning her valedictorian speech.”
I stutter out a laugh. But that’s not the part of the conversation that’s bothering me. There’s something else going on around here. Something people aren’t talking about. And it’s not my bump to the head.
“After what happened to Lucinda, I couldn’t bear to think…”
Lucinda …
Who is Lucinda?
Making sure Sequoia is fully engaged in her work, I pull my phone out of my bag and click on the SnipPic app. I scroll back to the picture I saw last night—the one where we’re doing those over-the-top swooning poses, pretending our book boyfriends had just proposed. It was taken at this very table. Except it had three people in it. Sequoia, me, and Luce_the_Goose.
Luce_the_Goose.
Luce …
Lucinda …
A chill runs up my spine. What happened to this person? Why isn’t she here? And why does Sequoia react so strangely every time someone mentions her?
I check the time stamp of the picture of the three of us. It was taken on November 9. Exactly one week ago. I scroll down, scrutinizing the photos that were posted before that. The smiling, short-haired Lucinda is in almost all of them. I scroll back up, studying the photos taken after November 9.
Lucinda is not in any of them.
It’s like she simply disappeared.