Secret Society Girl (4 page)

But since we‘d already bought the tickets, and I‘d made my hair appointment, we went to prom together anyway, where despite my earlier protests, I ended up losing my virginity in Colleen Morrison‘s little sister‘s bedroom at the after-party. Glamorous, huh? Jacob and I slept together twice more before graduation and then he started Duke in the summer session. I hooked up with him on Thanksgiving Break freshman year, but we didn‘t get past second base because I was already in heavy lust with

2)
Galen Twilo. Freshman Year. Reading Week, first semester. Omigod, this guy was gorgeous!

And an artist, the kind that a scant two years later I‘d laugh at for thinking he was deep with all his black sweaters and cigarettes and dog-eared copies of
Naked Lunch
(which isn‘t half as sexy as it sounds). I spent all of Reading Week (the week without classes just before exams, when we‘re supposed to study but really just party) in his bed, where I learned all kinds of nifty facts about the male anatomy and everything I needed to rock my Twentieth Century American Poetry final. When I came back after Winter Break, though, he pretended he didn‘t know me.

3)
Alan Albertson. Summer-Fall-Winter. Sophomore Year. We met at a summer job at the Eli University Press, and he was two years older than me. We spent the whole summer together avoiding beach trips and pool parties (I don‘t swim, c.f. unfortunate dockside incident, and he burns like a crab in the sun). It was love. And then he got a Fulbright and went to London (where there aren‘t any UV rays) and broke my heart, which put me on a dark path that led directly to
4)
Ben…Somebody. Sophomore Year. Spring Break at Myrtle Beach. And that‘s all I know, except that I remember that his dick had a funny bend in the middle.

5)
Brandon Weare. Junior Year. February 14th. All girls are notoriously weak-willed on Valentine‘s Day—it‘s like some sort of cosmic alignment of the Pathetic Planet and the Couples-Everywhere-You-Look Constellation in the seventh house of Loneliness. All I know is that every February 14th, even the most independent and academically focused girl on campus can be wooed with a dozen drugstore roses and a Hallmark card.

I‘ve always been completely honest with him about the fact that I wasn‘t exactly girlfriend material (see above list if you don‘t believe me). Even on that Valentine‘s Day, somewhere between the removal of the tops and the removal of the bottoms, I told him, ―This can‘t be serious, okay?‖

And of course he said, ―Okay.‖ It doesn‘t matter how many articles of clothing you‘re still wearing. As soon as a guy thinks there‘s sex on the table, he‘ll agree to anything.

The five times I slept with him after Valentine‘s Day…well, what can I say? I‘m a pushover.

Now, at least, I knew what he‘d been getting at with all the paper airplane–throwing and origami leapfrogs he‘d been shooting my way since we‘d met sophomore year. (Geeky boys flirt in random-access ways.) Brandon has been steadily campaigning for clarification on our ―status‖

since February, and I‘ve been putting off the conversation with notably more success than I‘ve had resisting the temptations of the flesh.

Or the possibility of free crab rangoon. Forty-five minutes later, I had a belly full of pad Thai and an earful of Brandon‘s theories about how worthless the archaic tradition of the Eli secret society was to the modern meritocracy of the college, how he was quite sure that we‘d done a bang-up job of networking and such without the benefit of black robes and secret handshakes, and how he liked me just the way I was, Quill & Ink be damned. Altogether a very heady speech for an impressionable young girl, especially given how many polysyllabic words he used. Man, Brandon must have rocked his SATs. If I wasn‘t careful, tonight might be Number Seven.

It wasn‘t until after the fried bananas that he started giving me the hard sell. ―The problem with you, Haskel, is that you overanalyze everything.‖

―If you‘re looking to get laid, Weare,‖ I snapped back, ―you shouldn‘t start sentences with ‗The problem with you…‘ ‖

―Ooh, is that a possibility?‖

I threw my chopstick wrapper at him. ―What do you mean, overanalyze?‖

―I assume you‘re familiar with the definition of the word.‖ He waited for confirmation, then continued. ―You think that your life has to be a stack of bricks, and if you put down one bad brick, the whole tower will fall over.‖

That or I‘d keep stacking bricks that never became a building.

―So you agonize over every single decision, terrified that you‘re going to screw up.‖

Ha! I
had
screwed up with this whole Quill thing. And let‘s not forget Ben Somebody. I was an old hand at making mistakes. I just wasn‘t a big fan of the process.

He waved his chopstick at me, his eyes flickering darkly by the glow of the tableside tea lights, and started ticking off my supposed bricks. ―Summer internship, position on the magazine staff, commencement issue theme, secret society membership. When was the last time you did something just because it was fun?‖

―Lydia and I went dancing at Froggie‘s last weekend.‖

―Something big.‖

I raised my eyebrow. ―Something like…getting into a relationship with you?‖

―For example.‖

―Brandon, I think we have a great friendship. I don‘t want to mess it up.‖

He rolled his eyes. ―Cliché alert.‖

The waitress came by with the check. I made feeble motions toward my handbag, but Brandon shook his head and pulled out his wallet.

―I‘ll get the next one,‖ I offered, though I knew he wouldn‘t let me. Brandon did things like hold open doors and pull out chairs and pay for dinners. He also had the ability to engineer a type of smile that I knew was just for me. The Amy-smile. It was intoxicating. And I knew if I let myself fall for him, I‘d crash like a four-fold stinger.

―Look, we‘ve talked about this.‖ I slipped my arms back into my coat. ―You‘re one of my best friends, and I‘m afraid that if I get involved with you, and it doesn‘t work out, I‘ll lose that.‖

Brandon signed his name across the receipt in a frustrated scrawl. ―Amy,‖ he said slowly, not looking up. ―We
are
involved. And it‘s
not
working out.‖

―You know what I mean.‖ I ducked my head.

He sighed. ―Let‘s get out of here.‖ We stood, and headed to the door, but before we got to the pink plaster Buddha at the entrance, he turned to me and looked me square in the eye. ―Just promise me one thing. Just once in your life, just for kicks, don‘t overthink, okay? See how it goes.‖

I nodded. ―Okay.‖

Brandon walked me back to my dorm entryway, and I, in defiance of the promise I‘d just made, brainstormed ways to leave him at the door of my suite without hurting his feelings.

Which, as it turns out, was unnecessary. The door to my suite stood open, and Lydia sat on the couch inside our common room. She still wore her jacket, her lap was full of books, and she was staring fixedly at a small, square piece of paper sitting in the middle of the floor.

―Lydia?‖ I said, waving a hand in front of her face. ―Are you all right?‖

She didn‘t look up at me, didn‘t even blink, just whispered, ―It‘s yours.‖

Brandon furrowed his brow and swiped the paper off the floor. ―Sure is,‖ he said, handing me a small white envelope edged in glossy black and sealed with a dollop of dark wax. ―They must have slipped it under the door.‖

I turned the envelope over in my hands. It was made of heavy, luxurious linen paper, and my name had been printed on the front in an odd, angular font.

But it was the back that truly held my interest, for into the solid black wax was pressed the unmistakable imprint of a rose inside an elongated hexagon.

The seal of Rose & Grave.

I stuffed the envelope into my jacket pocket quicker than a jock with a cheat sheet, and then turned to my friends.

―So Quill came through after all?‖ Brandon said with a wry smile.

―Quill & Ink,‖ Lydia said in that same strange, flat voice, ―gives out blue-and-silver edged envelopes.‖

Brandon and I exchanged looks at Lydia‘s display of society obsession. ―So who gives out black ones?‖ he asked her.

Lydia‘s eyes met mine, but she said nothing, and I knew then that she‘d gotten a very good look at that seal. If she was knowledgeable about random society-stationery factoids, then she sure as hell knew what that seal meant.

I turned to Brandon. ―Thanks so much for dinner. I wish I could hang out more, but it‘s getting late, and I have a lot of work to do tonight—‖

―No way.‖ He crossed his arms over his sweatshirt and planted his feet on my parquet. ―Not until I get to see that envelope again.‖

Lydia appeared to have finally found her tongue, for she leapt to her feet and began ushering him out the door. ―The lady says she‘s busy, Weare,‖ she said, crowding up on him. ―And much as we both like you, that means out. Now.‖

―But—‖ Brandon said, looking over his shoulder at me as Lydia hustled him out. I would have spoken up about the way she was manhandling my—well, my friend-with-bennies—but my mind was too busy doing round-off back handsprings and I was caressing that wax seal in my pocket like I was Frodo and it was the One Ring.

―Good night, Brandon!‖ I called as Lydia shoved him over the threshold and shut the door in his face. ―I‘ll call you tomorrow, I promise!‖

She threw the lock and turned to me. ―Open it.‖

I drew back, protecting my pocket. ―In front of you?‖

―I‘m your best friend!‖ she argued.

I snorted. ―You‘ve been pulling a disappearing act all week! You won‘t tell me a thing about your society interview, and yet you think you get dibs on reading my letter?‖

She thought about it for a second, then nodded. ―Yes!‖

―You show me yours, I‘ll show you mine.‖ I put my hands on my hips, realizing even as I did that I was leaving the envelope wide open for pickpockets.

―Fine,‖ Lydia said, stepping back. ―Be that way. I‘ll leave you alone with your precious envelope.‖ And then she turned, walked into her room, and shut the door, leaving me blinking at her whiteboard in surprise.

That‘s not how I expected that to go at all. But I recovered a few seconds later, remembering that I still hadn‘t opened the envelope.

I spent a good long time just staring at the seal. Would it crack when I opened it? I turned the paper over and over in my hands. Yep, that was my name, and yep, that was the Rose & Grave seal. And that was still my name.

But Rose & Grave did not tap women.

What the hell was going on?

Finally, I carefully slipped my fingertips beneath the wax and popped it open in one piece. The envelope split on irregular lines, and unfolded into an odd, distorted hexagon. The words were written on the diagonal in a heavy, angular script, and this is what they said:
B. S. C.
*2
Amy Maureen Haskel:

You have been judged and found worthy. Be in your room tonight at five minutes past eight
o"clock and await further instructions.

And then beneath that was the mark of Rose & Grave.

I was being tapped by Rose & Grave!

Oh wow. Oh wow, oh wow, oh wow.
(As missives go, it wasn‘t too groundbreaking, but at the time I was over the moon.)

I ran toward Lydia‘s bedroom, then skidded to a stop. Wait a second, I wasn‘t going to tell her anything until she shared with me.

Brandon! I bet he‘d be back to his room by now. I could call—No, he‘d just finished telling me how Paleolithic he thought secret societies were, and Rose & Grave was the undisputed T-Rex of the country. They were old school and blue blood and their pedigreed members grew up to be Supreme Court Justices and CEOs and founders of major media conglomerates like AOL

Time-Warner. Male ones.

Could all of those rumors be wrong? Or worse, could this be someone‘s idea of a sick joke?

Poor little Amy Haskel, didn‘t get an election, let‘s mess with her head. Such things had been known to happen before—of course, they tended to happen to gullible freshmen who didn‘t know any better. Every few years you heard stories about college pranksters dressing up in robes, kidnapping a gaggle of frosh, and putting them through all manner of humiliations in the guise of ―initiation.‖

But really, wouldn‘t it be just as easy to fool an upper-classman? It wasn‘t as if I could ask a bunch of black-robed figures for ID when they showed up. As that Shadow-Who-Smiles guy had said to me at the interview, that‘s why they called it
secret
.

I stabbed my hands into my hair in frustration. Why was there no information session on this?

Why wasn‘t it covered in the student handbook? Why had the paranoid corner of my brain hog-tied and gagged the rational part?

Okay, Amy, think. Think.
I checked my watch, and amended my mantra.
Think quicker.
I had ten minutes before the boys in black arrived.

Should I accept? Should I accept, even if I suspected this was nothing but a mean prank—because what if this
was
Rose & Grave? And if this invitation was what it appeared to be, what would membership in the society mean to me?

I was still considering this nine and a half minutes later, when there was a knock on my door. I froze, clutching the envelope tightly in my hands and staring at the door as if it were the only thing standing between me and Armageddon.

There was another knock.

Lydia cracked her bedroom door, stuck her head out, and glanced from the entrance to me and back again. ―Gonna get that?‖

―I‘m deciding.‖

―Oh, is that what you‘re doing?‖ She quirked an eyebrow at me. ― ‘Cause you don‘t look particularly decisive.‖

Another knock, this one very insistent. Lydia rolled her eyes, crossed to the door, and opened it wide…and in they came, brushing right past a bemused Lydia and surrounding me.

I couldn‘t tell how many there were—at least, not before they swept me up in their arms and hustled me out the door, their black cloaks flapping in their wake. It was every bit as exciting as I‘d always hoped it would be. But the trip ended abruptly about ten seconds later when we entered another dark room (they really go in for dark rooms) somewhere in my building. They deposited me right-side up and backed off.