The Swallows E-Book

Lisa Lutz

• Herausgeber: Titan Books
• Kategorie: Krimi
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2019

Beschreibung

A blistering, timely tale of revenge from the bestselling author of The PassengerGIRLS WILL BE GIRLSWhat do you love? What do you hate? What do you want?It starts with this simple writing prompt from Alex Witt to her students at Stonebridge Academy. When their answers raise disturbing questions of their own, Ms. Witt knows there's more going on at the school than anyone will admit. She finds the few girls who've started to question the school's 'boys will be boys' attitude and incites a resistance that quickly becomes a movement. As the school's secrets begin to trickle out, the skirmish turns into an all-out war, with deeply personal – and potentially fatal – consequences for everyone involved.

Leseprobe

Contents

Cover

Also By Lisa Lutz and Available from Titan Books

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Part I: In The Dark

Ms. Witt

Gemma Russo

Mr. Ford

Announcements

Ms. Witt

Norman Crowley

Gemma Russo

Ms. Witt

Norman Crowley

Ms. Witt

Gemma Russo

Announcements

Ms. Witt

Mr. Ford

Ms. Witt

Gemma Russo

Ms. Witt

Gemma Russo

Norman Crowley

Mr. Ford

Ms. Witt

Gemma Russo

Ms. Witt

Gemma Russo

Part II: Allies

Announcements

Ms. Witt

Norman Crowley

Gemma Russo

Mr. Ford

Ms. Witt

Norman Crowley

Gemma Russo

Ms. Witt

Mr. Ford

Ms. Witt

Gemma Russo

Ms. Witt

Gemma Russo

Announcements

Gemma Russo

Ms. Witt

Norman Crowley

Ms. Witt

Gemma Russo

Mr. Ford

Ms. Witt

Gemma Russo

Ms. Witt

Gemma Russo

Norman Crowley

Announcements

Ms. Witt

Gemma Russo

Ms. Witt

Mr. Ford

Announcements

Ms. Witt

Norman Crowley

Ms. Witt

Gemma Russo

Part III: The Army

Ms. Witt

Gemma Russo

Norman Crowley

Ms. Witt

Gemma Russo

Ms. Witt

Gemma Russo

Mr. Ford

Norman Crowley

Ms. Witt

Gemma Russo

Norman Crowley

Gemma Russo

Ms. Witt

Part IV: The War

Gemma Russo

Norman Crowley

Mr. Ford

Gemma Russo

Ms. Witt

Norman Crowley

Announcements

Gemma Russo

Norman Crowley

Ms. Witt

Mr. Ford

Norman Crowley

Ms. Witt

Gemma Russo

Ms. Witt

Norman Crowley

Gemma Russo

Norman Crowley

Gemma Russo

Mr. Ford

Gemma Russo

Ms. Witt

Gemma Russo

Norman Crowley

Ms. Witt

Gemma Russo

Ms. Witt

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Also Available from Titan Books

Website

“Suspenseful and funny and utterly riveting! I devoured The Swallows in one delighted gulp. You’ll laugh out loud, even as you anxiously flip the pages”

TESS GERRITSEN, NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING AUTHOR

“In her witty and charming style, Lutz offers a genre-busting work of fiction…this novel keeps readers on the edge of their seats”

BOOKLIST, STARRED REVIEW

“An offbeat, darkly witty pre-#MeToo revenge tale”

KIRKUS

“Wes Anderson meets Muriel Spark in this delicious and vicious Battle of the Sexes set within a private school. Wickedly fun and wildly subversive but packing an emotional punch, The Swallows is as powerful as it is timely”

MEGAN ABBOTT, BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF DARE ME AND GIVE ME YOUR HAND

“[Lutz] takes no prisoners”

PUBLISHERS WEEKLY

PRAISE FOR THE AUTHOR

“Told with enormous verve and at a breakneck pace, the story twists and turns like a corkscrew”

DAILY MAIL

“[Lutz] steps smartly out of her comfort zone to write a dead-serious thriller (with a funny bone)”

MARILYN STASIO, THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW

“Binge-worthy fare, especially for those drawn to strong female protagonists”

BOOKLIST, STARRED REVIEW

“This tenacious and resourceful heroine will keep you chasing, rooting, lip-biting, and above all reading until you reach the ending you never saw coming. My advice: buckle up”

TIM JOHNSTON, NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF DESCENT

“A sharp, clever, and utterly compelling thriller about a woman running from the mistakes and misfortunes of her past. Terrific”

CHRIS PAVONE, NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF THE EXPATS AND THE ACCIDENT

“With whip-smart writing and a breakneck pace, The Passenger’s clever plot twists and sharp characters are sure to keep you guessing long into the night”

KIM McCREIGHT, NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF RECONSTRUCTING AMELIA

THE SWALLOWS

ALSO BY LISA LUTZ

AND AVAILABLE FROM TITAN BOOKS

The Passenger

THE SWALLOWS

LISA LUTZ

TITAN BOOKS

The Swallows

Print edition ISBN: 9781785656279

E-book edition ISBN: 9781785656286

Published by Titan Books

A division of Titan Publishing Group Ltd

144 Southwark Street, London SE1 0UP

www.titanbooks.com

First Titan edition: September 2019

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Names, places and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead (except for satirical purposes), is entirely coincidental.

© 2019 Lisa Lutz. All Rights Reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

FOR ANASTASIA FULLER

PART I

IN THE DARK

Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.

WINSTON CHURCHILL

MS. WITT

Some teachers have a calling. I’m not one of them.

I don’t hate teaching. I don’t love it either. That’s also my general stance on adolescents. I understand that one day they’ll rule the world and we’ll all have to live with the consequences. But there’s only so much I’m willing to do to mitigate that outcome. You’ll never catch me leaping atop my desk, quoting Browning, Shakespeare, or Jay-Z. I don’t offer my students sage advice or hard-won wisdom. I don’t dive into the weeds of their personal lives, parsing the muck of their hormone-addled brains. And I sure as hell never learned as much from them as they did from me.

It’s just a job, like any other. It has a litany of downsides, starting with money and ending with money, and a host of other drawbacks in between. There are a few perks. I like having summers off; I like winter and spring breaks; I like not having a boss breathing over my shoulder; I like books and talking about books and occasionally meeting a student who makes me see the world sideways. But I don’t get attached. I don’t get involved. That was the plan, at least.

I came to Stonebridge Academy because it was the only place where I was sure of a no-questions-asked job offer. The dean of students, Gregory Stinson, is an old family friend. I don’t know if he offered me the job knowing everything or nothing. Back then, Greg never spoke of unpleasant things.

Why I wanted to give it another go is beyond me. It’s not like I thought of teaching as my life’s work. I doubt I’ll ever have that. Maybe I just wanted to wrap up my career in education with a memory that didn’t make my skin crawl.

It was July 2009 when I first laid eyes on the campus. During my preliminary visit, Greg and I hammered out my contract in his musty old office, which overlooked fifty acres of dense woods. Under the thick brush of summer, I couldn’t see the veins and arteries of the interconnected hiking and cross-country-skiing trails that Stonebridge boasted of so proudly in its brochure. It seemed like too much space for four hundred or so high school students. Despite the classic prep school architecture—cathedral buildings, everything stone—I had heard rumors about the lax academic environment. Warren Prep kids had called Stonebridge students “Stoners.” I considered that detail its most attractive quality.

Greg was sure I was perfect for the libertarian style of his school, and his certainty compensated for my hesitation. We discussed my course schedule for the new year. I would teach three English literature classes and one American lit.

After that, Greg took me on a brief tour of the campus. His office and several classrooms were housed in an imposing stone structure that had no formal name. Later, I learned that the students called it Headquarters. It was the only building on campus without a literary appellation. You know the game where you take your first pet’s name and add the street you grew up on and, voilà, there’s your porn name? I think Stonebridge used a similar formula for naming their buildings and recreational grounds. Take the last name of a British (or occasionally Irish) poet or author and add House, Manor, Hall, Field, Commons, or Square to it. The center of campus was Fleming Square; students ate in Dahl Dining Hall; Tolkien Library and Samuel Beckett Gymnasium flanked Fielding Field.

Across from Headquarters, adjacent to Beckett Gym, was the headliner of the tour: the Oscar Wilde Bathhouse. We passed through double doors with a sign that read NO STUDENTS ALLOWED, NO EXCEPTIONS. The marble compound, which housed a whirlpool tub, sauna, and steam showers, was apparently an extravagant gift from a former student.

“If this doesn’t seal the deal, I don’t know what will,” Greg said.

I had a feeling that Greg was using the bathhouse as camouflage. I suggested he show me faculty housing.

In silence, Greg led me across the square to a four-story brick building. There was a heavy drizzle outside, which made everything look like it was on the other side of a cheap, transparent shower curtain. We strolled past Dickens House, the boys’ dormitory. And, yes, they called it Dick House. Next to Dickens was a similar four-story brick structure. The sign above the door read WOOLF HALL.

“Yes. After you,” Greg said, opening the thick paneled door.

“No thanks,” I said, taking a step back.

There was no point in entering the building. I would not live among them. That was a deal breaker, I explained. I thanked Greg for the tour and told him I had to be on my way. He told me I was being rash. I had driven two hours; the least I could do was take some time to think it over.

Greg gave me a hand-rendered map of the school grounds, which I think he drew himself. Either way, it was not beholden to any concept of scale or structural accuracy.

Greg walked me to the edge of Fielding Field and suggested I take some more time before I made a final decision. I come back to that moment again and again. So many lives would have taken a different course had I not gone for a walk in the woods. That walk changed everything.

From Fleming Square I followed George Eliot Trail past Evelyn Waugh Way, and continued for about a quarter mile, until I came upon a tiny stone cottage. It was at least ten minutes’ walk from Fleming Square and, at that time of year, surrounded by vibrant wildflowers. Cedar, pine, and maple trees towered over everything. A pond nearby rippled under the drizzle. It sounded so much better than that machine I’d bought to help me sleep.

The perfection of it all I now see as a trick, not of nature but of my own mind. I needed a sign, even a wink, from the universe to believe that I was making the right decision. I ignored the fact that the foundation was cracked and some of those stones resembled Jenga pieces. When I looked for the cottage on the map, it wasn’t there.

For someone looking for a place to hide, that was as good a sign as any.

I returned to Greg’s office and told him I would take the job if I could live in the cabin with no name. He said the place wasn’t habitable. He mentioned the absence of a shower. I reminded him of the bathhouse. He continued to resist. I told him those were my terms, take it or leave it. Greg reluctantly agreed.

*   *   *

I returned to campus on Labor Day, after dark. Classes were to begin the next morning. I picked up the key to the cottage from the guard at the security gate and followed the blue ink on my annotated map. A muddy fire lane took me just shy of twenty yards from my new front door.

Inside the cabin, I stood on the cold stone floor and wondered what the hell I was thinking. I was struck by a fresh memory of the perils of dorm life and forced myself to feel at home. I wiped down the cabinets above the kitchen sink, which contained a sparse collection of dishware and an unopened bottle of bourbon. I pulled the bottle from the shelf and noticed a small square of folded paper attached to the neck. I unfolded the paper and read the note written in small block letters.

WELCOME TO STONEBRIDGE. BE CAREFUL.

I sat outside on a rickety chair and considered the message. Was it a warning or just a piece of advice? I drank half the bottle as I tried to decide. Then I crawled into bed and fell asleep.

The next morning, regretting the booze, I washed up in the kitchen sink, mourned the absence of coffee, and dressed in the first shirt and pair of jeans I could find.

I stumbled through the woods to Headquarters and entered Agatha Christie Admin (aka AA). Ms. Pinsky, the school secretary, handed me an envelope that contained my class schedule for the semester.

WITT, ALEX (FALL 2009)

Instructor Schedule

PERIOD

COURSE

ROOM

1. 8:00– 9:10 a.m.

CRWA400– Advanced Creative Writing

203

2. 9:20– 10:30 a.m.

CRW100– Creative Writing, Elective

203

3. 10:40– 11:50 a.m.

PHYSED501– Fencing, Intro

GYM

(no number)

12:00– 1:00 p.m.

Lunch

4. 1:00– 2:10 p.m.

Office Hours

5. 2:20– 3:30 p.m.

CRWAW410– Advanced Creative Writing Workshop

203

After I reviewed my schedule and noticed the bait and switch, I asked Ms. Pinsky if Dean Stinson was in his office.

“End of hall. On the left,” she said.

I stormed in hot. I shouted some things, including fraud and liar. Greg had a student with him, whom he quickly dispatched. I waved my class schedule in the air and then smacked it down on his desk.

“I teach English. Not creative writing. We had a deal,” I said.

I braced myself for a fight. Instead, Greg sat down in his chair and deflated. I swear, he lost four inches with a single sigh.

“Oh my,” he said, cradling his head in his hands. “My apologies, Alex. Len said that you wouldn’t mind the schedule change. I tried to reach you repeatedly. Len said you were at the monastery.”

“You spoke to Dad?”

“I did. Len insisted that if I simply presented you with a new schedule, you wouldn’t notice the difference.”

That trick worked once, maybe twice, when I was fifteen and smoked a lot of weed. I was stunned my father had the balls to provide tactical advice against his own daughter, and lousy advice at that. I sat down in one of the well-worn chairs across from Greg’s desk.

“You can’t change my schedule because my father told you it was okay,” I said.

Greg scrunched up his forehead like a shar-pei. Then he leaned back in his chair and crossed his long legs. I could tell he was settling in for a lengthy negotiation.

“I should not have listened to your dad, but I am in a terrible bind.”

“What happened to your previous writing teacher? Did he die?”

“No, no. Of course not. He is still on the faculty and I’m sure he’d honor our old agreement, if need be. However, he is currently working on a novel and feels that teaching writing at this time is stifling to his art.”

I liked the dead version of him better.

I wasn’t going to do any favors for an unpublished hack who thought of himself as Van Gogh with a laptop.

“I know this is all last minute. And I deeply apologize. But I need you to be flexible here, Alex. In fact, if you do this for me, we can forget about fencing.”

“I already told you I don’t fence. You can’t expect me to teach something that I don’t know how to do.”

“Okay,” Greg said. “Fencing is off the table.”

“It was never on the table,” I said. “Back to writing. I’ve never taught creative writing before. And I already prepared my literature curricula.”

“According to Len, you don’t really need a lesson plan.”

“If you mention my dad one more time—”

“Okay. Okay,” Greg said, with just the right dose of panic in his voice. “If you agree to the switch, you are released from any supervisory responsibilities.”

One of the worst things about private school employment was the boundless chaperoning responsibility tacked on to a full teaching schedule. I was unlikely to get a better deal.

*   *   *

I entered my class, Headquarters room 203, without a word about my tardiness. I wasn’t going to start the year in their debt. This time, I would not let down my guard. This time would be different.

As I gazed at my students, I had the same thought I always had on the first day. They looked so young and innocent. Then I found a dead rat in the bottom of my desk drawer and remembered the tenet I had learned over the last eight years. The young may have a better excuse for cruelty, but they are no less capable of it.

For someone looking for omens, it’s odd how many exit signs I chose to ignore.

If a century of tradition were the only thing my time at Stonebridge brought to an end, I’d be okay with that. It’s the two deaths that keep me up at night.

GEMMA RUSSO

I remember everything about that first day.

Ms. Witt showed up for class fifteen minutes late. She had on a pair of old Levi’s, a wrinkled light-blue button-down oxford shirt under a threadbare gray cardigan. She wore mud-splattered red Jack Purcell high-tops. Her straight brown hair hung loose and tangled, like she’d just rolled out of bed. She looked like she didn’t care about anything. She was definitely pretty, but she wouldn’t cause any traffic accidents. Her features were all kind of standard. From a distance, she was just another white woman with long brown hair. But, up close, you could see her wide brown eyes tracking everything. And when she flashed a smile, I saw her twisted tooth. It made her look dangerous or something. I liked her right away.

But when she found the dead rat, that’s when I knew she was special.

I’d heard that morning about Gabe’s planned prank. He was so stinking proud of himself, everyone knew. When Witt opened her desk drawer, she gave up nothing, like a gangster. She squinted, at first, like she wasn’t sure what she was looking at. Then there was the recognition, an eyebrow raise. Not even a millisecond of fear. The rodent was contained in a Ziploc bag, which Witt removed from the drawer and held from the corner edge.

“Is Ratatouille, may he rest in peace, property of the biology department or nature?” Ms. Witt asked.

Her eyes scanned the classroom, waiting for a response.

“We dissect mice, not rats, here,” said Bethany Wiseman.

“Thank you,” Witt said.

Gabriel Smythe was being a total spaz. His attempts to tamp down his laughter made it look like he was having a seizure. Witt lasered in on him.

“You, with the tie around your head, what’s your name?”

“Uh, uh, Cornelius . . . Web-ber . . . Mc . . . Allister,” Gabe said.

Gabe’s fake names are always unfunny because he takes so damn long to come up with them.

Witt dropped the dead rat on Gabe’s desk and said, “Please take this creature to his final resting place.”

“You want me to bury him?” Gabe said.

Gabe was totally freaking out by then. His face was bright red, his zits even redder. The class was dead silent.

“Well, he’s not going to bury himself,” Witt said.

Jonah let out a guffaw. I saw a slight smirk on Witt’s face.

“Chop chop,” said Witt.

Gabe quickly stood up and took the bagged rat out of the classroom. Then Ms. Witt returned to her desk and completely ignored us, as if nothing had happened.

My phone buzzed with a group text from the Ten.

Mick: Holy fuck. What was that?

Adam: That was kinda hot, right?

Tegan: Damn she cold

Rachel: What is she wearing?

Hannah: Weirdo

Mick: Def hot

Tegan: moths r obv drawn 2 her

Emelia: pretty, needs blush

Hannah: needs more than blush

Jonah: I think I’m in love

Mick: u r freak Jonah. Wish I could see her ass in those jeans

Jack: gd mouth

Rachel: sm mouth. Think it could hold your entire dick?

Hannah: OMG. Can u see that snaggletooth? Bitch could cut you

Emelia: 2 early in the day 2 think about Jack getting blown

Jack: never 2 early

Jonah: I like her teeth

The Ten refers to the top ten percent, give or take, of each class, which generally works out to around ten students. No one’s a Nazi about the precise number except Mick Devlin, who really likes it to be exactly ten. The tier has nothing to do with academic credentials; it’s a pure social hierarchy. Members come and go depending on a voting system that is so nebulous, I wouldn’t be surprised if there were some preppy wizard from years past pulling the strings somewhere.

This is the current roster of the senior Ten, in no particular order, along with their primary role in the organization:

Emelia Laird—hot girl you can bring home to Mom

Tegan Brooks—girl goon, gatekeeper

Hannah Rexall—dancer, humblebrag virtuoso

Rachel Rose—hot girl you don’t bring home to Mom

Jack Vandenberg—he who provides alcohol, enforcer

Adam Westlake—spokesperson, man about town

Mick Devlin—dandy, editor in chief

Jonah Wagman—jock, nice guy

Gabriel Smythe—court jester, suck-up, moron

Me—she who does not belong in this picture

None of the Ten mentioned Witt’s father. It was unlike them not to run a background check on fresh meat. As soon as Dean Stinson dropped her name, I did my research. I decided to keep that information to myself. But I had to chime in to the chatter to reinforce my shaky position in this ridiculous club.

Gemma: I want to be her when I grow up.

*   *   *

Ms. Witt didn’t say anything until Gabe returned to class. His shoes were muddy and there was a stripe of dirt on his shirt.

“It’s done,” Gabe said. “He’s interred behind the greenhouse. I gave him a eulogy and all. Would you like to hear it?”

Gabe glanced over his shoulder at the class, waiting for a few laughs or any nonverbal sign of encouragement.

“No,” Witt said. “We weren’t close.”

“Well, he’s in a better place now,” Gabe said, still trying to dig out of the ditch of submission in which he’d found himself.

“Take a seat, Cornelius,” Witt said. “I think we’ll start class.”

Witt wrote her name on the board.

“This is apparently advanced creative writing. I am Alex Witt. Address me however it is done here. Alex or Ms. Witt. Whatever. I just found out this morning that I’m teaching this seminar, so don’t expect a thoughtful syllabus at this point.”

Carl Bloom’s hand shot up, angled forward, like a Hitler salute. I’ve always meant to caution him about it. Never got around to it last year. Maybe this year. Carl has the unfortunate distinction of walking and talking like a nerd and yet struggling in every one of his classes.

“Ms. Witt,” he shouted. “Why isn’t Mr. Ford teaching creative writing anymore?”

Witt glanced up at Carl and then jotted something down in her notebook.

“That’s a great question. You should ask him. Over and over again,” she said.

As Witt scribbled some more, paying no attention to us, half-assed whispers circulated the latest information on Ford. Mel Eastman, who always knows the most while seeming to gossip the least, informed us all that Ford had taken over Ms. Whitehall’s core curriculum.

“What happened to Ms. Whitehall?” Ephraim Wiener asked Mel. “Did she die?”

“Not unless you killed her,” Mel muttered below his earshot.

I think Ephraim Wiener would have preferred that. Then he could finally stop pining for Whitehall. Boys are like that. They’d rather you die than reject them.

Mick Devlin stood up from his seat in the back row and ambled up the aisle with that lame half-gangster lean/limp he’d adopted late last year. When Devlin reached Witt’s desk, he extended his hand like one of those stock Wall Street–movie douchebags and formally introduced himself.

“Mick Devlin, Madame Witt. At your service.”

“Mick Devlin?” she said. “I’m going to remember that.”

Most people call him Devlin. Some girls call him “the devil,” and some mean it in that captivating bad-boy way. I don’t. Devlin’s eyes landed on Witt with generic lust, but his half smile, so boyish and goofy, balanced him out. Tegan once pointed out that the top and bottom of Mick Devlin’s face should have belonged to two different individuals. She demonstrated with his school photo and a pair of scissors, cutting his face in half just above the nostrils.

“See,” she said. “They don’t belong together.”

It was true. If you looked at him divided, neither part was particularly appealing. But I don’t see what the other girls see when they look at Mick. Emelia thinks it’s his eyes that give him power. From what I’ve heard, it’s his giant penis.

What also gives Mick power is his role as editor in chief. Every male member of the Ten is called an editor. It’s so stupid, I’m not even sure how to explain it. They don’t edit the school newspaper or a magazine. They manage an exclusive website that only select Stonebridge boys can see. It’s called the Darkroom. Suffice it to say, there’s not a whole lot of “editing” going on.

Witt tilted her head at Mick’s hand, looking confused or suspicious. Eventually she took it, but I could see he held on too long, like he does. Witt gave him a withering glance and he quickly let go.

“How old are you?” Jack Vandenberg said in that frog-deep voice of his.

Witt’s eyes narrowed as she determined the identity of the questioner. Jack, the biggest man on campus, is often mistaken for a teacher by the freshmen. Of course, he likes the tiniest girls. He won’t even look at a junior or a senior . . . with one exception. He likes the little bric-a-brac girls—small-boned, flat-chested. I have a theory that Jack is an undetected pedophile. In ten years, he’ll still want the same kind of girl. If you’re eighteen and date a fifteen-year-old (who looks thirteen), you can slide under the perv radar. But later he won’t have the age or discipline to hide his sickness.

“Name, please?” Witt said, annoyed.

“Jack. Vandenberg.”

Witt consulted the attendance sheet, nodded, and then cast her eyes on the rest of the class.

“I’m not going to take roll. There are nineteen students on the attendance sheet and nineteen in the class. I need a seating chart to learn your names.”

“I can do that for you,” offered Sandra Polonsky.

That’s Sandra’s thing, acting like everyone’s valet. One time, I sat next to her at lunch and told her to quit being so goddamn submissive. She thanked me for my advice and then bused my tray.

“No thank you,” said Witt. “And you are?”

“Polonsky. Sandra Polonsky.”

That was also her thing, saying her name like she’s James Bond.

Witt drew on the whiteboard a four-by-five grid so uneven that it suggested a neurological disorder. Witt regarded the grid, tilting her head like she hoped that would square it. She picked up the dry eraser and began vigorously deleting her crooked lines.

“Just be grateful I don’t teach geometry,” she said.

Some of the nerds started shouting their names. Witt winced and said, “Shhhh.”

“What was that on the board?” Adam Westlake said in his sweet, harmless voice.

“The aforementioned seating chart,” Witt said, taking a step back and regarding her work.

Adam approached the front of the classroom as the new teach finished wiping the board clean, and he picked up another dry-erase pen.

“Do you mind?” Adam said, uncapping the pen. “I have a steady hand.”

Then he flashed his dimples, which works every time.

“By all means,” Witt said, stepping aside. “For the first week or until I learn who ninety or so percent of you are, I need you to sit in the same seat. I learn better visually. So sit wherever you like, and then write your full name down on the corresponding chair.”

She turned around as Adam completed an almost perfect grid, as if he’d sketched it with a ruler the size of a human.

“Well done, um . . .” she said with a question mark at the end.

“Westlake. Adam Westlake.”

Maybe everyone introduces themselves like James Bond.

Witt pointed to the top and then the bottom of the board and said, “This is the front row, and this is the back row. Write down where you plan to sit for the next few weeks until I know who you are. Sort this out while I get a cup of coffee.”

Witt picked up her bag and headed for the door. A few of the front-row obsessives charged the board to claim their real estate. Witt lingered at the door.

“I want to be clear on something,” she said. “I’m going to learn the name that corresponds to the board. And I’m going to grade that name. If you get up to any nom-de-plume shenanigans—and I’m talking to you, Cornelius—I’m cool with that, but you better be prepared to live and breathe under your assumed name. You can never go back.”

When Ms. Witt walked out of the room, I felt as if she had taken all of the oxygen with her. I knew then that things were going to change.

Ms. Witt was my friend, my ally, my confidante. She charmed, teased, amused, incited, and befriended us.

Alexandra Witt was the pied piper of Stonebridge Academy.

MR. FORD

The first time I saw Alex Witt, I thought she was a student out of uniform. I would have paid good money to see her in uniform.

She walked into the teachers’ lounge looking lost. I asked her if she needed any help. She said yes, she was searching for coffee. I pointed her in the right direction. She got up close to the coffeepot and was watching the drip, like a kid staring at her pet goldfish. I thought maybe she didn’t know that it was the kind of carafe that you could pull out and pour as it brewed. That’s how all of them are now; how could she not know that? Finally, she removed the decanter and poured herself a mug. She took a sip and scowled. She held on to the sink for balance and looked down at the drain.

Then I realized who she was. There was only one new hire that year. It was odd that she didn’t introduce herself. Women always do that.

“Hi. I’m Finn Ford,” I said.

She put down her mug and glared.

“You. You. You’re the one.”

She started pointing at me, angry. I said I was sorry. I wasn’t clear what I was sorry for. But I have a policy to always apologize to women. She was going on about all of the lesson plans she had pored over for the lit classes she thought she would teach.

“Dean Stinson said you were cool with the change,” I said.

“Did he, now?” she said.

She was so pissed off I wouldn’t have been surprised if she pulled out a switchblade and held it against my jugular.

“I’m really sorry,” I said.

“I reread Moby-Dick,” she said. “I can’t get that time back.”

I loved Moby-Dick and asked her what she would change. She said she would have had Ishmael shove Ahab overboard around page 200.

“And then what?” I asked.

“Who gives a shit?” she said. “Finn Ford. Why does your name sound so familiar?”

“Because I’m the asshole who inadvertently made you read Moby-Dick for nothing.”

“Moby-Dick for Nothing,” she said, smiling. “Now, that book I wouldn’t mind reading.”

I liked her then. I thought she was crazy. But I liked her. She was stuck on my name. Fuck. I tried to get her off topic. She seemed easily distracted. I like that in a woman.

“I heard you staked your claim to the Thoreau Cabin,” I said.

“What? No. It has no name. Besides, that’s the wrong name, if it has a name. Everything on campus is named after writers from the British Isles. It’s bullshit if you throw in one or two American names, just out of convenience. Besides, it’s not on the map.”

“That’s what we call it,” I said. “There’s a pond nearby. We have a name for that too. And if you want to talk about boring books—”

“Why is this coffee so bad?” she said, as she took another sip.

“Because it’s bad coffee,” I said.

“Your name. I know that name. It’s going to drive me crazy,” Alex said.

“Are you really planning on living in the Thoreau Cabin the entire year?”

“Stop calling it that! I’ve been there one night. I wouldn’t put the address on my tax return.”

“I think it’s safe to say that place doesn’t have an address.”

“Finn Ford, Finn Ford. You wrote a book, right?”

“I did.”

“I think I read one of your books,” she said.

I told her it was physically impossible to read more than one. She asked me to remind her what the title was.

Tethered.

She made a different face, reminiscent of my editor’s. I have a visceral memory of our fight to the death over the title. It feels like a migraine in my solar plexus.

I was pleased she’d read it, even if it did slip her mind.

“Tethered. Yes. I think I liked it. Oh yes. I remember now. The ornithologist was weird. But I hate birds.

“Can I have that banana?” Witt asked.

There was a banana sitting in the middle of the table.

It wasn’t my banana. It was probably Martha Primm’s, and she would have been pissed, but I told Alex she could have it. She devoured the banana in four impressive bites. She didn’t do that thing women do where they cover their mouth while chewing.

She tossed the banana peel in the trash and said, “Give me the lowdown.”

I asked on what. She wanted to know the social hierarchy at Stonebridge, the predators and prey. This woman really got to the point. I was curious how that characteristic translated in the bedroom.

I considered her question. Some days it seemed like they were all predators. The image of the serpent eating its own tail came to mind. I told her she’d have to figure that out on her own. I felt proprietary all of a sudden. The inner workings of this academy had taken me years to dissect. I wasn’t going to give it up for nothing.

Witt took another sip of coffee and winced. I admired her commitment to caffeine. She asked me what I was working on now. I told her I was working on a novel about a guy trying to assassinate a whale who ate his leg. She laughed. Then she asked if I was a Phineas or a Finn. I told her I was just Finn. She asked if I had a middle name. “No,” I said.

Finn Ford makes me sound like enough of an asshole. Witt looked like the kind of woman who wouldn’t give a Phineas Finn Ford the time of day.

“Okay,” she said, smiling. There was something about her mouth that turned me on. I wanted to lick her snaggletooth.

She asked me when I decided that teaching writing was derailing my writing. I wanted to kiss her, partly so she’d stop asking questions. I told her I’d decided at the end of last year. I suggested that maybe the dean forgot.

She topped off her coffee and headed for the door.

“If you don’t want to answer a question, I’m cool with that. But don’t lie to me. You’re really bad at it,” she said.

ANNOUNCEMENTS

Good morning, students of Stone. This is your old friend Wainwright back for another year of enlightenment, education, and entertainment. The three E’s, if you will. It’s a sunny seventy-two degrees on this eighth day of September, 2009.

Today’s lunch menu is a choice between a tuna and kale casserole and falafel for the vegetarians. If that menu doesn’t turn you vegetarian, I don’t know what will. What was that?

[inaudible]

Since it’s the first day, I’ll keep my announcements brief. But before I go, let’s welcome the new creative-writing and fencing instructor, Ms. Alexandra Witt.

[inaudible]

Ah, really? Scratch that. Only independent-study fencing. How does that work? I sure hope there’s more than one person enrolled.

This is Wainwright signing off until we meet again. Which will be tomorrow.

MS. WITT

I was hunting through the desk drawers for a dry-erase pen when I found the dead rat. I didn’t jump, because I didn’t know what it was. I’d drunk way too much of that warning bourbon the night before and I needed coffee. After I registered that a dead rodent was in my desk drawer, it took all of my energy to remain calm. The prank was a power play. If I gave it up on the first day of school, I’d never get it back.

I may have looked ice-cold on the outside, but it felt like my entire body was in revolt. When I tried to draw a grid on the board, my hands shook uncontrollably. A boy offered to help. That’s when I left. I needed a moment to regroup, alone. Away from them.

*   *   *

When I returned to the classroom, a gravelly male voice was droning on the PA system. I thought he said my name, but there was no reaction among the students. They just kept staring at their laps, tapping away.

I opened my notebook and copied down the seating chart, making a few annotations on the ones who’d already made an impression.

Three girls huddled together in the corner, trying to pretend that class wasn’t in session. They were like the three bears, in cascading order of size. The tall one wore combat boots and had brown hair streaked with blond and blue stripes. She was attractive, but her heavy eye makeup and rainbow hair only distracted from it, which I assumed was the point. The second-tallest girl was her opposite, classically beautiful without any adornment. Her shiny brown hair hung just above her waist. She wore only a dab of lip gloss. Her eyes were dark as coal and her cheekbones jutted out like a paper airplane. The small one appeared almost malnourished next to the other two. In my notebook, I jotted down my first impression of the trio: rebel, beauty, wallflower. Their names I parsed later: Gemma, the rebel; Emelia, the beauty; Tegan, the wallflower. Their fist-tight conspiratorial whispers suggested they ruled as a triumvirate; I assumed one of them was queen. I couldn’t decide whether it was the rebel or the beauty.

The caffeine kicked in. I remember looking out onto a sea of wool. It looked scratchy. Unlike Warren Prep, which had a pajamas-to-class non–dress code, Stonebridge students sported the old-school button-down uniform. The girls wore a tailored light-blue oxford shirt with a slim crimson tie, which most knotted in a lazy half-Windsor. Of course, the schoolgirl look wouldn’t be complete without that short tartan skirt. Some of the girls were bare-legged, some wore black tights, and a few sported those iconic kneesocks. I often marveled at how private school uniforms hadn’t changed despite the masturbatory energy they evoked. I wondered how many of the mothers had borrowed their daughters’ uniforms to liven things up in the bedroom.

The boys wore yawn-inducing navy-blue slacks in cheap polyester, with a fat blue tie slashed by diagonal stripes. Although one boy, I noticed, sported a red bow tie instead. I have a theory about bow-tied men. They’re either good or evil, never in the middle ground. I also have a few strong and well-documented theories associating personality disorders with specific tie knots. If time were infinite, I would write a dissertation on the subject. Suffice it to say, keep your distance from any man wearing an Eldredge knot.

I erased the whiteboard and wrote down five questions.

1. What do you love?

2. What do you hate?

3. If you could live inside a book, what book?

4. What do you want?

5. Who are you?

“Who are you? is a weird question,” said the girl in row 2, aisle 3.

“You’re right,” I said, consulting my chart. “Melanie Eastman, is it?”

“Let’s go with Mel,” she said. “What do you mean, who are you?”

Mel wore her thick black hair in a sloppy ponytail. She had on dark-rimmed specs and her wrists were adorned with bands of beaded bracelets.

“It’s best, I find, if you interpret the question yourself. But the first thing you need to know is that the assignment should be completed anonymously. Do Not Write Your Name on Your Paper.”

I instructed my students to type their papers in a font of their choosing, to include the class name on the top right corner, to print it, and to deliver it to my box in the Agatha Christie Admin office. As always, the students had more questions about the assignment than the assignment itself had.

How long do the answers have to be?

However long the answer is.

What if it’s one word?

Then it’s one word.

Can you answer a question with a question?

I don’t know. Can you?

So the assignment is really anonymous—you’ll never know who wrote what?

Yes.

I started the Q&A’s in my second or third year of teaching. It’s a tradition now. I give it to all of my classes. I’ve adjusted the questions over the years. But it wasn’t until I made the assignment anonymous that I learned anything useful. I can usually identify the authors within a few weeks. So, no, it’s not really anonymous. I used to feel guilty about filleting my students like this. But it’s better to know up front who they are and what they’re capable of.

Some students still used quill and ink in class, others brought their laptops, but the universality of the mobile phone could not be denied. I don’t, as a rule, prohibit the use of phones in my class. As the students’ primary form of communication, the devices are much more useful as a bargaining agent.

I wrote my number on the board.

“If you need to reach me at any time, here’s my mobile. The first time you text, please provide your name. If anyone texts me any anonymous weird shit, I’ll track down your number and give you a D+ on everything you write for the rest of the semester. Also, please use normal spelling. I’m not fluent in text-speak. Got it?”

I could have sworn they were all looking up at me, but my phone began to vibrate like an old washing machine on the spin cycle as one text flew in after the next.

Sandra Polonsky: I’m done with the assignment. What is next?

Adam Westlake: at your service.

Jonah Wagman: I already like you better than that Ford fellow.

Tegan Brooks: Will we turn in ALL of our assignments anonymously?

Enid Cho: Will there ever be a syllabus? Will it be on Blackboard?

Blackboard is Stonebridge’s proprietary communication portal. Students and faculty use it not only to convey personal messages but to disseminate campus information and to deliver class materials that, in my day, would have been hand-collated and stapled by the instructor.

I replied to Enid’s text, informing her that I was undecided about the syllabus. Then I read through the influx of new numbers and questions. Most texts consisted only of the student’s name. A few added smiley faces or winks and some used punctuation in a code I didn’t understand. A few students said they’d finished their Q&A’s and asked what they should do next. It’s not like I had a creative-writing lesson plan up my sleeve.

“I don’t know,” I said. “Write something until the end of class. Or pretend to write something.”

I got some blank stares, and a few of the front-row kids pulled out notebooks and pretended to write. But mostly it was heads down, hands in their laps, tap-tap-tap. I was witnessing the brink of a complete restructuring of communication. Just a few years ago I would have had to tell my class to be quiet over and over again. Now I missed the ocean-like sound of whispers.

The tapping stopped. The room fell as silent as a snowstorm.

A howl pierced the quiet. It didn’t sound human, at first. I looked for the source. It was Gabriel Smythe, laughing like a goddamn hyena, aggressive and fake. No real person ever laughs like that. Others slowly joined in like an ugly orchestra. The din of adolescent cruelty. I looked around the room at the smirks, smiles, and other unmistakable expressions of schadenfreude. No one tried to hide it. That pitiless, joyous sound was so familiar, it triggered a fury and nausea deep inside me.

“What the hell is so funny?” I said.

They quieted.

Row 2, window seat, raised her hand. I consulted my chart. Her name was Kate Bush, like the singer. I still can see the humiliated flush on her face, the unmistakable color of shame, her body betraying her, as her classmates’ laughter blared like a stereo system. It was like watching Carrie, minus the buckets of blood. Her arm wrapped around her belly, like she might be sick.

“Go,” I said.

All eyes followed her out of the room. When the door shut, the laughter returned at a lower volume.

The girl in the last row, second aisle, was sitting slumped in her chair, scrutinizing everyone in the class. Her expression was like fury in a cage. I checked the seating chart and took note. Gemma Russo was not laughing at all.

NORMAN CROWLEY

II heard the howl first. Then I saw Kate, her face brick red, as she walked past my desk and out the door. She wiped tears with her sleeve. My phone was buzzing the whole time. There were already like twenty texts on the subject. I clicked on the first message.

A picture with a caption:

Kate’s Bush.

She was toast. In just a few seconds, I could see her entire senior year playing out.

By end of period, everyone would have seen her: Kate Bush—her own name biting her in the ass—lying on a twin standard-issue Stonebridge bed. Naked, legs spread. Her head thrown back, as if she were following someone’s instructions.

The comments flew into my text thread, like a gunman pulling the trigger until the chamber was empty. It was like my classmates thought they’d cease to exist if they didn’t add to the noise. I don’t even know why I’m in the group text for the Ten. I think it was Jonah who added me. I’m like the bcc of the group, if you could bcc in texts. That kind of sums up who I am at the school. I’m the guy you don’t see who sees everything. I’m not invisible in that cool superpower kind of way. I’m just not important to anyone, unless they need something from me.

Rachel: Has she ever met a rzr?

Hannah: OMG!! It really does look like a sm animal

Mick: the horror, the horror

Jack: I want to bleach my eyeballs

Jonah: Looks like my dad’s old Playboys

Gabriel: Can’t deal with unshaved girl

Adam: A man w/out options can’t afford 2 have standards

Ms. Witt told the class to shut the fuck up. She’d already earned major respect for the way she handled Gabe’s epic rat-prank fail. Everyone was super quiet when Kate slipped back into the room.

Tegan dropped a scrap of paper in front of Kate and quietly said, “Ask for Olga. You’ll be like a dolphin when she’s done with you.”

Tegan is a master of the sneering whisper. There’s no way Ms. Witt could have heard what she said, but the new teach stared her down. I imagined seeing flames in Witt’s eyes. For a very short, satisfying moment, Tegan looked scared. I wanted to say something. To tell the Ten what a bunch of dickwads they were. I wanted to tell Kate I was sorry. I didn’t say anything, as usual.

I completed Ms. Witt’s strange, anonymous assignment:

What do you love?

Bright Eyes, Reservoir Dogs, PB&J sandwiches, CS

What do you hate?

The Darkroom

If you could live inside a book, what book?

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

What do you want?

For my real life to begin

Who are you?

I’m a coward

GEMMA RUSSO

Stonebridge has a little brother/little sister program. As a junior you get a freshman all to yourself, and that person stays your charge until you graduate. Some of the upperclassmen abuse this tradition, using their little sisters or brothers as personal assistants or valets. Others just pretend they don’t exist. And, I suppose, there are a handful of students who take the job seriously.

I entered Stonebridge in sophomore year, but I was still assigned a big sister. She was a junior at the time. I think Dean Stinson was trying to engineer a friendship. Or, at least, give me a leg up with my acquaintances. Christine was one of the junior Ten and, as far as I could tell, on her way to becoming the queen of Stonebridge. I don’t know if Dean Stinson was fully cognizant of her status or simply understood that she was a girl who fit in. At first, Christine ignored me. Later, when she spotted me making inroads with the Ten, she began to acknowledge my existence. In the end, when her status at school had taken an unfortunate detour, she tried to warn me.

Christine was the first person who told me about the Dulcinea Award. It’s named after some beautiful woman in Don Quixote. It’s weird that I’ve never seen that book on any Stonebridge reading list. Christine said the boys score the girls on their blowjobs and pronounce a winner at the end of the school year. Only the girls don’t know they’re competing and the winner of the Dulcinea Award never learns of her victory. At least, that was how it had always been done, until the boys started getting sloppy.

The sloppiest of all had to be Kingsley Shaw, Christine’s steady boyfriend. One night, after they’d messed around, he went for a shower and left his laptop open, with Christine’s score sheet on full view. She couldn’t figure out what she was looking at, at first. She saw a lot of numbers—sixes mostly. It wasn’t until she read the comments section that the full impact hit her.

Christine was so angry, she had trouble focusing on the big picture. She got twisted up by the whole scoring system.

I remember Christine saying, “When you put your mouth on someone’s dick, that’s an automatic eight out of ten, with the only possible deduction coming from permanent damage.”

Christine confronted Kingsley, who owned up to not just his record keeping but to the larger conspiracy and made some kind of joke about there always being room for improvement. Christine told Kingsley that she was going to destroy him and every one of his cohorts. But she didn’t know what she was up against. She confronted the editors, without allies or backup. The editors responded with a full-blown attack on Christine’s character. They painted her as a queen bitch who spread nasty rumors about all of her friends. She was shunned and shamed until she transferred to a local high school to finish up her senior year. I’ve learned from Christine’s mistakes.

My little sister is Linny Matthews. Linny, a fifteen-year-old waif who wears her hair in a short bob with bangs, looks like prime bait for the editors. She’s also crazy smart, willful, and has an unusual talent for persuading people to do things they don’t actually want to do. I’ve told Linny everything she needs to know to stay out of the Darkroom, including not talking about the Darkroom. Linny’s contribution to my cause, however, is limited to a few administrative assignments. She has three years left at this school; I won’t put a target on her back.