1: 1
Junior year, first week back, my best friend and I both ran for vice president of student council.
She was the one who suggested that whoever lost had to dress up like a clown and run eight laps around the track.
In the end I won by ten votes.
But a second later, my boyfriend, Clay Henson, put photos of me being groped in a bar up on the big screen.
Along with a whole batch of private ones.
He announced it, flat and cold:
"I don't think a bar hostess who sells her private life for money deserves to be in this election."
Every face turned to me with the same look of disgust, like they were looking at the filthiest trash imaginable.
I was disqualified on the spot and thrown out of student council.
Something about the background in those photos was too familiar. I stopped Clay, shaking, and asked:
"Why are you lying? Those private photos, they were clearly you—"
He leaned in close with a smile and dropped his voice on purpose:
"Baby, who took them doesn't matter."
"You know how vain Bridget Fox is. She goes red-eyed over a strand of hair out of place. Put her in something like that and she'd cry all night."
"Besides, you did get groped, and you did sleep with me. Those are both facts. I just put them together, that's all. Be good, when you finish running I'll take you out for a nice dinner."
I watched him high-five Bridget, the two of them laughing, deciding where to go celebrate.
I wiped my tears and dialed a number:
"Mom, I've thought it over. I want to come study abroad, over there with you."
…
Someone dug a clown costume out of the storage room and threw it at my feet.
It was streaked with some stain I couldn't place, damp to the touch.
The one who'd thrown it grinned as he explained:
"I was eating instant noodles this afternoon and didn't hold the bowl steady. Don't be picky, Clem."
"Anyway, I hear rich guys really let loose, they pour red wine and stuff all over the girls, right? You must be used to that by now."
"Of course, if you'd rather go streaking we don't mind either. We'd get to admire the design department's campus beauty, oh wait, campus escort, hahaha."
The smell of the noodle broth mixed with the leers of those boys.
It sat heavy in my chest until I could hardly breathe.
The truth was, that night at the bar, Clay had happened to show up in time, stopped it, and called the police. Nothing had actually happened.
But I'd been terrified all the same, terrified the story would spread and I'd become someone people pointed at.
He was the one who'd promised, out of his own mouth, to keep it secret for me.
And now he was the one nailing me to the pillory as a "slut."
When I came out of the restroom in the costume, Clay was waiting by the door.
"Relax, I was watching the door for you. Wasn't going to let those punks peek."
"I told them, too, not to go running their mouths about it."
They should have been such considerate words. All I felt was cold.
I tilted my face up at him:
"So that night, when you said you'd been drugged, that was a lie. You just wanted me asleep so you could take the photos and help Bridget win the election. Right?"
In all the years Clay and I had been secretly dating, we'd never once crossed that line.
Until a few nights ago, when he suddenly called me, saying that while he was out chasing sponsors for a campus event, someone had slipped something into his drink.
He'd looked so pitiful, begging me to help him. I gave in.
I never imagined it was a trap he'd built for me, piece by careful piece.
Before Clay could say anything, Bridget's eyes went red first.
"Clem, don't blame Clay. He was just afraid of me losing face."
"Or, here, give me the costume, I'll run for you. So what if people laugh at me—"
Clay frowned and stopped her:
"Run? Since when could a little vanity queen like you stand wearing something that ugly?"
"Besides, your stamina's worse than Clem's. Just sit tight."
He turned and looked me over, displeased:
"Clementine Sullivan, stop being so calculating. It's a few photos. Isn't it enough that I know you're innocent?"
"Not everyone came up the way you did, out of an orphanage. Bridget's parents, her whole family, know she's running for vice president. If she loses, where's she supposed to put her face?"
My heart clenched all at once, so hard I couldn't get a breath around the pain.
I never knew that at some point coming from an orphanage had become a crime.
September in Ashford, the evenings were still unbearably muggy.
On the sixth lap my vision went dark in waves and I pitched forward onto the ground.
Behind me, Clay's voice, all worry: "You okay? You're not hurt?"
I turned my head without thinking, and froze.
One of his hands was holding a cold drink for Bridget, the other stroking her back, gentle.
His eyes on her, exasperated and doting all at once.
"Slow down, no one's fighting you for it. See? You choked on it."
"Two more sips, that's all. Your stomach's bad. Too much cold stuff and you'll feel awful."
Not once, the whole time, did he look at me.
Just then a few freshmen fresh out of military orientation walked by, recognized Clay, and greeted him, thrilled and envious.
"Clay, is this your girlfriend? Wow, you two are perfect together, wishing you a lifetime of happiness!"
The others joined in, teasing:
"Oh come on, three years of watching you two rub it in, and you're still not sick of each other?"
"Confess. You've secretly been together this whole time, haven't you? Doesn't matter, you're buying us a late-night snack tonight!"
I watched Clay and Bridget share a smile.
Not one of them denied it.
The burning in my throat, from how parched I was, spread down into every part of me.
After that night at the hotel, I'd asked Clay if we could make our relationship public.
He'd only frowned and said:
"Clem, we're both in student council. We have to avoid suspicion."
"Otherwise people will think I'm the president abusing my position to help my girlfriend get ahead. Let's wait until after graduation."
So it turned out it was never about avoiding suspicion.
It was only that the person he wanted to go public with was someone else.
Quietly, I took out my phone and opened that familiar profile picture:
【Mom, I've thought it over. I want to come study abroad, over there with you.】
