Page 47 of Come As You Are

“It’s come up a couple of times.”

“I’ll bet. What’s with the books?” she asks as she peers into the mirror on the inside of her door, examining her eyes closely to make sure she’s cleaned off every last bit of liner.

“Well.” I drop onto the floor and spread out the pile. “Ithought about what you said, how you wanted to be in a GSA but there wasn’t enough interest, so I thought we could start our own! I found this website that recommends different books, like you can find romances by trope or every YA with a pansexual main character, and it’s all super gay. I picked out a bunch of them and figured you could pick one we should both read and then we can talk about it and stuff. And we can make way better choices than the official Book Club made last week.” I pick up a pretty purple one. “Look, I even found a witchy one that looks like it has tarot cards on it.”

Sabrina eyes the books suspiciously, then me suspiciously, before examining each one. “You thought I’d want to read a romance between a football player and a cheerleader?”

I shrug. “I mean. Lesbians.”

She nods and sets it aside. “You do make a good point.”

I wait while she goes through each one before finally settling on the one I thought looked the most depressing and right up her alley, but she declares she’s going to try them all, just in case. We agree we’ll take turns reading it over the next couple of weeks and discuss it afterward. “What refreshments would a GSA have for book-club discussion?” I ask. “I have to admit, I’m new to this.”

She shrugs. “Rainbow cookies? Tequila? I don’t know. We do not actually have to—”

“Yes, we do. We are going to do this right,” I say firmly. “Now, what’s the soundtrack for this meeting?”

“Janelle Monáe, Chappell Roan, and Billie Eilish,” Sabrina says decisively, moving to put the music on her laptop, and it’s gratifying to see her stoniness about this crack soquickly. Without even bringing snacks! She joins me on the floor and we open up the book, taking turns reading sections of it aloud to each other until the door opens and Sabrina tucks the cover flap into the pages to save our place.

“Hey, Evie.” I immediately tense up at the sound of Heather’s voice, concerned each time I see her thatthistime she’s found out about me and Lucas, but she sounds as friendly and bouncy as always, and I relax. “What are you guys doing? Something for the talent show?”

“Nope, working on that with Isabel McEvoy. Are you performing?”

“Kayla and I are gonna do a scene fromHamilton.” She slides off her sneakers and hops onto her bed, curling her legs up underneath her butt. “We were just with Lucas and Jesse, performing for each other.”

Lucas? Performing?Ugh. Maybe I don’t want to attend after all. “What are they doing?” I ask casually.

“It’s amazing—they’ve completely and totally memorized stand-up routines. Lucas soundsexactlylike John Mulaney when he does his.”

Feels like stretching the word “talent” to its limit, but sure. I listen as Heather goes on about how Lucas and Jesse are so funny, and my heart aches as I think how easily I could bring that crashing down if I say or do the wrong thing. It’d be so much easier if Lucas were completely out of my social circle, but even if I wanted to ditch the Nicest Girl in the World, she’d still be Sabrina’s roommate, and ditching Sabrina is not an option if I want to maintain my sanity in this place.

Still, I think about how much it hurt to find out Salemhad kept Jenna a secret, and this is so much worse. If that felt like a betrayal, this is… I don’t know, but something uglier. And if Heather ever does find out, the domino effect of losing all my friends could be fast and furious.

Stop it. There’s no reason to think you’re gonna screw this up. You’re doing fine. Everything’s fine.

So why does it feel like a painful shift is inevitable?

One possible explanation arrives later that night, when I go to pee before bed. I amalwaysmore emotionally sensitive when I get my period, and with everything going on, I completely forgot to keep track of my cycle. Turns out even being regular can’t help you if your brain is a mess.

But it takes me two minutes of frantic searching to realize the bigger problem: I forgot to pack pads and tampons. It all comes back to me in a rush that of course Sierra and I were on the same cycle, and ofcourseshe finished them, promised to pick up more before I left, and never did. And now it’s been a month and I’m in an all-boys dorm after curfew, and I am so deeply screwed. Staining my sheets would be bad enough, but staining them and then having to use the washing machines at Rumson to clean them? Hell no.

It’s fine. I’m just gonna stay awake all night. Or sleep in the shower. Sure, that makes sense. God, how I wish I had a tub.

Ugh, and Lockwood issoclose. I bet it’sfilledwith tampons and pads—nothing but period protection as far as theeye can see! But of course, it’s locked at this hour, and so is Rumson, and am I seriously considering jumping out the window and running to Sabrina’s so I can yell up for her to toss me down a tampon?

I think forlornly of the rope ladder, curled up and safely hidden in the confines of Matt and Salem’s room. I could ask them to send it down, but I donotwant to explain why, and ugh it doesn’t matter because I have to change my underwear and go back to the bathroom anyway before I turn my pajamas into a crime scene.

I grab my phone and tap out a quick text to Sabrina, just in case she can somehow sneak out and save me, and am relieved when she immediately responds with a thumbs-up. I have no idea what she has planned, but I’m not wasting time having her answer my text questions when I need her here ASAP, so I just wad up some tissues and wait. Finally, I hear a tapping on the glass, but it doesn’t sound like a pebble, more like—

“Aah!” I jump twenty feet in the air (I’m pretty sure) at the sight of Salem Grayson, standing on the rope ladder, a fist poised right by the window he’d rapped on. “No,” I mutter. “No, she did not.”

I push up the window, and am absolutely horrified when Salem unfurls his fist to reveal a couple of tampons and an overnight pad. “You’re welcome,” he says dryly when I just stare at his open palm, but gratitude has taken about a thousand back seats to wishing I could simply die, thoroughly and immediately.

“Is this what having one of those dreams where you go to school naked feels like? It must be. Oh my God.”

He rolls his eyes. “Are you gonna take ’em, or should I just save it all for the next time I get a nosebleed?”

I snatch everything from his hand and immediately chuck it to the side, as if out of sight will put it out of his mind that he went on this recon mission. “I cannotbelieveshe sent you for this.”

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