Page 54 of The Academy
“Yes,” Annabelle said. Except she had already turned the speech into her college essay. Ms. Vandermeid said it was “very strong,” that it was “by far” the most compelling part of Annabelle’s application.
Annabelle could still use the essay—parents aren’t privy to them—but Annabelle believed in karma. If she included the mendacious essay in her Princeton application, she would get rejected. And so, for the past few days, amid studying for her government testand carrying the group project for Spanish on her back, Annabelle has been writing a new essay about her summer service trip to Ecuador. Annabelle thought writing a new essay from scratch would be the only repercussion.
But now she’s been exposed by Zip Zap.
The only people who know that Annabelle lied are Annabelle’s parents—and they certainly didn’t post.
“Somebody has it out for you,” Ravenna says.
“Who?” Annabelle says.
“Oh, come on,” Ravenna says. “Isn’t it obvious?”
By the end of first period, everyone has read the Zip Zap post and drawn the conclusion that the anonymous poster was Lisa Kim. Lisa coolly addresses the allegations at lunch. “It wasn’t me,” she says as she blows on a spoonful of soup. “Although I wouldn’t be surprised if Annabelle did lie about all of it. That speech sounded like performance art.”
That afternoon in the’Bred Bulletinoffice, Ravenna isa fuoco.
“Everyone’s taking sides,” she says. “Annabelle or Lisa. I would suggest we run a poll in the paper, but I’m afraid Annabelle would lose and she’s my roommate, so…”
Annabelle would definitely lose,Charley thinks. Charley isn’t privy toallthe gossip, though she does use the first-floor bathroom in South, so she’s heard plenty. People believe that Annabelle made the speech up and that Lisa is getting blamed.
“We should do an article about Zip Zap,” Ravenna says. Gone is the corpse Charley found flung across the Senior Sofa over Family Weekend. Today, Ravenna wears a Gucci belt and new Gucci logoboots, which were gifts from her parents to make up for their absence. “I’ll investigate it myself. How great would it be if the’Bred Bulletinuncovered the identities of the anonymous posters!” Ravenna’s cheeks have color, her hair has luster, Charley can practically see the adrenaline pumping through her veins. Grady and Levi turn their homely young faces to bask in her glow. “This is the most exciting thing that’s happened all year, and something tells me there’s a lot more to come.”
That, Charley thinks, is what she’s afraid of.
12. Tiffin Talks: Ghost in the Machine
None of us have any idea who’s behind Zip Zap.
As part of her investigative reporting, Ravenna Rapsicoli tries to post on the app herself but she gets shut out. So… the new posts are coming from… where? The ether? From Ralph Waldo Emerson’s transparent eyeball out in the woods, watching us?
A third post announces that Tilly Benbow has been sexting with someone outside the school, and this somehow leads to a first-floor Classic South scandal. Madison R.’s long-ago-missing Theragun is found by Olivia P. in Tilly’s room, and everyone suspects that Tilly has been using the Theragun to masturbate while sexting.
Tilly confesses to the sexting but not to the Theragun theft or masturbation. Instead of treating her like a pariah, the fifth-formgirls celebrate Tilly for her sexually adventurous relationship. Olivia H-T and Olivia P. both ask her who the guy is and Tilly turns pink beneath her Flawless Filter and says, “None of your business,” which is highly unusual because Tilly loves to overshare.
Zip Zap seems intent on unearthing all our secrets. It reminds some of us of the hypnotist who came to campus last winter. He chose people to go up onstage and put them under his spell. Some of them cried, one of them clucked like a chicken, and last year’s Honor Board chair, Vanessa Kendrick, told the whole auditorium that she still wet the bed. Vanessa ended up leaving school right after that, and we overheard Ms. Robinson telling Mrs. Spooner that the hypnotist would never be asked back.
Charley hopes she falls beneath the consideration of the Zip Zap app because she too has a secret: On Tuesday and Thursday nights, she signs out of the dorm saying she’s going to the Sink to study, but instead she sneaks down to the tunnel, where she’s helping East renovate the bomb shelter. Tonight they move the mattresses off the bunk beds and transport them up to the cellar, where they get tossed among the extra furniture. Then, using a power drill, East dismantles the bunk beds themselves until they’re just a pile of metal frames. Charley is freaked out by the sound of the drill—someone is going to hear it—but East assures her the shelter is soundproof.
It’s gratifying, watching the space morph into something else—Charley has never seen a single minute of HGTV, though she now understands the appeal—but the real reason she’s there is to be with East. She won’t deny that she’s attracted to him, but she’s also not delusional. She knows that when he looks at her, he sees only a brain, and once she learns to relax around him, he’ll see a sense of humor. East is extremely intelligent, though you would never know it from his lackluster performance in history class. He confides thatbecause Tiffin is his third high school, he’s covered all the material before and sees no point in doing it again. He doesn’t do the reading or turn in written work or participate in class, but he’ll ace the midterms and squeak by with a passing grade.
“Don’t you want to go to college?” Charley asks.
“God, no,” East says. “I know you’re going to tell me this is a college preparatory school and I’m going to tell you that the deal I have with my father is I have to graduate, then I can go to him with a business plan and he’ll back me.”
Charley could never, ever fall in love with someone who doesn’t want to go to college. And yet, she finds herself relishing the moments of physical proximity with East—for example, when he hoists her up to the counter so she can lift the open shelves off their brackets and hand them down to him. Once, he rubbed his thumb over the corner of her mouth and showed her a crumb—focaccia—saying, “You saving this for later?” Another time, when Charley’s hands were full, he pushed up her glasses, which gave such sweet rom-com vibes that Charley giggled, possibly for the first time in her life. She was more embarrassed about the giggle than she was about food on her face.
Occasionally she’ll catch him looking at her—she pretends not to notice, though she turns the color of a raspberry—and one night he says, “Remember when I first brought you here and you wore your hair down? I liked it that way.”
Charley tries not to go up in flames. East noticed her hair when it was out of its braids the night of First Dance?
“I keep it back so it doesn’t get in my face,” she says.
“Would you wear it down for me?” he asks. “Maybe on Thursday?”
They’re standing side by side in the doorway as they give the area one final look for the night. The room has been stripped bare. It’s uglier than it was before, but that’s the process: It has to get worse to get better.
“I’ll wear my hair down Thursday if you raise your hand in history tomorrow,” she says.
