I only took in the information that I wanted, and I ignored everything else. My mother would later tell me, in her nice way, not to be so hard on myself; I wasn’t the first person to ignore a risk. This is how we welcome both adventure and grief, as anyone who has done so will tell you.
That evening, Marley Gould, wearing piglet slippers and a long, ruffled nightgown, was camped out on the big orange couch that faced the elevators in the seventh-floor lobby. I was on a quick study break, headed downstairs to get a soda; but when I saw the back of Marley’s long braid, I slowed. I felt bad for Marley. She was from a town in western Kansas that had a slightly smaller population than our dorm. She seemed much younger than the other freshmen on my floor. Her roommate was in a sorority and never around. I knew she read out in the lobby because she was lonely.
“Hi, Marley. How’s it going?”
She looked up with such a happy, hopeful expression that when the elevator doors opened behind me, I didn’t move.
“Okay! Just doing some reading!” She showed me the cover of her book: a princess, in full princess garb, was holding a sword to a dragon’s throat. She glanced at my walkie-talkie. “You’re on duty?”
I nodded. Two black girls—I didn’t know their names—emerged from the women’s wing, laughing hard into their hands. One of them smiled at me and then at Marley, but they kept moving, running into the waiting elevator just before the doors closed.
“It’s finally getting colder out, huh?” Marley pulled her braid in front of her shoulder, and then just under her nose, as if she were sniffing the tip. “And the buses were running late all day. Did you notice? I have to get better shoes. I have these great boots back home, but I didn’t bring them up yet, because it was so warm at Thanksgiving, and now it’s cold. So my dad said he would send them, but…”
Trying to smile, I watched her lips move. I fought the urge to look at my watch. I had physiology lab the next morning, and before I went to it, I had to be able to diagram the central nervous system and digestive tract of a dog shark. And Tim was coming over at eleven. You can be kind, my mother had often said to both me and Elise. Nothing else you girls accomplish really matters if you don’t know how to look out for other people. When I was in grade school, she had methods of tracking my social ethics. She was always the room mother, coming to school with cupcakes or inviting herself along on field trips on which she would strongly encourage me on the bus to sit next to the kid no one else wanted to sit with. Just say hello and be friendly, she would say. It only takes a minute.
Marley was looking at me now, waiting. She had asked me a question.
“What?” I shook my head. “Sorry.”
“I said, ‘Do you want to come to the spring band concert this year?’ I know it’s a little early, but I can give you the date if you want to mark your calendar.”
“Yes!” I said. “Yes! I would like to go!” I had to go. There was no way out. Marley played the French horn, and at the beginning of the year, she’d told me she would be playing with the marching band before the first football game, and it was clear from the way she’d looked at me that she wanted me—or someone, anyone—to come see her. I’d said I would. But then I slept late at Tim’s, and I had a test the following Monday, and it was raining, and I didn’t want to go—so I did a terrible thing: I stayed in, studied all day, and then told Marley that I’d spent the day shivering in the stands, clapping and cheering her on. “You were great!” I told her, maybe too enthusiastic. She’d known I was lying. I was sure of it.
“I wish I were doing the holiday concert.” Marley pulled her blanket up around her shoulders. “You have to be selected for that, and most freshmen don’t get it. But Christmas music is my favorite. My mom played the piano for every music group in our town, so we always went to a bunch of holiday concerts. I always liked them, even when the