I push open Nurse Sharp’s door. She looks up from her computer, then sighs. “Again, Alison?” she says, walking over to the exam table and removing her thermometer from the drawer.
“I don’t have food poisoning,” I reply quickly, not wanting her to send me home. Nurse Sharp narrows her eyes, and I know I need to explain the dark circles under mine. “I was just up all night working on the newspaper.”
Nurse Sharp looks even less pleased. “Sit,” she orders.
I drop my bag and climb up onto the exam table. “Come on,” I implore. “I can’t be the only student here who’s sleep-deprived.”
She fits the plastic tip to the thermometer pointedly. “Did you know sleep deprivation can cause heart disease? It’s not something to be treated lightly.”
“I had to stay up. Ethan sabotaged the paper, and there are two days until the final version is due to the printer.” Before I can keep complaining, she slips the thermometer into my mouth. If she takes my blood pressure, I know what she’ll find. Just the thought of the deadline hits me with a new rush of panic. Part of me still can’t believe Ethan did this. He’s upped the stakes of our rivalry to hazardous heights, turning competition into torture. The thermometer beeps, and Nurse Sharp pulls it out. “I don’t know why he would do this,” I go on.
She huffs. “Don’t you? It’s constant with you and Ethan.” She returns the thermometer to the drawer without commenting on my temperature, which I consider a victory. “Tell me, honestly,” she continues, “you’re not planning your equally ugly revenge.”
I say nothing. Of course I’m planning revenge.
Nurse Sharp shakes her head. “I don’t understand it. I mean, I understand needing to prove yourself. When I was in the military, even in nursing school, I was constantly trying to show up the guys. There’s a difference between proving yourself and fighting every chance you get, though. Why keep this rivalry up?”
It’s obviously rhetorical, but the question leaves me thinking. While she washes her hands with practiced efficiency, I imagine my days without Ethan’s and my fights. Plenty of people go through high school or do great things without this constant feuding. Why has ours gotten so out of control?
“Why don’t you just not have your revenge?” Nurse Sharp asks. “Wouldn’t this war of yours die out?”
I’ve wondered the same thing on occasion. When I’ve received a grade short of perfect on an exam we blitzed, or when Ethan’s insults really hit their mark and I had to ignore the embarrassment singeing my cheeks. They’ve never been enough for me to bow out. His newspaper victory is no different. If I syndicated his story, it wouldn’t be the end of the world. I could let it go.
But I know I won’t. I tried. Ethan pulled me right back in, and I let him.
When I shrug emptily, Nurse Sharp writes a note on her chart. “Okay,” she says, her voice gentler. “I won’t send you home. But I will force you to take a nap.”
I nod, grateful not to be going home. “Fair,” I say. While Nurse Sharp returns to her computer, I curl up on the comfortable cot in the office. With the rough pillow under my cheek, my final waking thought is of her question. Why do I keep up this feud with Ethan? Being an overachiever means jumping through hundreds of hoops—why do I insist on lighting them on fire?
The answer, I know, is immature. Unprofessional. Everything I wish it wasn’t.
Even right now, with my head pounding ferociously and exhaustion running ragged through me, I recognize the undeniable thrill I get from the thought of besting him. The truth is, I fight with Ethan because I like it.
Thirty-Three
IN MY MOM’S CAR on the way home from school after production night, I close my eyes, collapsing into the cool leather of the seat. After napping in Nurse Sharp’s office, I returned to class and even managed to supervise four hours of production on the newspaper until I finally decided I was exhausted and useless. Miraculously, in that time, I finished the year-in-review story. Leaving Erin in charge, I decided I would regroup by heading home, resting my eyes for a few hours, and then starting the revisions the story desperately needs.
When I got in the car, Mom looked me over, no doubt observing my disheveled hair and red eyes. “I won’t ask,” she said. For once, I was grateful for her laissez-faire parenting.
I think I nodded off in the ten minutes it took to drive home, only waking up to the sound of the garage door. Heading into the kitchen for a water, I hear the noise of the TV. I close my eyes ruefully. Just my luck. As I pass through the living room, I find Jamie, Ted, and Mara watching Easy A. The volume is egregious. I’m exhausted, but I’m not exhausted enough to sleep while Emma Stone’s voice blares up from downstairs.
I pause close to the TV. “Hey, could you guys turn it down?”
Jamie, legs crossed on the long section of the sofa, looks up. “Hi, Alison. Yeah, sure.” She reaches for the remote and lowers the volume. When I turn to trudge toward the kitchen, Ted calls out.
“Wait, Alison, watch with us.” He’s propped his bare feet up on the coffee table, and I notice his soles are suspiciously filthy. I have no difficulty imagining the Henley he’s wearing hasn’t been washed in days. There’s a rip in one knee of his black jeans, a carabiner on one belt loop from which his keys dangle.
I shake my head. “I’m going to bed.”
“Whaaaaaat?” Ted draws out the word playfully. Jamie and Mara glance up, questioning, and I regret not coming up with a more normal explanation for not dropping everything to watch Easy A. “Come on,” Ted says. “It’s like seven!”
“This is backwards,” Mara says, laughing. “We’re the adults, and we’re literally pressuring a teenager to stay up late.”
Ted throws a piece of popcorn into Mara’s curls. “Dude, we’re not adults.”
I’m halfway out of the room when I stop. His words hit me with a flicker of inspiration, which unfurls into an idea. Adrenaline rushes into me, and I’m wide awake. I return to the living room, where I face Jamie and her friends.
“Hey,” I say, “could I interview you for a story?”
Thirty-Four
ON FRIDAY IN FIFTH period, the Chronicle, it’s distribution day for the new issue. The process involves the whole class, with parcels of the paper wrapped up in cable ties lining the long tables in the newsroom. Everyone takes their package and removes copies of the paper one by one, counting them into the right number for each class. The room is filled with the mechanical odor of ink and the rustle of newsprint.
It also happens to be Ethan’s birthday today. When he opens the new issue, he’ll discover I’ve left him the perfect gift.