“Not really,” Cath said, shutting her laptop. “Just finished.”

“No.” Levi leaned over and opened it. “You can’t stop in the middle of a vampire attack.”

“Vampires, huh?” Reagan said. “Sounds pretty exciting.”

“I’ve got to finish my biology essay,” Cath said.

“Come on.” Reagan turned to Levi. “Plant Phys. Are we doing this?”

“We’re doing it,” he grumbled, sliding off Cath’s bed. “Can I use your phone?” he asked her.

Cath handed him her phone, and he punched a number in. His back pocket started playing a Led Zeppelin song. “To be continued,” he said, handing it back to her. “Solid?”

“Sure,” Cath said.

“Library?” Reagan asked.

“Hi-Way Diner.” Levi picked up his backpack and opened the door. “Fanfiction makes me crave corned beef hash.”

“See ya,” Reagan said to Cath.

“See ya,” Cath said.

Levi ducked his head back at the last minute to flash her a wide grin.

If you wanted to meet other Star Trek fans in 1983, you’d have to join fan clubs by mail or meet up with other Trekkies at conventions.…

When readers fell for Simon in 2001, the fan community was as close as the nearest keyboard.

Simon Snow fandom exploded on the Internet—and just keeps exploding. There are more sites and blogs devoted to Simon than to the Beatles and Lady Gaga combined. You’ll find fan stories, fan art, fan videos, plus endless discussion and conjecture.

Loving Simon isn’t something one does alone or once a year at a convention—for thousands of fans of all ages, loving Simon Snow is nothing less than a lifestyle.

—Jennifer Magnuson, “Tribe of Simon,” Newsweek, October 28, 2009

THIRTEEN

Cath wasn’t trying to make new friends here.

In some cases, she was actively trying not to make friends, though she usually stopped short of being rude. (Uptight, tense, and mildly misanthropic? Yes. Rude? No.)

But everyone around Cath—everybody in her classes and in the dorms—really was trying to make friends, and sometimes she’d have to be rude not to go along with it.

Campus life was just so predictable, one routine layered over another. You saw the same people while you were brushing your teeth and a different set of the same people in each class. The same people passing you every day in the halls … Pretty soon you were nodding. And then you were saying hello. And eventually someone would start a conversation, and you just had to go along with it.

What was Cath supposed to say, Stop talking to me? It’s not like she was Reagan.

That’s how she ended up hanging out with T.J. and Julian in American History, and Katie, a nontraditional student with two kids, in Political Science. There was a nice girl in her Fiction-Writing class named Kendra, and she and Cath both studied in the Union for an hour on Tuesday and Thursday mornings, so it made sense to sit at the same table.

None of these friendships spread into Cath’s personal life. T.J. and Julian weren’t inviting her to smoke weed with them, or to come over and play Batman: Arkham City on the PlayStation 3.

No one ever invited Cath to go out or to parties (except for Reagan and Levi, who felt more like sponsors than friends). Not even Nick, whom Cath was writing with regularly now, twice a week.

Meanwhile Wren’s social calendar was so crowded, Cath felt like even calling her sister was an interruption. Cath had thought they were over the bar-tastrophe, but Wren was acting even more irritable and remote than she’d been at the start of the year. When Cath did try to call, Wren was always on her way out, and she wouldn’t tell Cath where she was going. “I don’t need you to show up with a stomach pump,” Wren said.

In some ways, it had always been like this.

Wren had always been the Social One. The Friendly One. The one who got invited to quinceañeras and birthday parties. But before—in junior high and high school—everyone knew that if you invited Wren, you got Cath. They were a package deal, even at dances. There were three years’ worth of photos, taken at every homecoming and prom, of Cath and Wren standing with their dates under an archway of balloons or in front of a glittery curtain.

They were a package deal, period. Since always.

They’d even gone to therapy together after their mom left. Which seemed weird, now that Cath thought about it. Especially considering how differently they’d reacted—Wren acting out, Cath acting in. (Violently, desperately in. Journey to the Center of the Earth in.)

Their third-grade teacher—they were always in the same class, all through elementary school—thought they must be upset about the terrorists.…

Because their mom left on September 11th.

The September 11th.

(Cath still found this incredibly embarrassing; it was like their mom was so self-centered, she couldn’t be trusted not to desecrate a national tragedy with her own issues.)

Cath and Wren had been sent home from school early that day, and their parents were already fighting when they got there. Her dad was upset, and her mom was crying.… And Cath thought at first that it was because of the World Trade Center; their teacher had told them about the airplanes. But that wasn’t it, not exactly.…

Her mom kept saying, “I’m done, Art. I’m just done. I’m living the wrong life.”

Cath went out and sat on the back steps, and Wren sat beside her, holding her hand.

The fight went on and on. And when the president flew over their heads that afternoon on the way to the air force base, the only plane in the sky, Cath thought maybe the whole world was going to end.

Her mom left for good a week later, hugging both of the girls on the front porch, kissing their cheeks again and again, and promising that she’d see them both soon, that she just needed some time to feel better, to remember who she really was. Which didn’t make any sense to Cath and Wren. You’re our mom.

Cath couldn’t remember everything that happened next.

She remembered crying a lot at school. Hiding with Wren in the bathroom during recess. Holding hands on the bus. Wren scratching a boy who said they were gay in the eye.

Wren didn’t cry. She stole things and hid them under her pillow. When their dad changed their sheets for the first time—not until after Valentine’s Day—he found Simon Snow pencils and Lip Smackers and a Britney Spears CD.

Then, in one week, Wren cut some other girl’s dress with safety scissors, and Cath wet her pants during Social Studies because she was scared to raise her hand to ask for a bathroom pass; their teacher called their dad in and gave him a business card for a child psychologist.

Their dad didn’t tell the therapist their mom was gone. He didn’t even tell Grandma until summer break. He was so sure she was going to come back.… And he was such a disaster.

They were all three such a disaster.

It had taken years to put themselves back together, and so what if some things didn’t get put back in the right place? At least they could hold themselves up.

Most of the time.

Cath closed her biology book and reached for her laptop. Reading was too quiet—she needed to write.

It startled her when the phone rang. She stared at it for a second before she answered, trying to recognize the number. “Hello?”

“Hey. It’s Levi.”

“Hi?”

“There’s a party at my house tonight.”

“There’s always a party at your house.”

“So you’ll come? Reagan’s coming.”

“What would I do at your party, Levi?”

“Have fun,” he said, and she could hear that he was smiling.

Cath tried not to. “Not drink. Not smoke. Not get high.”

“You could talk to people.”

“I don’t like to talk to drunk people.”

“Just because people will be drinking doesn’t mean they’ll be drunk. I won’t be drunk.”