I walked as quickly as I could to my room, but my feet froze when I reached the room I wasn’t supposed to ever go in. There was a new lock on the door. A keypad like the one on the front door. It definitely hadn’t been there before when I’d tried to open it. Right?
The same chill I felt in the foyer ran down my spine. I spun around. Someone was watching me again. I knew it. I could feel it in my bones. I spun around again. But no one was there. I ran the rest of the way to my room, closed the door, and locked it behind me. Not that it would help. I’d locked the door before, and Justin had just magically appeared inside my room the next morning with tons of clothes I didn’t want.
Before I could reach my bed, my phone buzzed again, this time repeatedly. I pulled it out and saw that Matt was calling instead of texting this time. I answered it before I could chicken out. “I can’t do this with you, Matt.”
“Do what? I need to talk to you. Come outside.”
“I can’t.” And it wasn’t just because I didn’t have the code to get out. “I told you not to break my heart. I’ve told you a million times. I’m not okay. I haven’t been okay in a really long time, and you’re making it worse. Everything you do just makes it worse.”
“Just give me a chance to explain.”
“No one person should ever need to give this many explanations.”
“Brooklyn…”
“I can’t.”
“I didn’t sleep with Rachel. I would never do something like that to James. You have to believe me…”
“Believe you? I did believe you. That’s the whole problem. I believed that you cared about your friends. I believed that I was special. I believed a lot of things. And I don’t anymore. I don’t believe in you.”
“I do care about my friends. And you are special. You’re so fucking special.”
I closed my eyes. I could hear the emotion in his voice. He needed me. He’d held me when I needed him. But the circumstances couldn’t be more different. I thought about what Mr. Pruitt had just said to me. That my mom didn’t belong in this world. That he wanted me to. But I didn’t. I never would. “It wasn’t going to work out anyway, Matt.”
“What are you talking about? We’re forever, Brooklyn.”
Forever was too long for someone with his privilege to understand. But me? I understood that forever could be cut short far too soon. That forever felt endless when you were alone. I needed someone from my own world. “I’ll never fit in with the Pruitts and Hunters and Caldwells of the world. I’m a Sanders. I’ll always be a Sanders.” I hung up the phone.
It immediately started buzzing again.
God, why did anyone think cell phones were a good idea? I turned it off so that the grating buzzing noise would finally stop. And then I shoved it in a drawer for good measure.
I’d broken up with Matt once. You’d think it would hurt less the second time. But if anything, it hurt more. Because I didn’t love him any less. I hated him. I hated him so much. But God, I still loved him too. And it was infuriating. Why couldn’t I just stop?
I went over to my closet, pushed past the green dress I’d described to Isabella, and grabbed my mother’s dress. I’m a Sanders. If my mom had lived longer, she would have warned me about the kind of boys that went to Empire High. She’d have made sure I didn’t make her same mistakes. Matthew Caldwell was a mistake in all capital letters. I needed to be with someone like me. Someone who wanted to pick up glass when it shattered. Someone that knew what it was like to not be elite.
I held my mother’s dress in my hands as I retraced my steps past the locked room and down the stairs. Miller had shown me where the staff resided. Left, right. Left, left. This door wasn’t locked. I made my way down the second set of stairs and through the empty hallway.
There were nameplates outside each door I passed, but I didn’t recognize any of the names. The only two people I knew besides Miller were Tiffany and the chef Barbara, but I didn’t know their last names. And the nameplates were all last names. I passed door after door. So many people I hadn’t even met yet. And then finally, at the end of the hall, much like my room, was a nameplate that read Miller.
I knocked before I could chicken out. I didn’t know what I was doing down here. This was probably a mistake, but my feet stood firmly rooted in place. I needed a friendly face right now. I needed him.
Miller answered the door. He was wearing a pair of gray sweatpants and no shirt. I wasn’t sure which was sexier. The outline the gray sweatpants gave the muscles in his legs or the exposed muscles of his very defined six-pack. I swallowed hard and my throat made a weird squeaking noise.
“You shouldn’t be down here,” he said.
I held up my mom’s dress. “I need to hide this from Isabella. Can I keep it down here with you?” I knew that Isabella was up to something devious. But I didn’t know what. And I’d be devastated if my mother’s dress got caught in the crossfire.
He leaned out of the doorway, looked both ways, and then grabbed my hand to pull me inside.
The room felt small as soon as I entered it. Or maybe it was just because Miller was so massive.
His hand fell from mine. He grabbed my dress and hung it in his closet amongst a sea of crisply pressed suits. He cleared his throat. “Was there anything else?”
I just want to be with someone like me. Even if only for a minute. I shook my head, but I didn’t move to leave.
“You’re going to get me fired.” He didn’t sound mad.
“You’d be fired if someone found me down here?”
“I’d be fired for a lot of things when it came to you. Letting you get high. Letting you go to the Alcaraz’s. But this? Yeah, this is probably the worst.”
“Why? I’m just standing here.”
I watched as his Adam’s apple slowly rose and fell.
Was he thinking it too? That he wanted to do more than stand? My eyes wandered to his bed behind him. It wasn’t made, and something about that felt so homey to me. I wanted to crawl under his sheets and never leave.
“You need to go,” he said.
“You’re the only one here that makes me feel like I’m not alone.”
“I can’t be that person for you.”
“Why?” I hated how small my voice sounded.