They were more than happy to oblige.
My job that night was simple enough: I was working as a student safety escort. That sounds boring, I know, but someone had to do it. It was a two-mile return hike back up to campus; Dover Springs was like a fortress, built high on a hill, overlooking the water, sequestered from the rest of the world by geography, by privilege—hell, even by iron gates. If someone felt unsafe walking alone in the darkness, I was meant to go with them and ensure they arrived back at school without getting mugged, abducted, or—the most likely scenario—passing out in their own puke before rolling into a drainage ditch to die. Of course, I wasn’t armed with a gun or pepper spray or anything other than a bright orange vest and a heavy-duty flashlight, so my role was one of illusion more than genuine protection. But that, I suppose, could be said about a lot of things.
Despite my role—or likely, because of it—I might as well have been invisible on that beach. No one bothered to speak or look at me, and the party was pretty much going full throttle by the time the stranger stumbled from the darkness. I didn’t get a chance to see where he’d come from or what he’d been doing—pissing in the sand dunes, no doubt—but I watched as he weaved his way in my direction before his legs gave out, sending him crashing to the ground, not five feet from where I was.
I didn’t say anything. My initial impression was that the guy was both extremely tall and extremely drunk; he had a half-empty bottle of Maker’s Mark gripped in one hand. He was also a Dover student, that much was obvious, but not like the others. His heavy blond hair had been styled into a Kennedy-esque swoop, and he wore ridiculous clothes for the occasion: a tweed jacket and dark tie and brown leather oxfords, all of which were the antithesis of the equinox celebration, both in overall spirit and basic common sense. Who the hell wore oxfords to the beach?
It took a moment before the stranger became aware of my presence, but when he did, he sprawled his large body across the sand like a walrus, rolling onto one side with a grunt so that he was facing me. He reached his hand to shake mine.
“Hollis English,” he boomed.
“I’m C. J.,” I replied.
“C. J. what?”
“Perez.”
“Well, C. J. Perez.” He offered me a roguish hint of a smile. “As luck would have it, you’re just the person I’ve been looking for.”
*
This was about the last thing I expected to hear. “You’ve been looking for me? Why?”
The stranger pushed himself up to sitting, so that we were both facing the ocean, the swell and suck of the rising tide. “Because tonight of all nights, I need what you’re offering.”
“And what would that be?”
“Safety.”
“Oh.” I relaxed a bit. “Well, sure. Yeah. Whenever you want, we can walk back up together. That’s what I’m here for.”
Hollis held up his whiskey bottle and shook it. “In the interest of self-disclosure, you should probably know that I’m really fucking drunk.”
“That’s okay. It’s sort of expected.”
“Want some?” he asked.
“No, thanks.”
“What? Don’t you drink?”
“Nah.”
He scoffed. “Why the hell not? And don’t start in with some virtue argument. I see that gold cross hanging from your neck, C. J. Perez. If you’re guilty of one sin, you’re guilty of them all. And we’re all fucking guilty. Even you.”
“I just don’t like it. Plus, I’m working.”
“Boring.” Hollis waved a disinterested hand. “Tell me what year you are. I’ve never seen you around before.”
“I’m a freshman.”
“Figures. I’m a sophomore, by the way, so my wisdom about this school is infinitely greater than yours. Anything you need to know, I’m your man. What house are you?”
“None.”
“None?”
“I’m not pledging.”
His eyes gleamed with boozy admiration. “Then you’re one smart fucking kid. First year, and you already know there’s no sense fighting tradition in a place like this. Hell, I only pledged Pike because my asshole dad did it before me. He really is an asshole, by the way. Guess that means I’ll be one too. But such is life, right?”
I didn’t answer.
Hollis leaned back on tweed-covered elbows. “How old does that make you? Eighteen? Seventeen, even? Tell me you’re a goddamn adult.”
“I’m twenty,” I said.
He snorted. “Who the hell goes away to college when they’re twenty?”
“A lot of people.”
“Really?”
“Sure.”
“Why?”
I pushed my fingers into cold sand, savoring grit. “For me, it was mostly a matter of money. I spent a couple years working after I graduated. My family, well, we were going through a hard time. I couldn’t afford to leave. Until now.”
“What happened?”
“My father died.”
“Shit.” Hollis frowned, pushing his perfect hair back. “Well, that fucking sucks. I’m sorry, man.”
“Don’t be. He was in a lot of pain.”
“But I am,” he insisted. “Losing a family member like that . . . It changes everything. It’s not easy to keep going, to keep doing what you’re supposed to do, when something happens to make it all feel pointless.”
“True. But you don’t always know how tragedy’ll change things. Because, in a way, my father dying was lucky.”
“Lucky?”
“I don’t mean it wasn’t awful. I just mean, well, we had nothing, really, after what happened, so I ended up working down at the yacht harbor, trying to save money. But it was my boss there who nominated me for this citizen scholarship program. That’s why I was offered the spot here at Dover Springs. Full ride. Room and board. It wouldn’t have happened otherwise. So, you know, fate, mysterious ways, and all that.”
“Still,” Hollis breathed, “that’s a steep price to pay for college.”
“Everything has a price.”
“I guess. What was he like, your dad? Were you close?”
“He was brave,” I said after a moment. Then: “Yeah, we were close.”
“Did you grow up around here? In Dover?”
“Yup.”
“Me too.”
Of course he had. This fact didn’t surprise me, even though our paths had never crossed. Hollis and I came from different worlds, after all. Like everyone I’d grown up with, I was the product of both public schools and public housing, whereas he’d clearly been raised on prep school and trust funds. Dover was funny that way, a dimorphic sun-baked beach town, populated mostly by working poor struggling to hold on to declining jobs in tourism, agriculture, and manufacturing. But there was also the Other Dover, the part that sat separate from the rest of us, an oceanfront enclave of gated communities that housed the ultra wealthy, the powerful, the influential. The people living in those communities rarely ventured to other parts of town. They never had to. And when it came time for their Ivy League–rejected offspring to flee the nest—or more accurately, hop out of it—Dover Springs was the obvious choice. Never mind that the school’s notorious exclusivity was based solely on tuition price, not reputation—the end result was the same; they could afford what others couldn’t.