How We Fall Apart

by Katie Zhao

  I guess even the Ruans’ fall wouldn’t stop the Patels and Chois from moving forward with their deal. Even if they no longer associated with the Ruans in the aftermath of the scandal.

  Even if, like everyone else, like me, Akil and Krystal stopped being Jamie’s friend.

  Mr. Ruan had been arrested late this winter. And Jamie’s world turned upside down with swift, vicious speed.

  For weeks, the story was on the media, Facebook, Tip Tap—everywhere.

  Despite our class difference, the Ruans had been, if not friends, at least family acquaintances for many years. But that didn’t stop Mama from resigning her part-time job as the Ruans’ housekeeper. Didn’t stop Mama from warning me to stay away from Jamie and her family. Didn’t stop me from obeying, despite the guilt that twisted my insides.

  Occasionally I had dreamed of it, dreamed of seeing myself at the top of the school, instead of Jamie. Dreamed of being the one who had everything, instead of Jamie.

  But I’d never actually expected Jamie to fall. Never thought she’d be the one to shatter into a million pieces.

  I yelped when my phone buzzed in my hand. A text from a restricted number lit up the screen. It was accompanied by a gruesome photograph of a pale hand dripping with blood.

  It’s the end of Jamie’s era, and the beginning of MY reign. Lesson number one, Sinclair Prep students: betrayal will haunt you from the grave.

  —The Proctor

  DECEMBER, JUNIOR YEAR

  Jamie’s penthouse, which was located a short walk away from Columbus Circle, offered one of the most breathtaking views of the city. From my seat at the mahogany dining table, I stared through the huge glass window in the dining room at the pristine buildings that created Manhattan’s famous skyline.

  A city of over eight million people. A city of extremes, of the cruelest and kindest, of the wealthiest and poorest. Sitting way up here, in a luxury penthouse, I could pretend, for a moment, that I’d made it to the top, ruled over everything and everyone.

  “Nancy, what’re you looking at?”

  I tore my eyes away from the window. Jamie peered at me, her glossy lips pursed. Her fingers played with the silver heart toggle Tiffany necklace she wore.

  “Nothing.” I returned to reality, which was staring at my AP Lang assignment, and then sighed. “Ugh, this sucks,” I groaned, banging my head against the table. “I’m never going to finish this essay in time.”

  “Well, you should’ve started earlier,” Jamie said loftily. She shuffled the papers in front of her, arranging them into a neat pile. “I’m finished.”

  “What?” I gaped at her. “That was so fast.”

  Jamie flashed me a prim little smile. Her signature I’m-better-than-you smile. “And you call yourself the writer.”

  I shrank back at the dismissal in her tone, the arrogance. And the guilt that sparked at her words.

  I couldn’t call myself a writer these days, not really. The stress of junior year, everything piling up on my plate, had kept me too busy, too drained to write my poetry. At Sinclair Prep, those who didn’t keep up with the workload would be crushed by the others, become the steps of the ladder the elite climbed to the top.

  I was determined not to be crushed. No matter what.

  Jamie reached for the bowl of cut peaches between us and plucked out a slice. She chewed it delicately, closing her eyes. “Your mother did a great job cutting the fruit.”

  I clenched my jaw. It was a barb, disguised as a compliment. Jamie’s specialty.

  To help make ends meet, my mother had been working for the Ruans as their housekeeper ever since we were kids, as far back as the days when Jamie and I attended Shuang Wen Learning Center, a weekend Chinese school on the Lower East Side.

  Back then, Jamie had avoided me like the plague—when she wasn’t busy teasing me for being poor. Even as a kid, Jamie knew she was a step above everyone else, knew it and used it. But one day, she saw me playing with a Barbie. Mrs. Ruan had banned all toys from their household, but Mama rewarded me with dolls when I did well in school or behaved myself.

  Jamie wanted to play with my Barbie. So I let her, because what Jamie wanted, she got. And that Barbie, of all things, was the reason Jamie and I became friends.

  Normally, I would let Jamie’s comments pass. Let Jamie split me open again and again, without a word of complaint.

  But enough was enough. The stress of the essay assignment, or the combined stress of junior year, maybe, or anger finally got to me. I snapped, “Yes, my mother has many useful skills. How about your mother, Jamie?”

  If Jamie wanted to throw a barb at me, I was going to throw one back. We both knew, at this moment, Mrs. Ruan, a housewife who spent very little time actually in the house, was out in the city. She was probably at one of her favorite haunts, Koreatown or Chelsea, having early drinks with her girlfriends.

  Jamie held my gaze. A stare. A challenge. Her expression revealed no emotion.

  She picked up another peach slice. Slowly raised it, eyes never leaving mine. Then, when it was inches from her lips, Jamie let the peach drop to the floor. Deliberately. She did this again. And again. In moments, several peach slices lay on the otherwise spotless floor at our feet.

  Still those eyes seared into mine. “Oh, Mrs. Luo, Nancy dropped some of the peaches onto the floor. Can you come clean up the mess?” Jamie said in that sickly sweet voice she liked to use around adults.

  Mama, who’d been busy tidying in the next room, came rushing over with a broom and dustpan. “Nancy, don’t dirty the Ruans’ floor!” she scolded. To Jamie, she gave an apologetic smile. “Sorry, Jamie.”

  “That’s okay, Mrs. Luo. It’s not your fault.” Jamie tilted her chin up at me, indicating that she’d won our challenge. Then she went back to rereading her essay, as though already the matter was behind her.

  Shame flooded through me. I hated seeing my mother like this, at Jamie’s beck and call. Hated that there was nothing I could do, nothing I could say, to change anything, no matter how hard I tried.

  The message was clear. The message was always this: the Ruan family—Jamie—stood far, far above me. If I dared step out of line, Jamie would crush me.

  I focused on my essay, not saying another word, the moment of rebellion gone. One more word would put me out of Jamie’s good graces. And at Sinclair Prep, being out of Jamie’s good graces spelled a death sentence.

  The tense silence was broken when the door opened. Jamie stiffened at the sound, and it was the only time I saw a flash of apprehension, of fear, in her eyes.

  My mother rushed to greet him first. “Mr. Ruan! Welcome home.”

  Jamie’s father, sweeping into the penthouse swiftly and quietly as a ghost.

  Jamie’s knuckles, clenching into fists so tightly they turned white.

  Mr. Ruan entered the dining room. Anger in his eyes, so like his daughter’s. But he was quick to disguise it, quick to give us a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. A smile that revealed white, perfect, sharp teeth.

  Jamie turned slowly, ever so slowly, toward her father. And now she wore the same face I’d made earlier when she’d dropped those peaches onto the floor, one by one. A mask, carved like an ice sculpture, on the verge of cracking.

  “Welcome home, Daddy.”

  CONFESSION THREE

  Legend has it that if you touch the Richard Sinclair statue at midnight, you’ll see all the ghosts that haunt this school . . . —Anon

  *****

  The eerie text must have been sent to everyone in our class. Students stared at their phone screens, their parents looking over their shoulders. The celebratory atmosphere had turned heavy with confusion and fear. Shivers—of apprehension, of adrenaline—traveled down my spine.

  A current ran through the crowd, setting them to whispering and murmuring. Everyone talking about what the text meant, discussing theories, some even as far-fetched as death. Jamie’s death.

  It’s the end of Jamie’s era.

  That made it sound
final. Made it sound like Jamie was gone. But that wasn’t possible. Was it?

  Families all around me left the school building, bumping into me on their way out, but my mind was elsewhere. First, Jamie’s disappearance today. Then, the stolen Diss Diary page dropped into the PowerPoint. Now, this eerie text, this person calling themselves “The Proctor.”

  And whispers, whispers of Jamie, Jamie’s end, Jamie’s death . . .

  A hand clamped down on my shoulder, jolting me out of my thoughts. I gasped.

  “Nancy! It’s me.”

  “Alexander,” I breathed in relief at the familiar voice. My gaze met a pair of dark brown eyes framed by long lashes. Alexander Lin tugged at the gray uniform tie around his neck, which topped off the black blazer, white shirt, and black dress pants of the boys’ uniform. He pulled it off well with his mussed mop of black hair. A chunk of his bangs stuck to his forehead with sweat.

  The sight of Alexander usually put me at ease. There was comfort in being friends with the other come-from-nothing scholarship kid in a school full of rich elite. But tonight, nothing could calm my nerves.

  Alexander frowned. “Are you all right? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

  “I’m worried about Jamie. I mean—you got that strange text too, right? Doesn’t it seem like someone—I don’t know—­harmed her?”

  “We don’t know anything,” Alexander said, but his grim expression told me what we both already sensed: Jamie was in trouble. Something was really wrong. “Let’s get out of here first.”

  As if agreeing with that suggestion, a large man shoved into me in his eagerness to leave, bumping me right into Alexander’s chest. “Whoa!” Alexander draped an arm around me protectively, and my heart rate sped up. “You okay?”

  I nodded and followed Alexander out, squeezing past the crowd. The cool evening air was a balm on my warm cheeks. As soon as we’d gotten away from the bulk of the crowd, Alexander let his arm drop and moved away from me.

  “I’m sure she’s okay, right?” The words came out almost without me meaning to, like muscle memory. Almost like I’d said them before. Like I needed them to be true, needed to convince Alexander—and myself. “I mean, this is Jamie we’re talking about. Nothing bad could ever happen to her.”

  Alexander bit his lip. You’re right, I wanted him to say. Jamie’s fine, and this is all some weird collective nightmare we’re having, and honors night went without a hitch, and everything will go back to normal tomorrow morning.

  Alexander said, “Which train are you taking?”

  “The Two.”

  “That’s on my way. I’ll walk you.”

  “Oh, that’s okay,” I said automatically. “You don’t have to—”

  “Don’t be silly.” Alexander’s voice was kind but firm. And I realized I was glad to have his presence beside me after that chilling text we’d received earlier. The silence between us wasn’t exactly comfortable, though. There was too much unspoken in that space.

  Feeling the need to say something, anything at all, I said, “So, um, what’s new with you? Everything good at home?”

  The moment those words flew thoughtlessly out of my mouth, I wished I could stuff them back in.

  A muscle worked in his jaw, but other than that, Alexander didn’t give any sign that the mention of “home” had bothered him.

  I knew it must have, though. To Alexander, “everything at home” meant only himself. But it wasn’t always like that.

  Once, Alexander had lived with his brother, Eric. Before his brother was taken down by this school, by all the whispers. Before he became a cautionary tale to those who didn’t watch each step they took at Sinclair Prep.

  Eric Lin had been three years ahead of us. Like us, he’d been on scholarship, and by his junior year, was ranked fourth in the class. He’d been treasurer of his class, captain of the swim team, and on track to get into at least a few of the Ivies.

  Then, Eric was caught red-handed with the answer key to the AP World History final exam. And he’d been turned in by none other than a few of his best friends—Richard Li, David Kim, and Peter Shui, the top three students in their class, known as the Golden Trio.

  For a scholarship student, getting caught cheating was the end of the road. As Principal Bates would put it, cheaters tarnished the name of the Richard Sinclair Preparatory School. Eric was stripped of his scholarship, stripped of his chance to graduate with a high school diploma from a top school. And he fell—all the way down the ladder.

  After, Eric was spotted getting into fights in K-town. There was a rumor he beat up someone badly enough that the other guy had to be hospitalized. Then Eric vanished, and with him, the whispers.

  I’d never heard Alexander speak about his brother again. I wanted to kick myself for bringing up his home life, something that had always been a sore spot for him. The tension of the night had gotten to me, and I hadn’t been thinking clearly.

  “I’m doing fine. You know, hanging in there for AP exams.” Alexander’s voice was far too light to be casual. I let him steer the conversation toward comfortable waters. Let him pretend that we were everything we appeared to be on the surface: two friendly, maybe a bit competitive Sinclair Prep students, sharing nothing more than a walk to the train station. “How are you, Nancy?” The question sounded a bit stiff. As though Alexander knew his role, knew he had to play along in this facade, but didn’t like it.

  “Oh, you know. Same old, same old. Haven’t changed.”

  “You aren’t the same old Nancy, though. You haven’t been for a while.”

  I stopped walking so suddenly that an older couple swerved around me to keep from hitting me. Alexander moved off the sidewalk and gestured for me to do the same. “What do you mean, I’m not ‘the same old Nancy’?”

  “I mean, you’ve . . . changed.”

  A silence between us that lasted a moment, a year. Then it was broken by a kid who ran shrieking up the sidewalk as his mother chased him, bumping into Alexander’s side on his way.

  On reflex, I reached out to grab Alexander’s arm and steady him. He ruffled the spot on his uniform where the kid had bumped him.

  “Be careful,” I said.

  “Yeah, let’s stop lingering where all the kids can bulldoze us.”

  “Be careful,” I repeated, and only then did Alexander look at me, really look at me. Only then did he realize I wasn’t talking about watching out for random passersby.

  There were some topics we had to be careful about. If Alexander wanted to dig out those memories, if he wanted to touch the flame, it was my job to remind him it would burn him.

  We lapsed into easy, familiar conversation. In no time, we reached the subway station. Alexander and I stopped near the entrance.

  He jerked a thumb over his shoulder and said rather sheepishly, “My train’s actually that way.”

  “Wait. You’re not heading home?” I asked, confused. “What did you walk all the way over here for, then?”

  With a slightly sly smile, Alexander said, “Get home safe, okay? And don’t forget we have that AP Lit practice test tomorrow.” Then he turned around and loped away, navigating the crowd with the ease of a born and raised New Yorker.

  Leave it to Alexander to remember our schoolwork in the midst of the chaos. I watched his retreating back as he disappeared into the throng of people. He’d come the opposite way to walk me to the station. The thought filled me, for a moment, with a warm, tingly feeling.

  “Good night, Alexander.”

  My thoughts were so far away that I didn’t react in time when the train screeched to a halt, causing me to practically careen into a stern-looking businessman. I’d arrived at my stop.

  After weaving through busy Chinatown dinner crowds and ducking around trash for two blocks, I turned onto Orchard Street, and I was home. “Home” was a small, two-bedroom apartment on the Lower East Side, where Mama and I had lived for ten years.

  “I’m back!” I yelled as I opened the door, slipping my shoes o
ff and stepping into the apartment.

  “Le-Le.” Mama came out of the kitchen, a weary smile on her face. She was already dressed in her sleepwear, a simple floral gown. Quite a contrast to the parents dressed lavishly at honors night, who’d waltzed around in designer labels like they were about to hit the red carpet. “Nǐ chī fàn le ma? I have leftovers from work.”

  “I’m not hungry,” I said. The smell of fried dumplings wafted from the kitchen. Normally the food from Lucky Jade Kitchen, the restaurant where she worked, was irresistible to me. But after tonight’s events, I had no appetite.

  “You’ll be hungry later,” Mama warned.

  “I’ll eat some granola bars.” It was a habit now. My mother was so busy managing the restaurant that she didn’t cook much anymore. Since Baba wasn’t around either, I’d stopped caring about what I ate, as long as it kept my stomach from growling.

  “Le-Le! You can’t always eat that junk food!”

  Ignoring Mama’s scolding, I skirted the coffee table in the living room and turned on the TV to the news channel. A blond news anchor reported the weather.

  I headed into my cramped bedroom. The walls were bare except for some old ribbons left over from science fairs and Chinese speech contests. I slept on a twin-size bed. There was a bookshelf next to the closet, filled with textbooks and extra workbooks Mama had bought so I could get ahead in school. A small blue crate served as my doorstop.

  I made a beeline for my white writing desk, which stood across from my bookshelf. I reached into the bottom drawer. Dug through old papers and notebooks. Pulled out everything until the whole drawer was empty.

  My pounding heart nearly stopped. This was the confirmation I’d been scared of: my Diss Diary—the rest of that letter—was gone. Stolen out from under my nose.

  But how? No one but I knew that journal existed. Not Jamie, not Alexander, not Krystal, not Akil. Not even my own mother. I’d never brought it to school, never carelessly left it where someone could have picked it up.