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  My mouth fell open. Rina stared at me and I stared right back. She couldn’t…. They hadn’t….

  My legs suddenly felt like they were going to give out, and I had to sit on the floor, leaning against the wall. Rina rolled her eyes and laughed. “I can’t believe you fooled yourself for so long,” she said, looking down at me, her voice mocking. “You are seriously delusional if you thought you could’ve made it through this past week without me, at least not without losing your precious class rank or getting, like, a 2 on the SATs. You’re a mess. You’re about one thread away from totally snapping, and you definitely would’ve if I hadn’t shown up. I mean, look what time it is—you’re about to miss the Yale deadline.”

  I looked at my watch and my eyes widened. Eleven fifty-six. My application was due at midnight. No. No! My wobbly legs were suddenly strengthened by adrenaline and panic. I sprinted up to my room, barely registering Rina behind me. I rushed to my computer, downloaded my essay from e-mail, and opened up my application. I tried to attach the essay, but the window froze. Dammit! It was now eleven fifty-nine. I tried again, shaking in fear that I wouldn’t make it in time. Suddenly Rina’s hand grabbed the mouse, moved it to the “send” button, and clicked.

  “What did you just do?” I screeched.

  “Sent my application to Yale,” Rina said calmly. “Your essay wouldn’t attach because I already attached mine. See?” She indicated an open document entitled “Crossed Country.”

  “What the hell is that?”

  “Your college application essay,” Rina answered. “Or rather, mine. Read it if you want. It’s genius, if I do say so myself.”

  “What are you talking—”

  “Please, I read that half page of notes you wrote the other day. They were pathetic. And I doubt the one you wrote today is any better. But mine? Mine’s getting us in.” She threw a triumphant look at the computer and then a scornful one back at me.

  I stared at her, numb with shock. I had no idea what was going on anymore—I had no idea what to do or say. If it were possible, I would have forgotten to breathe and keeled over dead. And I think Rina knew it. She got up, went over to the mirror to fix her hair, and calmly kept talking. “Oh, and since I wrote the essay, I’ll be the one driving to New Haven tomorrow for the on-campus interview. I’m pretty sure you’d just try too hard and screw it up.” Rina glanced at me, then moved her eyes over to my jewelry box sitting on the dresser. She opened it, picked out some delicate gold vintage-style earrings that my mom had given me for my birthday, and put them on. She admired her own reflection. “So I’ll be taking your car tomorrow,” she continued. “And I’m also taking our favorite jeans.”

  I opened my mouth, but no words came out. Rina glanced back at me. “Don’t look so surprised,” she said lightly. “I got sick of waiting for you to help me figure out my life, that’s all. But I guess that’s not surprising, since you couldn’t even handle yours.”

  We suddenly heard the sound of the garage door opening.

  “Mom,” I rasped, unable to make my voice any louder. I wasn’t crying—not really—but my body was so tense I was surprised I hadn’t shattered. “She’s home,” I tried again, my voice hoarse and tired and still much too quiet. “You can’t—you have to—”

  “Hey, I know the drill,” Rina said. “Don’t have to tell me twice.” She smiled coolly and strolled over to the closet. “Night, sis,” she singsonged, stepping inside and closing the door. “Wish me luck for tomorrow.”

  TO-DO LIST

  *** KILL EVERYBODY (i.e., Rina)

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  SUNDAY, DECEMBER 16

  AT FOUR IN THE MORNING, I STILL COULDN’T fall asleep, but it wasn’t a tossing-and-turning sort of night. It was a lying-dead-still-not-even-bothering-to-close-my-eyes sort of night. What would’ve happened if I’d been nicer to her? (Except I was nice!) What if I’d just realized earlier that Rina was completely and totally evil? (Except she’d done such a good job pretending!) The closet was silent. I had no idea if she was asleep in there, or if she was mulling over her recent victories, or perhaps plotting something even more nefarious.

  I stared at the ceiling. I had no idea how I was going to prevent her from going to my Yale interview for me.

  Unless.

  Unless I left now?

  I sat straight up, kicking myself for not thinking of this before. Of course! I would just leave before she did! Okay, this was not a well-thought-out plan, but at least it was a plan. I swung my feet out from under the covers and quickly stood up, wincing as both my bed and a floorboard creaked. Almost instantly, the closet door cracked open.

  “I heard that,” murmured Rina’s voice from the darkness, just loud enough for me to hear. “You’re not exactly the queen of stealth.” She flipped on the closet light, throwing a white-gold beam across the floor, then stuck her hand out the door, just far enough for me to see that she had my car keys in it. “I don’t know what you’re doing. But if you plan on going farther than the bathroom—like say, New Haven—you’ll probably need these.”

  “Wrong,” I hissed at her, “There’s a spare set in the—” I stopped, realizing I had no idea where my mom kept my spare car keys.

  “Kitchen drawer?” asked Rina innocently. She stuck her other hand out and I saw my spare keys dangling from her fingertips.

  “What,” I said, my voice a whisper of controlled anger, “is keeping me from wrestling those away from you right this second?”

  “Fear,” she answered matter-of-factly. “Because I would scream bloody murder, and your mom would hear.” She shut the closet door and after a moment, the beam of light under it disappeared.

  I got back in bed, cursing the world for having Rina in it. Granted, maybe it was better if she left. At least then she’d be impersonating me to strangers in New Haven, instead of to people I knew at home. I resolved to stay awake, in case a brilliant solution hit me before the morning, and I sat up in bed, prepared to rack my brain until it did. But I hadn’t had a full night’s sleep in ages, and as dawn approached, my exhaustion got the better of me. I eventually drifted off into blackness—silent and devoid of dreams.

  I slept for over ten hours. By the time I woke up, the house was empty. Mom was off on her business trip, and Rina had taken my car. She had also taken my backpack, my iPod, a bunch of clothes, and who knew what else, but I was delighted to the point of hysterics to find my cell phone buried under the covers of my bed. I hadn’t hidden it deliberately (although, in retrospect, I should have), but if she’d taken it, she would surely be wreaking havoc on Paul, and maybe even my other friends, from out of town.

  “Thank God,” I said out loud, turning the phone over in my hands gratefully. I looked up at the ceiling and prayed briefly that Rina would somehow crash on the highway, and that the car would explode, burning away all the evidence.

  Of course, that would leave me without a car.

  I got up, my happiness fading and my daze of anger and confusion returning, and went downstairs to get something to eat. There’s always murder. It’s not like anybody knows Rina exists, so as long as you hid the body properly…Yeah, right. My town didn’t exactly have a convenient water-filled gravel quarry to chuck a corpse into, and there was no way in hell I could dig a shovel far enough into the frozen ground to cover a whole person. I couldn’t even believe my mind had wandered as far as that sort of technicality.

  But what was I going to do? Rina wasn’t going to murder me and then just live my life, was she?

  Christ, was she?

  That was ridiculous. I mean, the entire situation was out of control, but it wasn’t a horror movie.

  I hoped.

  I poured myself a bowl of cereal and sat down at the kitchen table, idly using the back of my spoon to crunch the flakes down so that they were all below the milk line. Now what? I didn’t have homework. There weren’t any flash cards that needed memorizing or lab experiments to write up. For the first time in years, I had nothing to do. And I couldn�
�t even enjoy it.

  I took my cereal bowl back up to my room and sat down at my computer to check my e-mail. And there, on the computer desktop, I saw it. The icon for Rina’s college essay.

  I opened the file.

  “Crossed Country”

  AP bio, meet Kearney, Nebraska. Kearney, Nebraska, meet AP bio.

  I had just found myself stranded by the side of the road.

  Nebraska? What was she talking about? The essay was a chronicle of how Rina had apparently applied high school academics to surviving a solo cross-country road trip. Expectedly, but annoyingly, the thing was good. Hell, it was great—funny, but touching, easily weaving a high school career’s worth of academic achievement with a lifetime’s worth of street sense and wry wit. It was serious in parts and flippant in parts, but every single sentence sparkled with intelligence. Only it was all a lie—as if Rina had ever been on a road trip by herself! As if she’d used obscure knowledge from the AP chem test to help conjure a gasoline substitute when her car broke down in Tennessee! But the essay was believable—it was totally believable. And readable, and memorable, and oh-so-annoyingly unique.

  It was way better than mine, and it was probably going to get me into Yale.

  Or rather, her.

  I resisted the urge to slam my head face-first into my desk. Rina had done me a favor by sending in that essay. Except that she hadn’t meant to. She’d done herself a favor, unless I figured out some way to get rid of her. But assuming I got in, I’d be going to Yale on the strength of something I hadn’t written. This was exactly the scenario I’d wanted to avoid when Rina had first suggested doing my homework for me. I’d expected today to feel like a coronation—finally accomplishing everything I wanted. But this was exactly what I didn’t want.

  My phone rang. Paul.

  I let it go to voice mail, not knowing what I might blurt out if I actually picked it up (perhaps something along the lines of “Hi, you don’t know you suck, and it’s not your fault you suck, but you still suck”), then listened to the message.

  “Hey, it’s me. Thought I might come over—call me back.” Wait, what? He knew I was supposed to be out of town. I texted him back. I wanted to see him but didn’t trust what I would say. Twenty minutes later, Paul was at my front door.

  “Hi there,” he said, grinning and bending down to give me a big hug.

  “Hi,” I said, reluctantly letting his strong arms squeeze me tightly. All I could think about was the sight of him and Rina together, and the memory made me dizzy. I closed my eyes for a moment, then finally mustered the willpower to arrange my face into a happy expression. Sort of. The smile I managed to paste on looked totally fake when I glimpsed myself in the mirror across from the coat closet, but Paul didn’t seem to notice.

  “So,” he said, leaning toward me. “We’ve got the house to ourselves….”

  I backed away from him. “Yep. Mom’s not here. True.”

  Paul tilted his head and gave me a weird look. “Is something wrong?”

  “Well, yeah,” I said. I headed for the stairs and started walking toward my room. “I’m supposed to be in New Haven right now, remember?” I couldn’t believe that he’d forgotten my campus visit. I’d been giving him the benefit of the doubt earlier, figuring he’d just had a temporary brain freeze or gotten the date mixed up, but this was ridiculous.

  Paul followed me into my room, sat down at the foot of the bed, and stared at me for a second, confused. “Oh, right,” he said, shrugging out of his coat. “Right! I totally forgot! Wait, then why are you here?”

  “I just—I don’t really feel well, so I rescheduled,” I said. I sat down next to him, pulling my knees up to my chest, and watched as he took off his baseball cap and ran his hand through his hair. “Yesterday was…” I paused, waiting to see whether he would say anything that would give me a clue as to what had gone on between him and Rina.

  “Yesterday was what?” Paul asked. “Great? You seemed really good last night. When I left you were going to send in your application. You did turn it in, didn’t you?”

  “Yeah, I turned it in,” I said, picturing Rina’s hand clicking the mouse button for me. “I just…” I looked down at my bedspread and suddenly realized that the last time Paul had been in here, he’d been in here with her. I shivered, hopefully not noticeably, and scooched away from Paul a little bit.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked, the look on his face genuinely worried now, instead of just confused. “Did something happen?”

  A lot of things happened, I thought to myself. Way too many things. “No, nothing happened,” I said.

  “Well, if nothing happened, why’d you reschedule?” Paul looked at me, his blue eyes skeptical. “Do you really think that’s a good idea? I mean, I hope you at least told them you got majorly sick. If they think you’re blowing them off, it might hurt your chances.”

  “Whatever.” I scooched back a little more. His tone had gone from skeptical to disapproving, which was irritating. “I just rescheduled for next month. It’s not that big a deal.”

  “Okay, okay,” he said, hearing my defensiveness and backing off. He half-smiled. “Wow, did you get hit in the head or something? You’ve been so psyched about this interview forever.”

  “No,” I answered, feeling a glimmer of hope. “Why, have I been acting like I got hit in the head?” Had he noticed that he’d been with an entirely different girl the past few days? If he’d noticed, then…well, I didn’t know what, but I did know that I wanted him to have noticed.

  “No,” Paul answered. “It was just a joke.”

  Oh.

  “So I haven’t been acting different lately?” I asked him hopefully. I didn’t really care that the question came out of nowhere. This conversation was already spiraling downward. No sense trying to steer it back. The brake lines were cut; the car was heading off the cliff.

  “No,” Paul said, shrugging. “Same old you. Although you’re acting kind of weird right now.”

  “What’s that mean?” I crossed my arms and backed away a little more. I was now sitting kind of far away from him, actually, almost on my pillow at the head of the bed. I watched as he realized it too, and gave me an odd look.

  “I don’t know, the last couple days you were so fun and sort of, you know, carefree—”

  “I was?”

  “—and now we’re on vacation and finals are over, so you’d think now you’d be chilled out. But instead you’re acting extra crazy.”

  “Am not,” I retorted like a four-year-old.

  “You just postponed your interview. That’s a little crazy.” Paul gave me a look like he expected me to agree. “And quit getting mad, I’m just trying to help. I just want you to get in.”

  “What for?” I asked. “So I can follow you all over campus next year?” My voice had gotten shrill without me even realizing it.

  “Of course,” Paul joked, then, noticing my daggerlike stare, shook his head. “No,” he said. “I want you to get in because that’s what you want.”

  I stared at him, unable to answer for a long moment. “Yeah,” I said finally. “Right.” Of course that’s what I wanted. To go to an Ivy League school, preferably the one my boyfriend was at. What could be better? It was the plan.

  “Okay then,” he said.

  We were both quiet for a long moment. Paul stared into space. I stared at the floor. Finally, Paul broke the silence. “Should I just leave?” he asked.

  “I guess,” I agreed flatly. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw him look over at me, but I kept staring at the floor, clutching my pillow.

  “Fine.” Paul got up, and I blinked back a tear. How had this turned into a fight? No, I knew how. And I knew that I’d done it, but I desperately wished that I hadn’t. I wanted to rewind our conversation and start over. Paul saw the look on my face and his expression softened. “Hey,” he said. “It’ll be okay. I’m sorry—you’re just having a bad day.”

  I clutched my pillow harder and nodded, willing the te
ars not to fall.

  “I’ll leave you alone,” Paul said softly. “Is that okay? Or did you want me to stay?” He took a step back toward me.

  I shook my head and he sighed. “Okay. I’ll see you later.” He turned to leave, and a few moments later I heard him drive off.

  I was alone again.

  I got up, walked to my window, and stared out into the pitch-dark late afternoon. The day had ended as badly as it had begun, and Rina wasn’t even around. But as I noticed a few tiny sprinkles of snow beginning to fall, I realized that she’d been right. She’d picked up my slack. She’d made it possible for me to do multiple things at once. Who knows what would’ve happened if she had never shown up? I might’ve stressed out and flunked all my finals. I might’ve lost so much sleep that I keeled over during the SATs.

  And if I got into Yale based on her essay, that meant I probably couldn’t have done that without her either. She was the same person I was, sure, but the smarter and more efficient version (and the more evil version, but that was a side issue). She was the better version.

  So what did that say about me?

  I’d been awake for barely half a day, but I hit the lights and crawled back into bed.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  MONDAY, DECEMBER 17

  AFTER SLEEPING FOR ANOTHER ELEVEN HOURS straight (boy, I really was sleep-deprived), I got up determined to do something productive with my Monday. Namely, to stop moping, take advantage of the fact that Rina was gone, and figure out a way to get rid of her once and for all. I didn’t care if I had to go to the library to look up books on witchcraft and cast some sort of disappearing spell by the light of the silvery moon. I didn’t even care if that disappearing spell involved an animal sacrifice, as long as it wasn’t anything too fluffy and cute.