A Previous Selection

Chapter Thirty

"What do we even do with our time now that the reception's over?" Addison says as we sit down in the corner of the Women's Room.

"I don't know. What we did before I guess."

"Which was. . .?"

"Umm, talk?"

"Right. Well, what do you want to talk about?"

"I don't know. Our lives have revolved around the reception for the past few days, so I don't even know what else to talk about BESIDES that."

"Let's talk about it then. How do you think we did?" she asks, and I shrug my shoulders.

"I think we did pretty good," I say. "Everything went exactly how we planned, and the French women seemed to really enjoy the whole thing. Evelynn and the Queen also seemed pretty pleased with it, so I want to say that we did a good job with the whole thing."

"Evelynn and Queen Kimberely were surveying the whole thing pretty hard. Do you think that they'll be talking to Cameron and giving him their opinions on who he should consider sending home?"

"Honestly? Probably." I pick up the tea that a maid laid out for us and take a sip. "Since both of the receptions were specifically for women, he couldn't be there to observe how we did. They were probably his eyes."

"Yeah, that makes sense."

We're both taking sips form our tea when Leila walks up to us with a bright smile.

"Hey, girls! Do you mind if I join you?"

"Of course not!" Addison says. "We were just talking about the receptions."

"Ooh! What about them?" she asks as she sits down on the other side of Addison.

"Just how we think we did on ours. And how Evelynn and Queen Kimberely are probably going to be discussing how we did with Cameron."

"Why would they need to do that?"

"Oh, umm, we're pretty sure that Cameron is going to make another cut soon, and that he'll be using the receptions as a factor in his decision," I tell her.

"Really?" She suddenly looks really worried. "Did he tell you that?"

"Not exactly. He just hasn't sent home anyone since he cut it down to the Elite, and we were just thinking that since the Elite is pretty much all about training to be Queen, that this big project of ours would be the perfect opportunity for him to assess how we're all doing in the Queen area and make a cut from that."

"Oh. Well, I guess that does make a lot of sense," she says as she looks down at her lap. "So are you two worried about it? Because I think our group did pretty well."

"We do too. I honestly think it'll be someone from the other group. Their reception was good, but I did see a few mistakes that they made. But who knows?" Addison tells her, and she looks over at me.

"What about you, Wren? Are you worried?"

Something about the way she's asking the question makes it feel different than just girls sharing boy troubles. It's like she's trying to dig for more information. Like she's trying to sketch out what's between me and Cameron. What we are.

"I mean, I'm always a little worried about eliminations, but I think that our group did good enough to where we won't have to worry about it this time."

"I sure hope you're right," she says. "I'm not ready to go home."

She stares at me when she says it, almost as if she's challenging me, or testing me, to see how I'll react to her. But after Cameron's reassurance the other night, Leila doesn't scare me.