Faking It

Chapter 45: Grades and Gustavo's

A week later, my entire semester boiled down to a moment of truth on a Friday afternoon. I'd been fidgety all day, checking and double checking the student portal to see if the history grades had been posted yet. Mr. Harris had said he'd share them by the end of the day, and my spot on the finals roster that weekend hinged on it. Audra had texted me every hour we weren't in class together, and by the end of the day, I was so anxious that I could've burst. After class, she and Gyeong-Ja joined me in the common room, all three of us staring at my laptop screen while I endlessly refreshed.

When the grade alert finally pinged, I slammed my eyes closed.

"I can't look," I said, fingers shaking over the trackpad.

"You want me to open it?" Gyeong-Ja asked.

I sucked in a breath and nodded, eyes still pressed shut. Behind me, Audra muttered something that sounded an awful lot like a prayer.

The click of my trackpad hung in the silence between the three of us.

"Ellie," Gyeong-Ja said. I didn't want to hope that it was a smile in her voice.

I opened one eye right as Audra exploded into a fit of cheering.

Summary of Grades - History

Class Participation: B

Quizzes: C

Midterm paper: B+

Term average: B

I'm pretty sure I screamed. I know I knocked my chair over in my haste to stand, and Audra's arms were around me, dragging me into her frenzied jumping while Gyeong-Ja laughed. A B+ was more than I could've hoped for, and finally, finally, it felt like something was going right.

"We need to celebrate," Gyeong-Ja said, when I'd calmed down enough to click through and read Mr. Harris' comments on my paper.

"Gustavo's," Audra said without a beat of hesitation. "Let's start the carb loading early. Like, right bloody now."

Just the name of the restaurant had my shoulders tensing. But I couldn't let every damned thing remind me of the Ellerbys. Riding the high of my passing grade, I forced my shoulders to relax. I deserved to start resetting some of those bitter memories.

I closed my laptop. "I'm in."

"Perfect. I'll get an Uber," Audra said, head already bowed over her phone.

So ready to eat and finally get off campus after all my endless studying, I raced upstairs to drop my laptop, then flew back down so fast that I only barely skidded to a halt to avoid crashing into Theo on my way out the door.

"You okay?" he asked, brows crashing together in something that looked an awful lot like concern, before he seemed to remember himself and stiffened.

I swallowed down the ache in my chest that had reawakened at his concern. "I passed my history paper," I said, then ducked around him.

He didn't say anything else. Or, maybe he did, but I was already out the door, refusing to be sucked back in.

It was over, and I needed to be okay with that. And with Gyeong-Ja and Audra and an entire menu of carbs all awaiting me, I was starting to feel like I finally could. Like there were good things on the other side of this, if I could just stop looking back.

Gustavo's turned out to be delicious, and the three of us lingered over a pizza so massive they had to put it on a little platform above our plates so it could fit on our tight, wobbly table. For the first time since things had ended with Theo, I actually enjoyed the taste of my food, and nearly snorted my 7up out of my nose at one of Audra's jokes. It was so nice to get off campus and away from Kingsbridge and all its drama for a little while that I didn't even think about how the last time I'd left, it had been for Thanksgiving.