“What’s Sector Three?” Teddy asked.
The woman looked around. “Who are you?” she asked.
“Teddy, a girl who doesn’t want to say final goodbyes any time soon. I’ll take any scoop I can get.”
“My grandmother told me there was this secret government facility in the eighties that trained psychics for the military, and then the whole thing went to shit,” the woman said. “Mind you, my grandma also believes that they kept real live aliens at Area 51, so, grain of salt and all that.”
Teddy couldn’t get a read on the woman, but she was beginning to understand that this would be her new normal. She would have to learn to live in a world where people could lie to her and get away with it. At least while she was at Whitfield. “So your grandmother was a psychic?” she asked.
The woman looked Teddy over and smiled. “I come from a long line of psychics. I’m the first at Whitfield, though. I’m Dara, by the way.”
They walked toward a fold-out table at the front of the auditorium, where Jillian stood alongside a group of students. She picked up a folder with her name scrawled across it. Inside was her ID and a stack of papers.
“Guess who got lucky in the roommate lottery?” Jillian said, and pointed at Teddy.
Teddy smiled. She could deal with Jillian. Though the endless enthusiasm might get on her nerves eventually. Teddy scanned the room for Molly and saw her talking to Jeremy quietly in the first row, her hand on his arm. She’d wanted to ask Molly more questions about Whitfield, since she had been through the introductory phase before, but her conversation with Jeremy looked heated—like Teddy wasn’t the only one who’d already identified a potential extracurricular.
“Come on,” Teddy said to Jillian. “It says here we’re in Harris Hall, room seventeen.” She slipped her ID badge in her pocket.
* * *
Their belongings were piled on the steps of the building next door. Teddy and Jillian dragged their luggage up three flights of stairs and along a brightly lit hallway to room seventeen. Jillian swiped her ID in the card reader. The door clicked open to reveal a space the size of a utility room: two metal-frame twin beds that were practically guaranteed to squeak; desks and chairs that looked like office rejects; gray blankets that made Teddy’s skin itch from the doorway; white walls. Teddy figured dorms were the same, no matter if the school was Stanford or Whitfield.
She ran a hand along the wall. “If you worked for a paint company, what would you call this color? Oncology waiting room?”
“It’s not so bad,” Jillian said. She tugged up the metal blinds at the window. “Look, we’ve even got a view of Alcatraz.”
“I wonder if the prisoners there had better accommodations.”
Jillian laughed. “Well, we’ll hang some posters.”
Teddy picked up a folder from one of the desks. Inside was a schedule with her name on it, as well as a sheet of paper labeled: Whitfield Institute Code of Ethics. The form described a range of behaviors and substances that were strongly discouraged on campus: no drinking, no drugs, no red meat, no caffeine, no refined sugar, no physical relationships between students, no infiltrating the minds of faculty or other students without permission. In other words, no fun.
“Goodbye, hamburgers,” Teddy said, passing the form to Jillian. “We’re supposed to sign to acknowledge that we’ve read it and then turn it in tomorrow morning.”
Jillian squinted at the small print and shrugged. “It doesn’t say anything here about agreeing. But honestly, Teddy, I’ve been a vegan since I was eight. It will really clear up your aura.” She grabbed a pen from her backpack, scrawled out her signature, and then handed the pen to Teddy. “Sign it and we’ll deal with the more important stuff.”
“What would that be?”
“Going downstairs for dinner. Then maybe encountering some individuals to enhance our psychological well-being through emotional and physical contact.”
Teddy looked at her and paused. “Emotional and physical contact?” It took her another second before she put it together: Jillian Blustein wanted to get laid. “Isn’t that against the rules?”
“It never hurts to look.” Jillian winked. “Come on, let’s see what’s on the menu.”
* * *
Teddy expected the worst—soggy, tasteless cafeteria food. But the buffet was like something out of a pricey spa, featuring the sort of self-righteously organic, New Age, feed-your-soul food that people were thrilled to overpay for: roasted squash salad with mustard greens; braised lentils with simmered onions and carrots; spiced quinoa with charred eggplant.
They sat down at a long metal-topped institutional-style table across from Molly and Jeremy. The two were debating the finer points of something called mental defense. “You have to build a wall,” Jeremy said. “It’s all about the wall.” Teddy had no clue what they were talking about. All she wanted was to build a wall between her and that hot guy from the assembly so she could avoid any temptation. But when she stood to check out the dessert table, there he was.
“Hey,” he said.
Teddy thought about the list of discouraged activities. If she ignored him, maybe it would be easy to stick to her promise. She focused on a strawberry acai yogurt bowl, reading the list of ingredients over and over.
“I’m Lucas, but everyone calls me Pyro,” he said.
Teddy couldn’t resist. “Did you pick that nickname yourself? Real cool.”
“I think you mean ‘real hot.’ ” He winked. “That was corny, wasn’t it?”
Teddy laughed. “Very.”
“So what can you do?” he asked. “You know, psychically.”
She shrugged. “I think I’m a faulty human lie detector.” Clint had been right: psychics weren’t easy to read. She hadn’t picked up anything since she’d been at Whitfield, other than that image from Molly.
He smiled. “Should we play truth or dare?”
“Sure,” Teddy said. “I dare you to show me what you can do.”
Pyro’s gaze moved slowly down her body.
She
