Preparations

                                    

                                          
The five days that followed Sunday’s dressage practice passed in a blur of exhaustion such as I’d never known before. I was in a constant state of physical agony as I continually punished my body: in the morning at the laundry, hefting sheets and towels in bundles that outweighed me, and then in the evening at the private practices in the arena with Brady. The only respite was during classes, where I fought to stay awake and keep out of trouble. Thankfully, English and French were a breeze, so I only really had to worry about science and then literally not falling over in P.E.
                          
By the time I got to Friday, all I wanted to do was fall into bed and sleep for a week, but that wasn’t on Emmie’s agenda.
                          
“You’re going to the dance,” she declared that afternoon in our room after last period.
                          
My laying face down on my bed should have been her tip off that I had other plans for the evening. “No,” I muttered into my pillow. “I’m dead. Leave me to decompose in peace.”
                          
She was having no part of it. “You have twenty minutes to nap, then we’re going to dinner. Then back here to get ready.”
                          
“No dinner,” I moaned, too tired to care about food.
                          
She exhaled. “Fine. But when I get back, you’re getting ready for the dance. You don’t want to miss your opportunity to see your guy, do you?”
                          
I didn’t. Not that Will was my guy, but still…
                          
“Come on, Brooklyn, Brady’s going to be waiting for you. You can’t disappoint him by being a no-show.”
                          
Brady, not Will. I wasn’t surprised that Emmie would mention my coach. I’d downplayed the Will thing, since the further I got from that first day, the more I realized it had probably been nothing. If he’d been flirting at all, it was just to be friendly.  And even if it had been real interest, I kept telling myself that a few minutes of joking around wasn’t the real thing. I was not a believer in instalove. So said the rational part of my brain. Although when I closed my eyes, I could still see that smirk and his ocean-blue eyes looking back at me.
                          
Get over it, Brooklyn, I told myself. At least three times a day.
                          
The Brady thing, though, well, that had gotten a bit weird. When we were in the arena, he was all business: Coach Fleming. But back in the barn? He was all Brady; flirty Brady who was starting to make my insides tremble when he got close and his voice dropped to that low murmur he used when it was just us.
                          
Emmie knew I had been with him every night and figured something was going on besides the hard-core training. I’d assured her nothing had happened, but she’d waved me off and said it was just a matter of time. She was probably right, though it felt weird and sordid—although he was still a high school student, he was technically off limits. All my new friends thought I was nuts. Maybe I was.
                          
But it was a moot point, for tonight, anyway. Brady had told me he wasn’t going to the dance. I didn’t ask why, but I had a feeling he needed to catch up on some of his own training, since he’d been working with me so much. I felt a bit guilty about that, but he kept promising me he wasn’t falling behind, so I tried to take him at his word.
                          
“Brooklyn!” Emmie barked.
                          
Rolling to my side and pulling my comforter over me, I said, “I’ll get up, I promise. I just really need a little rest first.”
                          
“I’ll be back in one hour,” Emmie said just before I heard the door close softly behind her.
                          
What felt like no more than one minute later (but was probably closer to the hour, as promised), she was back, waking me up from the sleep of the dead.
                          
“Brooklyn!” she said, plunking down on my bed. “Get up. It’s time to get ready.”
                          
I exhaled and forced myself to get out of bed and stumble toward the bathroom for a shower. Five minutes later, I was leaning against the tile, eyes closed and enjoying the soothing hot water in a near trance, when the spray turned ice cold. I screamed and opened my eyes to see my roommate standing beside the shower stall, a determined look on her face and a hand on the hot tap.
                          
“Let’s go!” she said.
                          
It appeared my roommate, the save-the-world poster child for altruism, had a take no prisoners attitude when it came to getting her roommate ready for a dance.
                          
I both loved and hated her for it.
                          
“I’m coming. I’ll be out in a few.”
                          
“No sleeping in the shower.”
                          
I shivered, turning the cold water off. “Yeah, not much chance of that happening now. I need to dry my hair and do my face.”
                          
She was finishing her makeup, leaning close to the mirror to do her mascara, her mouth agape as she concentrated on covering each lash. “It’ll be dark in the gym, so make sure you wear a bit more makeup than usual to be dramatic.”
                          
“How long do I have?”
                          
She glanced down at the phone on the counter. “Bus leaves for Westwood in a half-hour.”
                          
I cursed. That was barely enough time. I hadn’t even picked out anything to wear yet—not that I had a lot of outfits to choose from. We wore uniforms to classes and then most of the rest of my wardrobe was jeans and pajamas. I had exactly two dresses that my mother had sent me with, just in case. We hadn’t really thought about dances; who figures they need anything nice to wear at an all-girls school?
                          
“What are you wearing?” I asked, reaching for the towel and wrapping it around me.
                          
“The Fendi,” she said, as though I could identify parts of her wardrobe by designer.
                          
“Oh, God, that was pretentious,” she said, shaking her head. “I’m sorry. The black dress. The one with the lace on top.”
                          
“Hello?” Chelly called out from the door.
                          
“We’re in here,” Emmie called back.
                          
Chelly materialized in the bathroom doorway wearing a tight and curvy dress in fire-engine red, which should have looked gaudy with her red hair, but didn’t. She looked like a bombshell.
                          
“Wow,” I said, giving her the once over.
                          
“Right?” she said, her wide smile confident. I wished I had a quarter of her self-assurance. Hell, I bet any girl did—if you could bottle that stuff and sell it, you’d be an instant millionaire.
                          
Emmie turned away from the mirror and took in Chelly. “You look Ah-ma-zing!”
                          
“Thanks, girls. Brooklyn! You’re in a towel! Are you going to be ready in time?”
                          
“Yeah, sure,” I said. “As soon as I figure out what I’m going to wear.” It was a joke, since I had such a narrow choice.
                          
Emmie and Chelly exchanged a shocked look. “You don’t know what you’re wearing yet?” Chelly asked, scandalized. I suppose if I hadn’t been slaving in the laundry and working my ass off in the equestrian arena, maybe I would have put some more thought or care into tonight, but as it was, I was barely awake.
                          
“You should borrow my Stella McCartney,” Emmie announced. “You’ve got the body for it.”
                          
“No, it’s okay. I don’t need to borrow your clothes,” I was starting to feel anxious as it was; I didn’t need to worry about her très expensive wardrobe, too.
                          
Chelly disappeared and returned holding up a black dress with a black and white heart print on top. “This one?”
                          
Emmie nodded. “Yeah, it will look amazing on you, Brooklyn. Just try it on. But hurry up, we have eighteen minutes!”