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“Yes, I did,” he says. “A very smart boy.” He nods to himself. “He’ll be a great asset here.”
    “Uh … Grace and Steph told me he has a tattoo.”
    My dad shrugs. I can tell he’s only pretending to be unaware. “Does he?”
    “Well, Steph said it’s kind of hard to miss.”
    “His name is Del,” my dad says. “And he’s absolutely brilliant. Now, that’s between you and me.” And he winks.
    “So I should make friends with him?”
    There’s that cloudiness again. Just for an instant. “Sure,” my dad says. “Why not?” He narrows his eyes. “Why won’t you sit down, Emily?”
    They have to be done by now. I can sense that they’re finished. At least, I can’t hear Grace clapping anymore. “Oh, I have a bunch of precalc to study. It was nice talking to you, Daddy. Don’t work too hard in here, okay?”
    “What, are you leaving already?”
    I’m at the door. “Yes.”
    He frowns. “That wasn’t much of a visit. Come give me a hug.”
    So I do. My father holds me close for a second. I turn my head to look out the window, and I don’t see my roommates anywhere. They’re finished.
    “Emily,” he says, “about the new boy.”
    “What, Daddy?” I keep my tone light and innocent.
    “It’s just … nothing. I think you should focus on academics, that’s all.”
    Like I said, I’m lousy in school.
    “Well, you know how I love to study.”
    “Uh-huh. Okay, get outta here. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
    “See you tomorrow.” I kiss him on the cheek.
    When I leave the building, I take a second to look at his car. I giggle out loud. The Dadmobile vanity plate looks ridiculous. I wonder how long he’ll drive around before he notices it. I don’t worry for a minute that he’ll be mad; he just isn’t like that. He’ll be flattered. He loves the nickname Dad; I think it makes him feel appreciated.
    Every night after dinner there’s a two-hour study hall in our rooms. We have to leave our doors open while the faculty strolls from dorm to dorm, offering help to whoever needs it, making sure that nobody’s slacking off.
    Emotional stuff, like my nightmare earlier in the day, Franny, and the whole exchange with Renee, always leaves me physically exhausted, which makes my reluctance to sleep that much worse. I can hardly keep my eyes open as I try to get through my last two pages of precalc homework. Franny sits at her desk, struggling to stay awake as well while she reads what seems like the same page of Catcher in the Rye for the whole two hours.
    Finally, she tosses the book on the floor. “I give up,” she says. “Steph loves this book. She’ll tell me all about it.” She yawns. “I’m going to go put on my jamiflams.”
    I pause in my homework. “Your what?”
    Franny gives me a timid smile. “My jamiflams.”
    “What the hell are jamiflams ?”
    “The word I made up for pajamas.”
    I’m almost speechless. I just want to hug her, to cuddle, to let her know how much she’s loved. “That,” I say, tossing a pencil playfully in her direction, “is the cutest thing I’ve ever heard in my life.”
    Her eyes brighten. “You like it?”
    It breaks my heart how little it takes to make Franny happy. “I love it.”
    There’s always a weird feeling of restlessness on Sunday nights, at least for me. Even though this has been my life for as long as I can remember, I always feel a kind of disappointment at the beginning of another week, which is sure to be almost exactly the same as the week before. I’m so tired tonight that all I want to do is fall into a deep, dreamless sleep, the kind that makes you twitch as you’re drifting off. So I figure, what the hell—after Franny has changed into her jamiflams and quickly fallen asleep, I go ahead and take three of Dr. Miller’s pills right before I climb into the top bunk.
    “Emily. Baby, wake up.”
    It’s like someone has yanked me out of my own body. Before I can shout or move, I feel a hand over my mouth. “Shhh.