her face. Portia rolled her big green eyes when I looked her way, and the Twin Cities studied their
perfectly manicured nails. Only Constance and Sabine looked at me, silently begging for
forgiveness.
The reality washed over me. It was true. They had all turned on me. They had voted to kick me out
of the dorm I had just saved for them--the dorm I had raised five million dollars for in order to
keep Headmaster Cromwell from shutting us down. The dorm I had lived in all last year--longer
than many of them. This was my home. And they were taking it away from me.
"Who voted me out?" I asked, my voice clear as a bell.
I was angry and desperate and grasping at straws, but I needed to know. I needed to know exactly
who had turned on me. And I couldn't just surrender and slink out of there with my tail between
my legs. I refused.
Noelle scoffed at my question. Everyone else exchanged troubled glances. Disbelieving glances.
Like asking them to tell me which of them were traitors was so very gauche. As if I cared about
gauche right then.
"Who voted me out?" I said again. "I want to know."
13
Missy Thurber's hand was the first to go up. Shocker. Girl and her Chunnel-size nostrils had always
hated my guts. But then, ever so slowly, more hands started to rise. Lorna's, Shelby's, Portia's.
Even Kiki, Rose, Tiffany, and the Twin Cities had voted against me. People who a week ago I would
have counted among my good friends. Only three sets of hands stayed firmly planted in their
owners' laps.
Sabine, Constance, and Astrid had taken my side. That was it. That was all I had. Three real friends.
The burning dread in my gut slowly hardened into heavy, cold, sorrow.
"Sorry, Glass-Licker," Noelle said with a tilt of her head. "Looks like you're going back to where
you've always belonged."
Back to where I always belonged? Was she kidding? She was the one who had always told me that
I belonged here. She was the one who had insisted that Billings House needed me. How could she
possibly look me in the eye and say that?
Noelle started by me, brushing my shoulder with hers. Indignant anger flared beneath my shock,
and I heard myself speak.