BACK TO US

BACK TO US

by Oluwalonimi Gideon

Episode 1: The Scoreboard

The list went up at 8:47 in the morning, and by 8:49, Julian Ashford already knew he'd lost something, even though the number beside his name said he hadn't.

It was pinned to the corkboard outside the main hall the way it always was — typed, unceremonious, the kind of paper that decided futures without ever raising its voice. Third-term rankings. Everyone crowded around it like it might change if they looked hard enough.

Julian didn't crowd. He never had to. People made room for him the way they made room for weather.

He found his name first, out of habit. Ashford, J. — 98.6. Then, one line above it, in the position that had belonged to him for three straight terms, a name that made his stomach do something complicated.

Sinclair, A. — 98.6.

A tie. He read it twice, certain the second reading would fix it. It didn't.

"Well," said a voice at his shoulder, dry as chalk dust, "this is either the best day of my life or the worst one. I haven't decided yet."

Avery Sinclair had a way of arriving like a verdict. She was already looking at the board, arms crossed, chin tilted at the exact angle she used when she wanted people to think she wasn't bothered. Julian had catalogued that angle over three years of watching her not be bothered by things that clearly, deeply bothered her.

"You're point six ahead of everyone else and tied with me," he said. "I'd call that a good day."

"I'd call it a Tuesday." She finally looked at him, and there it was — the flicker, quick and gone, that she thought no one could see. He saw it every time. "Don't get used to sharing the top, Ashford. I plan on fixing this by finals."

"Noted."

"Genuinely. Write it down if you have to."

He almost smiled. He didn't let himself, because smiling at Avery Sinclair in public was the kind of thing that got noticed, and being noticed with her was a category of trouble he'd successfully avoided since the ninth grade, when she'd told a room full of people that his essay on Keats was "technically correct and emotionally hollow," and he'd hated her for it for exactly as long as it had taken him to realize she was right.

The hallway noise thinned. Julian felt it before he understood why — the particular hush that meant someone with authority had entered the frame. Headmaster Voss came down the corridor with the unhurried certainty of a man who had never once been late to anything, Ms. Whitfield a half-step behind him holding a folder against her chest like it contained something fragile.

"Mr. Ashford. Ms. Sinclair." Voss stopped in front of the board as though he hadn't already known what it said. "I see you've found the results."

"Hard to miss them, sir," Avery said. "They're in the middle of the hallway."

A ghost of amusement crossed the headmaster's face and was gone. "The Ellery Foundation scholarship committee reviews their finalist this Friday. Full tuition, four years, at whichever university takes you. It's the largest single award this school offers, and for the first time in Ashcombe's history, we have two students tied for the position that determines it."

Julian felt Avery go very still beside him. He understood why. They'd both known the scholarship was coming. Neither of them had let themselves say it out loud, the way you don't say a thing you want too much, in case saying it makes the wanting visible.

"There's a complication," Voss continued, "and an opportunity. The committee has asked for a supplementary submission this year — original work, published under the school's name, demonstrating leadership and collaboration. The Clarion's spring issue." He nodded toward Ms. Whitfield, who opened her folder like a woman presenting evidence. "Which needs an editor. Or, as of this morning, two."

The word landed in the hallway and did not leave.

"I'm sorry," Julian said carefully. "Two editors. Meaning —"

"Meaning you and Ms. Sinclair will co-edit this term's issue," Ms. Whitfield said, not unkindly, in the tone of someone who had already anticipated every objection and filed them alphabetically. "Together. One publication, one byline line, equal credit. The committee wants to see how you work under pressure with someone whose interests directly oppose your own. I imagine they'll get quite a show."

Avery's laugh came out short and disbelieving. "You're joking."

"I very rarely joke, Ms. Sinclair. Ask anyone."

"There has to be another way to —"

"There isn't," Voss said, and something in his voice closed the door on the sentence before she could finish it. "One scholarship. One seat at Cordell University's freshman symposium, which the Foundation chair happens to run personally. Whichever of you demonstrates the strongest editorial leadership by the issue's publication will be recommended. The other will not." A pause, precise as punctuation. "I'd encourage you both to remember that collaboration and competition aren't opposites here. They're the assignment."

He left it at that, the way people who are used to being obeyed always do — no further explanation, no room for appeal, just the quiet certainty that the conversation was already over. Ms. Whitfield handed Julian a slip of paper with a room number on it, gave Avery a look that was almost sympathy, and followed the headmaster back down the hall.

The hallway noise came rushing back in, too loud, full of other people's futures that weren't currently on fire.

Julian looked at the paper in his hand. Archive Room, Sub-Level 1. Thursdays, 4 p.m.

"So," Avery said. Her voice had gone careful, the way it did right before she said something she meant. "One of us gets to leave this school with everything we've worked for. And the other one just watches."

"That's the general shape of it, yes."

"And they expect us to build something together first. Knowing that."

"Apparently they think it'll make good copy."

She was quiet for a second, studying him the way she used to study opposing arguments in debate — looking for the seam, the place where the structure gave. He'd never once told her that he found it unbearable, the way she looked at him like he was a puzzle worth the time it took to solve. He wasn't going to start now.

"I'm not going to make this easy for you, Ashford," she said finally.

"I wouldn't know what to do with easy," he said. "I've never had it from you."

Something crossed her face that wasn't quite a smile and wasn't quite a warning, and for a moment — one unguarded moment, in a hallway that still smelled like new term paper and floor polish — Julian let himself think that maybe the worst part of this arrangement wasn't going to be losing.

It was going to be four o'clock on Thursday, and a room with no windows, and three years of not saying things finally running out of places to hide.

Avery turned first, walking away with her chin still at that same defiant angle, and Julian watched her go the way he'd been watching her leave rooms since he was fourteen years old — like it cost him something he'd never admit to paying.

Behind him, the scoreboard held their names side by side, exactly even, for what both of them already suspected would be the last time all term.

End of Episode 1.