Page 21 of Break Points and Face Offs

“So, what do we do?”

I push down the groan at the very thought of it and force myself to say the words. “I suppose we’ll have to work together.”

I get a call from Father as I’m pulling up outside my building.

I briefly consider ignoring it, but he’ll leave a message, and he won’t be happy if I don’t promptly return the call.

I’m put through by his secretary. As always, Father sounds busy and distracted. I wish I could remind him that he called me first. Of course, I don’t.

“How are things going at school?”

“Good,” I lie.

“I spoke to someone about your professor. She told me Minerva Moreno has a reputation for giving her students a hard time—something about a leaderboard.” He sounds amused. I would probably find it amusing if I were top of that leaderboard. If my group weren’t currently sitting at the very bottom.

He doesn’t ask directly where I am on the leaderboard, or even whether I will confirm that the rumors of a leaderboard are true, but I know this is what he wants.

“It’s true,” I tell him. “But don’t worry. I’ll be top of the leaderboard at the end of the semester.”

I hold my breath, praying he doesn’t ask if she’s already started ranking us or where I currently am. There’s a white lie and then there’s a bare faced lie.

“Good,” he says.

I let out a sigh of relief.

“I’m sure I don’t have to remind you how important it is that you prove yourself, Priestley.”

“Of course not.”

Prove myself? How much more proof do you want?

After a little back and forth in the group chat—and a lot of working around everyone’s schedules—we arrange a group study session in the library on Friday evening.

I run into Will outside. He’s wearing sweatpants and a hoodie with the Princeton Hockey logo on the front.

“You didn’t tell me you were on the hockey team here?”

“I’m not,” he says. “It’s just a part-time job, helping out the equipment assistant. He gave me this hoodie to wear while I do it.”

Another part-time job?

“How many jobs do you have?”

“Just the two.”

Usually, I’d relish the knowledge that he’s so distracted, but while we’re trying to work as a team, I’d rather he focus full-time on his studies.

“Can’t you … I don’t know, not do one of them? Just while we get ourselves off the bottom of the group leaderboard?”

He laughs and slaps me on the shoulder. “That’s not how jobs work.”

Rolling my eyes, I say, “I’ve had jobs, you know.”

“Oh really?” He raises an eyebrow, crossing his arms over his chest. “Like what?”

I’m about to tell him about all the summers I’ve spent helping out at my father’s office, but then I remember my father’s lip curling around the word nepotism and the way Professor Moreno looks at me like I’m something on the bottom of her shoe.

“I’ve been a TA.”