Mirror in the Sky by Aditi Khorana

there only affirmed this narrative.
    But by the time the afternoon light was filtering through my shades in long vertical lines, lambent slices of burnished gold, the outrage I had felt earlier that morning was replaced by despair. How could she do this to us? I knew my father didn’t love his job running the restaurant, and I had certainly never fit in at Brierly, but my mother had been a part of our limping team, and now she wanted out. Now she had decided that there was a better world out there for her, a better life, and she was simply going to leave us behind in order to embrace it.
    â€œWhy now? Why
California
?” my father yelled at her.
    â€œBecause if I don’t do it now, I never will!” she yelled back.
    â€œSo you’re just going to run away, Jennifer? What about Tara? What about us? How can you be so selfish?”
    â€œI can’t explain it to you,” she whimpered. “But if I can just see my parents again . . .”
    â€œThey’re gone, Jennifer! You’re here. You have us! At least value what you have! You’re acting like an awful mother, an awful wife!”
    It was betrayal of the highest order, and I was glad that my father was angry, yelling at her that she was an awful mother and an awful wife.

    At 9:45 I got a text from Nick. Heading your way. Should be there in 10 , it said. I’ll meet you outside , I quickly texted back, before I threw on a pair of skinny jeans and a black halter top. My parents were so busy fighting that they didn’t even notice me slipping out the door. I emerged on the driveway just as the headlights of Nick’s Jeep lit up the branches of the eucalyptus tree across the street, transforming them to outstretched arms.
    My heart began to race. For a minute, all the grief and outrage I felt for my mother dissipated, and when he turned into the driveway, I greeted him with the kind of enormous smile that can only emerge after a tension-filled day, an object thrust from a highly pressurized capsule.
    â€œI hope you like the Kinks,” he said as I jumped into the passenger seat, the stereo blasting old British pop.
    â€œNever heard of them,” I told him. He looked cute in awhite polo shirt, jeans, and flip-flops. His hair was slightly wet, as though he had just emerged from the shower.
    â€œWhat?! Tara Krishnan’s never heard of the Kinks? I thought you were all cultured and shit.” He smiled that familiar, loose smile and looked right at me, making me blush.
    â€œWhatever gave you that impression?” I laughed, buckling my seat belt.
    â€œDidn’t you grow up in the city?”
    â€œI’ve been living here since the fifth grade.”
    â€œYou always seem like you’ve got all this smart stuff swirling around your head. Like you’re way beyond the rest of us. Halle says you’re aloof.”
    â€œI’m not aloof,” I said, hearing the defensiveness in my voice. Is that what they all thought? Is that why I had never been invited to anything, ever? “And besides, you’re smart too,” I said, to soften my response.
    â€œNot like you, though.”
    Nick was being modest. He was one of the top students in our grade and president of the student council; but it was true, Halle and I had the highest grades in our class, not to mention the most extensive smattering of extracurriculars at Brierly. It was Mrs. Treem who had inadvertently revealed this to me in a meeting in her office, leaning forward in her chair in anticipation of a rare opportunity to seem helpful.
    â€œI just want you to know that you have the second-highest GPA in your class. If you’re able to maintain it, stick with swim team and yearbook and Amnesty International, and do well on the SATs, I’m confident you’ll be able to get into a good college.”
    â€œWho has the highest GPA?” I had asked her, remembering Mrs. Treem’s irritating tendency to bury the